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Bechtel’s Impact Report

Retrofits

man in protective equipment standing in a field

Meeting environmental and economic needs

Whether reducing emissions or extending the life of a plant, work begins with a thorough assessment of technical and economic viability and the development of innovative solutions that will result in successful project execution. 

Retrofits can be capital intensive, which is why detailed studies and analysis are crucial to determining the best modifications or upgrades. Bechtel’s technical expertise, global procurement, and project experience help improve the constructability of equipment and systems, reduce construction and overall costs, minimize changes through early site review, and mitigate disruptions to plant operations.

Increase performance, decrease emissions

By adding or replacing aging or obsolete power generation equipment with newer generation equipment alongside the still-usable components, our customers can increase power generation over a longer period with improved operability, maintainability as well as environmental performance.

For example, swapping a coal-fired boiler for a steam turbine generator would result in 150,000 to 800,000 fewer tons of carbon emissions per year, in addition to eliminating all toxic fumes such as mercury, arsenic, and acid gasses.

The biggest hurdle for repowering is the life-cycle cost of generation. Our customers can depend on us to deliver renewed power plants with a better combination of capital expenditure, fuel, and operations and maintenance costs than the originals.

Asset enhancement

We also retrofit existing refining and petrochemical assets to make them greener. Whether that is implementing new technology that converts gas drives to electric drives that source renewable power, adding carbon capture systems, enhancing hydrogen production, adding industrial-scale production of advanced fuels, or efficiency improvements to minimize carbon emissions, our solutions will help to deliver on sustainability commitments.

In each case, we are applying emerging technologies in the earliest phases of project development, increasing energy efficiency throughout the design, and decarbonizing our execution across the project lifecycle in order to deliver clean energy projects for our customers.

We believe that working closely with the plant operating team is the best way to select and implement a solution that meets the needs of the plant. Our goal is to tailor solutions to each plant owner to create viable responses to the decarbonization.