Material Insights · Understanding the Material World

Steam turbines and thermal power plants: Equipment and suppliers

Boilers, rotors and generators that run for 40 years

What this tab covers For each method, the main pieces of equipment, who makes them (by region) and what they are made of (bill of materials).

A steam plant is a boiler, a turbine, a generator and a condenser; ORC and Stirling machines shrink the same functions into packaged units.

Coal-fired steam plant

Boiler (steam generator)251113141517

Burns pulverised coal and turns feedwater into high-pressure, high-temperature steam, with reheaters for steam returning from the turbine.

China Dongfang Electric, Harbin Electric, Shanghai Electric India Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL) Europe Steinmüller United States Babcock & Wilcox (mainly retrofits and boiler equipment)
Bill of materials
  • Water walls, superheater and reheater tubes: creep-resistant 600 C-class alloy steels; nickel alloys needed for 700 C designs
  • Burners, mills and fans: steel
Steam turbine2510111314151918

Expands steam through high-, intermediate- and low-pressure sections to drive the generator; double reheat raises efficiency.

China Dongfang Electric, Harbin Electric, Shanghai Electric India Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL) Europe Siemens Energy, Arabelle Solutions Japan and Korea Toshiba, Doosan Enerbility
Bill of materials
  • Rotor forgings and blades: high-alloy steels rated for 600 C-class steam
  • Casings and valves: cast alloy steel
Generator51012131415

Converts shaft rotation to electricity at up to 99% efficiency.

China Dongfang Electric, Harbin Electric India Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL) Europe Arabelle Solutions, Siemens Energy United States GE Vernova
Bill of materials
  • Stator windings: copper bars, water-cooled in large units
  • Rotor: steel forging cooled by hydrogen

Organic Rankine cycle unit

ORC turbogenerator6

Expands the organic vapour through a slow, robust turbine coupled to a generator.

United States Ormat, TAS Europe Turboden, Exergy, Orcan Energy, Enogia, Enertime
Bill of materials
  • Turbine and generator (rotating equipment): about 70% of purchased equipment cost in a 375 kW system about 70%
  • Evaporator, recuperator and condenser: steel heat exchangers about 30%

Stirling and thermoacoustic engines

Stirling engine with receiver89

Converts concentrated sunlight or other external heat into shaft power with a sealed hydrogen charge.

United States No current volume maker identified; the 2008 record used a Stirling Energy Systems dish built with Sandia
Bill of materials
  • Heater head and regenerator: high-temperature alloy heat exchangers
  • Working gas: hydrogen (Stirling) or helium at 30 bar (thermoacoustic)

Sources

  1. China's Pingshan Phase II Sets New Bar as World's Most Efficient Coal Power Plant POWER Magazine, 2023
  2. Harbin Electric wins bids for two 2 GW coal-fired power projects in China Enerdata, 2024
  3. The organic Rankine cycle power systems market: Recent developments and future perspectives (Wieland, Schifflechner, Dawo, Astolfi), Applied Thermal Engineering 224 Elsevier (author copy, Politecnico di Milano), 2023
  4. Sandia, Stirling Energy Systems set new world record for solar-to-grid conversion efficiency Sandia National Laboratories, 2008
  5. A thermoacoustic-Stirling heat engine: Detailed study (Backhaus and Swift), J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 107(6) Los Alamos National Laboratory / Acoustical Society of America, 2000
  6. GIGATOP generators Arabelle Solutions, 2025
  7. Shanghai Electric Power Generation Group (company profile) Shanghai Electric, 2025
  8. Air-cooled generators (GEN-A) GE Vernova, 2025
  9. Dongfang Electric Corporation Limited: Annual results announcement for the year 2025 Dongfang Electric (HKEX filing), 2026
  10. Harbin Electric Company Limited: Annual results announcement for the year ended 31 December 2025 Harbin Electric (HKEX filing), 2026
  11. BHEL: order for 1x800 MW Anuppur thermal power project (stock exchange disclosure) Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (NSE filing), 2025
  12. B&W awarded USD 13 million boiler cleaning equipment and installation contract for Southeast Asia coal power plant Babcock & Wilcox via Business Wire, 2025
  13. Doosan Enerbility to equip Qatari combined-cycle plant (Facility E) Turbomachinery International, 2025
  14. GE HA Turbine Snags Another World Record for CCGT Efficiency POWER Magazine, 2018