Experimental investigation on the effect of CO2 diluents on pollutants emission in propane-air non-premixed flames

Authors

Abstract

Control of nitric oxides (NOx) is one of the key elements in designing combustion systems because of the important role on ozone layer destruction and smog formation. Because of the sensitivity of thermal NO mechanism to temperature, a practical and scientific method for thermal NO reduction is decreasing the flame temperature. Dilution is one way to reduce maximum temperature in the combustion chamber which in turn leads to a reduction in formation of the thermal NO. The aim of this paper is to present an experimental study of the effect of CO2 dilution on the formation of the pollutant NOx in the non-premixed flame of propane-air in the combustion chamber. The experimental results were obtained by designing a furnace with an axisymmetric cylindrical combustion chamber. The experiments were conducted with the equivalence ratios from 0.7 to 1.3 and various dilution ratios. The experimental results indicated that by increasing the extent of dilution, maximum temperature of the flame as well as emission of the pollutant NOx from the combustion chamber decrease.

Keywords