Syngas combustion: Analysis of exergy losses

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2013

Authors

Silva, V (Author) Other; Couto, N (Author) Other; J L Alexandre (Author) FEUP; Rouboa, A (Author) Other

Journal

Title: Advanced Science Letters

Vol. 19

Pages: 609-614

ISSN: 1936-6612

Publisher: American Scientific Publishers

Indexing

Scopus - 0 Citations

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-008-AFG

DOI: 10.1166/asl.2013.4727

Abstract (EN): An exergy analysis was carried out considering the combustion of methane and syngas obtained from biomass pine residues, abundant specie in Portugal. Taking into account that the irreversibilities of a thermodynamic process are path dependent, the combustion process was considered as resulting from different hypothetical paths each one characterized by four main sub-processes: reactant mixing, fuel oxidation, internal thermal energy exchange (heat transfer), and product mixing. The exergetic efficiency was computed using a zero dimensional model developed by using a Visual Basic home code. It was concluded that the exergy losses were mainly due to the internal thermal energy exchange sub-process. The exergy losses from this sub-process are higher when the reactants are preheated up to the ignition temperature without previous fuel oxidation. On the other hand, the global exergy destruction can be minored increasing the pressure, the reactants temperature and the oxygen content on the oxidant stream. This methodology allows the identification of the phenomena and processes that have larger exergy losses, the understanding of why these losses occur and how the exergy changes with the parameters associated to each system which is crucial to implement the syngas combustion from biomass products as a competitive technology.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific