Introduction - Novel Combustion Concepts for Sustainable Energy Development - page 3

depletion in hydrocarbon fuel reserves from growing demands on energy, it is
important to develop new and novel technologies to reduce energy cost, improve
ef

ciency, and reduce pollution from the existing energy utilization systems. The
energy use, power generation, and propulsion pose direct impact on the environ-
ment with subsequent effects on local and global climate. Therefore, one must focus
on ef energy production from conventional and

alternative energy sources and develop technologies for a range of applications
from micro to mega scale. Although the air toxins from power plants have con-
tinued to decrease over the past few decades, CO 2 concentration in the atmosphere
continues to grow, and CO 2 emissions remain a big challenge due to ever increasing
demands on chemical energy.
Combustion science has made remarkable strides over the last few decades on
improved ef

cient and sustainable “ green ”

ciency of all power, energy conversion, and propulsion systems,
including power generation, gas turbine engines, automobile engines, rocket
engines, industrial furnaces, and many other chemical to thermal to mechanical and
electrical energy conversion systems. However, with rapid increase in energy
demand and increased population, along with limited supply of fossil fuels and
increased concern on global warming from global warming gases emission, sig-
ni ciency and perfor-

mance, reduce pollutants emission, and increase the life of combustion equipment
with improved quality of product. The large reserves of coal in many countries
make it attractive but coal as fuel emits twice the amount of CO 2 than natural gas on
per unit energy basis (coal emits approximately 227 pounds of CO 2 while natural
gas emits 117 pounds for equal BTU of energy). Recent announcement by the US
Environmental Protection Agency on its proposed set of regulations to reduce
annual greenhouse gas emissions from existing power plants by 30 % by 2030
makes it harder for coal to be used. We must enhance plant ef

cant efforts must be made to further improve the system ef

ciency and per-
formance with low carbon footprint fuels. The greenhouse gas emissions (mostly
CO 2 ) in the USA alone were 6,525 million metric tons by the entire economy.
Thermal generating stations contributed to more than 30 % of the CO 2 . The global
CO 2 concentration in 2014 has now exceeded over 400 ppm from about 315 ppm in
1960 and the current level continues to increase. We continue to blast at a rate that
now exceeds over 2 ppm per year. Projected CO 2 concentration is expected to
increase to over 850 ppm by some estimates that will lead to 4 8 ° C global

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temperature rise and about 1 m sea level rise by year 2100. Today ' s contribution to

the greenhouse effect on earth is from water vapor (36 70 %), carbon dioxide

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(9 7 %), and other trace contributors. Major

contributor is therefore CO 2 as water vapor is naturally present in the air with no
real control technology for atmospheric water vapors.
Several developing economies face ever growing energy need in all sectors of
power generation, transport, domestic, and industrial. The fuel used often depends
on the local fuel availability. One key common issue is the growing environmental
pollution for most of the Western countries as well the growing economies in India,
China, and other countries. Western countries have made great strides to curtail
most of the harmful emissions so that the air is much cleaner today than that in the

- 26 %), methane (4 - 9 %), ozone (3 -