Boiler-house load equalisation

The vast majority of steam generating plants have to deal with steam-using equipment, the demand of which varies from hour to hour, minute to minute, or even from second to second. The transference of the steam demand, unaltered, to the steam generating section of the plant imposes a duty on the latter which is frequently very severe, and which seldom permits of the boilers operating at their best efficiency, not to mention the strain placed on the operating staff in many instances. The desirability of approximating as closely as possible to constant-firing conditions, maintained over longish periods of time, is almost self-evident, and this is the object aimed at in what I have termed Boiler-house Load Equalisation.