Hydrogen use in Internal Combustion Engine: Analysis and comparison of turbulent combustion models

The main challenge of the transport sector today is the reduction of emissions, and one of the most innovative solutions currently under investigation in this direction is the use of hydrogen as fuel, in particular the application of it in the internal combustion engines (ICEs). The present thesis attempts to firstly provide an overview of what are the main solutions for the application of hydrogen in the transport sector and compare them from the environmental and economical point of view. Secondly, three combustion models highly used in the study of ICEs run by hydrogen will be compared through simulations using the CONVERGE software, with the aim of identifying the key parameters that influence the results, and the conditions under which the models yield predictions that converge or diverge. The simulations will be done on a single-cylinder, spark-ignition (SI) engine operating exclusively on hydrogen. Moreover, the parameters that will change will be the air/fuel ratio and the Spark Time (ST). The combination of those factors will show how much both influence the results for this type of engine simulations for each model.