China's first home-grown 110-megawatt heavy-duty gas turbine, the Taihang 110, rolled off the assembly line at a turbine facility on Monday and is bound for commercial delivery.

The rollout ushers in the commercial operations of the country's most powerful home-grown gas turbine, and will bolster national efforts to achieve its carbon emissions targets, according to the Aero Engine Corporation of China (AECC).

Heavy-duty gas turbines, which are core equipment and a symbol of industrial strength, can be independently developed by only a few countries.

The Taihang 110 boasts a rapid start-up time, a high combined-cycle thermal efficiency level and low maintenance requirements. Capable of running on fuel, natural gas or low-to-medium heating value gases, it is ideal for combined heat and power generation, natural-gas-peaking power plants and combined-cycle power generation.

Improving upon thermal power generation units of the same capacity, the 110-megawatt heavy-duty gas turbine can reduce carbon emissions by over 1 million tonnes per year. In its combined-cycle mode, it can generate more than 150,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity an hour, which can meet the daily electricity demand of over 10,000 households.

AECC has also initiated research and development on hydrogen-fueled gas turbines, having achieved breakthroughs in key technologies such as rapid hydrogen-air mixing, low-emission hydrogen combustion organization, and the stable combustion control of hydrogen fuel, said Lu Jibin, head of gas turbines at AECC.