Abstract
Pyrolysis oil has become an important subject of research as it is considered to be a potential environmentally friendly and cheap alternative to conventional fossil fuels. Unfortunately, due to the significant differences of the chemical and physical properties of pyrolysis oil than that of fossil fuels, the deployment of pyrolysis oil in existing power systems such as gas turbines and internal combustion engines has been highly restricted. Thus, major research on pyrolysis oil has been conducted to overcome these challenges related to the unfavorable physical and chemical properties of pyrolysis oil. This paper reports experimental work on the effects of physical properties of the pyrolysis oil on spray performance of nozzles. Effort to evaluate the spray performance by using different types of atomizers has been made as well. Laser based diagnostics was applied to obtain qualitative comparisons spray characteristics of various pyrolysis oils. Experimental data such as the distribution of fuel droplet sizes and overall spray shapes was analyzed, which could provide valuable guidelines to design fuel nozzles. Lastly, the paper will also present NRC’s plans to accelerate the deployment of such pyrolysis oils in industrial gas turbines.
