Water and steam injection in micro gas turbine supplied by hydrogen enriched fuels: Numerical investigation and performance analysis

This paper investigates the energetic and environmental performance of micro gas turbine plant with two proposed concurrent improvements: the methane-based fuel enriched by hydrogen and the humidification of the plant cycle. The energetic and environmental benefits of both features are well-know, and the aim of this work is the analysis of their combined impact on the micro gas turbine operation. Despite enhancing fuel with H-2 in(vol)ves significant advantages like greenhouse emission reduction and a better combustion in case of low LHV fuels, most of commercial micro gas turbine combustors are not able to burn fuels with high hydrogen content unless structurally modified. On the contrary, has been demonstrated that humidified gas turbines (i.e., gas turbines with water injection, humid air turbine (HAT) and steam injection gas turbine (STIG) cycles) improve the combustion stability as well as electric power delivered and plant efficiency. Hence, in order to investigate the feasibility of the concurrent two features, the first step of this work was the thermodynamic analysis of a micro gas turbine supplied by methane-based fuels enriched with H-2 up to 20%(vol), considering both dry and humidified cycles. Since a combustion anomaly was detected, i.e., flashback, in the CFD study on the combustion chamber, a steam injection in the combustor has been added in the plant layout with the aim of overcoming the anomaly, and its effect on the combustion process has been analyzed also raising the hydrogen content up to 30%(vol). The main outcome of this paper is the assessment of the feasibility of supplying the combustor of the proposed HGT-STIG micro gas turbine with a hydrogen enrichment up to 30%(vol), achieving a safe and regular combustion mainly owing to a steam injection mass flow equal up to 125% of fuel flow. (C) 2021 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This study investigates the combined impact of hydrogen-enriched fuel and humidification on the energetic and environmental performance of a micro gas turbine plant. The results show that structural modifications are necessary for commercial micro gas turbine combustors to burn fuels with high hydrogen content. However, humidified cycles can improve combustion stability, electric power output, and plant efficiency.