Investigation of the Efficiency of a Dual-Fuel Gas Turbine Combustion Chamber with a Plasma‒Chemical Element

Abstract The study is devoted to the possibility of increasing the efficiency of the working process in dual-fuel combustion chambers of gas turbine engines for FPSO vessels. For the first time, it is proposed to use the advantages of plasma‒chemical intensification of the combustion of hydrocarbon fuels in the dual-fuel combustion chambers, which can simultaneously operate on gaseous and liquid fuels. A design scheme of a combustion chamber with a plasma‒chemical element is proposed. A continuous type mathematical model of a combustion chamber with a plasma‒chemical element has been developed, which is based on the solution of a system of differential equations describing the processes of chemical reactions in a turbulent system, taking into consideration the initiating effect of the products of plasma‒chemical reactions on the processes of flame propagation. A modified six-stage kinetic scheme of hydrocarbon oxidation was used to simultaneously predict the combustion characteristics of the gaseous and liquid fuels, taking into account the decrease in the activation energy of carbon monoxide oxidation reactions when the products of the plasma‒chemical element are added. The results reveal that the addition of plasma‒chemical products significantly reduces CO emissions in the outlet section of the flame tube (from 25‒28 ppm to 3.9‒4.6 ppm), while the emission of nitrogen oxides remains practically unchanged for the studied combustion chamber. Further research directions are proposed to enhance the working process efficiency of a dual-fuel combustion chamber for gas turbine engines as part of the power plant of FSPO vessels.