Research on Heating Clay by Low Carbon Catalytic Combustion Furnace of Natural Gas

doi:10.4236/jpee.2014.212002

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Journal of Power and Energy Engineering, 2014, 2, 7-10

Published Online December 2014 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/jpee

http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jpee.2014.212002

How to cite this paper: Fang, K., He, F. and Zhang, S.H. (2014) Research on Heating Clay by Low Carbon Catalytic Combus-

tion Furnace of Natural Gas. Journal of Power and Energy Engineering, 2, 7-10.

http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jpee.2014.212002

Research on Heating Clay by Low Carbon

Catalytic Combustion Furnace of Natural Gas

Kai Fang, Fan He, Shihong Zhang

Beijing Key Lab. of Heating, Gas Supply, Ventilating and Air Conditioning Engineering, Beijing University of Civil

Engineering and Arch., Beijing, China

Email: [email protected]

Received Oc tob er 2014

Abstract

This article did a research about exhaust gas constituent inside the catalytic combustion furnace

with Pd-based honeycomb monoliths of lean natural gas-air mixtures and discussed the feature of

the exhaust gas. In addition, the near-zero pollutant emissions of catalytic combustion burner was

proved by a test report provided by NIM. From a low-carbon prospective, the application prospect

of catalytic combustion furnace was discussed

Keywords

Catalytic C om bus tion , L ow -Carbon, Exhaust Gas Pollutant Emissions

1. Introduction

Energy and environment are two major topics in today’s world. At the end of 2006 to the beginning of 2007, the

phenomenon that the average temperature has increased universally result of serious reaction, and greenhouse

effect that cause global warming became an important problem that people have to face [1]. Many studies focus

on new energies, such as nuclear, wind, marine stream and solar energy to find path to low carbon. However,

nuclear and many renewable technologies cannot be set in large scale in the short term, because of their uncer-

tainties. In addition, people came into the industrial revolution age at the same with the growing of the content

of greenhouse gas, thus can declare the effect of anthropogenic activities to the global climate variation [2]. Re-

search Introduction of Solar Energy in the USA proposed that we should use liquid fuel made from crops, nuc-

lear energy, wind energy, water energy, tidal energy, and many other energy wide-spread, so that we can de-

crease the dependence on petroleum and fossil fuel [3].

Catalytic combustion, as a new way of burning, nearly 100% of the fuel conversion can be realized. Com-

pared with flame combustion, catalytic combustion of combustion temperature is low, and can achieve near-zero

emissions. This is now the only way can achieve nearly zero emissions of burning [4]. Furthermore, when natu-

ral gas burning in average way, it can reach 1800 K usually, but when it reach 1500 K the rate of producing of

NOx will increase seriously with temperature rising [5]. At present, the main research contents for methane cat-

alytic combustion are: catalytic combustion reaction mechanism, characteristics, application and preparation of

the catalyst [6]-[8]. Catalytic combustion is recognized to be a kind of high combustion efficiency. Therefore,

the way of catalytic combustion can make natural gas burning almost totally. Through catalytic combustion, the

K. Fang et al.

disadvantages of flaming can be avoided, and the advantage of catalytic combustion is that catalytic combustion

can produce less pollution [9].

2. Low-Temperature Field inside the Furnace of Catalytic Burner

Experimental Set-Up

Figure 1 presents the conventional diagram about the equipment. The core of the system is the catalytic com-

bustion furnace, whose size is 100 cm long, 180 cm high and 880 cm wide. From conventional diagram we can

comprehend that there are three catalytic burners which embed in the same side of the catalytic combustion fur-

nace, who consist of four Pd-based honeycomb monoliths of lean natural gas-air mixtures. Each square honey-

comb monolith is 150 mm wide and 20 mm long, with square-shaped cells whose sectional area is 1 mm × 1

mm. In order to control the flow rate of natural gas and air, GMS0050BRSN200000 natural gas meter and

CMG400A080100000 air meter with 0 - 50 L/min and 0 - 80 m3/h of full-scale range, which get electric from

manostat to operate, were equipped. Each catalytic burner has one natural gas meter, while they share the same

air meter.

