1. Internal combustion engine The internal combustion engine is an engine in which the combustion of a fuel (normally a fossil fuel) occurs with an oxidizer (usually air) in a combustion chamber. In an internal combustion engine the expansion of the high-temperature and -pressure gases produced by combustion applies direct force to some component of the engine, such as pistons, turbine blades, or a nozzle. This force moves the component over a distance, generating useful mechanical energy. The term internal combustion engine usually refers to an engine in which combustion is intermittent, such as the more familiar four-stroke and two-stroke piston engines, along with variants, such as the Wankel rotary engine. A second class of internal combustion engines use continuous combustion: gas turbines, jet engines and most rocket engines, each of which are internal combustion engines on the same principle as previously described. The internal combustion engine (or ICE) is quite different from external combustion engines, such as steam or Stirling engines, in which the energy is delivered to a working fluid not consisting of, mixed with, or contaminated by combustion products. Working fluids can be air, hot water, pressurized water or even liquid sodium, heated in some kind of boiler. A large number of different designs for ICEs have been developed and built, with a variety of different strengths and weaknesses.
1. Introduction1) Fuels Solid fuels: Coal and Biomass Coal is one of most important fuel in Korea for electricity production and other industrial uses. It consists of the remains of vegetation deposits of past geologic ages, after subjection of biochemical actions, high pressure, temperature, and submersion. The characteristics of coal vary considerably with location, and even within a given mine there is some variation in composition. Depending on the level of coalification process, coal is categorized into different ranks: peat, lignite, sub-bituminous, bituminous and anthracite. While coal is fossil fuel, biomass is a ‘renewable’ resource. The energy source that induces the renewability of biomass is the sunlight or radiation from the sun captured by photosynthesis. The term “biomass” is used to describe all living matter derived from plants, such as trees, grass, animals, fungi and algae.