Proceedings of COBEM 2009 20th International Congress of Mechanical Engineering Copyright © 2009 by ABCM November 15-20, 2009, Gramado, RS, Brazil ETHANOL UTILISATION IN THE GE T-58 TURBINE APPLIED TO ELECTRIC POWER GENERATION Debaalbeck Borges da Costa Gespi Aeronáutica Ltda – São José dos Campos - SP debaalbeck@gespi.com.br Cristiane A. Martins Instituto Tecnológico de Aeronáutica – São José dos Campos - SP cmartins@ita.br Pedro Teixeira Lacava Instituto Tecnológico de Aeronáutica – São José dos Campos - SP placava@ita.br Abstract. The General Eletric T58 engine is a free-shaft axial flow gas turbine. It was designed to power jet helicopters in the 50s. Since then,it has been used in a number of military helicopter aplications such as the tandem rotor CH-46 Sea Kinght. After more than 50 year sit is clear that there are several T58 out of service. Sometimes, these engines are still in good condition considering land-based operation. Flight safety demands are much more restrit. On other hand, ethanol seems to have an important role considering CO2 emission balance. This work presents the potentiality of ethanol utilisation as fuel in aeronautics turbine engines out of service for the purpose of generating eletric power. Experimental prelimanary tests indicated economic viability and it was also estimated power turbine operation up to 18,000 hours until the first maitanence. . This is one indicative of the high reliability of the aeronautics engines. Whole experimental tests were conducted in the Gespi Aeronautics Ltda and more details will be presented here. Keywords: ethanol, aeronautic turbine, gas turbine, electric plant 1. INTRODUCTION Electric power can be generated in different kinds. In fact, generator has the necessity of something able to cause the shaft and armature to spin. The result is the generation of an electric current. The process responsible for the spin shaft and armature can be so different, as a hydroelectric turbine, wind turbine, a nuclear power plant or the same gas turbine power plant. Independently, all system must be able to turn the copper armature inside the generator and to generate electric current. Particularly, in a gas turbine power plant, fuels are burned to create hot gases which go through a turbine, which spins turning the copper armature inside the generator and generating electric current. Normally, the turbine consists of several stages with each stage consisting of a stationary blade and a rotating blade. Stationary blades convert the potential energy of the exhaust product (temperature and pressure) into kinetic energy (velocity) and direct the flow onto the rotating blades. The rotating blades convert the kinetic energy into forces, caused by pressure drop, resulting in the rotation of the turbine shaft. The turbine shaft is connected to a generator, which produces the electrical energy. The rotation speed is 3000 rpm for 50 Hz systems and 3600 for 60 Hz systems. Development of the turbine applications to flight and to ''light'' (power plants) started at the same time. History registers indicate that the first jet powered aircraft flashed across the skies above the Baltic Sea to start jet Age on August 27, 1939. Hitller´s war launched the jet Age with the gas turbine powered Heinkel He 178. Von Ohain was responsible for that . At the same time, some kilometers from Germany, in 1939 one Swiss company completed the development of the first modern land-based gas turbine. It was installed at Neuchatel in the Swiss Alpine foothills to power a 4-megawatt electrical generator for backup power. (Langston, 2000). Gas-turbine power stations (GTPS) have been recently widespread in power engineering of foreign countries. For example in Russia, it had been widely used. There, electro generators of gas-turbine and electric power station gas turbines were developed by Aviadvigatel on the basis of PS-90А engine. The engine is responsible to provide power to the most modern Russian aircrafts Il-96-300, Тu-204, Тu-214 and even to VIP-aircraft for the President of the Russian Federation. Gas turbine unit models developed until now were GTU-2,5P (2.5 МW), GTU-4P (4 МW) and GTU-6P (6 МW). (Aviadvigatel, 2009). The common fuel is natural gas. Another kind of the gas-turbine power generation is the gas turbine mobile units. These units in general are used as the main electric power source for industrial and domestic