Towards cleaner combustion: The role of hydrogen blending and swirl strength in emission reduction

High-hydrogen-content fuel blends are increasingly popular for mitigating carbon emissions. However, the influence of both hydrogen content and flow dynamics (i.e., swirling strength) in conventional burners necessitates extensive research, especially regarding producing harmful emissions such as NOx. Thus, this manuscript numerically investigates the effects of fuel type and composition on NOx and CO 2 formation in a swirl burner. Numerical simulations have been conducted using the Finite Volume Method (FVM) in ANSYS Fluent 15.0. Time steps and grid sizes are employed until convergence is achieved. The governing equations with boundary conditions are solved using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). The investigations encompass various fuel types (methane, propane, and methane-hydrogen mixtures) that are employed at different swirl numbers (0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7, 0.8, and 0.9). Numerical results have been validated by comparison with other published experimental and numerical literature. A strong correlation exists between the current and published experimental and numerical results from reputable sources in the literature. The findings indicate that swirl number and fuel type significantly influence the temperature distribution within the combustion chamber and the level of NOx emissions. This effect is also evident in forming other pollutants, such as CO2.