Patent ID: 7282171

Claim:
A combustion method comprising the steps of: providing a furnace having at least one burner, and configured to substantially prevent the introduction of air into the furnace; supplying oxygen having a purity of at least about 85 percent; supplying a carbon based fuel; feeding the oxygen and the carbon based fuel into the furnace in a stoichiometric proportion to one another; limiting an excess of either the oxygen or the carbon based fuel to less than 5 percent over the stoichiometric proportion; controlling the combustion of the carbon based fuel to produce a reduction in fuel usage of at least about 5 percent or more measured as a reduction in fuel required to achieve an equivalent change in energy of a body in a specified furnace under predetermined conditions, wherein the specified furnace is the furnace of the present method fed by air; and wherein the method is about 70 percent more efficient than a specified combustion process in which air is employed rather than oxygen.