The IMPACT Project: 2009 to 2013 (The birthplace of the IBN-1 9%Cr Steel).
IMPACT (Innovative Materials, Design and Monitoring of Power Plant to Accommodate Carbon CapTure) is a 4-year, £1.8M UK collaborative R&D project, part-funded by the UK Technology Strategy Board (TSB), which was completed in December 2013. Its aims have been to improve the efficiency of future steel-based coal-fired power plant, and hence reduce carbon emissions, by improving high temperature creep-resistant alloy steels and weldments, in-service monitoring and component design.
IMPACT has carried out a comprehensive development project on martensitic high temperature steels.
This has shown that a novel UK alloy based on the Japanese "MARBN" concept named "IBN-1" is substantially superior to the steels P91 and P92 now used on plant. IMPACT has also developed an improved composition and manufacturing route, shown that boron-nitrogen addition improves creep strength over a wide range of acceptable compositions, and produced a practical semi-commercial scale cast product.
Major Project Partners
Goodwin produced all test heats of the variant MarBN steel and the full scale IBN-1 heat for the IMPACT project.
This comprised of a full scale 4500kg prototype casting (T=300mm), ingots ranging from 125kg to 3500kg and various test plates in the IBN-1 material which were subsequently evaluated and characterised within the project. All of the test data created within the project was derived form Goodwin manufactured material.
