AI Helps Iranian Experts to Detect Faults in Gas Turbines of Power Plants

“In this project, the application of this technology in the gas turbine of thermal power plants was pursued to inspect and detect automatic faults,” said Mehdi Akraminia, a faculty member of the research group of rotating mechanical equipment at Nirou research center.

“This project was put on our agenda to verify the feasibility and ability of artificial intelligence in the field of electricity production,” he added.

Noting that the project has two phases, Akraminia said, “The first phase is extracting the required data in the gas turbine and the second phase is detecting defects with the help of artificial intelligence and comparing with the conventional methods.”

“The first phase of the project has been successfully completed which can lead to the development of suitable data for use in artificial intelligence in other power generation equipment like different models of other gas turbines, steam turbines, combined cycle, generators, power plant transformers, power plant pumps, wind turbines and water turbines; in the second phase of the project, the data extracted from the first phase is exploited and artificial intelligence models are developed, and by examining the working conditions of the gas turbine, its possible defects are detected,” he said.

In a relevant development last year, experts at the Iranian Offshore Oil Company (IOOC) had also succeeded in designing and manufacturing gas turbine equipment, including special sensors.

“We built and installed the sensor for determining the position of the breathing valves and applying it to the Siemens SGT200 model gas turbine control system of the island's power plant,” said Armin Bahrami, the head of turbine repair unit of Siri island’s Iranian Offshore Oil Company.

“One of the important components of gas turbines is the blow off valve which prevents destructive phenomena in gas compressors and plays an important role when starting combustion engines,” he added.

“The main advantage of this plan is to speed up the troubleshooting operation while notifying the operator of the bleed valve’s open and closed position,” Bahrami said.

Iranian Offshore Oil Company (IOOC) is one of the world's largest offshore oil producing companies with over a half century of experience. The Company shares one third of Iranian oil export, operating in the Iranian side of the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman.

4155/v