INSPIRE — INSpiring Pressure gain combustion Integration, Research, and Education

Results in brief

INSpiring Pressure gain combustion Integration, Research, and Education

The primary, overarching, research objective of INSPIRE was to advance Pressure Gain Combustion (PGC) as the next generation of sustainable, highly efficient, and hydrogen-optimized combustion concepts toward achieving the performance and emissions goals of the next few decades. Thanks to the background of partners on PGC, INSPIRE brought relevant expertise together pursuing solutions on an integrated level. The following key objectives can be summarized: 1. Gain a deeper understanding of the impact of gas turbine integration on the specific combustion issues within both PGC solutions, including pressure effects, turbine interaction, performance losses, and ignition. 2. Investigate innovative turbine aerodynamics and cooling technologies designed to address the specific issues and unsteadiness associated with PGC; 3. Explore the application of PGC cycles in power generation and propulsion applications, including the provision of targets for the highest potential PGC applications for future research targets; 4. Raise the global awareness of the potential of PGC applications and communicate to the research community the coupled effects of the above objectives on existing and future technologies; 5. Raise and prepare a new generation of researchers, equipped with the skills to pursue such interdisciplinary problems as in PGC. The network was organized into 15 ESR projects spread across 4 technical work packages (see Figure 1). Overall, the project objectives were successfully achieved. All of the research projects were completed on time and the corresponding PhDs have been carried out or are expected shortly. It can be emphasised that the research and training programme developed in INSPIRE helped to instil in the recruited fellows an awareness of their global impact on the environment and on social responsibility. The overall quality of the produced results is confirmed by the scientific papers produced along the project, with more than 70 papers among which 18 journal articles, suggesting the possible relevant scientific impact of the outcomes in the near future.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

The thermodynamic cycle used in a gas turbine (GT) has undergone little change since its early development. Over the last decades effort has been put into increasing efficiency through reducing losses and raising overall pressure ratio and peak temperature. To break out of current limits a different cycle is required. One of the most promising is the case where a pressure rise across the combustion process is allowed. Cycle models show that such a change would reduce the fuel consumption of a large turbofan engine by ~15% and of a small engine by ~25%. An efficiency increase of up to 20% is also expected for land based GT. The pan-European team assembled offers the possibility of studying the most promising Pressure Gain Combustion, PGC solutions on an innovative integrated level. Current PGC solutions are of two types, the subsonic type, which is limited by low heat release rate but is practical and the detonative type, with very high heat release rate but currently impractical. PGC solutions are expected to be key technologies for the efficient use of carbon neutral fuels such as hydrogen. INSPIRE is aimed at studying both technologies, the Constant Volume Combustion, CVC and the Rotating Detonation Combustor, RDC. Around the two WP focusing on CVC and RDC, where institutions such as TUB, ENSMA, CERFACS, and SAFRAN will supervise the experimental and modelling activities of the involved ESR, two additional WP will aim at studying the main phenomena and technologies required to enable PGC solutions on actual engines. Topics as heat transfer, unsteady components interaction, noise generation and overall system performance will be faced by ESR supervised by UNIFI, UNIGE, KTH and TUB. The training of new researchers familiar with the concepts of PGC will ease the adoption of the technology in European industry. Since the developmental life cycle of GT is long, familiarizing a generation of new researchers with PGC will allow them to grow along with the technology.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI FIRENZE · FlorenceCoordinatorItaly
CENTRE EUROPEEN DE RECHERCHE ET DEFORMATION AVANCEE EN CALCUL SCIENTIFIQUE · TOULOUSE CEDEXFrance
ECOLE NATIONALE SUPERIEURE DE MECANIQUE ET D'AEROTECHNIQUE · Futuroscope CedexFrance
KUNGLIGA TEKNISKA HOEGSKOLAN · StockholmSweden
POLITECNICO DI TORINO · TorinoItaly
SAFRAN SA · ParisFrance
TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITAT BERLIN · BerlinGermany
UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI GENOVA · GENOVAItaly

INSPIRE · INSpiring Pressure gain combustion Integration, Research, and Education

Results in brief

INSpiring Pressure gain combustion Integration, Research, and Education

Project objective

Participants

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