Variable Load on Power Stations

The function of a power station is to deliver power to a large number of consum ers. However, the power demands of different consumers vary in accordance with their activities. The result of this variation in demand is that load on a power station is never constant, rather it varies from time to time. Most of the complexities of modern power plant operation arise from the inherent variability of the load demanded by the users. Unfortunately, electrical power cannot be stored and, therefore, the power station must produce power as and when demanded to meet the requirements of the consumers. On one hand, the power engineer would like that the alternators in the power station should run at their rated capacity for maximum efficiency and on the other hand, the demands of the consumers have wide variations. This makes the design of a power station highly complex. In this chapter, we shall focus our attention on the problems of variable load on power stations.