Wisconsin Public Service
- Owner: Wisconsin Public Service
- Project: Coal Handling System
- Location: Weston Station, Rothschild, Wisconsin
- Scope: Engineering, Procurement, Construction, Startup and Commissioning
Project Background
Roberts & Schaefer Company and AZCO were awarded a turnkey contract from Wisconsin Public Service for the engineering, procurement, construction, start–up and commissioning of the Coal Handling System at the WPS Weston 4 generating station near Rothschild, Wisconsin. The systems were successfully completed and in operation in 2007.
Coal is received by rail and discharged by an existing rotary rail car dumper. The coal is then fed onto an existing stockout system, through a new diverter gate and onto the first of the new conveyors provided by Roberts & Schaefer Company, Conveyor CVY–11. Conveyor CVY–11 is a fixed cantilevered stockout conveyor with a new telescopic chute located at the head end for dust control purposes. The coal forms a 20,000 ton capacity conical storage pile located over a new reclaim hopper.
The coal reclaim system starts with the new reclaim hopper and slide gate located above a frozen coal cracker. The frozen coal cracker feeds the coal onto a variable frequency belt feeder with the capacity ranging from 400 to 1,600 tons per hour. The belt feeder feeds the coal onto Conveyor CVY–13 with a capacity of 1,000 TPH and onto the existing crusher building.
The existing crusher building has been modified to feed the coal to both Weston Units 3 and 4.
A magnetic separator has been installed at the head end of Conveyor CVY–13 to pick up any tramp iron that may have found its way into the as–received coal. A two way diverter gate then directs the coal to existing conveyor B or through another diverter gate and into one of two surge bins. One surge bin is the existing Unit 3 bin and the other bin is a newly provided bin for Unit 4. The new Unit 4 surge bin includes a slide gate at the bottom that will allow the coal to be fed through a new coal crusher and onto new reclaim conveyor CVY–15. CVY–15 has a capacity of 1,000 TPH.
CVY–15 feeds the coal into Junction House No. 2 and onto conveyor CVY–16. A new magnetic separator has been installed at the head end of CVY–16 to pick up any tramp iron that may have come from the crushing operation. Conveyor CVY–16 feeds the coal into Junction House No. 3 and onto new power feed conveyor CVY–17, also with a capacity of 1,000 TPH. Conveyor CVY–17 feeds the coal onto fixed tripper conveyor CVY–18 located in the tripper bay of the new unit 4 generating building. Conveyor CVY–18 feeds the coal into the five (5) coal silos with the same capacity of 1,000 TPH.
A dust collection system picks fugitive dust from all transfer points and pneumatically conveys the dust to one of two designated coal silos.