project update

Optimization of waste gas burner

Challenge
Waste gas burners are used in the electronic chip manufacturing industry for emission reduction by means of combustion. Stricter environmental requirements are the impetus for developing more efficient burners. Due to the complexity of the design problem, it was decided to apply advanced modelling in order to reduce the development time and to attain a more effective design.

Solution approach
A CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) model of the burner was made and validated by experimental data. CFD is based on a finite volume method for solving fluid, heat and mass transfer problems from first principles of mass, momentum and energy conservation. The applied code, CFX4, is currently one of the leading CFD codes world-wide and includes a variety of combustion models. For the current project, models were used which are not in standard available within CFX: Reaction scheme: The combustion of methane and oxygen is modelled by a reduced reaction scheme developed by Jones and Lindstedt consisting of two irreversible reactions and two reversible reactions; Reaction rates: Forward reaction rates were given by Jones and Lindstedt. Backward rates for the two reversible reactions are determined from the equilibrium constants, which are calculated using the thermodynamic properties taken from the commercially available database NRG-Tbase;

Complete scheme of the burner

Equipment
The burner (see top figure) consists of the combustion chamber (the central cylinder), placed in a cavity filled with air for thermal insulation. The combustion chamber has ceramic and steel walls. Nitrogen serves as the carrier gas for the toxic waste gas. The waste gas nitrogen mixture, oxygen and methane are injected separately at the bottom of the chamber. The waste gas nitrogen mixture (80 liters/min) is injected axially. Methane (25 liters/min) is injected through a circular crown that encloses the waste gas inlet. Oxygen (50 liters/min) enters through small holes circularly distributed around the fuel inlet and tilted toward the burner axis. In addition, air is injected perpendicular to the center line in a plane downstream. The ratio between the methane and the oxygen mass flow rates is nearly stoichiometric. Finally, water is injected into the system at two different heights above the cap for scrubbing the offgas. After scrubbing, offgas is discharged into the chimney.

Streamlines for all four feed gases Turbulence modelling: Standard ke model with modified values for constants based on NRG experience; Radiation modelling: As opposed to the standard CFX model, a faster and simpler model developed in house is used to model the thermal radiation of the gaseous species (mainly water vapour and carbondioxide;)

 Molecular transport properties: Properties such as viscosity, heat conductivity, and mass diffusivities were defined carefully; this was important since the burner contains both regions of turbulent flow and of laminar flow.

Solution
The temperature plots (see figure below) show how the nitrogen flow enters the hot region of combustion products. In the left plot, the hot gas region is relatively small. This is disadvantageous, since the nitrogen flow is the carrier of waste gases to be destroyed by high temperatures. Combustion is not limited to a sharp flame, but occurs in a relatively large region as shown by the concentration plots of hydrogen,

an intermediate reaction product. By changing the gas flow rates, the size of the high temperature region is enlarged considerably. Other improvements were achieved by changing the methane and oxygen inlet angles from 45 with the symmetry line to optimum values. By applying CFD to the optimisation of the waste gas burner, considerable savings in time and resources were achieved. Summarising, the main benefits of employing CFD in this project have been: Improved waste gas burner design beyond that possible with conventional methods; Relatively low design costs; Short design time.

temperature (left) and [H2 ] (right) profiles for two methane-oxygen ratios

About the author:

Arn Siccama has been working with NRG for over 10 years, specializing in advanced modelling of combustion and other chemically reactive flow problems. Arn has a PhD in combustion engineering and a BSc and MSc in Chemical Engineering. He can be contacted at +31 224 56 4034, email siccama@nrg-nl.com. tion technology for gas turbines and coal burners, separation and filtration processes, aerodynamic and hydrodynamic design for valves and other components, reactive systems, two phase systems. The Structures-FEM team has proven expertise in design and analysis of mechanical structures, simulation of metal forming processes, pressure vessels, crash analyses and drop tests and many other processes. NRG is a member of the KEMAECN group of companies. NRG can do more for you. Feel free to contact us about the challenges you face. We will be glad to discuss what CAE can do to aid your development. Call Victor Wichers, telephone +31 224 564656 or +31 6 511 523 84 (cellular); or send us an email at wichers@nrg-nl.com. For more information visit http://www.nrgnl.com/product/ppt/cae.
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About NRG CAEs group:

NRGs Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) group has successfully applied CAE technology for customers in the power, offshore, petrochemical and machinery industries. The core competencies of the group are Structures-FEM, Processes-CFD and Design-CAD. The expertise of the Processes-CFD team includes combus-