Investigation of Hydrogen-enriched Low Calorific Value Landfill Gas Combustion in a Porous Medium Based Burner

Project Details

Description

Methane containing Landfill gas (LFG) is one of the promising renewable sources of energy which is somewhat underutilized due to various techno-economic issues. Currently, high calorific value LFG is utilised for electricity generation, production of synthetic natural gas and heating needs. Low calorific value LFG containing <40 vol% CH4 is mainly managed by on-site flaring or controlled venting which is a waste of renewable source of energy and also harmful to the environment. The low calorific value LFG is undesirable for industrial energy applications due to low energy content, low laminar burning velocity and difficulty in maintaining stable flame. The prior research have shown that fuel enrichment with high quality fuel such as hydrogen, can effectively be used to enhance the combustion performance of low calorific value LFG. Furthermore, porous medium burners are proven to be effective in combustion of low calorific value gases and results in low level of harmful emissions. However, limited research investigations have been carried out to study the combustion performance of hydrogen-enriched low calorific value LFG in porous medium burners and hence lack the knowledge of optimum operating parameters for efficient combustion and reduced emissions. In this research study, the combustion and emission performance of hydrogen-enriched low calorific value LFG in a porous medium burner is investigated using numerical and experimental techniques with an expectation of developing necessary knowledge and data to develop efficient porous medium based combustion technology for potential industrial process heating.

According to the prior research, Silicon Carbide (SiC) porous medium is more effective in combustion of low calorific value gases due to its high heat transfer properties and thermal shock resistance. Numerical model will be developed to investigate the combustion and emission performance of hydrogen-enriched low calorific value LFG (with <40 vo% CH4) in a SiC porous medium burner. ANSYS CHEMKIN will be used with GRI-Mech 3.0 chemical kinetics mechanisms for gas-phase chemical kinetics analysis. The effect of different LFG compositions, hydrogen enrichment percentage, inlet velocities and porous media characteristics on combustion and emissions will be investigated fully. The insight from the numerical analysis will be used to develop a suitable SiC porous medium burner and experimental investigations will be carried out to establish stable combustion region for different fuel gas mixtures and equivalence ratios. The combustion and emission performance data will then be obtained experimentally for different gas mixtures operating within the established stable flame regions. The experiments will be carried out for SiC porous media with different pore densities. It is expected that the numerical and experimental investigations results provide necessary knowledge and fundamental data to develop optimised porous medium based burner technologies to utilise hydrogen-enriched low calorific value LFG for industrial applications.
StatusActive
Effective start/end date1/01/2431/12/26

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