A numerical study on parametric sensitivity of the flow characteristics on pulverized coal gasification

In order to analyse the sensitivity on pulverized coal flames of variables such as initial turbulent intensity, steam addition, primary/secondary momentum ratio, and radiation heat transfer, a numerical study was conducted at the gasification process. Eulerian approach is used for the gas phase, whereas Lagrangian approach is used for the solid phase. Turbulence is modeled using the standard k–ϵ model. The turbulent combustion model incorporates the eddy dissipation model. The radiation heat transfer is solved using a Monte‐Carlo method. One‐step two‐reaction model is employed for the devolatilization of a Kideco coal. In pulverized flame of long liftoff height, the initial turbulent intensity is an important factor to predict the accurate flame front position. The radiation heat transfer and wall heat loss ratio distort the temperature distributions along the reactor wall, but do not affect the reactor performance such as coal burnout, residence time and flame front position. The primary/secondary momentum ratio only affects the position of flame front, but the coal burnout is slightly influenced. It is confirmed that the momentum ratio is a variable only associated with the flame stabilization. The addition of steam in the reactor has a detrimental effect on all the aspects, particularly in reactor temperature and coal burnout. The increase of liftoff height and dropped gas temperature mean the harm of flame stabilization in the reactor, and so the gasification reaction may be deactivated. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A numerical study on the effect of flow distribution on reactor performance

A numerical study was conducted to analyse the effect of flow distribution of stirred part and plug flow part on combustion efficiency at the coal gasification process in an entrained bed coal reactor. The model of computation was based on gas‐phase Eulerian balance equations of momentum and mass. The solid phase was described by Lagrangian equations of motion. The k–ϵ model was used to calculate the turbulence flow and the eddy dissipation model was used to describe the gas‐phase reaction rate. The radiation was solved using a Monte‐Carlo method. A one‐step two parallel reaction model was employed for the devolatilization process of a high volatile bituminous Kideco coal. The computations agreed well with the experiments, but the flame front was closer to the burner than the measured one. The flow distribution of a stirred part and a plug flow part in a reactor was a function of the magnitude of recirculation zone resulting from the swirl. The combustion efficiency was enhanced with decreasing stirred part and the maximum value was found to be around S=1·2, having the minimum stirred part. The combustion efficiency resulted from not only the flow distribution but also from the particle residence time through the hot reaction zone of the stirred part, in particular for the weak swirl without IRZ (internal recirculation zone) and the long lifted flame. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Investigation of flame characteristics using various design parameters in a pulverized coal burner for oxy‐fuel retrofitting

In oxy‐coal combustion for carbon capture and storage, oxygen and recirculated CO₂ are used as oxidizers instead of air to produce CO₂‐rich flue gas. Owing to differences between the physical and chemical properties of CO₂ and N₂, the development of a burner and boiler system based on fundamental understanding of the flame type, heat transfer, and NOx emission is required. In this study, computational fluid dynamic analysis incorporating comprehensive coal conversion models was performed to investigate the combustion characteristics of a 30 MWth tangential vane swirl pulverized coal burner. Various burner design parameters were evaluated, including the influence of the burner geometry on the swirl strength, direct O₂ injection, and O₂ concentrations in the primary and secondary oxidizers. The flame characteristics were sensitive to the oxygen concentration in the primary oxidizer. The performance of direct O₂ injection around the primary oxidizer with low O₂ concentration was dependent on the mixing of the fuel and oxidizer. The predictions showed that swirl number adjustment and careful direct oxygen injection design are essential for retrofitting air‐firing pulverized coal burners as oxy‐firing burners.     

