The purpose of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is to develop a novel combustor that would allow the combustion of natural gas to be done with air as the oxidizing agent, without mixing of the air and fuel, thereby allowing C0 and H2O to be recovered in an undiluted state. This combustor also has the advantage of zero NOx production. Presently available technologies for natural gas combustion are subject to a number of limitations. While the amount of NOx produced by natural gas combustion varies from one technology to another, they are all similar in that some NOx is produced. In regions such as Southern California in which the air quality problems are critical, preventable NOx emissions are likely to be intolerable even if they are relatively small. Available natural gas combustion technology is also unsatisfactory in that it involves mixing the natural gas with air prior to or during the combustion process. This causes the C02 and H20 produced by the combustion process to be diluted with nitrogen from the air. This lowers the partial pressure of water vapor in the postcombustion gases, decreasing the dew point to such an extent that useful recovery of the heat of vaporization of water is not practically possible. The dilution of the combustion products with nitrogen also makes it impractical to recover and sell the C02. This is regrettable both because there is a substantial market for C02, and because of the possible problem of global warming. If a technology which could economically recover and sell C02 from combustion gases were fully developed, it would then be available as a method of controlling C02 emissions in the event that such control was discovered to be necessary. Initial applications of this technology are likely to be limited to regions with critical air quality problems such as Southern California and to situations in which it is practical to sell the recovered C02. Very wide spread application is to be expected if it bec omes necessary to control C02 emissions.
