Monitoring of combustion processes in industrial burners using electrical capacitance tomography

The development of diagnostic methods suitable for the monitoring of practical flames is an important objective, which is receiving a growing attention and significant research efforts. This is motivated by the need to achieve a more precise description of the process and, ultimately, implement efficient and reliable control and optimization methods as a key step towards the development of more efficient, flexible, reliable and clean combustion systems. Many interesting attempts have been proposed, involving very different approaches in the use of various instruments and sensors. One of parameter difficult to control is distribution of reaction zone. Presently, such system which allows monitoring combustion process of industrial burners does not exist. Measurements of temperature or control of exist flame by using ionization probe provide only partial information about performance of combustion process. For that reason, new diagnostic methods should be developed. Many and interesting attempts have been proposed but one of interesting solution will be development of combustion process diagnostic methods by means of the Electrical Capacitance Tomography (ECT). Obtained results show that it will be a very good tool for research proposes, especially in development of a new combustion chamber operated at very high pressure, where installation of optical windows is very difficult and many time not possible.