Numerical Simulation of Combustion Characteristics in High Temperature Air Combustion Furnace

The influences of air preheating temperature, oxygen concentration, and fuel inlet temperature on flame properties, and NOx formation and emission in the furnace were studied with numerical simulation. The turbulence behavior was modeled using the standard k-e model with wall function, and radiation was handled using discrete ordi-nate radiation model. The PDF (probability density funetion)/mixture fraction combustion model was used to simu-late the propane combustion. Additionally, computations of NOx formation rates and NOx concentration were carried out using a post-processor on the basis of previously calculated velocities, turbulence, temperature, and chemical composition fields. The results showed that high temperature air combustion (HiTAC) is spread over a much larger volume than traditional combustion, flame volume increases with a reduction of oxygen eoncentration, and this trend is clearer if oxygen concentration in the preheated air is below 10%. The temperature profile becomes more uniform when oxygen concentration in preheated air decreases, especially at low oxygen levels. Increase in fuel inlet tempera-ture lessens the mixing of the fuel and air in primary combustion zone, ereates more uniform distribution of reactants inside the flame, decreases the maximum temperature in furnace, and reduces NOx emission greatly.