Fuels and Combustion

L-04

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 What is a Fuel? Recap

➢ Fuel is a material that carries energy in chemical form. (what about other
sources?)
➢ When the fuel is reacted (e.g., through combustion), most of the energy is
released as heat. (what else?)
➢ Though sometimes e.g., in fuel cells or flow batteries it can be released as
electric power
➢ Fuels have much higher energy densities than other ways of carrying energy.
Very convenient for transportation.
➢ The energy is released via chemical reactions. Each fuel undergoes different
reactions, with different rates. Chemical details matter.

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 Chemical Fuels

✓ Primary fuels
Fuels which involve only physical operations during their processing
▪ Mining
▪ Drilling
▪ Crushing

✓ Secondary fuels
Fuels which involve chemical processes in their manufacturing
▪ Reforming
▪ Cracking

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 Chemical Fuels

Physical state Primary (Natural) Secondary (Artificial)

Solid Fuels Wood, Coal, Peat, Dung Coke, Charcoal

etc.

Liquid Fuels Petroleum Diesel, Gasoline, Kerosene, LPG,

Coal Tar, Naptha, Ethanol

Gaseous Fuels Natural Gas Hydrogen, Propane, Coal Gas, Water Gas,
Blast Furnace Gas, Coke Oven Gas, CNG

LPG (Liquefied Petroleum Gas), LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) and CNG (Compressed Natural Gas)
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 What properties do we desire in a fuel?

➢ Prefer not to carry more than one reactant on vehicle; take second reactant from the
atmosphere. (vehicles)
(Air is 78% N2 , 21% O2 , 1% Ar. N2 is poor reactant (N≡N bond too strong), Ar is unreactive,
leaves O2. )
➢ Fuel should have highly exothermic reaction with O2
➢ Fuel should be abundant in nature or easy to make. And cheap.
➢ Fuel itself should be environmentally benign and renewable
➢ Prefer to dump exhaust so we don’t have to carry its weight. Exhaust should be environment
friendly. (vehicles)

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 Fuel Characteristics

▪ Ignition temperature

▪ Limits of flammability

▪ Calorific value (heating value)

▪ Calorific intensity

▪ Specific heat
We will study these
▪ Specific gravity
terms later in details
▪ Storage capacity

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 Solid Fuels

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Introduction
➢ Solid fuel refers to various types of solid material that are used as fuel to
produce energy and provide heating, usually released through combustion.

Solid fuels include:

➢ Wood
➢ Charcoal
➢ Peat
➢ Coal
➢ Fuel tablets & pellets made from wood
➢ Corn
➢ Wheat
➢ Rye
➢ Other grains
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Introduction

➢ Industrially employed solid carbonaceous fuels can be classified in

three main categories:

➢ Coal
➢ Biomass
➢ Other

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Chemical Properties

Among the differences between biomass and coals, there is the carbon-to-hydrogen
ratio, with higher values for the last ones.

Physical Properties

Among the principal aspects concerning the physical properties of solid fuels there are:

➢ Size or particle size distribution

➢ Shape of particles

➢ Porosity of particles

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 ➢Sphericity: Sphericity is a measure of how spherical an object is

𝑆𝑢𝑟𝑓𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑝ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑐𝑎𝑙 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑙𝑒

𝜑𝑝 =
𝑆𝑢𝑟𝑓𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑙𝑒 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑠𝑎𝑚𝑒 𝑣𝑜𝑙𝑢𝑚𝑒 𝑎𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑝ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑐𝑎𝑙 𝑜𝑛𝑒

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 ➢ Apparent particle density, 𝜌𝑎𝑝𝑝 :
✓ The ratio between the mass of an average particle and its volume, including the void volumes of internal pores.

➢ Real density, 𝜌𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑙 :

✓ The ratio between the mass of an average particle and its volume, excluding the volumes occupied by internal
pores.

➢ Porosity:
✓ The ratio between the volumes occupied by all pores inside a particle and its total volume (including pores)

𝜌𝑎𝑝𝑝
𝜍𝑝 = 1 −
𝜌𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑙

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