Measurement of CO2, CO, SO2, and NO emissions from coal-based thermal power plants in India

Measurements of CO2 (direct GHG) and CO, SO2, NO (indirect GHGs) were conducted on-line at some of the coal-based thermal power plants in India. The objective of the study was three-fold: to quantify the measured emissions in terms of emission coefficient per kg of coal and per kWh of electricity, to calculate the total possible emission from Indian thermal power plants, and subsequently to compare them with some previous studies. Instrument IMR 2800P Flue Gas Analyzer was used on-line to measure the emission rates of CO2, CO, SO2, and NO at 11 numbers of generating units of different ratings. Certain quality assurance (QA) and quality control (QC) techniques were also adopted to gather the data so as to avoid any ambiguity in subsequent data interpretation. For the betterment of data interpretation, the requisite statistical parameters (standard deviation and arithmetic mean) for the measured emissions have been also calculated. The emission coefficients determined for CO2, CO, SO2, and NO have been compared with their corresponding values as obtained in the studies conducted by other groups. The total emissions of CO2, CO, SO2, and NO calculated on the basis of the emission coefficients for the year 2003–2004 have been found to be 465.667, 1.583, 4.058, and 1.129 Tg, respectively.