Page - 43 - in Our Car as Power Plant

43 So if we want to study the efficiency of the power system we have to compare power system efficiencies and not only the individual power plant efficiencies at full load. The efficiencies of individual base load power plants are of course much higher than the average efficiency. For example at present, the efficiency of newly built gas fired power plants, combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT), is 60% at full load. Using higher turbine inlet temperatures, this can increase to about 65% in the future (18). The efficiency of newly built coal fired power, super-critical pulverized coal (SCPC) plants, is about 46% at full load. In the future efficiencies at full load can come up to 52% (19), by SCPC power plants or CCGT fired power plants. However, because the power system has to balance supply and demand - and must be able to react on disruptions - the system efficiency is much lower. For example the Dutch power system efficiency is about 40%. And the system effi- ciency in almost all other countries is even lower than 40%. In the US the power system efficiency is 36% and in China 32% (20,21).