This paper presents an analysis of the corrosion hazard in the burner belt area of waterwalls in pulverised fuel (PF) boilers that results from low-NOx combustion. Temperature distributions along the waterwall tubes in subcritical (denoted as SUB) and supercritical (SUP) boilers were calculated and compared. Two hypothetical distributions of CO concentrations were assumed in the near-wall layer of the flue gas in the boiler furnace, and the kinetics of the waterwall corrosion were analysed as a function of the local temperature of the tubes. The predicted rate of corrosion of the boiler furnace waterwalls in the supercritical boilers was compared with that of in the subcritical boilers.

One of the methods of obtaining energy from renewable sources is the technology of indirect cofiring of biomass. It consists in the gasification of secondary fuel and combustion of the generated gas in the boiler together with its primary fuel. The paper presents a thermodynamic analysis of the use of the boiler flue gases as the converting medium in the process of indirect co-firing - a technology which is being developed at the Institute of Power Engineering and Turbomachinery of the Silesian University of Technology. The basis of the analysis are the data resulting from variant calculations conducted with the use of the Gaseq program. The calculations were made for various compositions of gasified fuel and the converting medium, variable fuel/oxidiser ratios and variable gasification temperatures. As a result, the equilibrium composition and the calorific value of the generated gas were obtained. The main optimisation objective adopted here was the nondimensional efficiency coefficient, which is the ratio of the chemical energy of products to the chemical energy of the process reactants.

The subject of the CFD analysis presented in this paper is the process of biomass indirect co-firing carried out in a system composed of a stoker-fired furnace coupled with a gasification reactor. The installation is characterised by its compact structure, which makes it possible to minimise heat losses to the environment and enhance the physical enthalpy of the oxidising agent – flue gases – having a favourable chemical composition with oxygen and water vapour. The test results provided tools for modelling of biomass thermal processing using a non-standard oxidiser in the form of flue gases. The obtained models were used to optimise the indirect co-combustion process to reduce emissions. An overall effect of co-combustion of gas from biomass gasification in the stoker furnace is the substantial reduction in NO emissions by about 22%.