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Fuel bunkers, commonly simply known as bunkers, are containers for the storage of fuel on steam-powered boats or steam tank engines, or rooms for the storage of fuel in furnaces.
The term "bunker" or "fuel bunker" is typically only used for storage areas for solid fuels, especially coal; the term "fuel tank" is typically used for liquid fuels (such as gasoline or petrol), or gaseous fuels (such as natural gas).
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For example, on the Titanic the propulsion boilers were heated by burning coal. 6,611 tons of coal were carried in its official bunkers, with a further 1,092 tons carried in Hold 3. The furnaces required over 600 tons of coal a day to be shoveled into them by hand, requiring the services of 176 firemen working around the clock. [1]
Fuel oil depots built in reinforced concrete and heated with steam to maintain a minimum temperature of 140°F and pump it to other heat exchangers in the boiler building.
A boiler is a closed vessel in which fluid is heated. The fluid does not necessarily boil. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications, including water heating, central heating, boiler-based power generation, cooking, and sanitation.
A furnace, referred to as a heater or boiler in British English, is an appliance used to generate heat for all or part of a building. Furnaces are mostly used as a major component of a central heating system. Furnaces are permanently installed to provide heat to an interior space through intermediary fluid movement, which may be air, steam, or hot water. Heating appliances that use steam or hot water as the fluid are normally referred to as a residential steam boilers or residential hot water boilers. The most common fuel source for modern furnaces in North America and much of Europe is natural gas; other common fuel sources include LPG, fuel oil, wood and in rare cases coal. In some areas electrical resistance heating is used, especially where the cost of electricity is low or the primary purpose is for air conditioning. Modern high-efficiency furnaces can be up to 98% efficient and operate without a chimney, with a typical gas furnace being about 80% efficient. Waste gas and heat are mechanically ventilated through either metal flue pipes or polyvinyl chloride (PVC) pipes that can be vented through the side or roof of the structure. Fuel efficiency in a gas furnace is measured in AFUE.
A tank locomotive is a steam locomotive which carries its water in one or more on-board water tanks, instead of a more traditional tender. Most tank engines also have bunkers to hold fuel; in a tender-tank locomotive a tender holds some or all of the fuel, and may hold some water also.
A tender or coal-car is a special rail vehicle hauled by a steam locomotive containing its fuel and water. Steam locomotives consume large quantities of water compared to the quantity of fuel, so their tenders are necessary to keep them running over long distances. A locomotive that pulls a tender is called a tender locomotive. Locomotives that do not have tenders and carry all their fuel and water on board the locomotive itself are called tank locomotives or tank engines.
Fuel oil is any of various fractions obtained from the distillation of petroleum. Such oils include distillates and residues. Fuel oils include heavy fuel oil, marine fuel oil (MFO), furnace oil (FO), gas oil (gasoil), heating oils, diesel fuel, and others.
A central heating system provides warmth to a number of spaces within a building from one main source of heat. It is a component of heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems, which can both cool and warm interior spaces.
A fire-tube boiler is a type of boiler invented in 1828 by Mark Seguin, in which hot gases pass from a fire through one or more tubes running through a sealed container of water. The heat of the gases is transferred through the walls of the tubes by thermal conduction, heating the water and ultimately creating steam.
A fireman, stoker or boilerman is a person who tends the fire for the running of a boiler, heating a building, or powering a steam engine. Much of the job is hard physical labor, such as shoveling fuel, typically coal, into the boiler's firebox. On steam locomotives, the title fireman is usually used, while on steamships and stationary steam engines, such as those driving saw mills, the title is usually stoker. The German word Heizer is equivalent and in Dutch the word stoker is mostly used too. The United States Navy referred to them as watertenders.
A thermal power station, also known as a thermal power plant, is a type of power station in which the heat energy generated from various fuel sources is converted to electrical energy. The heat from the source is converted into mechanical energy using a thermodynamic power cycle. The most common cycle involves a working fluid heated and boiled under high pressure in a pressure vessel to produce high-pressure steam. This high pressure-steam is then directed to a turbine, where it rotates the turbine's blades. The rotating turbine is mechanically connected to an electric generator which converts rotary motion into electricity. Fuels such as natural gas or oil can also be burnt directly in gas turbines, skipping the steam generation step. These plants can be of the open cycle or the more efficient combined cycle type.
An air preheater is any device designed to heat air before another process, with the primary objective of increasing the thermal efficiency of the process. They may be used alone or to replace a recuperative heat system or to replace a steam coil.
Cockenzie power station was a coal-fired power station in East Lothian, Scotland. It was situated on the south shore of the Firth of Forth, near the town of Cockenzie and Port Seton, 8 mi (13 km) east of the Scottish capital of Edinburgh. The station dominated the local coastline with its distinctive twin chimneys from 1967 until the chimneys' demolition in September 2015. Initially operated by the nationalised South of Scotland Electricity Board, it was operated by Scottish Power following the privatisation of the industry in 1991. In 2005 a WWF report named Cockenzie as the UK's least carbon-efficient power station, in terms of carbon dioxide released per unit of energy generated.
A pulverized coal-fired boiler is an industrial or utility boiler that generates thermal energy by burning pulverized coal that is blown into the firebox.
A coal trimmer or trimmer is a position within the engineering department of a coal-fired steamship that involves all coal handling duties. Their main task is to ensure that coal is evenly distributed within a ship to ensure it remains trim in the water. Their efforts to control the fore-and-aft angle at which a ship floats is why they are called “trimmers”. Without proper management of the coal bunkers, ships could easily list due to uneven distribution of the coal.
A coal-fired power station or coal power plant is a thermal power station which burns coal to generate electricity. Worldwide there are over 2,400 coal-fired power stations, totaling over 2,130 gigawatts capacity. They generate about a third of the world's electricity, but cause many illnesses and the most early deaths, mainly from air pollution. World installed capacity doubled from 2000 to 2023 and increased 2% in 2023.
A boiler or steam generator is a device used to create steam by applying heat energy to water. Although the definitions are somewhat flexible, it can be said that older steam generators were commonly termed boilers and worked at low to medium pressure but, at pressures above this, it is more usual to speak of a steam generator.
Kilroot power station is a fossil fuel power plant on the north shore of Belfast Lough at Kilroot near Carrickfergus in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. The plant currently has a 141 megawatt (MW) capacity from four standby gas turbines and a 10 MW battery energy storage capacity from the Kilroot Advancion Energy Storage Array.
A Bahnbetriebswerk is a German railway depot where the maintenance of locomotives and other rolling stock is carried out. It is roughly equivalent to a locomotive shed, running shed or motive power depot. These were of great importance during the steam locomotive era to ensure the smooth running of locomotive-hauled services. Bahnbetriebswerke had a large number of facilities in order to be able to carry out their various maintenance tasks. As a result, they needed a lot of staff and were often the largest employers in the area.
A "Scotch" marine boiler is a design of steam boiler best known for its use on ships.
High Marnham Power Station was a coal fuelled power station in Nottinghamshire, to the west of the River Trent, approximately 0.5 miles (0.8 km) north of the village of High Marnham. Construction site clearance began in November 1955, No. 1 Unit power generation commenced in October 1959, and the station became fully operational in June 1962. The plant operated until 2003 when it was decommissioned, though the cooling towers weren't demolished until 2012.
A thimble tube boiler is a form of steam boiler, usually provided as an auxiliary boiler or heat-recovery boiler. They are vertical in orientation and would be considered a form of water-tube boiler.