Combustion performance and numerical simulation of a high‐temperature air–LPG flame on a regenerative burner

High‐temperature air combustion is attracting great interest in the metallurgical industry lately as its claimed benefits include large energy saving, low air emissions, increased product quality and increased productivity. This paper presents a numerical study of combustion performance in a semi‐industrial test furnace equipped with a regenerative burner and with a conventional turbulent jet burner. The numerical calculation is also validated by experiment. In this regard, flow field was calculated with k‐ɛ turbulence model, the model of combustion employed the eddy dissipation concept with a two‐step mechanism to describe chemical reactions; radiation was handled using the discrete transfer method. The results indicate that equipping a furnace with high‐cycle regenerative burner systems can provide more uniform gas temperature profiles, a higher energy utilizing efficiency, a low NOx emission, a larger flame, the low maximum local heat release and the possibility of low combustion noise.