Catalytic micro-device for methane combustion: a study on kinetics and fluid-dynamic.

Some kind of remote power application require to be free of acoustic and vibration noise as well as independent from sunlight. Such requirements can be satisfied by a catalytic microcombustor coupled with a thermoelectric generator. For this reason a complete kinetical study of a Pd catalyst supported by Ceria-zirconia and by LaMn perovskites was made and the kinetical equations obtained were used to build a CFD model of a microcombustor device. This thesis discusses also the swich on - swich off phemomena taking place in the simplified 2D cylindrical and in the full 3d models explaining them as heat holding properties of the materials employed.