Large eddy simulation investigation of pressure and wall heat loss effects on rich ammonia-hydrogen-air combustion in a gas turbine burner

Abstract

Ammonia is currently investigated as a sustainable energy source. Its mixture with hydrogen may present combustion characteristics that are similar to those of hydrocarbon, which motivates its use in gas turbines burners. Such similarities were discussed at atmospheric pressure in previous works for a fuel blend with a molar fraction of hydrogen XH2Fuel=0.46, which is further studied here. The influences of pressure and wall heat loss on ammonia/hydrogen/air flames are for the first time investigated via large eddy simulation. A first campaign is led at both 1 and 5 atm, to estimate the effect of pressure. It demonstrates that NO emissions are favoured by flame interactions with a hot wall, along which NO is convected. Accordingly, the flame length reduction observed at high pressure, due to higher heat release rates, leads to a more efficient NO consumption. Increasing the pressure shifts the equivalence ratio for optimal NH3 and NOX emissions towards the lean side. It results in lower hydrogen emissions and therefore an increase of the combustion efficiency. Finally, the NH3 and NOX emissions at optimal equivalence ratio are reduced from 450 ppmv for φ = 1.27 at 1 atm, to ∼ 100 ppmv for φ = 1.20 at 5 atm. A second campaign is led at both 1 and 5 atm, by varying the burner wall thermal boundary conditions. Lean combustion with cold walls presents high N2O emissions of 607 ppmv while in rich cases, the higher gas temperatures and the excess of H radicals in the burned gases yield complete N2O consumption. It is shown that heat loss effect on N2O fractions distribution is reduced at high pressure due to weaker flame interaction with the cold walls. Finally, thermal boundary conditions are found to significantly affect NOX, N2O and NH3 emissions, showing that heat losses should be considered when modelling such configuration.