Experimental and Kinetic Modeling of the Oxidation of Synthetic Jet Fuels and Surrogates

ABSTRACT

The interest for synthetic and/or bio-derived jet fuels is increasing with the aim of reducing air transportation dependence on fossil fuels, soot emissions, and carbon footprint. Jet fuels can be produced through Fischer–Tropsch synthesis of paraffins followed by post-processing or blending to meet jet fuel specifications. Synthetic jet fuels mainly contain n-alkanes, iso-alkanes, and cyclo-alkanes, with possible aromatic fractions. The aim of this work is to study the kinetics of oxidation of gas-to-liquid (GtL) and coal-to-liquid (CtL) alternative jet fuels and representative surrogates in a jet-stirred reactor (JSR) operating under the same conditions of temperature, pressure, and equivalence ratio. To experimentally represent the selected synthetic jet fuels, we have designed surrogates consisting of 3–5 representative species. We experimentally studied the oxidation of these representative mixtures (n-decane, iso-octane, and decalin for GtL; n-decane, iso-octane, n-propylcyclohexane, decalin, and n-propylbenzene for CtL), a 100% GtL, and a 100% CtL in a JSR at 10 atm and an equivalence ratio φ = 1. A detailed kinetic reaction mechanism (2430 species versus 10,962 reversible reactions) and model fuels (4–7 components) were developed and validated by comparison with experimental results.

KEYWORDS:

• Jet fuel
• Jet-stirred reactor
• Kinetic modeling
• Oxidation

Funding

The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013)/ERC grant agreement no. 291049−2G-CSafe.

Additional information

Funding

The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013)/ERC grant agreement no. 291049−2G-CSafe.