Case study: Clifty Creek
plant, Madison, Indiana
Clifty Creek is a coal-fired power
plant owned by Ohio Valley Electric
Corp. (OVEC) and Indiana-Kentucky
Electric Corp. (IKEC). It is situated
on 820 acres along the Ohio river in
Jefferson County, Indiana. The plant
has been operating for over 60 yrs
and its six generating units make
enough to power a city of 1 million
people. The plant is equipped with
current environmental-control
equipment to address a variety of
plant emissions.
The challenge
During the creation of electricity in a
coal-fired power plant, flyash
particles are released from the boiler
with the flue gases. Clifty Creek is
equipped with electrostatic
precipitators that remove 99% of this
flyash before it can be released into
the atmosphere. At the plant, this
flyash is loaded into trucks and
disposed of at the landfill on site.
The solution
Clifty Creek plant realised it needed
to better control fugitive particulate
matter emissions. Trucks leaving this
facility were transmitting the flyash
to the roads and surrounding
environment. In 2010, Clifty Creek
Station contracted Bell Engineering, a
full service civil engineering firm
based in Lexington, Kentucky, to
design an environmental solution.
Bell, in turn, brought in IES and
Bowen Engineering to help design,
manufacture and construct an
automated wheel wash system to
prevent uncontrolled fugitive
particulate matter emissions. The
engineering design phase lasted from
February through to July 2010. Bell
Engineering designed all civil,
structural and electrical components
of the truck wash system.
Construction, completed by Bowen
Engineering, began in October 2010
and finished in March 2011. The
successful start-up of Clifty Creek
plant’s new truck wash for its
40 short t articulating haul trucks
was in April 2011.
The Clifty Creek plant’s tyre wash
is a fully automated and closed-loop
washing system. The heavy
galvanised steel wash platform,
installed as a fixed installation within
concrete and concrete barriers, is 34 ft
long (three tyre revolutions of
cleaning) and 13 ft wide. It is
embedded with spray nozzles, side
curtains and side spray bars. The
bladed steel platform is designed to
point-load the tyre, which aids in
removing dust and solids from the
tread of the tyres. The electronic
control panel is wired to three main
components of the wash system: a
magnetic sensor is used to detect
trucks and start the wash cycle, 20 hp
high-volume, low-pressure pumps
flush the tyre free of dirt and debris,
as dual flocculent dispensers
distribute clay-based flocculent to
solidify the flyash at the bottom of the
tank, leaving the optically clear water
on top to be reused.
The wash water is held in large
series of concrete recycling tanks,
totalling approximately 50 000 gal.
The wash pumps are configured with
auto coupler and stainless rail
assemblies to prevent needed access
to the tank for maintenance of the
pumps. The wash station is plumbed
with 80 PVC piping, solenoid valves
and adapter boxes in order to
automatically replenish fresh water to
the tank through the use of float
valves to keep the operation running
with a minimum of operator
intervention. Supplementary items in
Clifty Creek’s truck wash include a
hand wash assembly for additional
manual rinses and tracinator rumble
grids placed at the entrance of the
wash to help rumble off any heavy
solids leading on to the platform.
There is a second series of rumble
grids at the exit to remove excess
water from the treads of the trucks
coming off of the trucks after the
rinse. The rumble grids return the
excess water to the recycling tank to
continue the closed loop cycle.
The installation and
implementation of the automatic truck
wash system enabled Clifty Creek
plant to comply with environmental
standards. The plant’s current coal
combustion residual fugitive dust
control plan now states that a truck
wash is used for all vehicles leaving
the loading area and landfill.
Conclusion
Clifty Creek successfully cut down
on its fugitive dust emissions and in
turn is now providing a safer
environment to the surrounding
community. With the installation of
the automated truck wash, it is able
to prevent track-out and comply with
the state and local air permit.
AUTOMATED WHEEL
WASH SYSTEMS
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