State of the art and challenges of flamelet method in gas turbine combustor simulation

ZHANG Guihua; WU Yuxin; WU Jiahao; ZHANG Yang; ZHANG Hai

doi:10.16511/j.cnki.qhdxxb.2023.25.026

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Journal of Tsinghua University(Science and Technology) ›› 2023, Vol. 63 ›› Issue (4) : 505-520. DOI: 10.16511/j.cnki.qhdxxb.2023.25.026

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State of the art and challenges of flamelet method in gas turbine combustor simulation

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[Significance] Given the consistent increase in the number of evaluation parameters, enrichment of fuel types in gas turbine combustors, and in-depth investigation of the combustion technology, the numerical simulation of combustion processes in gas turbines has become crucial. In various turbulent combustion models, the flamelet method couples numerous chemical components with a small number of scalars by preconstructing a table, which can reduce the number of transport equations to be solved while considering the detailed chemical reactions. The flamelet method, owing to its accuracy and computational efficiency, provides a primary alternative to numerical simulation for gas turbine combustors. [Progress] The present study reviews the advancement of flamelet methods. Subsequently, in view of the future development trend of gas turbine combustors with multiple working conditions, numerous parameters, and low pollution, we reviewed the relevant models and application scope of flamelet methods and analyzed their application and challenges in gas turbine combustors considering the following four aspects: the application of the flamelet method in an adaptive turbulent combustion model, optimized selection of progress variables, coupling with the turbulent model, and its application in pollution analysis. The application of the flamelet method in an adaptive turbulent combustion model includes its coupling with other turbulent combustion models and the development of a multi-region flamelet method. Toward this end, exploring appropriate identification techniques of different combustion modes is crucial, and the machine learning method is a robust tool to address this challenge. The optimized selection of progress variables involves multi-phase flow combustion and multi-fuel and multi-jet problems. However, a universal progress variable that can act as a representative of all problems is lacking. The flamelet method requires different expressions of progress variables in different problems. The development of universal optimization methods form the primary research aim. The coupling with the turbulent model mainly includes the presumed and transport probability density function methods; however, the balance of accuracy and computation cost remains to be elucidated. The application of the flamelet method in pollutant analysis requires solving additional transport equations of pollutants and modifying the expressions of source terms. [Conclusions and Prospects] Based on the review of previous literature, we recommend developing specific validation methods for each submodel in the flamelet method, performing further studies on the coupling effect of different submodels, and obtaining more data on real gas turbine combustion chambers to guide the development of a flamelet method suitable for real gas turbine combustion chambers.

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fuel and combustion / flamelet method / gas turbine / progress variable / multi-scale multi-regime

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ZHANG Guihua, WU Yuxin, WU Jiahao, ZHANG Yang, ZHANG Hai. State of the art and challenges of flamelet method in gas turbine combustor simulation[J]. Journal of Tsinghua University(Science and Technology). 2023, 63(4): 505-520 https://doi.org/10.16511/j.cnki.qhdxxb.2023.25.026

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