Thermal Efficiency and Pollutant Emissions of Domestic Cooking Burners Using DME-LPG Blends as a Fuel

Traditional liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) is blended with Di-methyl-ether (DME) as substitution for conventional household cooking fuel. Effect of DME-LPG blend composition on performance of domestic cooking burner was investigated. Two types of the nationwide burner, conventional burner (CB) and porous radiant burner (PRB) were tested. DME was blended up to 30% weight in LPG, in which, the stabilized flames can be established without any burner modification, except for PRB, at 30% DME, the lifted flame was observed. It was found that a small amount of DME blended with LPG enhances significantly combustion efficiency. For the CB, a zero emission of CO gas was detected at 20% weight of DME in DME-LPG blend at constant fuel supply pressure. However, increasing DME decreases thermal efficiency. By mean of increasing oxygenate compound, flame length decreased, hence, the impinging flames is more diluted by a surrounding. In case of the PRB, there are no significant differences in thermal efficiency with the increase of DME less than 20%. On the other hand, at higher than 20% DME, thermal efficiency significantly decreases due to a decrease in radiation efficiency. The combustion zone moves downstream and the premixed flames stabilize at the upper surface of the porous media.