Parametric study of upstream flame propagation in hydrogen-enriched premixed combustion: effects of swirl, geometry and premixedness

TL;DR

This study uses LES with a Thickened Flame model to analyze how swirl, premixedness, and geometry influence upstream flame propagation in hydrogen-enriched premixed combustion, revealing key effects of these parameters on flame stability and behavior.

Contribution

It provides new insights into the combined effects of swirl, premixedness, and geometry on hydrogen-enriched flame dynamics using advanced LES-TF modeling.

Findings

Higher swirl strength increases upstream flame movement.

Increased premixedness enhances combustibility and susceptibility to upstream propagation.

Stable combustion occurs at low swirl levels regardless of premixedness.

Abstract

The effect of swirl, premixedness and geometry has been investigated for hydrogen enriched premixed flame using Large Eddy Simulation (LES) with a Thickened Flame (TF) model. Swirl strength has been varied to study the effects of swirl on flame behavior in a laboratory-scale premixed combustor operated under atmospheric conditions. In addition, the levels of premixedness and geometry have also been changed to study the role of these quantities on flame behavior. The turbulent flow field and the chemistry are coupled through TF model. In the LES-TF approach, the flame front is resolved on the computational grid through artificial thickening and the individual species transport equations are directly solved with the reaction rates specified using Arrhenius chemistry. Good agreement is found when comparing predictions with the published experimental data including the predicted RMS fluctuations. Also, the results show that higher swirl strength and increase in level of premixedness make the system more susceptible to upstream flame movement due to higher combustibility of hydrogen, which increases the reaction along the flame front, thereby raises temperature in the reaction zone and leads to combustion induced vortex breakdown (CIVB). Moreover, upstream flame movement is always observed at higher swirl strength irrespective of level of premixedness and burner geometry, whereas the premixed systems exhibit stable behavior while operating at low swirl.