Mechanism analysis on the pulverized coal combustion flame stability and NOx emission in a swirl burner with deep air staging

Low NOx burner and air staged combustion are widely applied to control NOx emission in coal-fired power plants. The gas-solid two-phase flow, pulverized coal combustion and NOx emission characteristics of a single low NOx swirl burner in an existing coal-fired boiler was numerically simulated to analyze the mechanisms of flame stability and in-flame NOx reduction. And the detailed NOx formation and reduction model under fuel rich conditions was employed to optimize NOx emissions for the low NOx burner with air staged combustion of different burner stoichiometric ratios. The results show that the specially-designed swirl burner structures including the pulverized coal concentrator, flame stabilizing ring and baffle plate create an ignition region of high gas temperature, proper oxygen concentration and high pulverized coal concentration near the annular recirculation zone at the burner outlet for flame stability. At the same time, the annular recirculation zone is generated between the primary and secondary air jets to promote the rapid ignition and combustion of pulverized coal particles to consume oxygen, and then a reducing region is formed as fuel-rich environment to contribute to in-flame NO_X reduction. Moreover, the NOx concentration at the outlet of the combustion chamber is greatly reduced when the deep air staged combustion with the burner stoichiometric ratio of 0.75 is adopted, and the CO concentration at the outlet of the combustion chamber can be maintained simultaneously at a low level through the over-fired air injection of high velocity to enhance the mixing of the fresh air with the flue gas, which can provide the optimal solution for lower NOx emission in the existing coal-fired boilers.     

Numerical simulation of the combustion processes in a W‐shaped boiler furnace under different operating conditions

Numerical simulations of gas–solid flows, heat transfer and gas–particle turbulent combustion have been conducted for a three‐dimensional, W‐shaped boiler furnace. The gas–particle flow, distributions of temperature and concentrations of gaseous constituents, distributions of the rates of heat release, burnout rates of coal particles, and formations of volatiles have been predicted. The results indicate that a steady high‐temperature zone is formed under the arch of the W‐shaped flame boiler, this zone would be of benefit to the ignition and carbon burn‐out and suggest that the W‐shaped flame boiler is suitable for burning low‐quality coals and can operate well under different operating conditions for full and partial loads. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Detailed investigation of a pulverized fuel swirl flame in CO2/O2 atmosphere

A novel approach to oxycoal flame stabilization has been developed at the Institute of Heat and Mass Transfer at RWTH Aachen University [D. Toporov, M. Förster, R. Kneer, in: Third Int. Conf. on Clean Coal Technologies for Our Future, Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy, 15-17 May 2007]. The swirl burner design and its operating conditions have been adjusted in order to enforce CO formation thus stabilizing the flame and obtaining a full burnout at levels of O₂ content in the O₂/CO₂ mixture similar to those in air. The paper presents results of detailed numerical and experimental investigations of a stable oxy-fired pulverized coal swirl flame (type-2) obtained with a 21 vol% O₂ concentration. The combustion tests were performed in a vertical pilot-scale furnace (100 kW_th) in the framework of the OXYCOAL-AC research project aiming to develop a membrane-based oxyfuel process. The experimental results concerning gas velocities, gas and particle temperatures, and gas compositions are presented and discussed, focusing on the underlying mechanisms as well as on the aerodynamics of the oxycoal flame. A comparison between measurements and simulations has shown the validity of the numerical method used. The reported data set can be used for validation of numerical models developed for prediction of oxyfuel combustion.     

Study on strengthening combustion and NOx formation properties of rough‐surfaced bluff‐bodies

A new type of pulverized coal burner combining a bend with a rough surface taper 60° bluff‐body has been designed. The cold state test showed that behind the rough‐surfaced bluff‐body there exists a larger recirculation zone, recirculation ratio and stronger turbulence, but its pressure drop increases by about 15–20 per cent more than that of the smooth‐surfaced bluff‐body. The hot state test in a one‐dimensional furnace indicates that the rough‐surfaced bluff‐body has much faster ignition, higher flame temperature and higher burnout ratio. A heat balance model was established using a lumped parameter method for the recirculation zone. Through it, the condition of the primary air was derived for flame stability and the strengthening combustion ability of rough surface in bluff‐body was proved. On the basis of a hot state test, numerical stimulation was performed on NO_x formation. This suggests that rough‐surfaced bluff‐body only increases the production of NO_x a little. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Influence of primary air ratio on flow and combustion characteristics and NOx emissions of a new swirl coal burner

