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Abstract A commercial natural gas 65 kW microturbine generator produced by Capstone Green Energy Corporation is used to study the impact of hydrogen addition to natural gas. Hydrogen addition in natural gas turbines can reduce carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide emission as a step towards carbon neutrality. Exhaust emissions and power output are evaluated for increasing levels of hydrogen in the fuel mixture. Additionally, a chemical reactor network (CRN) is used in conjunction with injector mixing characterization to support the development. The CRN analysis predicts NOx using perfectly stirred reactors (PSR) therefore, a strategy to account for the measured fuel concentration at the injector exit was implemented to estimate NOx emissions for the actual fuel/air mixing. At full load, experimental NOx emissions remain almost unchanged as the %vol of hydrogen increases from 0 to 30%. CO and CO2 decrease with increasing vol% of hydrogen in the fuel as expected. The CRN captures the general emissions trends with hydrogen addition and illustrates sensitivity to the mechanism utilized. Visual inspection of the injectors following hydrogen addition tests indicated that flashback or combustion inside the injectors did not occur. Measured engine system efficiency was not impacted by the addition of hydrogen. Mixing performance tests for the injectors showed that the fuel and air were well mixed prior to combustion, consistent with the single digit NOx ppm levels measured. The study indicates that addition of hydrogen, up to 30% by volume, is possible without any modification to this gas turbine engine.
Villatoro et al. (Mon,) studied this question.