The Internal Energy Agency (IEA) considers ammonia (NH3) key to decarbonising 
shipping. A new report from the IEA believes it will be ammonia, not methanol, 
that must play a major role if shipping is to meet its ambitious emissions 
reductions targets. While the technical issues related to the combustion of 
ammonia in engines have already attracted considerable attention from the 
international combustion community. No study in the public domain addressed 
accidental combustion of potential leaks of NH3 in engine rooms, which are 
confined/semi-confined. Potential ignition, the resulting fire and explosion 
risk as mitigation measures such as venting should be considered to inform 
regulations and policy as well as the development of mitigation measures, such 
as venting. 

	The PhD project aims to address the above issues with specific focus on 
vented explosion mitigation. The specific tasks include:
•	Analyse the combustion characteristics of ammonia in the context of fire 
and explosion safety.  	
•	Establish a strategy to extend HyFOAM, the in-house modified 
computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code for modelling hydrogen explosions 
developed within the frame of OpenFOAM, to ammonia explosions. The modified code 
will be named as NH3FOAM.
•	Validate the predictions with published experimental data of similar 
fuels and/or any new data on ammonia explosions which may come out during the 
PhD.
•	Conduct a series of CFD predictions to examine the effects of different 
venting strategies, considering the geometric layout and environment in the 
propulsion systems and engine room.Use the predictions to extend the engineering 
model for vented hydrogen explosions previously developed in the HySEA 
(Improving Hydrogen Safety for Energy Applications (HySEA) through pre-normative 
research on vented deflagrations) project to ammonia.

        The studentship cover Full UK tuition fees and Stipend at UKRI rates (Full time annualised £18,622)for 
3.5 years. Because of the huge difference in tuition fees between UK and international rates (including 
EU), the advert is only open to British Students. Further information about tuition fees can be found at 
https://www.surrey.ac.uk/postgraduate/aerodynamic-and-environmental-flow-phd

Information about research activities in the supervisors group can be found at 
https://www.surrey.ac.uk/people/jennifer-x-wen