Cold airflow experiments on a small-scale burner model, as well as in situ experiments on a centrally fuel-rich swirl coal combustion burner were conducted. Measurements were taken from within a 300 MW_e wall-fired pulverized-coal utility boiler installed with eight of centrally fuel-rich swirl coal combustion burners in the bottom row of the furnace during experiments. Various primary air ratios, flow characteristics, gas temperature and gas species concentrations in the burner region were measured. The results of these analyses show that with decreasing primary air ratio, the swirl intensity of air, divergence angles and maximum length and diameter of the central recirculation zone all increased, and the turbulence intensity of the jet flow peaked but decayed quickly. In the burner nozzle region, gas temperature, temperature gradient and CO concentration increased with decreasing primary air ratio, while O₂ and NO_x concentration decreased. Different primary air ratios, the gas temperatures and gas species concentrations in the side-wall region varied slightly.     

花瓣燃烧器流场特性分析与研究

采用三维贴体坐标结构化网格,对复杂曲面形状的新型旋流燃烧器(花瓣燃烧器)进行了三维的流场数值实验.模拟了旋流的衰减过程,分析了花瓣燃烧器的流场特点;首次给出了旋流燃烧器回流区的立体形状图,直观地反映了回流区的特性;分析了普通旋流燃烧器和花瓣燃烧器的流场参数,并对掺混系数进行了对比;通过花瓣燃烧器流场特性的研究得出,花瓣燃烧器的回流区是由径向回流区和中心回流区融合构成,端部呈花瓣状,所形成的特殊流场能够使煤粉颗粒从燃烧器喷入炉内后,不是首先向外扩散,而是迅速地进入回流区,与高温烟气迅速混合,形成稳定热源,为煤粉着火燃烧提供了前提条件,具有良好的稳燃性能.     

The influence of swirl burner structure on the gas/particle flow characteristics

Improvements were made to a low-NO_x axial swirl burner (LNASB), aimed at mitigating slagging in a 600-MWe boiler burning bituminous coal. The new design is referred to as improved low-NO_x axial swirl burner (ILNASB). This paper describes investigations of the influence of swirl burner structure on the gas/particle flow characteristics using a three-dimensional particle-dynamics anemometer. In comparing results from both ILNASB and LNASB, a central recirculation zone is seen to form in the region x/d = 0.1–0.3 within the ILNASB. This zone had shifted from the region between primary and secondary air in LNASB to a region between inner and outer secondary air. In the vicinity of the burner outlet, particle volume flux is reduced significantly in the central recirculation zone. In contrast, this flux is high near the central axis in ILNASB, thus concentrating a great fraction of pulverized coal near the central axis. Form the study, the gas/particle flow characteristics of the ILNASB show that the improved burner has the ability to ease slagging and reduce NO_x emissions.     

径向外浓内淡旋流燃烧器NO_x排放和燃尽率的试验研究

在一台1 MW的热态煤粉燃烧试验炉上进行热态模拟试验,用两台双调风旋流燃烧器对冲燃烧,并且在主燃烧器上方的不同位置还布置了燃尽风装置(OFA)。主燃烧器使用的是变截面的一次风管和碰撞环相结合,在一次风管内,风粉气流在惯性的作用下分离为外浓内淡的环状气流,从而实现了燃烧器喷口处沿直径方向的浓淡分布。通过对陕北神华优质烟煤、山西河津劣质烟煤和山西长治贫煤这三种特性相差较大的煤的燃烧对比实验,得到了燃尽风布置的相对位置变化,一次风率、内二次风率、外二次风率的变化,内二次风、外二次风旋流强度等因素的变化,对NOx的生成和对飞灰含碳量的影响作用,同时也得到了NOx的生成和燃尽率之间的相互关系,以及对燃烧的稳定性、经济性的影响因素,其结果对工程设计和实际应用有着重要的指导意义。     

