TURBULENT FLAME SPEED AS AN INDICATOR FOR FLASHBACK PROPENSITY OF HYDROGEN-RICH FUEL GASES

摘要

The turbulent flame speed (ST) is proposed to be an indicator of flashback propensity for hydrogen-rich fuel gases at gas turbine relevant conditions. Flashback is an inevitable issue to be concerned about when introducing fuel gases containing high hydrogen content to gas turbine engines, which are conventionally fueled with natural gas. These hydrogen-containing fuel gases are present in the process of the integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) with and without pre-combustion carbon capture, and both syngas (H_2 + CO) and hydrogen with various degree of inert dilution fall in this category. More understanding on the flashback phenomenon for these mixtures is thus necessary in order to evolve the IGCC concept (either with or without carbon capture) into a promising candidate for clean power generation. Compared to syngas, the hydrogen-rich fuel mixtures exhibit an even narrower operational envelope between the occurrence of lean blow out and flashback. When flashback occurs, the flame propagation is found to happen exclusively in the boundary layer of the pipe supplying the premixed fuel/air mixture to the combustor. This finding is based on the experimental investigation of turbulent, lean-premixed, non-swirled, confined jet flames for three fuel mixtures with H_2 > 70 Vol.%. Measurements were performed up to 10 bar at fixed bulk velocity at the combustor inlet (u_0 = 40 m/s) and preheat temperature (T_0 = 623 K). Flame front characteristics were retrieved via OH-PLIF diagnostics, and turbulent flame speed (S_T) was derived accordingly from the perspective of a global consumption rate. Concerning the flashback limit, the operational range of the hydrogen-rich mixtures is found to be well represented by the velocity gradients prescribed respectively by the flame (g_c) and the flow (g_f). The former (g_c) is determined as ST/(Le × δ_(L0)), where Le is the Lewis number and δ_(L0) is the calculated thermal thickness of the one-dimensional laminar flame. The latter (g_f) is predicted by the Blasius correlation for fully developed turbulent pipe flow, and it indicates the capability with which the flow can counteract the opposed flame propagation. Our results show that the equivalence ratios at which the two velocity gradients reach similar levels correspond well to the flashback limits observed at various pressures. The methodology is also found to be capable of predicting the aforementioned difference in the operational range between syngas and hydrogen-rich mixtures.