Air Products has commissioned a new Clean Energy Combustion Lab at its headquarters in Allentown, Pennsylvania. The large-scale facility is hoped to enhance Air Products’ global profile by showcasing its combustion technology.
In particular, the lab will be used to demonstrate the benefits of Air Products’ industrial gases and technologies, especially in relation to energy efficiency and reduced environmental emissions.
David Taylor, Vice President of Energy Businesses at Air Products, said, “We will be able to use the lab for testing across all of our major businesses. The facility will allow Air Products to test actual fuels from customers and demonstrate at scale the advantages of certain applications operating in an oxygen-enriched atmosphere.”
Taylor continued, “Increasing demand for large oxygen supply holds really great promise for Air Products moving forward. We have over 70 years of experience delivering oxygen safely, and designing and operating air separation units, and now we can demonstrate the capabilities of our related technologies at large scale.”
The new facility features over 40 years of application knowledge and intellectual property in combustion and burner technology. It will allow the company to hone and demonstrate both combustion and gasification of a variety of fuels which includes; solids such as coal, petcoke and biomass; liquids ranging from light to heavy fuel oils, bio-liquids and other alternative fuels, as well as a range of gaseous fuels.
A key priority of the new unit will be to test-fire various types of coal in oxyfuel combustion mode, showcasing Air Products’ capabilities for carbon dioxide capture for power plant applications. Taylor remarked, “Combusting fuels with pure oxygen, or in an oxygen-enhanced environment, can improve a facility’s operational efficiency by saving fuel as well as increasing production. It also significantly reduces air pollutants such as nitrogen oxides and particulates. Of course, less fuel consumed means less CO2 emitted.”
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