High- and Low-Pressure Applications
VAST has applications in many and varied markets. Examples of these applications include:
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- most industrial heating processes
- transportation applications such as the engines powering ships, trains, trucks, or cars
- industrial gas turbines such as those used in electrical power generation or to power pumps on pipelines
- oil spill clean-up technology for use on land or water
- situations requiring controlled burning of highly variable gaseous fuels such as methane from agricultural waste or garbage dumps and various forms of combustible off-gases that are created during industrial processes
- situations requiring better control of the combustion of extremely hot burning gaseous fuels such as syngas from coal gasification, or hydrogen from newly evolving technologies
- situations requiring delivery of steam for space heating or for industrial use in sterilization, cleaning, or drying of products during intermediate stages of manufacturing
Much effort has been spent evaluating these opportunities and prioritizing them based on criteria established to enable the focusing that is so essential for proper stewardship of scarce research and development funds. These opportunities fall into both high and low-pressure applications. The following table illustrates some of the criteria used to determine which sets of applications VASTechnologies™ offer the greatest advantage.
| Market Niche | Criteria |
|---|---|
| High and Low Pressure | Presence or absence of pollution requirements for which compliance is not economically available with current technology |
| Applications benefiting from the ability to very quickly change the rate of delivery of coolant to the combustion process | |
| Applications benefited by being able to combust fuels of opportunity which include large amounts of water or a variable mixture of various kinds of combustible hydrocarbons resulting in a highly variable Btu-release rate | |
| Applications needing more precise temperature profiles for the combustion products in order to increase component life or to reduce product overheating such as scorching of goods being dried by steam | |
| Applications requiring very small form factors to generate process steam | |
| Applications benefited by the ability to vary in real-time the temperature and pressure of the process steam being generated | |
| Applications seeking to combust very mixed fuel streams which include significant amounts of inert diluents such as water | |
| High Pressure, DG/CHP | Significant variability in demand for steam, power, or heat, especially combined with rapidly changing market prices for any of these outputs, or for the cost of fuel as an input. |
| High Pressure | Applications seeking to combust highly variable Btu-release rate fuels due to the variability of gas release rate (as in methane generation from animal or landfill waste) or gas quality, as in the variability of syngas Btu-value produced as a byproduct of some industrial process |
Viewed somewhat differently, the Marketing Opportunity list helps illustrate some of the market forces or needs which VASTechnologies™ is positioned to meet.