09 Combustion (burners, combustion systems)
Two demonstration projects are described. At modest costs of boiler
design changes, substantial decreases in NO x and SO2 emissions were
achieved without impairment of technology and economic parameters.
09 COMBUSTION
Burners, combustion systems
03/00722 A generic simulation method for the lower and
upper furnace of coal-fired utility boilers using both air firing
and oxy-fuel combustion with COa recirculation
Zheng, L. et al. Proceedings of the International Technical Con/~rence
on Coal Utilization & Fuel Systems, 2002, 1, (27), 571-579.
The development of lower and upper furnace models for coat fired
utility boilers, and the role of flue gas recirculation are described. It
was demonstrated that by the adjustment of the flue gas recirculation
amount the boiler pressure parts of lower and upper furnace could be
made to perform properly without major modification by conversion
from air-fired to oxy-fired operation. The lower as well as the upper
furnace model predicted results very closely to measured data, and
could model a wide variety of geometries and configurations. The
models could also be used for variable flue gas properties and
simulation of air fired systems.
03/00723 Combined preburner-catalytic combustion-post-
combustion unit for Iow-NOx combustion of solid and liquid
fuels and lean fuel gases
Anon., GeL Gebrauchsmusterschrift De 20,200,353 (CI. F23D 14/02), 4
Jul 2002, Appl. 20,200,353, 10 Jan 2002. 12. (In German)
A low-pollutant catalytic combustion unit for combined pre-combus-
tion and catalytic combustion of liquid fuels consists of the following
elements located in a downstream sequence: (1) a pre-burner, (2) a
cooling channel, (3) a Venturi mixer, (4) a primary catalytic burner
containing two catalytic reactors, and (5) a homogeneous (gas-phase)
second burner. The pre-burner contains a fuel-air mixing chamber and
a porous ceramic chamber, in which the mixing chamber has a first fuel
inlet opening and a first air inlet opening. The cooling channel has a
second air inlet opening next to the pre-burner; the Venturi mixer has a
second fuel inlet opening. Combustion catalysts for the first and second
catalytic combustion chambers are Pd-Rh/AlzO3 and SrosLa02Mn-
AltiO19, both supported either a ceramic support or a honeycomb.
The homogeneous combustion chamber is fabricated from high-
temperature-resistant steel to withstand temperatures > 1260'Z Such a
combustion unit is capable of burning normally polluting liquid and
solid fuels (e.g. tars, biomass, low-Btu fuel gases, etc.) with low NO~
formation.
03/00724 Environmental implications of power generation
via coal-microalgae cofiring
Kadam, K. L. Energy, 2002, 27, (10), 905-922.
Electrical power plants are responsible for over one-third of the US
emissions, or about 1.7 Gt CO2 per year. Power-plant flue gas can serve
as a source of CO2 for microalgae cultivation, and the algae can be
cofired with coal. The study objective was to conduct a Life Cycle
Assessment (LCA) to compare the environmental impacts of electricity
production via coal firing versus coal/algae cofiring. The LCA results
demonstrate that there are potentially significant benefits to recycling
CO2 toward microalgae production. As it reduces CO2 emissions by
recycling it and uses less coal, there are concomitant benefits of
reduced greenhouse gas emissions. However, there are also other
energy and fertilizer inputs needed for algae production, which
contribute to key environmental flows. Lower net values for the algae
cofiring scenario were observed for the following using the direct
injection process (in which the flue gas is directly transported to the
algae ponds): SOx, NOx, particulates, carbon dioxide, methane, and
fossil energy consumption. Lower values for the algae cofiring scenario
were also observed for greenhouse potential and air acidification
potential However, impact assessment for depletion of natural
resources and eutrophication potential showed much higher values.
This LCA gives us an overall picture and impacts across different
environmental boundaries, and hence, can help in the decision-making
process for implementation of the algae scenario.
03/00725 Industrial applications of advanced high-
temperature air combustion technology
Miyata, K. Kagaku KOgaku. 2002. 66. (5), 286-289. (In Japanese)
A review of the applications of high-temperature air combustion
method in pulverized coal-fired boilers, waste incineration, and high-
temperature chemical reactors.
03/00726 Infrared thermographic image processing for the
operation and control of heterogeneous combustion
chambers
Manca, D. and Rovaglio, R. Combustion and Flame, 2002, 130, (4), 277-
297.
