Invited lectures

Direct Numerical Simulation of Mixed-Mode Combustion Relevant to Reheat Gas Turbine Combustors

Jacqueline H. Chen, Sandia National Laboratories, Combustion Research Facility, P.O. Box 969 MS9051 Livermore, CA 94551-0969

Jacqueline H. Chen is a Distinguished Member of Technical Staff at the Combustion Research Facility at Sandia National Laboratories. She has contributed broadly to research in petascale and exascale direct numerical simulations (DNS) of turbulent combustion focusing on fundamental turbulence-chemistry interactions underlying the design of fuel efficient clean burning engines. These benchmark simulations provide fundamental insight into combustion processes and are used by the combustion modeling community to develop and validate turbulent combustion models for engineering computational fluid dynamics. In collaboration with computer scientists and applied mathematicians she was the founding Director of the Center for Exascale Simulation of Combustion in Turbulence (ExaCT). She led an interdisciplinary multi-laboratory team to co-design DNS numerical algorithms, domain-specific programming environments, scientific data management and in situ uncertainty quantification and analytics, and architectural simulation and modeling with combustion proxy applications. She is also the principal investigator of a DOE Exascale Simulation Project focused on combustion simulation. She is a Fellow of the Combustion Institute and a member of the National Academy of Engineering. She received the DOE INCITE Award between 2005-2018 and the 34th International Combustion Symposium Distinguished Paper Award in 2012. She is a member of the DOE Advanced Scientific Computing Research advisory committee (ASCAC) and a member of the Combustion Institute board of directors. She was the editor of Flow, Turbulence and Combustion, the co-editor of the Proceedings of the Combustion Institute, volumes 29 and 30, and the Co-Chair of the Local Organizing Committee for the 35th International Combustion Symposium.

Ultra-Low Emission Technology for Coal-fired Flue Gas and Its Applications

Professor Xiang GAO, Cheung Kong Professor, Distinguished Young Scholar of National Science Foundation, Senior Specialist of Zhejiang Province.

Currently, Prof. Xiang GAO is the Dean of the College of Energy Engineering in Zhejiang University and the Director of the Coal-fired Air Pollution Control Engineering Center for the Ministry of National Environmental Protection. Prof. Xiang GAO has built a steady profile in the field of simultaneous removal of multi-pollutants (NOx, SOx, particulate matter and heavy metal, etc.) in flue gas. As a nationally leading researcher in air pollution control, Prof. Xiang GAO pioneered the Ultra-Low Emission (ULE) technology, which was proposed for the first time to reduce emissions from coal-fired power plants to a level even lower than the regulation set for gas-fired plants. His work opened up new fields using multidisciplinary approaches, including the wet flue gas desulfurization (WFGD)-based integrated technologies for efficient removal of SOx, NOx, and Hg, and multi-stage humidified semi-dry flue gas purification as well as the high-efficiency selective catalytic reduction (SCR) and wet electrostatic precipitation (WESP). Due to the outstanding work, Prof. Xiang GAO has won the National Award for Technological Invention (first prize), National Award for Scientific and Technological Progress (second prize), National Award for Technological Invention (second prize), National Award for Teaching Achievements (second prize), Provincial Award for Technological Invention (first prize), Chinese Outstanding Patents Award, etc. Prof. Xiang GAO has published more than 150 SCI covered papers, 45 authorized invention patents (including 4 international patents) and more than 20 national/industrial standards.

Modelling Radiative Heat Transfer in Combustion Processes

Doctor Jean-Louis Consalvi, Aix-Marseille University, IUSTI UMR CNRS 7343, 5 Rue E. Fermi 13453 Marseille Cedex.

Dr. Jean-Louis Consalvi is a senior researcher the Lab IUSTI UMR CNRS 7343 of Aix-Marseille University. His research interests are on the numerical modelling of two-phase reacting flows, radiative heat transfer in gas-particle media including turbulence-radiation interactions, ignition and thermal degradation of solid fuels exposed to fires, and soot production in laminar and turbulent diffusion flames. The main applications of these researches are energy conversion including control and formation of pollutants released from industrial processes or practical applications. Also the research has been applied to understand fires in confined and open environments at normal gravity and micro-gravity conditions including mitigation of fires by water mist. He published more than 75 SCI covered papers in these fields and is awarded of the best paper in the Fire Research colloquium for the 36th International Symposium on Combustion 2016 and of the 2017 Innovation Awards for Franco-Chinese teams of the “Comité France-Chine”.