旋流煤粉燃烧技术的发展

文中回顾了国内外旋流煤粉燃烧技术的发展,根据二次风的供入方式,一次风粉混合物煤粉浓度的不同将此类技术分为三类：普通型、分级燃烧型、浓缩型、浓缩型又分为高浓度型及浓淡型,总结了各种类型燃烧器在火焰稳定性、燃烧效率、ＮＯｘ排放、结渣、高温腐蚀、调节性能等方面的特点,指出浓淡型旋流煤粉燃烧器是我国旋流煤粉燃烧技术的发展方向。     

Influence of inlet flow conditions on the performance of a swirl‐stabilized combustor burning liquid fuel spray

A numerical model of liquid fuel spray combustion is developed to study the effects of inlet flow conditions of primary and dilution air on the performance of a swirl‐stabilized axi‐symmetric combustor. The model is based on two‐phase stochastic separated flow approach. A standard k–ϵ model with logarithmic law of the wall for the near‐wall region is adopted for the solution of the gas phase turbulence. The chemical reaction is taken as a single step, irreversible, global one with the rate determined by the kinetically and diffusionally controlled rates. The liquid spray is divided into a finite number of droplet classes with the size distribution following a probability function. It has been observed that an improved pattern factor and better combustion efficiency can be obtained when both the primary and the dilution air streams enter the combustor with swirl, but in the counter‐rotating directions. However, the combustor pressure loss factor increases for the counter‐rotating flow entries of the primary and the dilution air compared to the co‐rotating air entries or to the swirled primary and non‐swirled dilution air entries. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

旋流煤粉多相流动与燃烧一维数学模型及应用

为了发展和有效地进行旋流煤粉多相流动与燃烧数值模拟,作者在多连续介质模型的框架中建立了综合考虑气-固两相旋流流动,燃烧与传热的旋流煤粉燃烧一维数学模型。应用这一模型对涡旋燃烧炉环形通道内煤粉燃烧和气体燃烧的数值计算表明,该模型可快速有效地用于模拟旋流煤粉多相流动与燃烧过程,给出炉内温度、速度与浓度分布以及燃烧效率等主要参数。     

中储式热风送粉W型火焰锅炉炉内空气动力场实验研究

针对引进美国FW公司的配备双旋风分离式煤粉燃烧器的W型火焰锅炉,在相似模化的基础上建立冷态模型,利用热线风速仪与示踪法测量了不同工况下炉内的空气动力场,得出了不同工况内流场的矢量图、火焰长度、炉内主气流在炉深方向上的分曲线以及主气流充满度变化曲线,通过实验结果对炉内空气动力特性进行了分析,研究结果表明,沿水平方向高速送入炉内的三次风对炉内空气动力特性有显著影响。     

Effects of swirl on the stability of jet diffusion flames

An experimental study was made, using a double-swirl burner, of the stability of swirling-fuel-jet diffusion flames in swirling air streams. The fuels were hydrogen and methane. The primary variables studied were swirl intensities of the fuel jet and the air stream. It was found that the stability of flame depended on the swirl intensity of both the fuel jet and the air stream. The application of swirl to the fuel jet decreased the rim stability of the flame, but increased the blowout stability of the lifted diffusion flame. For low swirl intensity of the air stream, the effect was similar to that of the fuel jet. At higher swirl intensities of the air stream, above a critical value, the flame stability increased noticeably because of the formation of a recirculation zone near the injector exit. Even in strongly swirling air streams, the favorable effect of fuel swirl on stability of the lifted flame was evident, particularly for the methane flame.     

