Burner Management System Flame Detection Segmentation
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Solution Overview
Problem
The high capital and maintenance costs associated with installing flame detectors at each burner in industrial gas appliances, particularly in multi-burner applications, create challenges for plant operators, as existing codes require rapid response times that become impractical and costly with increasing numbers of burners.
Innovation Solution
A burner management system that only requires a subset of burners to have flame detectors, using a gas flow meter to measure cumulative fuel gas flow and a controller to determine the status of non-supervised burners, restricting the lighting of additional non-supervised burners when the number reaches a predetermined threshold to prevent unsafe fuel gas concentrations below the lower explosive limit.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If flame detectors are installed at each burner, then safety response time is improved, but capital cost and device complexity increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments burners into two categories: supervised burners with flame detectors and non-supervised burners without flame detectors. This segmentation allows the system to meet safety requirements for critical burners while reducing overall instrumentation complexity and cost for the entire burner array.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies different monitoring qualities to different burners based on their location and operational characteristics. Supervised burners receive full flame detection monitoring, while non-supervised burners rely on fuel gas flow measurement and control. This local differentiation optimizes safety where needed while reducing overall system complexity.
2Reliability
If flame detectors are installed at each burner, then flame detection reliability is improved, but maintenance cost increases
Solution Approach 1:
By segmenting burners into supervised and non-supervised groups, the patent reduces the total number of flame detectors required, thereby reducing maintenance scope and costs while maintaining adequate reliability through strategic placement of detectors on supervised burners.
3Productivity
If the number of burners increases, then productivity is improved, but system complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent makes the fuel gas flow measurement system multi-functional by using it both for process control (regulating fuel gas flow to maintain desired burners per foot) and for safety monitoring (detecting unsafe conditions when too many burners are lit). This universality allows the system to scale to more burners without proportionally increasing complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces fuel gas flow measurement as an intermediary mechanism that indirectly monitors the state of non-supervised burners. Instead of directly detecting flames at every burner, the system uses fuel gas flow data as a mediator to infer burner status and trigger safety responses, thereby managing system complexity.
4Productivity
If fuel gas flow is increased to light more burners, then productivity is improved, but safety risk increases due to potential fuel gas accumulation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements feedback control by continuously measuring fuel gas flow and comparing it against calculated values based on supervised burner status. When the measured flow exceeds the calculated flow (indicating potential unsafe conditions with too many non-supervised burners lit), the system provides feedback to close the fuel gas control valve, preventing fuel gas accumulation and potential ignition hazards.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies preliminary anti-action by proactively preventing unsafe conditions before they can develop into hazards. The system calculates a maximum safe number of non-supervised burners based on fuel gas flow measurements and prevents lighting additional burners when this threshold would be exceeded, thereby preventing fuel gas accumulation before it becomes dangerous.
Data Source
AI summary
The present disclosure provides a burner management system (BMS) for an industrial gas appliance and method for controlling a warm-up operation of the industrial gas appliance. The BMS and control method only requires a subset of the burners to be provided with flame detectors. In accordance with one aspect, the method involves lighting a supervised burner by providing a fuel gas flow thereto; continuously detecting a flame at the supervised burner indicating that the supervised burner is lit; incrementally lighting non-supervised burners by providing the fuel gas flow thereto when a non-supervised burner status indicates a safe lighting condition, the non-supervised burner status being determined by: measuring a total fuel gas flowing to the plurality of burners; and determining the number of the non-supervised burners with the fuel gas flowing thereto from the measurement of the total fuel gas and a supervised burner status.