Power Plant Engineering

8.5 DISADVANTAGE OF DIESEL POWER PLANT
The disadvantages of diesel power plants are listed below.
1. High Maintenance and operating cost.
2. Fuel cost is more, since in India diesel is costly.
3. The plant cost per kW is comparatively more.
4. The life of diesel power plant is small due to high maintenance.
5. Noise is a serious problem in diesel power plant.
6. Diesel power plant cannot be constructed for large scale.
8.6 APPLICATION OF DIESEL POWER PLANT
Since there are many disadvantage of diesel power plant, although the plant find wide applica-
tion in the following fields.
1. They are quite suitable for mobile power generation and are widely used in transportation
systems consisting of railroads, ships, automobiles and aeroplanes.
2. They can be used for electrical power generation in capacities from 100 to 5000 H.P.
3. They can be used as standby power plants.
4. They can be used as peak load plants for some other types of power plants.

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DIESEL POWER PLANT
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5. Industrial concerns where power requirement are small say of the order of 500 kW, diesel
power plants become more economical due to their higher overall efficiency.
8.7 GENERAL LAYOUT OF DIESEL POWER PLANT
General layout of diesel power plant is as shown in Fig. 8.2.
Storage &
Shop
Wash room
Office
Hall
Space for future
expansion
Unit no. 3
Unit no. 2
Unit no. 1
Air
Compressor
Com
pr
es
s
ed
ai
r bot
tl
es
Oil Storage
Tanks
Front Entrance
Switch board
 Fig. 8.2. General Layout of Diesel Power Plant.
Generally the units are placed in parallel lines as shown in fig. In any plant some space is always
provided for further expansion. Also sufficient space should provide for maintenance of diesel engine.
Proper ventilation is also provided in power plant. Storage of fuel for power plant is always provided
outside the main building.