Numerical simulation of combustion in 35 t/h industrial pulverized coal furnace with burners arranged on front wall

Coal-fired industrial boilers should operate across a wide range of loads and with a higher reduction of pollutant emission in China. In order to achieve these tasks, a physical model including two swirling burners on the front wall and boiler furnace was established for a 35 t/h pulverized coal-fired boiler. Based on Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) theory and the commercial software ANSYS Fluent, mathematical modeling was used to simulate the flow and combustion processes under 75% and 60% load operating conditions. The combustion characteristics in the furnace were obtained. The flue gas temperature simulation results were in good agreement with experimental data. The simulation results showed that there was a critical distance L along the direction of the furnace depth (x) and Hc along the direction of the furnace height (y) on the burner axis. When x < L, the concentration of NO decreased sharply as the height increased. When y < Hc, the NO concentration decreased sharply with an increase in the y coordinate, while increasing dramatically with an area-weighted average gas temperature increase in the swirl combustion zone. This study provides a basis for optimizing the operation of nitrogen-reducing combustion and the improvement of burner structures.