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The industrially-established Czech countries welcomed the electricity of the late 19th century with great enthusiasm and began to use it quickly in lighting both private and public spaces, transport and production. The Czechs were not passive recipients of the rapid development of energy, but they actively participated in it.
Some inventions or practices have become a model for the rest of the world. Examples include the Kaplan turbine, the development and manufacture of steam boilers or the introduction of a collective remote control (HDO).
"Energy has always attracted top technicians who have been constantly striving to move forward. The Czech footprint has always been and still remains significant in this respect. Obviously, the most significant discovery on the Czech territory was the Kaplan turbine, which is now used in hydropower plants around the world, "says CEO CEO Daniel Benes.
"And I am very glad that further improvement of the water turbines is taking place with the support of CEZ Group today. The swirl turbine , which was created with the support of CEZ at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of the Brno University of Technology, increases the efficiency of production in small hydropower plants, which can be useful for these plants, especially during prolonged periods of drought. "
Although the famous Czech inventor and entrepreneur Frantisek Krizik has bettered the less-used DC stream, we can still trace its influence on power transmission systems. The northern network of electrified trains in the Czech Republic (more than half) still uses the 3 kV DC system, like Belgium, the southern part of France, Italy, Spain or Poland. Križíks attempts at a DC system with a high and then very high voltage at the beginning of the 20th century were not only among the first in the world, they also produced excellent results and inspired construction in other European countries and in America.
Kaplan inspiration
Hydroelectric power plants around the world are using the invention of Viktor Kaplan - Kaplan turbine . Although Kaplan was Austrian, most of his great discoveries, including this turbine, were carried out in Brno, as a professor at the German Technical College. The original type of propeller water turbine has been designed and built already before the First World War. The blades have been made smaller and narrower in order to reduce the friction, thanks to the impeller blades, it also retains high efficiency even at low flow rates.
While Francis turbines were at a speed of about 400 revolutions per minute, Kaplan could have doubled. The first one was put into operation in 1919 in the Velma army mill in Bohemia and was first used in the Czech Republic in the power plant in Podebrady in 1921. Today, the Kaplan turbine is the most widely used type in large hydropower plants on high-flow and low-flow rivers. At most, the greatest humidity, ie the flow of water under certain conditions, has Kaplan turbines at the Gabcíkovo hydropower in South Bohemia: 636 m3 / s, at a drop of 12.88 to 24.20 meters.
Nearly a century after Kaplan, the water-power levels were disturbed by another invention of Brno provenance: a multi-stage turbine from the workshop of František Pochylý and his team from the Fluid Engineering Department of Viktor Kaplan of the Institute of Energy at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of VUT in Brno. CEZ also participated in the development, and in 2016 the turbine turbines were turned into a small hydropower plant called Želina , in addition to the Francis turbines there.
The swirl turbine is ideal for smaller, one-to-three meter rivers, compared to the classic Kaplan turbine, which is structurally simpler and the installation costs are roughly half. This makes it more affordable for investors to build small hydropower plants. Another Czech notch in the inventory of turbine inventions is the rolling turbine Miroslav Sedlácek of the Faculty of Civil Engineering of the Czech Technical University, designed for slow flowing rivers, streams or for the production of electricity from the sea tide and outflow.
Put the boiler under the boiler, spin the turbine
Czechoslovakia also belonged to European pioneers in introducing high pressures and steam temperatures in steam power plants, and it also excelled in the use of new technologies. At the Porící I power plant, a powder heating system was tested in 1925 , when coal was named for dust (grains smaller than 1 mm), increasing its specific surface area up to 100 times. It will burn in a matter of seconds, increasing performance. Five years later, the state-of-the-art thermal power plant in Europe with powder boilers was launched in Brno, which contributed to their subsequent expansion into the world. The respected know-how gained Czechs even in the area of ??automation and measurement.
