Combustion of Liquid Fuel Sprays

Essex

PREFACE

The development of spray combustion has effectively followed two separate paths, one concerned with engine applications in which the aerospace applications have dominated the field, the second has been concerned with stationary equipment such as furnaces and boilers. Generally textbooks have been concerned with one area or the other and the object of this book is to outline the fundamentals of the combustion of sprays in a unified way which may be applied to any existing or future technological application. During the last decade the necessity of controlling the emission of pollutants has assumed greater significance in all aspects of combustion. More recently the requirements have been for pollution control and increased combustion efficiency. In the future it will be necessary to burn fuels which are of low or variable quality or synthetic fuels having properties differing greatly from present-day fuels. For all these developments a greater understanding of spray combustion is required.

This book has been written at a level suitable for those entering the subject and for students undertaking courses or research in fuel, combustion or energy studies. The emphasis has been towards the fundamental aspects although some industrial applications have been outlined, and where possible the text is augmented by Appendices expanding certain quantitative aspects of the book.

I am indebted to a number of individuals and organisations for assistance and the provision of material, namely Mr. P. Beard, Professor N. Chigier, Mr. J.B. Champion, Professor I. Fells, Mr. R.A. Freeman, Mr. D. Gunn, Dr. G. Masdin, Dr. K.J. Matthews, Dr. K. Salooja, Mr. P. Sharp, Dr. P.J. Street, Professor J. Swithenbank, Dr. J. Sykes, Mr. S. Turner, Airoil Flaregas, Babcock Energy Ltd., CEGB, Foster-Wheeler Power, Hamworthy Combustion Systems Ltd., Malvern Instruments, NEI (International Combustion Ltd.) Peabody-Holmes Ltd., Stein Atkinson Stordy, Stordy Engineering, The Institute of Energy, Weishaupt (UK) Ltd.

CHAPTER 1

SPRAY COMBUSTION AS A SOURCE OF ENERGY

Publisher Summary

This chapter discusses about spray combustion as a source of energy. The combustion of sprays of liquid fuels is of considerable technological importance to a diversity of applications ranging from steam raising, furnaces, space heating, and diesel engines to space rockets. Because of the importance of these applications, spray combustion alone is responsible for a considerable proportion of the total energy requirements of the world. Spray combustion is a powerful method of burning relatively involatile liquid fuels; indeed it remains the major way of burning heavy fuel oils even at present, though they can be burned in fluidized bed combustors. The basic process involved is the disintegration or atomization of the liquid fuel to produce a spray of small droplets to increase the surface area so that the rates of heat and mass transfer during combustion are greatly enhanced. A burning spray differs from a premixed, combustible gaseous system in that it is not uniform in composition. The fuel is present in the form of discrete liquid droplets which may have a range of sizes and they may move in different directions with different velocities to that of the main stream of gas. This lack of uniformity in the unburnt mixture results in the irregularities in the propagation of the flame through the spray and thus the combustion zone is geometrically poorly defined.

1.1 The General Nature of Spray Combustion

The combustion of sprays of liquid fuels is of considerable technological importance to a diversity of applications ranging from steam raising, furnaces, space heating, diesel engines to space rockets. Because of the importance of these applications spray combustion alone is responsible for a considerable proportion of the total energy requirements of the world, this being about 25% in 1988.

Spray combustion was first used in the 1880’s as a powerful method of burning relatively involatile liquid fuels, indeed it remains the major way of burning heavy fuel oils today even though they can now be burned in fluidised bed combustors. The basic process involved is the disintegration or atomisation of the liquid fuel to produce a spray of small droplets in order to increase the surface area so that the rates of heat and mass transfer during combustion are greatly enhanced. Thus the atomisation of a 1 cm diameter droplet of liquid into droplets of 100 μm diameter produces 10⁶ droplets and increases the surface area by a factor of 10,000.

A burning spray differs from a premixed, combustible gaseous system in that it is not uniform in composition. The fuel is present in the form of discrete liquid droplets which may have a range of sizes and they may move in different directions with different velocities to that of the main stream of gas. This lack of uniformity in the unburnt mixture results in irregularities in the propagation of the flame through the spray and thus the combustion zone is geometrically poorly defined.

Flames used in industrial applications are highly complex systems because of various complicating factors such as the complex flow and mixing pattern in the combustor chamber, heat transfer during the combustion process, and the non-uniform size of the spray droplets. For purposes of demonstration the assumption is often made that the system is uni-dimensional. Thus the flame can be considered as a flowing reaction system in which the properties of flow, temperature, etc. vary only in the direction of flow and are constant in any cross section perpendicular to the direction of flow.