Combustion of Biomass and its Derived Fuels Under Conditions Pertinent to Stationary Applications

Professor Hongwei Wu, Discipline of Chemical Engineering in Western Australian School of Mines: Minerals, Energy and Chemical Engineering, Curtin University, Perth, Australia.

Professor Hongwei Wu received his PhD degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Newcastle, Australia in August 2000. After worked for two years as a postdoctoral researcher in the Cooperative Research Centre for Clean Power from Lignite at Monash University, Australia, he joined Curtin University in August 2002 as a lecturer in the Discipline of Chemical Engineering, where he has progressed into a full professor since January 2010. Prof Wu’s research focuses are clean and efficient utilisation of fuels and energy, particularly thermochemical processing of various fuels. At Curtin University, Professor Wu is currently leading a research team of 15 members and managing three research laboratories that host an array of state-of-the-art facilities and instruments. As on 27 March 2018, Prof Wu has published 160+ papers in refereed international journals and held 2 international patents in the related areas. Prof Wu has also been serving as Associate Editor of Energy & Fuels, which is a top journal in the area of fuels and energy, published by the American Chemical Society.

Modelling Thermal Conversion of Biofuels

Doctor Miriam Rabaçal, ETH Post-Doctoral Fellow, Aerothermochemistry and Combustion Systems Laboratory of ETH Zurich, Switzerland.

Doctor Miriam Rabaçal is an ETH Post-Doctoral Fellow since 2017. She completed her PhD studies in 2016 obtaining her degree from Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon, Portugal. During her studies she visited Imperial College London, UK, the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany, and the Technical University of Freiberg, Germany, as part of her collaborative research programme. Her research interests are direct numerical simulations of auto-igniting jets, kinetics of pyrolysis and gasification of biomass, experimental characterization of early stage combustion of coal and biomass and large eddy simulations of pulverized coal and biomass combustion. Her research is driven by the incorporation of biofuels in power generation, heat production, and transportation. She participated in more than five international and national research projects in the areas of high-performance computing, combustion, and energy. She has more than 20 papers in international peer-reviewed journals, one book chapter, one edited book, and more than 30 communications in international scientific meetings.

Ammonia utilization to support Global Decarbonization

Doctor Agustin Valera-Medina, Cardiff University, School of Engineering, United Kingdom

Doctor Agustin Valera-Medina is an Associate Professor at Cardiff School of Engineering. His research interests include alternative fuels, hydrodynamics, flame stabilization, fuel injection, heat transfer and combustion technologies. He has participated as PI/CI on 22 industrial projects with multi-nationals including GE, PEMEX, Rolls-Royce, Siemens, Ricardo and EON. He has published 128 peer reviewed papers, and 22 of these specifically concerning ammonia power. He has supervised 22 PhD students (5 on ammonia related topics) - with 13 successfully graduated - and 2 PDRAs since his appointment in 2012. He has won international conference awards including AIAA ‘Best Paper in Terrestrial Technologies’ in 2010 and 2013, and SDEWES SEE 2018, the latter for his research on ammonia/hydrogen humidified combustion. Doctor Valera-Medina led Cardiff’s contribution to the Innovate-UK ‘Decoupled Green Energy’ Project (2015-2018) led by Siemens and in partnership with STFC and the University of Oxford, which aims to demonstrate the use of green ammonia produced from wind energy. He has been part of various scientific boards, chairing sessions in international conferences and moderating large industrial panels on the topic of “Ammonia for Direct Use”. He is supporting the preparation of two Royal Society (UK) Policy Briefings on the use of ammonia as energy vector for Parliamentary scrutiny, whilst working with recognized companies (Airgas, CATF, Ricardo, etc.) in the development of reports and standards for the utilization of ammonia as a fuel.