Research Projects

The innovative energy solutions are required to cope up with the rising global energy demands and overcome the environmental burden of waste plastic. This research intends to address these challenges by integrating refused plastic fuel (RPF) with coal fired to coal gasifier with recycled CO2 injection and capture. This research aims to effectively contribute to plastic waste management along with enhanced energy output with reduced CO2 emissions. By examining the synergistic effects of co-gasification of RPF and coal, as well as the conditions that promote soot formation due to the presence of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) species towards the reductor section of the gasifier, this project proposal aims to improve the efficiency and environmental sustainability of the gasification process. Additionally, it introduces high-fidelity computational approaches to describe complex multi-physics and multiscale gasification processes under pressurized conditions. High-fidelity large eddy simulation will be conducted by integrating detailed chemistry based flamelet/progress variable (FPV) approach for homogeneous chemistry for the first time which has recently shown great accuracy while handling multi-stream system during coal combustion. Two Tasks will be conducted during this project. In Task 1, five FPV-LES computations will be performed using KAUST PAH mechanism having 202 species and 1351 reactions, and in Tak 2, two FPV-LES computations will be performed using CRECK mechanism having around 537 species and 4500 reactions to described complex homogeneous reactions to investigate influence of CO2 injection under pressurized conditions. In both the Tasks the gasifier operates under pressurized conditions so that it can be coupled to run a steam turbine. Injecting CO2 which is one of the gasifying agents is expected to promote the gasification reaction thus enhancing the gasifier performance. The gasifier performance will be evaluated by comparing important flame characterises such as reactive flow field distribution, yield of product gases and carbon conversion for each case. This project's novel integration of RPF with coal in gasification can significantly advance waste-to-energy technology. It can also provide a scalable way to reduce undesired plastic waste while producing cleaner energy. Furthermore, this research can shed light on multi-scale, multi-physics gasification, including complex soot formation in the gasifier's reductor section, where low temperature and low reactivity may cause PAH-based soot precursors. Overall, this project will advance gasification modeling and serve as a foundation for an efficient and cleaner energy system by addressing emission and waste utilization, paving the way for novel approaches to waste-to-energy and carbon capture technologies.