Generation of a skeletal mechanism of coal combustion based on the chemical pathway analysis

A skeletal mechanism of coal combustion was derived from a detailed coal combustion kinetic mechanism through an importance analysis of chemical pathways. The reduction process consists of roughly two parts. The first process is performed based on a connectivity analysis between species. In this process, DRGEPSA is chosen for reduction process. Strongly connected species and related reactions from the important species set as start species by the operator are sorted into the reduced mechanism. About 70% of species and reactions can be removed with a limited accuracy loss. Subsequently the second reduction process, CSP, is performed. This method focuses on an importance of each reaction and can reduce a volume of mechanism appropriately. Through these analyses, a skeletal mechanism is generated that is including 65 species and 150 reactions. The generated skeletal mechanism is verified through a comparison with the detailed mechanism in the homogeneous reactor model of CHEMKIN-PRO under wide range of conditions. The generated mechanism can give an advantage in the analysis of coal combustion characteristics in detail in large scale simulations such as LES and DNS.