In Situ H2o and Temperature Detection Close to Burning Biomass Pellets Using Calibration-free Wavelength Modulation Spectroscopy

The design and application of an H2O/temperature sensor based on scanned calibration-free wavelength modulation spectroscopy (CF-WMS) and a single tunable diode laser at 1.4 μm is presented. The sensor probes two H2O absorption peaks in a single scan and simultaneously retrieves H2O concentration and temperature by least-squares fitting simulated 1f-normalized 2f-WMS spectra to measured 2f/1f-WMS signals, with temperature, concentration and nonlinear modulation amplitude as fitting parameters. Given a minimum detectable absorbance of 1.7×10 cm Hz, the system is applicable down to an H2O concentration of 0.1 % at 1000 K and 20 cm path length (200 ppm·m). The temperature in a water-seeded lab-scale reactor (670-1220 K at 4 % H2O) was determined within an accuracy of 1 % by comparison with the reactor thermocouple. The CF-WMS sensor was applied to realtime in situ measurements of H2O concentration and temperature time histories (0.25 s time resolution) in the hot gases 2 to 11 mm above biomass pellets during atmospheric combustion in the reactor. Temperatures between 1200 and 1600 K and H2O concentrations up to 40 % were detected above the biofuels.