Analysis of Specific Energy Consumption and Energy Reduction Approach for Limestone Production in Mae Moh Power Plant

Abstract

Mae Moh Coal Power Plant, Mae Moh District, Lampang Province produces and use limestone to remove sulfur dioxide (SO₂) from coal combustion, 1,296,941 tons of limestone are used yearly. In the production process, machines are used energy mainly from diesel and electricity. Specific Energy Consumption (SEC) is used to analysis energy consumption in limestone production process including direct energy consumption and indirect energy consumption from the transportation of resources used in the production process. It was found that the production of 1 ton of limestone has an SEC value of 78.31 MJ, divided into direct energy consumption of 76.52 MJ and indirect energy of 1.79 MJ. The open-pit mining and quarrying processes consumed the most energy from the diesel use of the heavy machinery accounting for 48.01 percent of the total energy consumption entire the limestone production. Limestone crushing, dumping and transportation to power plant have a proportion of SEC accounted for 34.83, 12.05 and 5.11 percent of total energy consumption, respectively. Current energy-saving implementations for limestone quarry are including decrease stone feedback in the crushing process and reduce waiting time of transport vehicles. It was found that both implementations can reduce the SEC by 5.51 MJ or 7.03 percent of the total energy consumption entire process.