Fast Combustion Simulations
Time-Integration of Chemical Processes in Reactor Networks, using Julia
J.S. van der Heide (TU Delft - Applied Sciences)
D.J.P. Lahaye – Mentor (TU Delft - Mathematical Physics)
CR Kleijn – Mentor (TU Delft - ChemE/Transport Phenomena)
More Info
expand_more
Other than for strictly personal use, it is not permitted to download, forward or distribute the text or part of it, without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), unless the work is under an open content license such as Creative Commons.
Abstract
Is Julia suited for chemical process analyses? Yes.
This thesis investigates solving ordinary differential equations (ODEs) in programming language Julia, which it does firstly through a simple example of algae populations, and secondly through complex chemical simulations. A progressively more complex framework describing chemical combustion and diffusion is established and implemented. Problems of great stiffness and containing 200+ variables have been integrated in less than 20 seconds, showing the promise this new, open-source and accessible code language.
The thermochemical model that was developed could be improved upon: it has the problem of unexpectedly low flame temperatures because of heat lost to dissociative effects, the current solution for preventing variables overshooting into the negative, it is is ugly and there is ever more optimisation possible. What the program does is run, and it approximately simulates the kinetics and thermochemistry of combustion within acceptable runtimes, thus proving the technical feasibility but lacking the complete implementation of graph-based chemical analysis in Julia.