The general nature of the processes involved in spray combustion in such an idealised case for the combustion of a dilute spray is shown in Figure 1.1. Such systems, containing droplet diffusion flames are characterised by their yellow nature. In this one-dimensional case the individual droplets that make up the spray burn as discrete droplets in a surrounding oxidising atmosphere which is most commonly air. This heterogeneous spray combustion is also clearly shown in Plate 1.1 which shows a simplified (flat) spray system. This plate also demonstrates the other major features of a spray flame, namely atomisation, air entrainment, flame stabilisation and the irregular nature of atomisation. The flame front is visible as a diffuse zone across the upper part of the plate. Sprays can also burn in what is effectively a homogeneous way in that the droplets can evaporate as they approach the flame zone so that in fact clouds of fuel vapour are actually burning rather than droplets. This is illustrated diagrammatically in Figure 1.2. Such flames are characterised by their blue colour and are usually associated with sprays of volatile fuels (such as aviation kerosine) which have small initial droplet diameters (e.g. 10 μm).

Plate 1.1 The essential features of a burning spray. This particular spray flame is produced by means of a fan jet atomiser.

Figure 1.1 A diagrammatic model of idealised heterogeneous spray combustion.

Figure 1.2 A diagrammatic model of idealised homogeneous spray combustion.

It is clear that for any detailed understanding of the process of spray combustion it is necessary to have an adequate knowledge of the combustion of the individual droplets that make up the spray so that a burning spray may be regarded as an ensemble of individual burning or evaporating particles. However it is also necessary to have a statistical description of the droplets that make up the spray with regard to droplet size and distribution in space.

The essential stages involved in spray combustion are outlined in Figure 1.3. The fuel is transmitted from the fuel storage tank by a fuel handling system that incorporates pumps, filters and some means of control to an atomiser by means of which the fuel is atomised into small droplets, these droplets are usually injected directly into the combustion chamber where they burn. The combustion process is very complicated because, to a large extent, the mixing of the fuel and oxidant takes place inside the chamber and thus the mechanics of the mixing process play an important rôle. This mixing process is controlled by the geometry of the combustion chamber, the spatial distribution and momentum of the injected spray, the direction and momentum of the air flow and the influence of any flame stabilisation devices. Consequently the atomiser and combustion chamber should be designed as an integrated unit rather than as independent items.

Figure 1.3 The major combustion processes in a spray combustion chamber.

1.2 Sources of Liquid Fuels Used in Spray Combustion

The liquid fuels used at the present time are almost exclusively the fuel oils. The term ‘fuel oil’ means different things in different countries but essentially it covers the range of products from gas oil to extremely viscous products of high molecular weight. This group encompasses both diesel fuels and industrial fuels used in boilers and furnaces. Their major source is crude oil but fuel oils can also be produced from coal by solvent extraction as well as by the pyrolysis of oil shale and tar sands. Alternative liquid fuels can also be produced from plants, such as vegetable oils (soya bean, palm oil etc.), or by slurries of finely powdered coal (ca 70 wt %) or bitumen particles dispersed in water.

In view of the increase in world energy consumption and the importance of the contribution of oil as illustrated in Figures 1.4 and 1.5, there has been considerable interest in the security of oil supplies as well as in its price. As far as the global supply of oil on a long term basis is concerned then the general indications are that the total world ultimately recoverable is of the order of 250 Gt (10⁹ tonnes) (Masters et al, 1987). This includes 40 Gt tonnes already recovered, some 90 Gt tonnes in proved identifiable reserves whilst the rest is an undiscovered resource. In addition there are recoverable reserves of extra heavy oil of about 8 Gt of which 7.6 Gt are in Venezuela, together with 10 Gt of natural bitumen distributed mainly in Canada (4 Gt) and USA (6 Gt). Table 1.1 lists the present-day fossil fuel reserves of oil, gas, coal and uranium and the dominance of the coal reserves is clear (Appendix 1 lists some energy interconversion factors). It is interesting to note that in the case of crude oil that the proven reserves have not changed over the last 25 years and indeed the ratio of (proven reserves) / (production rate) has remained effectively invariant with a value of about 32, and thus oil has behaved over that time as if it is an infinite resource, which is clearly not the case. Table 1.2 indicates the possible lifetimes of crude oil based on the assumptions of (a) the present-day demand, and (b) a continued expansion of oil demand assuming it increases at the rate of 5% per annum. The difference in lifetime of oil and coal is illustrated in Figure 1.6. Whilst future growth rates always remain uncertain it is clear that by the early part of the next century alternative sources of liquid fuels must be developed, these may be based on coal in view of its extensive resource base, or on biomass or synthetic fuels generated by some other renewable energy source such as solar.

