The international effort to reduce the environmental impact of electricity generation, especially CO2-emissions requires considerations about alternative energy supply systems. An effective step towards low pollution power generation is the application of hydrogen as a possible alternative gas turbine fuel, if the hydrogen is produced by renewable energy sources, such as wind energy or biomass. The use of hydrogen and hydrogen rich gases as a fuel for industrial applications and power generation combined with the control of polluted emissions, especially NOx, is a major key driver in the design of future gas turbine combustors. The micromix combustion principle allows a secure and low NOx combustion of hydrogen and air and achieves a significant reduction of NOx-emissions. The combustion principle is based on cross-flow mixing of air and gaseous pure hydrogen and burns in multiple miniaturized diffusion-type flames. For the characterization of the jet in cross-flow mixing process, the momentum flux ratio is used. The paper presents an experimental analysis of the momentum flux ratio’s impact on flame anchoring and on the resultant formation of the NOx-emissions. Therefore several prototype test burner with different momentum flux ratios are tested under preheated atmospheric conditions. The investigation shows that the resultant positioning and anchoring of the micro flames highly influences the NOx-formation. Besides the experimental investigations, numerical simulations have been performed by the application of a commercial CFD code. The cold flow simulation results show the mixing of the air and hydrogen after the injection, in particular in the Counter Rotating Vortices (CRV). Furthermore, the hydrogen jet interacts also with another vortex system resulting from a wake flow area behind the combustor geometry. Furthermore, reacting flow simulations have been performed by the application of a Hybrid Eddy Break-Up (EBU) combustion model. The combustion pressure has been varied from atmospheric conditions up to a pressure of 16 bar. The experimental and numerical results highlight further potential of the micromix combustion principle for low NOx-combustion of hydrogen in industrial gas turbine applications.

Combined with the use of renewable energy sources for its production, hydrogen represents a possible alternative gas turbine fuel for future low-emission power generation. Due to the difference in the physical properties of hydrogen compared to other fuels such as natural gas, well-established gas turbine combustion systems cannot be directly applied to dry low NOx (DLN) hydrogen combustion. The DLN micromix combustion of hydrogen has been under development for many years, since it has the promise to significantly reduce NOx emissions. This combustion principle for air-breathing engines is based on crossflow mixing of air and gaseous hydrogen. Air and hydrogen react in multiple miniaturized diffusion-type flames with an inherent safety against flashback and with low NOx emissions due to a very short residence time of the reactants in the flame region. The paper presents an advanced DLN micromix hydrogen application. The experimental and numerical study shows a combustor configuration with a significantly reduced number of enlarged fuel injectors with high-thermal power output at constant energy density. Larger fuel injectors reduce manufacturing costs, are more robust and less sensitive to fuel contamination and blockage in industrial environments. The experimental and numerical results confirm the successful application of high-energy injectors, while the DLN micromix characteristics of the design point, under part-load conditions, and under off-design operation are maintained. Atmospheric test rig data on NOx emissions, optical flame-structure, and combustor material temperatures are compared to numerical simulations and show good agreement. The impact of the applied scaling and design laws on the miniaturized micromix flamelets is particularly investigated numerically for the resulting flow field, the flame-structure, and NOx formation.

Combined with the use of renewable energy sources for its production, hydrogen represents a possible alternative gas turbine fuel for future low emission power generation. Due to the difference in the physical properties of hydrogen compared to other fuels such as natural gas, well-established gas turbine combustion systems cannot be directly applied to Dry Low NOx (DLN) hydrogen combustion. The DLN Micromix combustion of hydrogen has been under development for many years, since it has the promise to significantly reduce NOx emissions. This combustion principle for air-breathing engines is based on cross-flow mixing of air and gaseous hydrogen. Air and hydrogen react in multiple miniaturized diffusion-type flames with an inherent safety against flash-back and with low NOx-emissions due to a very short residence time of the reactants in the flame region. The paper presents an advanced DLN Micromix hydrogen application. The experimental and numerical study shows a combustor configuration with a significantly reduced number of enlarged fuel injectors with high thermal power output at constant energy density. Larger fuel injectors reduce manufacturing costs, are more robust and less sensitive to fuel contamination and blockage in industrial environments. The experimental and numerical results confirm the successful application of high energy injectors, while the DLN Micromix characteristics of the design point, under part load conditions and under off-design operation are maintained. Atmospheric test rig data on NOx emissions, optical flame structure and combustor material temperatures are compared to numerical simulations and show good agreement. The impact of the applied scaling and design laws on the miniaturized Micromix flamelets is particularly investigated numerically for the resulting flow field, the flame structure and NOx formation.

KHI (Kawasaki heavy industries Ltd, Japan) and JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) have been working together since 2004 to improve lean staged concentric fuel injector technologies. One of the weak points of a lean staged fuel injector is said to be ignition / light around performance. Ignition characteristics were assessed on several fuel injector configurations in burner tests. Laser diagnosis, CFD analysis and high-speed video camera recording were used to understand the effect of fuel injector geometry on fuel spray distribution and ignition characteristics. They showed a clear relationship between the burner geometry and ignition characteristics. Light around characteristics was evaluated with the burner configuration optimized in burner tests. Light around performance deteriorated in multi sector unit compared to that in burner test. CFD analysis and some ignition tests with different configuration of combustor gave a clue to restore the light around characteristics deteriorated in multi sector unit.

In the future low pollution power generation can be achieved by application of hydrogen as a possible alternative gas turbine fuel if the hydrogen is produced by renewable energy sources such as wind energy or biomass. The utilization of existing IGCC power plant technology with the combination of low cost coal as a bridge to renewable energy sources such as biomass can support the international effort to reduce the environmental impact of electricity generation. Against this background the dry low NOx Micromix combustion principle for hydrogen is developed for years to significantly reduce NOx emissions. This combustion principle is based on cross-flow mixing of air and gaseous hydrogen and burns in multiple miniaturized diffusion-type flames. The two advantages of this principle are the inherent safety against flash-back and the low NOx concentrations due to a very short residence time of reactants in the flame region of the micro-flames. The paper presents experimental results showing the significant reduction of NOx emissions at high equivalence ratios and at simultaneously increased energy density under preheated atmospheric conditions. Furthermore the paper presents the feasibility of enlarged Micromix hydrogen injectors reducing the number of required injectors of a full-scale Micromix combustion chamber while maintaining the thermal energy output with significantly low NOx formation. The experimental investigations are accompanied by 3D numerical reacting flow simulations based on a simplified hydrogen combustion model. Comparison with experimental results shows good agreement with respect to flame structure, shape and anchoring position. Thus, the experimental and numerical results highlight further potential of the Micromix combustion principle for low NOx combustion of hydrogen in industrial gas turbine applications.