EPA Approved ACI Commercial Burning

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Air Curtain Burners, also called Air Curtain Incinerators/Destructors, FireBoxes, Trench Burners, etc., were designed essentially to act as a pollution control device for open burning. The primary objective of an air curtain machine is to reduce the smoke, which results from burning clean wood waste. Using a technology  called "air curtain," the smoke particles are trapped and re burned, reducing them to an acceptable limit per U.S. EPA guidelines.

Clean wood waste is loaded into the Trench/FireBox, and an accelerant such as diesel fuel is used to ignite the wood waste, just like starting a campfire or open burn pile. To keep from blowing out the fire the air curtain is not engaged until the fire has reached a strong burn, this usually happens within 15-20 minutes. The air curtain is then engaged. The air curtain runs at a steady state throughout the burn operation, and the waste wood is loaded at a rate consistent with the burn rate.

Concept

The purpose of the "air curtain" is to slow down the smoke particles and trap them in the trench causing them to be subjected to the highest temperatures in the trench/firebox. In doing this the particles are then reburned and reduced down to an acceptable limit. Which results in a more environmentally friendly burn with opacities well under 10 on the Ringlemann scale, compared to open burning which on average runs between 80-100 on the Ringlemann scale. 

Operation

To operate properly, the air curtain machine has to provide a curtain of air over the fire. The curtain of air has to have a mass flow and velocity that are consistent with the potential mass flow and velocity of the burning wood waste.