Optical investigations on lean combustion improvement of natural gas engines via turbulence enhancement

In the global background of“Carbon Peak”and“Carbon Neutral”,natural gas engines show great advantages in energy-saving and pollution reduction.However,natural gas engines suffer from the issues of combustion instabilities when operating under lean burning conditions.In this paper,the role of turbulence enhancement in improving the lean combustion of natural gas was investigated in an optical SI engine with high compression ratios.Variable swirl control valves(SCV)were designed and intake tumble and swirl were combined to regulate turbulent motion and turbulent intensity.Particle image velocimetry was employed to measure in-cylinder turbulence,and transient pressure acquisition and high-speed photography were synchronously performed to quantify combustion evolutions.The results show that incylinder turbulent intensity is enhanced significantly through reducing SCV closing angles.Such that flame propagation speed and thermal efficiency are significantly improved with an increment of turbulent intensity,which indicated that mean effective pressures are not sensitive to spark timing.The analysis of flame images shows that the combined turbulence increases in the radial orientation from the spark plug to the cylinder wall,leading to an earlier flame kernel formation and a faster burning rate.Therefore,the combined turbulence has the potential in reducing the cyclic variations of lean combustion in natural gas engines.

Distributed Gas Ignition Using Injection Strategy for High Efficiency and Clean Combustion Under Lean Condition

Jet ignition is an efficient way to achieve lean burn of the engine and a promising strategy to meet the stringent emission regulations in the future.This paper presents a distributed gas ignition(DGI)combustion concept and realizes a DGI combustion mode using a newly designed DGI igniter.The igniter integrates a fuel injector and a spark plug to achieve minimum volume and easy installation.As the mixture preparation within the jet chamber is essential for the performance of the igniter,different jet chamber injection strategies were tested with varying excess air-fuel ratio ranging from 1.4 to 2.0.By addressing the dual injection strategy,the ignition delay and combustion duration were improved evidently.Compared with the single injection strategy,dual injection strategy improves the flexibility when preparing the mixture inside the jet chamber and therefore retains more fuel.The increased energy density of the jet chamber helps to generate more energetic jets under dual injection strategy,resulting in the improvement of ignition and combustion performance with lean burn.A higher thermal efficiency and a leaner limit of the engine are attained with dual injection than that with single injection.Dual injection exhibits its potential in reducing CO and THC emissions to an acceptable level with leaner mixture.Based on dual injection strategy,the maximum indicated thermal efficiency of 45%is achieved.

Progress and key challenges in catalytic combustion of lean methane

As a primary type of clean energy,methane is also the second most important greenhouse gas after CO_(2)due to the high global warming potential.Large quantities of lean methane(0.1–1.0 vol%)are emitted into the atmosphere without any treatment during coal mine,oil,and natural gas production,thus leading to energy loss and greenhouse effect.In general,it is challenging to utilize lean methane due to its low concentration and flow instability,while catalytic combustion is a vital pathway to realize an efficient utilization of lean methane owing to the reduced emissions of polluting gases(e.g.,NOxand CO)during the reaction.In particular,to efficiently convert lean methane,it necessitates both the designs of highly active and stable heterogeneous catalysts that accelerate lean methane combustion at low temperatures and smart reactors that enable autothermal operation by optimizing heat management.In this review,we discuss the in-depth development,challenges,and prospects of catalytic lean methane combustion technology in various configurations,with particular emphasis on heat management from the point of view of material design combined with reactor configuration.The target is to describe a framework that can correlate the guiding principles among catalyst design,device innovation and system optimization,inspiring the development of groundbreaking combustion technology for the efficient utilization of lean methane.

LaMnO_(3)(La_(0.8)Sr_(0.2)MnO_(3))Perovskites for Lean Methane Combustion:Effect of Synthesis Method

The effect of the preparation method on the properties of LaMnO3 and La0.8Sr0.2MnO3 perovskite was studied. Materials were prepared by four methods: sol-gel, chemical combustion, solvothermal and spray pyrolysis and characterized. The effect of the synthesis method on the texture, acid-base character of the surface, reducibility with hydrogen, oxygen desorption, surface composition and catalytic activity for combustion of lean methane was studied. It was found that synthesis method affects physicochemical properties of obtained materials-solvothermally produced materials exhibit well-developed surface area, presence of reactive oxygen species on surface and high catalytic activity for CH4 combustion. Generally, LaMnO3 and La0.8Sr0.2MnO3 perovskites show catalytic activity for lean CH4 combustion comparable or higher than the activity of 0.5 wt.% Pt/Al2O3 but lower than 1 wt.% Pd/Al2O3.