Table 1.1

Estimates of world fossil fuel reserves (Gt (10⁹ tonnes) oil or oil equivalent (Fells et al, 1986).

Table 1.2

Estimated lifetimes of possible oil supplies (years).

Figure 1.4 World energy consumption trends (Fells, et al, 1986).

Figure 1.5 Patterns of energy consumption: The graphs illustrate the relative share of each fuel in the total annual energy consumption of various geographical areas, NGAS - natural gas, N - nuclear, H - hydro, R - other renewables and X - total pacific OECD forecast. (Fells et al, 1986).

Figure 1.6 Comparison of possible future usage of oil and coal. The area under each curve represents their respective world reserves.

1.2.1 Fuel Oils from Crude Oil

The main source of liquid fuels at the present time is crude petroleum which occurs naturally in sedimentary basins in the earth’s strata. They are derived from vegetable and animal remains such as proteins, lipid, polyisoprene hydrocarbons such as terpenes and derivatives of porphyrins, since chlorophyl is an important plant ingredient. Loss of oxygen and nitrogen leaves a largely hydrocarbon mixture. The hydrocarbons, pristane and phytane, have been used as biological markers and the pristane/phytane ratio has been used as an indicator of the oxidising conditions under which the sediments were deposited. As a result crude oil consists essentially of hydrocarbons together with smaller quantities of sulphur, oxygen, nitrogen-containing hydrocarbons and some organo-metallic compounds particularly of vanadium and iron, sodium is also present as sodium chloride. Gaseous, liquid and solid (or semi-solid) compounds may be present in crude oil and these are separated at the wellhead and during the refining processes to give a range of liquid products, some of which are used as fuels for spray combustion. The properties of the liquid fuels produced are markedly dependent upon the source of the fuel, the nature of the refining operations and method of blending used to produce the final product.

The hydrocarbons present in crude oil have differing boiling points and are separated by the process of distillation into a range of primary products. The nature of many of the final products, particularly the fuel oils, is determined by the chemical composition of the crude oil that is distilled. Because of the multiplicity of the molecular species present, crude oils, as well as the products, may be classified in terms of the concentrations of broad chemical groupings, namely paraffinic, naphthenic, aromatic or asphaltic. During the process of distillation and other refining operations these products are distributed amongst the final products according to their properties as are the sulphur and nitrogen-containing hydrocarbons, etc. and inorganic components.

A typical but simplified refinery flowsheet is illustrated in Figure 1.7. The raw crude oil is fractionated in the crude distillation unit into distillate and residuum streams. Typically in a two-stage unit, an atmospheric tower produces middle distillates and lighter fractions with a vacuum section producing a heavy gas oil cracking stock and other streams for lubricating oil production, etc. Before processing the salt and water concentrations are reduced and then the crude is flash distilled, thus producing gases and gasoline and a number of sidestreams which after additional purification stages yield directly aviation kerosines, diesel fuels and gas oils. The major finishing process used for these products is hydrotreating in which mild hydrogenation conditions are employed to reduce the concentrations of sulphur, oxygen and nitrogen compounds as well as the unsaturated compounds. A number of properties are improved by this process, particularly odour and stability. The stripped atmospheric bottoms are reheated and passed to the vacuum tower. Here further yields of (vacuum) gas oils are produced whilst the vacuum residuum is used directly or if further processed. In the latter case the residuum may be processed in a visbreaker to produce essentially a gas oil product directly available for sale. Alternatively it may be charged to a delayed coker to produce gas oil and lighter fractions as well as petroleum coke. Thus, apart from these two processes, the distillation process provides the whole range of fuel oils since the final products are blended from straight distillates, residues and by-products from other refinery operations. A number of additives may be incorporated into the final product; in the case of aviation fuels used for spray combustion the additives normally present are anti-oxidants whilst in the case of engine fuels pour-point depressants, antiwear additives and antirust additives may be present. Other additives to reduce pollutant formation may be added prior to use; these are discussed in Chapter 6. Further details of these processes are outlined in standard textbooks on petroleum, e.g. Modern Petroleum Technology, Hobson and Pohl,