Study of porous radiant burners

The objective of the present study is to generate fundamental knowledge about heat transfer and combustion in porous radiant burners (PRBs) in order to improve their performance. A theoretical heat transfer and combustion model is developed to study the characteristics of PRBs. The model accounts for non-local thermal equilibrium between the solid and gas phases. The solid is assumed to absorb, emit and scatter radiant energy. Combustion is modeled as a one-step global reaction. It is revealed that the flame speed inside the porous medium is enhanced compared to the adiabatic flame speeds due to the higher conductivity of the solid compared to the gas as well as due to radiative preheating of the reactants. The flame speeds near the edges of the porous medium are controlled by conduction alone. Two spatial domains of stable flame speeds are predicted. One spanned the upstream half of the porous region and the other was a narrow region near the downstream edge. The effects of the properties of the porous material on the flame speeds, radiative outputs and efficiencies were investigated. To improve the radiative output from the burner, it is desirable that the porous layer has an optical thickness of about ten. The radiative output and the efficiency is higher for lower scattering albedo. The heat transfer coupling between the solid and gas phases should be high enough to ensure local thermal equilibrium, by choosing a fine porous matrix. Higher solid phase conduction enhances the flame speed and the radiative output. Experiments are performed on a ceramic foam to verify the theoretical findings. The existence of the two stability regions was verified experimentally. The experimental data on flame speeds and radiant outputs for flames stabilized inside the porous medium agreed reasonably well with the theoretical predictions.