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Duct Burner Deterioration in HRSGs: A Challenge for Power Plants

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If you’ve experienced duct burner deterioration and failure in your Heat Recovery Steam Generators (HRSGs), you’re not alone. This is a frequent challenge, especially in the supplementary firing areas where conditions are extremely harsh. The problem becomes even more pronounced in aging plants, where equipment is increasingly vulnerable to wear and tear.

Duct burners operate in some of the most extreme environments, enduring hurricane-force winds and blistering temperatures around the clock. Given these harsh operational conditions, burners are exposed to numerous factors that can cause deterioration.

Inadequate or improperly engineered equipment often leads to issues such as burner failure or fractures. These include inadequate support systems, improper prior repairs, unsuitable material selection, non-uniform flue gas patterns, thermal oxidation, and creep damage.

Unfortunately, some plants opt to replace faulty equipment with identical components, leading to repeated failures, costly shutdowns, and unnecessary replacement expenses.

Buckled Active Runner on Grid Burner

At Tetra Engineering, we believe the focus should be on engineering solutions that address these underlying issues, ensuring your facility operates reliably and efficiently for years to come.

Recently, Tetra Engineering successfully conducted two Root Cause Failure Analyses (RCFA) on duct burners at natural gas-fired power plants, each equipped with a double-pressure HRSG. Our investigations aimed to identify and resolve the root causes of failures in these critical components and resulted in the plant conducting a redesign and retrofit of the burners.

Tetra Engineering has been performing HRSG Inspections for over 30 years with 1000s of Inspections to date. We provide an integrated service that supports Owners and Operators throughout the full HRSG life-cycle. In addition to the HRSG Inspections we also perform HRSG Condition Assessments, in which we review not only the present condition of the HRSG Unit but also how historical operation has affected its integrity.

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