The Development of a Virtual Plant Demonstration Model

The power generation industry is facing challenges from ever-tightening environmental constraints, increased competition and deregulation of the markets. Modelling and simulation of novel power generation cycles is vital in proposing technically and economically feasible solutions which are environmentally friendly. The development of a Virtual Plant Demonstration Model (VPDM) in the UK is addressing the challenges by providing a distributed simulation environment in which heterogeneous component models can securely be run remotely at partner sites using the Internet. The VPDM programme is comprised of UK companies and academia, and is receiving support from the DTI Carbon Abatement Technologies Programme. This paper presents the creation of the VPDM framework and uses a steam turbine component model to demonstrate the key features of the VPDM.