Lessons learned from transient analysis of combustion equipment in the process industries

During gas flare operation, hydrocarbon gas is fed through a flare stack and ignited by a pilot. During the ignition process, flares generally produce significant amounts of smoke (see Figure 1) since enough mixing energy is not available to entrain surrounding air to completely burn the flare gas. Large Multi-Point Ground Flares (MPGF) with hundreds of flare burners arranged in rows and operated in stages pose a significant safety risk during the ignition process (see Figure 2).