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It is important to monitor the temperature and H2O concentration in a large combustion environment in order to improve combustion (and thermal) efficiency and reduce harmful combustion emissions. However, it is difficult to simultaneously measure both internal temperature and gas concentration in a large combustion system because of the harsh environment with rapid flow. In regard, tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy, which has the advantages of non-intrusive, high-speed response, and in situ measurement, is highly attractive for measuring the concentration of a specific gas species in the combustion environment. In this study, two partially overlapped H2O absorption signals were used in the tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy (TDLAS) to measure the temperature and H2O concentration in a premixed CH4/air flame due to the wide selection of wavelengths with high temperature sensitivity and advantages where high frequency modulation can be applied. The wavelength regions of the two partially overlapped H2O absorptions were 1.3492 and 1.34927 μm. The measured signals separated the multi-peak Voigt fitting. As a result, the temperature measured by TDLAS based on multi-peak Voigt fitting in the premixed CH4/air flame was the highest at 1385.80 K for an equivalence ratio of 1.00. It also showed a similarity to those tendencies to the temperature measured by the corrected R-type T/C. In addition, the H2O concentrations measured by TDLAS based on the total integrated absorbance area for various equivalent ratios were consistent with those calculated by the chemical equilibrium simulation. Additionally, the H2O concentration measured at an equivalence ratio of 1.15 was the highest at 18.92%.

Oxygen (O2) and carbon monoxide (CO) are produced in combustion reactions and are important gas species, which are closely related to combustion efficiency and production of air pollutants. O2 generates thermal nitrogen oxide (NO x ) by reacting with nitrogen in the air at high temperatures, and the presence of excess O2 also affects the energy efficiency as a result of increasing exhaust heat energy. CO is generally well-known for being a toxic gas and is a crucial gas species produced by incomplete combustion. However, it is difficult to measure O2 and CO level variations in a huge combustion system, such as used in steel annealing and power plant boilers, because of their harsh environment. Therefore, as a multi-species measurement technique, which is non-intrusive and has a high sensitivity and high response, tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy was chosen as the optical method used to measure O2 and CO concentrations in exhaust gases. In this study, experiments were carried out to measure the O2 and CO concentrations in an electrical furnace and a combustion system using direct absorption spectroscopy and wavelength modulation spectroscopy. The measured results were compared to those of a gas analyzer of the electrochemical sensor type. The O2 and CO concentrations were measured in the exhaust gas produced from methane/air flame through adjustment of the equivalence ratio to form both fuel-lean and fuel-rich conditions. To measure the O2 and CO concentrations precisely and without interference from other combustion products, visible and near-infrared wavelength regions at 760.8 and 2325.2 nm were selected, respectively.

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