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First experimental demonstration of a novel low-emission swirl-stabilized gas turbine combustor designed for pure ammonia
Date posted:
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Post Author
Tracey Biller
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Ammonia is attracting growing interest as a carbon-free fuel for power generation thanks to its ease of storage, transport, and established distribution infrastructure. However, its low reactivity and fuel-bound nitrogen make direct use in gas turbines challenging, leading to flame stability issues and high NOx and N2O emissions. While recent laboratory and micro-gas turbine scale studies have demonstrated the feasibility of pure ammonia combustion, validated burner designs developed to industrial standards and tested at gas turbine relevant pressures are still lacking.
In an important milestone in ammonia combustion technology, Siemens Energy AB (Sweden) and SINTEF Energy Research (Norway) have successfully achieved the first experimental demonstration of a novel low-emission gas turbine combustor operating on 100% ammonia fuel.
The results have now been published in a new research report in Applications in Energy and Combustion Science.
The report presents the first experimental demonstration of a new swirl-stabilised burner designed specifically for pure, uncracked ammonia, integrating key lessons from prior research: a rich primary zone with extended residence time, rapid secondary air mixing in a rich-quench-lean (RQL) configuration, and active liner heat loss management.
The combustor, manufactured by additive manufacturing, was tested at pressures up to 10 bar and fuel input powers up to 117kW in both non-premixed and piloted premixed configurations. Stable operation was achieved over a wide primary zone equivalence ratio range with ammonia slip below the 1 ppm detection limit.
Both configurations exhibited an emissions optimum near ϕPZ=1.2, with NOx as low as 47 ppm and N2O around 1 ppm, and pressure benefits saturating near 8 bar. No HCN was detected during methane to ammonia fuel transition, supporting a practical start-up strategy.
These results represent a critical step towards industrially relevant validation of direct ammonia-fired gas turbine combustion technology.
Notably, the research used a high-pressure HIPROX test facility, access to which is available to IFRF members and supporters since SINTEF is an IFRF member.