Combustion has played a central role in the development of our civilization which it maintains today as its predominant source of energy. The aim of this book is to provide an understanding of both fundamental and applied aspects of low-temperature combustion chemistry and autoignition. The topic is rooted in classical observational science and has grown, through an increasing understanding of the linkage of the phenomenology to coupled chemical reactions, to quite profound advances in the chemical kinetics of both complex and elementary reactions. The driving force has been both the intrinsic interest of an old and intriguing phenomenon and the centrality of its applications to our economic prosperity. The volume provides a coherent view of the subject while, at the same time, each chapter is self-contained.

This research book provides state-of-the-art advances in several areas of energy generation from, and environmental impact of, fuels and biofuels. It also presents novel developments in the areas of biofuels and products from various feedstock materials along with thermal management, emission control and environmental issues. Availability of clean and sustainable energy is of paramount importance in all applications of energy, power, mobility and propulsion. This book is written by internationally renowned experts from around the globe. They provide the latest innovations in cleaner energy utilization for a wide range of devices. The energy and environment sustainability requires a multipronged approach involving development and utilization of new and renewable fuels, design of fuel-flexible combustion systems and novel and environmentally friendly technologies for improved fuel use. This book serves as a good reference for practicing engineers, educators and research professionals.

Practical fuels are a complex mixture of thousands of hydrocarbon compounds, making it challenging and difficult to study their combustion behavior. It's generally agreed that in order to study these complex practical fuels a much simpler approach of studying simple fuel surrogates containing limited number of components is more feasible. Ethanol and n-heptane have been studied as primary reference fuels in the surrogate study of gasoline and diesel over the past few decades. The objective of the following thesis has been to study the autoignition characteristics of ethanol and n-heptane and validate chemical kinetic mechanisms. The validation of a chemical kinetic mechanism provides a deeper insight into the combustion behavior of the fuels which can be further used to study advanced combustion concepts. Experiments have been conducted on the rapid compression machine (RCM) and validated against mechanisms from literature study. Rapid compression machines have been primarily used to study chemical kinetics at low to intermediate temperatures and high pressures for their accuracy and reproducibility. For the following study experiments span over a range of temperature (650-1000 K), pressure (10, 15 and 20 bar) and equivalence ratio ([phi]=0.3, 0.5, 1). Experimental data based on the adiabatic volumetric expansion approach have been modeled numerically using the Sandia SENKIN code in conjunction with CHEMKIN. Experiments have been primarily focused on validating kinetic mechanisms at low to intermediate temperatures and elevated pressures. Ignition delay time data from experiments have been deduced based on the pressure and time histories. A brute sensitivity and flux analysis has been performed to reveal the key sensitive reactions and the dominant reaction pathways followed under the present experimental conditions. Improvements have been suggested and discrepancies noted in order to develop a valid chemical kinetic mechanism. Under the present experimental conditions for the study of ethanol, reactions involving hydroperoxyl radicals, namely C2H5OH+HȮ2 and CH3CHO+ HȮ2 as well as the formation of H2O2 from HȮ2 radical and its subsequent decomposition have been found to be sensitive. Based on the following, improvements and developements have been suggested to increase the accuracy and predictability of the mechanisms studied. Ignition delay data from experiments have been compared against those obtained from the mechanism used in the study for n-heptane. Discrepancies have been found in the low temperature region, with the mechanism under predicting the first ignition delay. The causes for the discrepancy have been noted to be due to the NTC behaviour exhibited during the two stage ignition of n-heptane. At low temperatures the reaction pathway proceeded by chain branching mainly due to the ketohydroperoxide species reaction pathway has been analysed. As the temperature of the reaction increases the reaction pathway is dominated by the ȮOH species propagation resulting in the formation of conjugate olefins and [Beta]-decomposition products, a further investigation of which can help improve the predictability of the mechanism.