Combustion and emission characteristics of a dual injection system applied to a DISI engine

Concerns about environmental pollution and energy shortages have increased worldwide. One approach to reduce CO2 emissions from gasoline engines is to achieve stratified charge combustion with various injection ratios using port fuel injection （PFI） and direct injection. The combustion and emission characteristics of a 4-valve direct injection spark ignition （DISI） engine equipped with a dual injection system were investigated while the injection ratio was varied. When the direct injection ratio increased, the lean limit A/F was extended. This suggests that the dual injection gasoline engine with both PFI and direct injection can meet severe vehicle emission and fuel economy requirements. The dual injection system had higher combustion pressure than that of either a conventional or direct injection systems. Therefore, the engine power of a dual injection DISI engine would be higher than that of a single injection DISI engine. However, NOx emissions increased compared with the emission levels in both PFI and DISI systems.

Numerical and Experimental Investigation on the Performance of Lean Burn Catalytic Combustion for Gas Turbine Application

This manuscript presents our numerical and experimental results regarding the performance characteristics of lean bum catalytic combustion for gas turbine application. The reactant transport was assumed to be controlled by both bulk diffusion as well as surface kinetics, implemented by means of an approximate reaction rate equation and empirical coefficients to incorporate reaction mechanism. Experimental and numerical results were compared to examine the effects of methane mole fraction, inlet temperature, operating pressure, velocity and hydrogen spe- cies on combustion intensity. The results indicate that inlet temperature is the most significant parameter that im- pacts operation of the catalytic combustor and the most effective methods for improving the methane conversion are increasing the inlet temperature and increasing the methane mole fraction. Simulations from ID heterogene- ous plug flow model can capture the trend of catalytic combustion and describe the behavior of the catalytic mo- nolith in detail. The addition of hydrogen will provide heat release by the exothermie combustion reaction so that the reactants reach a temperature at which methane oxidation can light-off.

Part-load Performance Characteristics of a Lean Burn Catalytic Combustion Gas Turbine System

The purpose of this study is to compare the part-load performance of a lean burn catalytic combustion gas turbine (LBCCGT) system in three different control modes: varying fuel, bleeding off the fuel mixture flow after the compressor and varying rotational speed. The conversions of methane species for chemical process are considered. A 1D heterogeneous plug flow model was utilized to analyze the system performance. The actual turbomachinery components were designed and predicted performance maps were applied to system performance research. The part-load characteristics under three control strategies were numerically investigated. The main results show that: the combustor inlet temperature is a significant factor that can significantly affect the part-load characteristics of the LBCCGT system; the rotational speed control mode can provide the best performance characteristics for part-load operations; the operation range of the bleed off mode is narrower than that of the speed control mode and wider than that of the fuel only mode; with reduced power, methane does not achieve full conversion over the reactor at the fuel only control mode, which will not warrant stable operation of the turbine system; the thermal efficiency of the LBCCGT system at fuel only control strategy is higher than that at bleed off control strategy within the operation range.

Effects of swirler position on flame response and combustion instabilities

This study is concerned with the experimental and theoretical investigation of the combustion instabilities in a premixed swirl combustor.It is focused on the effects of the swirl mixing distance on the intrinsic thermoacoustic mode.The swirler as an origin of the swirling flow is also the source of the flow disturbance,which has effects on the flame response.The location of the swirler is varied in the experiment to study the effect on combustion instabilities and flame transfer functions.A low order model is built to analyze the thermoacoustic instabilities of the combustion system.The experimental results show that the ITA switches from an unstable state to a stable state as the swirl mixing distance changes with an increment of 15 mm;while the instability of the quarter-wave mode is not varied.The measured Flame Transfer Functions(FTFs)show that the gain curves of the frequency-dependent FTFs seem to be stretched or compressed with the modulation of the swirler position,which has effects on frequencies and instabilities of thermoacoustic modes.With the low order model,the effects of flame response on combustion instabilities are analyzed and the flame dominant nature of the ITA mode is confirmed.

Experimental investigations on combustion characteristics of syngas composed of CH_(4),CO,and H_(2)

The residual gas and remained raw gas in dual gas resources polygeneration system are quite complex in components(mainly CH_(4),CO,and H_(2)),and these results to the distinguished differences in combustion reaction.Experimental investigations on basic combustion characteristics of syngas referred above are conducted on a laboratory-scale combustor with flame temperature and flue gas composition measured and analyzed.Primary air coefficient(PA),total air coefficient(TA),and components of the syngas(CS)are selected as key factors,and it is found that PA dominates mostly the ignition of syngas and NOx formation,while TA affects the flue gas temperature after high temperature region and NOx formation trend to be positive as H_(2)/CO components increase.The results provide references for industrial utilization.