The measurement of temperature in a combustion chamber, using
conventional devices such as thermocouples, can be misleading. An
infrared thermographic camera can achieve a non-intrusive measure.
Having acquired a still image of, for example, a kiln, it can be used to
produce a map of the effective temperature of the waste bed, walls, and
combustion gases. This paper describes a technique for processing an
infrared image to identify what really happens within such a
combustion chamber. The use of a thermographic camera, to produce
a temperature map of a combustion chamber, can be helpful,
particularly for control purposes. This paper addresses the criteria
adopted in the selection of the thermographic system, in terms of both
wavelength sensitivity and geometric location within the chamber.
Moreover, a detailed description of the zonal method is reported,
together with the identification procedure adopted to infer the
temperature map from an infrared image. As a matter of fact, the
presence of soot and fly-ash within the combustion chamber does
complicate the radiative model, because a grey gas analogy must be
accounted for. Soot and fly-ash give rise to a foggy and diffusive effect
on the image with a consequent apparent homogeneous temperature
profile. To simulate the effective radiative energy flux entering the
camera lens and impinging on the CCD photoelectric cell, a raytracing
technique has been developed. Each discrete area and volume, within
the combustion chamber, emits a pencil of radiation, which after
passing through the hot gases, reaches the CCD device. Such a light
pencil is generated by the energy emitted and reflected from the
discrete surfaces, plus all the energies emitted by the volumes of gas
distributed along the path, minus any attenuation. The total energy
balance equations, coming from the zonal method, must be coupled
with the temperature-energy maps acquired by the infrared camera to
identify the unknown effective temperatures. Once the temperatures of
the walls and bed are known, it is possible to use them to improve the
control strategy by means of a set of new measures and combustion
efficiency indexes, which are usually unavailable when conventional
thermocouples are adopted. Finally, a validation of the proposed
procedure is presented with an online application to an incinerator for
industrial solid waste. The combustion dynamics within the primary
kiln is analysed and quantified, in terms of both absolute temperatures
and characteristic times.
03/00727 Low sulfur coal additive for improved furnace
operation
Johnson, S. A. et al. U.S. Pat. Appl. Publ. US 2002 66,394 (CI. 110-
342: F23B7/00), 6 Jun 2002, US Appl. PV213,915, 26 Jun 2000. 17.
The present invention is directed to additives for coal-fired furnaces,
particularly furnaces using a layer of slag to capture coal particles for
combustion. The additive(s) include Fe, mineralizer(s), handling
aid(s), flow aid(s), and/or abrasive material(s). The Fe and minerali-
zers can lower the melting point of ash in low-Fe, high alkali coals,
leading to improved furnace performance.
03/00728 Manufacture of combustion accelerator for fossil
fuels
Wada, K. Jpn. Kokai Tokkyo Koho JP 2002 194,365 (Cl. Cf0L9/12), 10
Jul 2002, Appl. 2000/395,557, 26 Dec 2000. 5. (In Japanese)
The combustion accelerator for gasoline, light oil, kerosine, heavy oil,
natural gas, etc. is manufactured by (1) immersing pulverized bamboo
into water and mixing with steamed grains (as culturing base) for
producing a first raw material, (2) immersing roasted grains in seawater
in a container with a lid, ripening at 10-50 ° by solar heat for
immobilizing dye elements of the seawater on the roasted grains,
drying, and pulverizing for producing a second raw material while
collecting water drops deposited on the lid, (3) immersing a mixture of
the first and the second raw materials in a mixture of the collected
water and kerosene at 5-40 ° for 3-10 days, (4) adding S powder into
the raw material solution and fermenting in a room filled with COz at
25-35" for 4-7 days, and (5) mixing the fermented material with
kerosene at 10-50 ° and filtering producing the combustion accelerator.
The combustion accelerator increases fuel efficiency and decreases
generation of toxic substances in fuel exhaust gas.
03/00729 Measurements and particle resolved modelling of
heat-up and drying of a packed bed
Peters, B. et al. Biomass and Bioenergy, 2002, 23, (4), 291-306.
The objective of this study is to measure the heat-up and the drying of a
packed bed consisting of large wood particles as encountered in
furnaces and to compare the predictions of a particle resolved
Fuel and Energy Abstracts March 2003 97