IFTS measurements of a laboratory scale laminar flame

Abstract

A point-and-shoot, passive remote sensing technology is highly desired to accurately monitor the combustion efficiency (CE) of petrochemical flares. A Phase II DOE-funded SBIR effort is being led by Spectral Sciences, Inc. to develop the methodologies needed to enable remote CE measurements via spectral remote sensing. Part of this effort entails standing up a laboratory-scale flare measurement laboratory to develop and validate CE measurements. This paper presents an overview and summarizes current progress of the Air Force Institute of Technology's (AFIT) contribution to this multi-organization, two-year effort. As a first step, a Telops Hyper-Cam longwave infrared (LWIR, 750-1300cm^-1 or 7.7-13.3μm) imaging Fourier-transformspectrometer (IFTS) is used to examine a laminar, calibration flame produced by a Hencken burner. Ethylene and propane were combusted under several different fuel/air mixing ratios. For each event, 300 hyperspectral datacubes were collected on a 172(W)×200(H) pixel window at a 1.5cm^-1 spectral resolution. Each pixel had approximately a 1.5×1.5mm² instantaneous field-of-view (IFOV). Structured emission is evident throughout the combustion region with several lines arising from H₂O; other lines have not yet been assigned. These first known IFTS measurements of a laminar Hencken-burner flame are presented along with some preliminary analysis. While the laminar flame appears stationary to the eye, significant flame flicker at a fundamental frequency of 17Hz was observed in the LWIR, and this is expected to complicate spectral interpretation for species concentrations and temperature retrieval. Changes to the fuel-air ratio (FAR) produced sizable changes in spectral intensity. Combustion spectra of ethylene and propane corresponding to ideal FAR were nearly identical.