Case Study: Kanthal achieves reduced emissions and 10–20% higher burner efficiency with ANSYS simulation

Simulation Helps Reduce Pollution and Enhance Burner Efficiency

Kanthal AB, a Sandvik Group company that designs and manufactures process burners, faced the dual challenge of meeting tightening emissions standards while maintaining high burner efficiency for its single‑ended recuperative (SER) burners. Key problems included delivering the correct air–gas mix to minimize NOx and CO and predicting creep deflection in horizontally mounted tubes—a process that traditionally required up to 3,000 hours (125 days) of physical testing. To address this, Kanthal turned to ANSYS technologies, including ANSYS Mechanical, ANSYS CFX and the ANSYS Workbench platform.

Using ANSYS Workbench to import SolidWorks models, ANSYS Mechanical was used to simulate tube creep/deflection (cutting the simulated testing time to less than one day from 125 days), and ANSYS CFX was used to model and optimize flow, mixing and combustion. The ANSYS-driven design produced an SER burner with roughly 80% efficiency (10–20% better than conventional SER burners), NOx under 50 ppm (≈20 mg/MJ) versus typical 200–500 ppm, reduced CO, and development time shortened by several months—demonstrating measurable emissions, efficiency and time‑to‑market improvements.

Kanthal

Orjan Danielsson

Senior Simulation Specialist