A dimensionless factor characterizing the ignition of pulverized coal flow: Analytical model,experimental verification,and application

An analytical model describing the ignition process of pulverized coal is proposed, and a dimensionless condition number (N_com) is obtained to describe the comprehensive effect of factors governing the ignition of pulverized coal flow, such as the initial temperature of flow, the sectional heat load of the furnace, and the flux of primary air, secondary air and recirculation flue gas. An optimized concentration of pulverized coal flow is derived explicitly, upon which the earliest ignition of pulverized coal flow is possible. The model is verified in a hot furnace experiment, where it is shown that the derived criterion (N_com) can be used for different kinds of coal and different types of burner. For given coal and sectional heat load of furnace, when the value of N_com increases, the condition of ignition is improved and both unburned carbon and NO_x emission are reduced. The employment of N_com in the optimization of burner operating conditions is demonstrated through two applications. In practice, the criterion N_com can be used to guide the selection of the concentration and type of pulverized coal, as well as the choice of burner and desired aerodynamic field, so as to achieve an optimized performance. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hydrogen addition effects in a confined swirl-stabilized methane-air flame

The effect of hydrogen addition in methane-air premixed flames has been examined from a swirl-stabilized combustor under confined conditions. The effect of hydrogen addition in methane-air flame has been examined over a range of conditions using a laboratory-scale premixed combustor operated at 5.81 kW. Different swirlers have been investigated to identify the role of swirl strength to the incoming mixture. The flame stability was examined for the effect of amount of hydrogen addition, combustion air flow rates and swirl strengths. This was carried out by comparing adiabatic flame temperatures at the lean flame limit. The combustion characteristics of hydrogen-enriched methane flames at constant heat load but different swirl strengths have been examined using particle image velocimetry (PIV), micro-thermocouples and OH chemiluminescence diagnostics that provided information on velocity, thermal field, and combustion generated OH species concentration in the flame, respectively. Gas analyzer was used to obtain NO_x and CO concentration at the combustor exit. The results show that the lean stability limit is extended by hydrogen addition. The stability limit can reduce at higher swirl intensity to the fuel-air mixture operating at lower adiabatic flame temperatures. The addition of hydrogen increases the NO_x emission; however, this effect can be reduced by increasing either the excess air or swirl intensity. The emissions of NO_x and CO from the premixed flame were also compared with a diffusion flame type combustor. The NO_x emissions of hydrogen-enriched methane premixed flame were found to be lower than the corresponding diffusion flame under same operating conditions for the fuel-lean case.     

运行参数对锅炉煤粉着火燃烧和飞灰含碳量影响的数值研究

为了达到锅炉的优化运行以保证煤粉气流及时着火和充分燃尽，采用IPSA两相流动模型和煤粉燃烧综合模型，在不同的一次风率和煤粉细度的工况下，对1台350MW锅炉煤粉燃烧过程进行了数值模拟，得出了炉内燃烧器区域以及出口处烟气温度场和燃烧产物的组分浓度分布。分析了一次风率和煤粉细度对煤粉着火燃烧和飞灰含碳量的影响规律，并确定了优化的运行参数。结果表明：一次风率对煤粉气流的着火影响较大，而对出口处烟气温度、氧量以及飞灰含碳量影响较小。煤粉细度对煤粉气流的着火、燃烧以及燃尽均有较大影响。图8表2参9     

一种用于携带流反应器试验台的煤粉燃烧器的优化设计

为了优化一种用于携带流反应器系统的煤粉燃烧器结构参数,降低氮氧化物排放,本文利用计算流体动力学软件FLUENT对该煤粉燃烧器结构参数的优化过程进行了数值模拟研究,并与试验结果进行了对比验证。结果表明,燃烧器一次风喷口采用扩口结构以及对冲二次风的引入均能有效的促进二次风与一次风煤粉的混合,增强煤粉着火及燃烧的稳定性。适当增加二次风喷口与一次风喷口的间距可以加速煤粉的燃尽。采用优化后的结构参数可以获得更低的氮氧化物排放,为基于携带流反应器系统的燃煤污染物减排研究提供了坚实的基础。