PDPA studies on turbulence and particle concentration in a swirl burner

To develop low-pollutant burners, the effect of inlet blocking on NO formation is studied. It is recognized that the NO formation is affected by the turbulence, coal concentration and temperature. In this paper, the turbulence and coal concentration in swirl burners with an inlet blocking or a coal concentrator were measured. A DANTEC-made 3-D phase-Doppler particle anemometer (PDPA) installed in the State key Lab. of Clean Coal Combustion is used to measure the particle velocity and concentration. The measurement results are compared with those obtained by numerical simulation. Both measurement and simulation results indicate that either the blocking or the coal concentrator increases the turbulent kinetic energy at the inlet region and the particle concentration in the near-axis region, which is favorable for reducing the NO emission during coal combustion.