At the beginning of igniting the burner, the gas reacted in condition of burning. After eight or ten minutes, the

blue flame was achieved above the monolith and gradually disappeared when the catalyst started glowing red

internally as the temperature inside the monolith increased. And the flow rate of air should be changed for the

condition of catalytic combustion.

3. Result and Discussion

3.1. The Variation of Exhaust Gas Constituent

Near-zero pollutant emissions of catalytic combustion burner. Figure 2 showed how each composition of emis-

sion gas changed when the experiment operating. We can grasp the whole variation trend of the content of emis-

sion gas. The content of CO rose at first, and it arrive at the greatest value about eighty minutes, and then the

content of CO gradually decreased, so that natural gas nearly totally reacted. In addition, though the total content

of NOx increased continuously, the content is under 5 ppm, which almost can be ignored (Table 1).

Fig ure 1. Combustion system of catalytic combustion burner.

Table 1. Composition and content of exhaust gas of catalytic combustion burner.

Sample Compo Sition Content

Natrual gas-air Mixtures

19.9% [v/ v]

Natrual gas H2s 1.63 × 10−6 [mol/mol] (2.47 [mg/ m3])

Exhaust gas

O2 9.65%v/v

Co2 6.25%v/v

No2 <0.5 × 10−6 [mol/mol] (1 . 03 [mg/ m3])

Co 4.53 × 10

−6

[mol/mol] (5.66 [mg/ m

])

Ch4 0.432 × 10

−6

[mol/mol] (0.309 [mg/m

])

Source: National Institute of Metrology (NIM) .

K. Fang et al.

Apart from the data we measured, there is also a test report of composition and content of exhaust gas pro-

duced in catalytic combustion of natural gas provided by NIM, it can tell us that the contents of CH4 in exhaust

gas was less than 5 ppm and the emissions of NO2 and CO were also closed to zero. According to the result of

composition and content of exhaust gas detecting by flue gas analyzer and NIM, we can see there still produced

a lot of CO2 when natural gas reacted, However, there are several toxic substance exist. We can put the exhaust

gas into greenhouse, so that we can decrease the emission of CO2 as well as provide vegetation with CO2 that’s

needed during photosynthesis.

3.2. The Experimental Results

When filling water, well-distributed water was absorbed by the wall of pottery clay container and not seeped out

side. The wall of pottery clay container has not cracked for long time. When filling water again after that there

was not a crack in the wall (Figure 3).

4. Conclusions

Avoid Natural gas catalytic combustion achieves a real sense of low carbon, denitration emissions, and flue gas

at high temperatures to produce sterile components and new Fresh air is the same. Because of its burning stabil-

Fig ure 2. Variation of exhaust gas constituent.

Fig ure 3. For comparison before and after heating.

K. Fang et al.

ity of Burns, burns and the near-zero pollutant catalytic combustion of natural gas plays normal burning irrepla-

ceable role in heat supply part, food industry, chemical industry and furnaces, metallurgical industries and agri-

cult ur e.

Natural gas catalytic combustion-infrared heating technology received wide attention with it high efficiency,

low running costs and less pollution and potential applications. Using catalytic combustion stoves can not only

reduce production costs, but also can effectively control the pollution of the environment. With ever increasing

people’s awareness of environmental protection, this form of pollution-free combustion will have wider space.

Acknowledgem e nts

The project was sponsored by the Beijing Municipality Key Lab. of Heating, Gas Supply, Ventilating and Air

Conditioning Engineering; 2014 Funding Project (Building Environment and Facilities Engineering, Water

supply and Sewerage engineering), the Core Course of Heat Transfer and Fine Quality Course of Thermody-

nami cs .

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