Breakdown reaction

[Amirreza Hesabi Shotorbani]

Hello,

I would greatly appreciate your assistance with a thermal degradation modeling problem I'm working on.

I am attempting to model a thermal degradation reaction where my fuel, with the chemical formula C_a H_b O_c, decomposes into various light gas species. This reaction occurs in the absence of oxygen (pyrolysis conditions).

 C_a H_b O_c -----> A CO2 + B CO + C H2 + D CH4

I would like to use Cantera's gas.equilibrate("TP") method to determine the stoichiometric coefficients for this reaction. However, I understand that Cantera typically requires predefined species rather than allowing direct input of elemental compositions.

I have two specific questions:

1. Is there a way to define a fuel species in Cantera using only its elemental composition (C, H, O ratios) without specifying the exact molecular structure?
2. If I need to define this fuel separately in a mechanism file (such as GRI30.yaml), would Cantera be able to solve the equilibrium problem for this custom species?

Any guidance on the best approach for handling this type of problem would be very helpful.

Thank you for your time and assistance.