Development of an intelligent monitoring system with high temperature distributed fiber-optic sensor for fossil-fuel power plants

This paper presents the current research activities into the development of an intelligent monitoring system utilizing distributed fiber optical sensors for real-time monitoring of high temperatures in a boiler furnace in power plants. Of particular interest is the estimation of spatial and temporal distributions of high temperatures within a gas, coal or oil-fired boiler, which will be essential in assessing and controlling the mechanisms that form and remove pollutants at the source, such as NOx. Intelligent distributed parameter estimation coupled with the proposed fiberoptic sensor system is to be used to better estimate the temperature distribution within the boiler that can be used for feedback control for improved combustion.