MARKET FOUNDER AND GLOBAL INDUSTRY LEADER

TAS Energy’s founder, Tom Pierson, invented Turbine Inlet Chilling (TIC) and subsequently created the company responsible for successfully bringing the technology to market. The company has pioneered and patented the technology and is recognized as the world leader in the industry with over 60% of the world’s TIC market share. In fact, since 1999, TAS Energy has chilled more gas turbines than all other providers, combined.

Cruel Physics

Gas turbines have an inherent flaw. In warm climates, when the summer temperatures increase, gas turbines lose efficiency and power. This is because hot air is less dense than cold air and consequently has less oxygen to contribute to the combustion process of the turbine. All of this results in a situation in which the electrical output of the turbine is significantly reduced (sometimes in excess of 30%). Ironically, when power demand is at its peak because of the hot weather, power producers experience a reduction in performance of the very equipment they rely on to meet the increased demand.

The Solution: Turbine Inlet Chilling

Traditionally, this problem has been solved by building more power plants. As a result, our country has thousands of ‘peaker’ power plants that have been built simply to fill a need in the event the electrical grid is overloaded on hot days. These “peaker” plants often run only 1,200 or 2,000 hours per year, but cost the industry and rate- payers millions of dollars to build. TIC is a drastically more cost effective solution to this problem. Instead of building more power plants that will spend the vast majority of their useful life sitting idle, operators can install TIC systems on their existing fleet for a fraction of the cost and time of new turbines.

Dollars & Sense

More Megawatts, Better Megawatts, for Less

TAS Energy’s Turbine Air Systems modular units often cost one-third the amount of building a new ‘peaker’ power plant, yet provide the equivalent “peaker” power at better heat rates.  Through getting more work out of your existing equipment. Turbine inlet chilling systems can be installed on new or existing gas turbines, even those that have evaporative or fogging systems currently on them. Often it is the case that New Source Reviews are not required to install a TIC system, an especially advantageous benefit over new generation in environmentally sensitive states.

The chart below, from EIA data, shows the top 10 states in the United States for highest potential of peak time mw recovery from turbine inlet chilling. Across the United States, there are more than 19,000 MWs of power that can be recaptured by the installing turbine inlet chilling on our existing generation fleet.

Increased Access to Ancillary Services Markets

Installing TAS Energy’s Turbine Air Systems not only offers more megawatts for less, it also provides plant operators increased access into the ancillary services markets through increased capacity, spinning reserve, and frequency regulation. Even territories experiencing demand destruction are not exempt from experiencing grid frequency and reliability issues. Adding Turbine Inlet Chilling from TAS Energy’s Turbine Air Systems with or without a Thermal Energy Storage tank can strengthen your profit margins, providing flexibility to your operation all while adding strength to the grid.

They Operate. We Optimize.

TAS Energy holds over 60% of the global market share not simply because we are the market inventors, but because we have committed the R&D needed to ensure we are offering the most efficient, optimized systems in the world. One of the more significant, and often overlooked, aspects of our success is our superior control and automation provided in our packaged chillers. TAS proprietary control software continually optimizes, rather than simply operates our unit’s performance in real time. Our competitors design their unit to simply function, often designing around a single weather condition and load with little regard for how to efficiently operate the system under “off-design” weather conditions or varying turbine load. This is a tremendously important distinction, since fluctuating weather conditions all but ensure that the TIC equipment will spend a majority of its time “outside” its design point.

Turnkey, Tested & Ready to Go- Project Schedule Reduced to Half

TAS Energy’s optimized Turbine Air Systems designs are made even better through applying our expertise in packaging by standardizing our products for easy repeatability. After spending thousands of engineering hours to design the most optimized and efficient system, we simply repeat for every project. Our designs allow for flexibility according to unique customer requirements, while ensuring we don’t reinvent an already perfect wheel. In addition to guaranteeing product performance, packaging or standardizing our designs into products allows us to manufacture, assemble and pre-test them at our environmentally controlled 250,000 sq foot headquarters in Houston, Texas. After a thorough testing regimen, our Turbine Air Systems unit is disassembled into easily reassembled ‘blocks’ and transported by truck, train or ship anywhere in the world.

The TAS Energy optimized design and packaged standardized approach of modular manufacturing eliminates a number of risks faced by the traditional approach of merely operational and field erected equipment, reducing project schedule by up to 40%. These risks include weather delays, component shipment delay, unreliable and inexperienced labor, and risk of actual performance. By designing TAS Energy Turbine Air Systems as modular, turnkey solutions, manufacturing them in a controlled environment, and testing them prior to delivery, TAS Energy systems are guaranteed to be delivered on time and on budget.  For this reason, TAS Energy’s Turbine Air Systems for retrofit projects can be completed in as little as 40 weeks, with a plant outage in as little as two weeks.

More with Thermal Energy Storage

Night-time Pricing Options

TAS Energy has designed Turbine Air Systems packages with a Thermal Energy Storage tank to provide operators the opportunity to take advantage of night-time pricing options particularly in high renewable generation territory. With a Thermal Energy Storage tank, operators can pull electricity from the grid at night-time hours (and pricing) to chill the water and have it stored for use the following day during peak demand. In many cases customers are able to chill their water for increased megawatts during the hot daytime hours for free, or next to free.

Pictured below, a Thermal Energy Storage tank being installed in conjunction with one of TAS Energy's Turbine Air Systems units