In 2010 the University of Massachusetts Lowell reaped the benefits of their Cleaver-Brooks equipment upgrade from Phase 1. The first phase was to upgrade their Bigelow 34,000 PPH IWT boiler with a natural gas fired burner to reap the rewards of a National Grid rebate. The job was unusually tricky because they also wanted to retain their ability to burn both #6 oil and burn #2 oil in the future. The unique design challenges to keep oil options and make natural gas the primary fuel were met by the Cleaver-Brooks design team!
The ProFire Division of Cleaver-Brooks was able to design a burner to meet their specification and supplied a ProFire NTXLEG-378A 30 PPM burner. The burner incorporated technology from their Natcom division for the oil nozzle and delivery to the burner head. It was combined with a Hawk Ultra 100 control and featured Parallel Positioning, O2 trim and a VFD for the 60 HP blower motor.So the customer was able to upgrade and reduce emissions all in one unit.
The combined energy savings in the plant was $1,000,000.00 for the first year. The energy savings due to the new equipment with a metered system has been estimated at up to 8 % of the total project dollar savings. In addition, National Grid the local energy utility provided an incentive to help finance the project based on the ROI of the energy saving controls as part of the specification. The combination of all the components on the burner were also inspected and approved on site by UL for a custom burner package.
The customer will soon proceed with Phase II which will remove two end of life IWT units and replace them. They have purchased Cleaver-Brooks 400 and 800 HP Firetubes with Hawk ICS Advanced Steam Package Controls. They also have a Cleaver-Brooks DA tank with the ADAC Control Package System going on line at the same time.