Staff

The European research project HYROPE aims to discover new scientific knowledge needed to decarbonize large-scale power generation and aviation by enabling state-of-the-art gas turbines to operate on zero-carbon, hydrogen based fuels. This can be achieved using an intrinsically fuel-flexible, “two-stage” combustion process which can be used for power generation as well as for new disruptive combustor architectures in hard to abate fields like aviation.

Current high-efficiency gas turbines have been optimised to burn hydrocarbon fuels, but new technology is needed to burn hydrogen-based fuels. Fuel flexibility is one of the key technological advancements required to transition to hydrogen-based fuels rapidly and seamlessly. During the upcoming transition period, an abundant and uninterrupted supply of hydrogen-based fuels cannot be taken for granted. Consequently, any reliable and resilient energy system will require fuel-flexible gas turbines that can switch between hydrogen-based and traditional fossil fuels as a backup solution. Therefore, the combustion system must be able to operate at maximum efficiency using different fuel blends from natural gas to hydrogen-enriched blends to pure hydrogen and ammonia-based fuels, which have widely varying combustion properties.

Research Area

Sequential staging is key to handling the high reactivity of hydrogen by burning most of the fuel in the second stage in a stable continuous autoignition mode and also controlling emissions from ammonia-based fuels. However, the fundamentals of stabilising lean combustion of hydrogen-based fuels under autoignition conditions is unchartered territory.

At the RSM we are currently investigating the following:

• flame microstructure of autoignition stabilised flames,
• formation of nitrogen oxides,
• the effect of different turbulence levels on the transition between propagation and autoignition combustion modes in lean hydrogen.