Study of Combustion Characteristic of LPG with Steam in a Burner

Nowadays, improving fuel efficiency and environment protection have become an
important issues in industrial since the era of cheap fuel are over and the pollution
caused due to the combustion process from the rapidly growing industrial. This report
basically discusses the preliminary research done and basic understanding of the chosen
topic, which is to study the combustion characteristic of LPG (Liquefied Petroleum Gas)
and steam in a burner. The objective of the project is to find the potential of saving fuel
by increasing the combustion efficiency and reducing emission of pollutants by using
steam in a burner. The challenge in this project is to find the most favorable way to
introduce the steam to the combustion process that was in the burner (C491 Combustion
unit) and analyzing the effect of steam in increasing the combustion efficiency. There
are 2 method prepared for this project. First method is by using the C491 combustion
unit. Some modification has been done to this unit where the flange that were used as a
observation windows were modified to allow the steam injection directly to the flame in
the C491 combustion chamber. The modified flange also been used in the second
method where a new combustion chamber have been fabricated and using a Bunsen
burner as a heat producer. The modified flange will also be used as a steam input to the
new fabricated combustion chamber. Varies amount of steam flow rate have been
injected in order to studying its effect on the combustion process. The effect of steam in
both environment protection and increasing the combustion efficiency has been
identified by the heat and flame produced during the combustion process. Based on the
result, the combustion efficiency start to increase at the first 30 seconds of the heating
process. Type of flame produced is the same without the steam injection means there is
no decrease on pollutant emission.