Modeling of combustion and soot formation in large two-stroke marine Diesel engines

Spatial distributions of  OH (top) and soot particles (bottom) at different crank angle degrees after top dead centre. The centre axis is the cyclic boundary. Yellow, green and blue colours indicate high, intermediate and low species concentrations, respectively. 

Large two-stroke marine diesel engines dominate as prime movers for cargo ships due to their high efficiency and reliability. In 2016, the International Maritime Organisation has enforced new regulations for marine engines, with the aim to reduce emitted pollutants for instance, to reduce the nitric oxides by 80%. Producing engines for low emission limits without lowering the fuel efficiency is a challenging task. Indeed, both fuel efficiency and formation of emissions are strongly dependent on the combustion characteristics, which is a result of fuel spray development such as droplet breakup, evaporation and mixing with air. Meanwhile, the scavenging flow plays a significant role in influencing the aforementioned processes. Integration model of three-dimensional CFD and chemical kinetics is hereby used to provide a better understanding and gain insights of the in-cylinder events. A skeletal chemical mechanism is developed, of which is computationally efficient for three-dimensional large bore marine engine simulations yet sufficiently comprehensive to include species essential for pollutant formation predictions. By incorporating the in-house chemical mechanism and turbulence/velocity fields obtained from scavenge flow simulations, development of a heavily sooting diesel flame and the heat transfer process under large, two-stroke marine diesel engine-like conditions are investigated.
  • Sigurdsson, E., Ingvorsen, K. M., Jensen, M. V., Mayer, S., Matlok, S. and Walther, J. H.Numerical analysis of the scavenging flow and convective heat transfer in large two-stroke marine diesel enginesApplied Energy, 123, 37-46, 2014 (ORBIT Link).
  • Pang, K. M., Karvounis, N., Walther, J. H., and Schramm, J.Numerical investigation of soot formation and oxidation processes under large two-stroke marine diesel-like conditions using integrated CFD-chemical kineticsApplied Energy, 169, 874-887, 2016 (ORBIT Link).

https://www.fluid.mek.dtu.dk/research/combustion-engines/soot
13 MARCH 2025