Abstract
The paper presents atomisation measurements, semi-industrial scale experiments and computational fluid dynamics computations of heavy fuel oil combustion in a glass tank simulator. The study has demonstrated the pronounced effect of discrete fuel injection on NOX emissions in glass tank conditions. Injecting and dispersing the oil droplets into the recirculation zone appeared to be a very successful method for NOX emission reduction due to the delayed mixing between oil droplets and combustion air. The method takes advantage of both the high process temperatures and the strong recirculation zone of the glass tank system so that a substantial NOX emission reduction is achievable without excessive CO emissions.
The authors wish to acknowledge St Gobain and the IFRF with its members for co-funding of this work and the gentlemen F. Breussin, A. Bürgers, A. Verlaan and R. Weber who have substantially contributed to the work presented here.