THE EFFECT OF IMPURITIES ON IGNITION DELAY TIMES AND LAMINAR FLAME SPEEDS OF SYNGAS MIXTURES AT GAS TURBINE CONDITIONS
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In addition to mostly H2 and CO, syngas also contains reasonable amounts of light hydrocarbons, CO2, H2O, N2, and Ar. Impurities such as NH3, HCN, COS, H2S, and NOx (NO, NO2, N2O) are also commonly found in syngas. The presence of these impurities, even in very low concentrations, can induce some large changes in combustion properties. Although they introduce potential design and operational issues for gas turbines, these changes in combustion properties due to the presence of impurities are still not well characterized. The aim of this work was therefore to investigate numerically the effect of the presence of impurities in realistic syngas compositions on some fundamental combustion properties of premixed systems such as laminar flame speed and ignition delay time, at realistic engine operating conditions. To perform this study, a state-of-the-art C0C3 detailed kinetics mechanism was used. This mechanism was combined with recent, optimized sub-mechanisms for impurities which can impact the combustion properties of the syngas such as nitrogenous species (i.e., N2O, NO2, NH3, and HCN) and sulfur-based species such as H2S, SO2 and COS. Several temperatures, pressures, and equivalence ratios were investigated. The results of this study showed that the addition of some impurities modifies notably the reactivity of the mixture. The ignition delay time is decreased by the addition of NO2 and H2S at the temperatures and pressures for which the HO2 radical dominates the H2 combustion. However, while NO2 has no effect when OH is dominating, H2S increases the ignition delay time in such conditions for pressures above 1 atm. The amplitude of these effects is however dependent on the impurity concentration. Laminar flame speeds are not sensitive to NO2 addition but they are to NH3 and HCN, inducing a small reduction of the laminar flame speed at fuel rich conditions. H2S exhibits some inhibiting effects on the laminar flame speed but only for high concentrations. The inhibiting effects of NH3, HCN, and H2S are due to the OH radical consumption by these impurities, leading to the formation of radicals that are less reactive.