The golden age of the coal-fired power plants in the 1960s and 1980s was accompanied by a gradual increase in unit outputs - first at 100 and then at 200 MW. The unique feature of its time was the first "five-star" built in Melník in 1976-1980: EME III. The cooling circuit combines the warming water from the EME I and II technological units so that it is not necessary to draw more water from the Elbe, it was unique throughout Europe. The combination of flow cooling and the cooling tower thus solved the coexistence of three different sources in one power plant.
Mass remote control (HDO)
The Czechs have also developed one of the first to use the principle of smart grids - more than half a century ago. This is a mass remote control (HDO), that is, the regulation of remote electricity consumption. HDO reduces electricity consumption during the day and brings more energy to consumers. It is used for households that heat or heat the water: in exchange for a more advantageous tariff, customers allow the distributor to remotely switch on or off their storage stoves or boilers. In these cases, the water can be preheated and pre-heated, so the customer does not have any disadvantages if the boiler or stove is switched on.
"Mass remote control technology is the first" smart grid "precursor. The comprehensive control and communication system monitors the electricity consumption curve and, depending on the power that goes into the grid from the production sources, switches on or off the appliances so that the curve is as uniform as possible. This ensures reliable operation of the distribution system and the electricity system of the Czech Republic as a whole, prevents emergencies or solves them, " says CEO of CEZ Distribuce Martin Zmelík.
At the same time, it is one of the fastest ways to establish a balance in the network - since the impulse is pulled out, the appliances are disconnected or connected about a minute. Similarly, only hydroelectric power plants are coming from the sources.
The first attempts with HDO took place in Czechoslovakia already in the 1930s - for the Prague network the HDO deployment project was ready already in 1936. It continued at the end of the 1950s, the first deployment of the transmitter to the 22kV level of 10kVA occurred within the West Bohemian energy race in May 1960 in Cheb. It began with the construction of small power transmitters, followed by the development of higher voltage systems.
Today, distribution companies in the Czech Republic have a total of 26 very high voltage transmitters outside high voltage transmitters. Transmitters of Czechoslovak production were also built abroad - in Bulgaria, the former GDR and the former Yugoslavia. Devices used in HDO were domestically produced and, thanks to constant innovation, showed excellent technical parameters and reliability of operation. The system of this control is now being used in a number of other countries.
More recently, HDO is also used to remotely control the power of small power plants, including their complete shutdown. This enables the power supply from solar and wind power plants to maintain the stability of distribution systems and transmission systems. Smart grid elements, including Advanced Metering Management (AMM), will continue to grow in the future. The long-term experience of Czech energetics with HDO will therefore be very useful.
Nuclear peak
The Czech Republic also has a world respect in the field of nuclear energy and research. The first research reactor was launched in ÚJV Rež already in 1957, whereby Czechoslovakia became only the ninth country that managed the fission reaction. Czech nuclear research keeps its finger on the pulse of the time.
Thanks to the reputation of the research staff and designers of the Nuclear Research Institute and the subsidiaries of the Research Center Rež (CVR), the Czech Republic has been able to design and realize the installation of the unique hot cells of the research reactor Jules Horowitz in France. Most research reactors operating within the European Union end their service life after 2020 (reactors in Reža will be shut down around 2027) and Jules Horowitz will take over part of their research. In exchange for the supply of hot chambers, the Czech Republic gained access to part of its research capacity.
Another important activity of Nuclear Power Plant, in particular CVR, is the development of a small modular high-temperature reactor with a low capacity (about 20 MWt) cooled by liquid salts. Its design is based on the unique knowledge of three generations of Czech nuclear engineers. The combination of long life, easy transport (all three circuits - primary, secondary and tertiary - can be transported as separate units) and the simple design of the reactor with a great emphasis on safety has a potentially wide range of use.
For example, for water desalination and purification, energy supply for remote sites or for energy storage systems through hydrogen production. The Czech concept, called Energy Well, is well-attended by expert conferences and many companies have shown interest in participating in its further development.
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