The fuel properties of three-phase emulsions as an alternative fuel for diesel engines

Diesel engines are employed as the major propulsion power for in-land and marine transportation vehicles primarily because of their rigid structure, low breakdown rate, high thermal efficiency and high fuel economy. It is expected that diesel engines will be widely used in the foreseeable future. However, the pollutants emitted from diesel engines (in particular nitrogen oxides and particulate matter) are detrimental to the health of living beings and ecological environment have been recognized as the major air pollution source in metropolitan areas and have thus attracted much research interest. Although diesel oil emulsion has been considered as a possible approach to reduce diesel engine pollutants, previous relevant applications were restricted to two-phase emulsions. Three-phase emulsions such as oil-in-water-in-oil briefly denoted as O/W/O emulsions and water-in-oil-in-water, denoted as W/O/W, have not been used as an alternative fuel for any combustion equipment. Studies on the properties of three-phase emulsion as fuel have not been found in the literatures. The emulsification properties of an O/W/O three-phase diesel fuel emulsion were investigated in this experimental study. The results show that the mean drop size of the O/W/O emulsion was reduced significantly with increasing homogenizing machine revolution speed. An increase in inner phase proportion of the O/W/O emulsion resulted in increasing the emulsion viscosity. The viscosity of O/W/O emulsion is greater than that for water-in-oil (denoted briefly as W/O emulsion) for the same water content. More stable emulsion turbidity appeared for three-phase O/W/O diesel emulsions added with emulsifier with HLB values ranging from 6 to 8. In addition, three-phase O/W/O emulsions with greater water content will form a larger number of liquid droplets, leading to a faster formation rate and greater emulsion turbidity at the beginning but a faster descending rate of emulsion turbidity afterwards. The potential for using O/W/O emulsions as an alternative fuel for diesel engines was also evaluated.     

Comparative environmental behavior of bus engine operating on blends of diesel fuel with four straight vegetable oils of Greek origin: Sunflower, cottonseed, corn and olive

An experimental study is conducted to evaluate the use of sunflower, cottonseed, corn and olive straight vegetable oils (SVO) of Greek origin, in blends with diesel fuel at proportions of 10 vol.% and 20 vol.%, in a fully instrumented, six-cylinder, turbocharged and after-cooled, heavy duty (HD), direct injection (DI), ‘Mercedes-Benz’, mini-bus engine installed at the authors’ laboratory. The series of tests are conducted using each of the above blends, with the engine working at two speeds and three loads. Fuel consumption, exhaust smokiness and exhaust regulated gas emissions such as nitrogen oxides (NO_x), carbon monoxide (CO) and total unburned hydrocarbons (HC) are measured. With reference to the corresponding neat diesel fuel operation, the vegetable oil blends show reduction of emitted smoke with slight increase of NO_x and effectively unaffected thermal efficiency. Theoretical aspects of diesel engine combustion, combined with the very widely differing physical and chemical properties of the vegetable oils against those for the diesel fuel, aid to the correct interpretation of the observed engine behavior.     

Low-temperature phase behavior of vegetable oil/co-solvent blends as alternative diesel fuel

Vegetable oils (triacylglycerols) have many characteristics that make them attractive candidates as renewable alternative fuels for compression-ignition (diesel) engines. Unfortunately, vegetable oils are too viscous to be compatible with modern direct-injection diesel fuel systems and engines. Co-solvent blending is a simple and flexible technology that reduces viscosity by mixing the oil with low molecular weight alcohol. A co-solvent (A), consisting, of surfactant plus an amphiphilic compound, is added to solubilize otherwise nearly immiscible oil-alcohol mixtures into a single-layer (isotropic) solution. This work examines low-temperature phase behavior of two soybean oil (SBO)/methanol mixtures solubilized by A=unsaturated long-chain (C₁₈) fatty alcohol/medium-chain alkanol (n-butanol and 2-octanol), one SBO/methanol mixture solubilized by A=triethylammonium linoleate/2-octanol, and one SBO/95 wt% ethanol (E95) mixture solubilized by n-butanol. The E95-blend was further blended in 1∶1 (vol/vol) mixtures with No. 2 diesel fuel. Two types of anisotropic phase behavior were observed; formation of a cloudy layer of solid crystals suspended in bulk solution (Type 1) and formation of two immiscible liquid layers (Type II). The type of phase separation in a given solution was influenced by phase separation temperature (T _ϕ) relative to the crystallization characteristics of compounds in the SBO and fatty alcohol or amine constituents present in solution. Solutions with relatively low T _ϕ values experienced crystallization of small solid particles favoring Type 1 separations. Conversely, solutions with T _ϕ sufficient to avert crystallization of high melting point compounds favored Type II separations where T _ϕ=critical solution temperature (T _critical). Increasing the A/oil (SBO or No. 2 diesel/SBO mixture) mass ratio decreased T _ϕ while increasing the mass fraction of alcohol (methanol or E95) increased T _ϕ. This work shows that vegetable oil/A-based blends can be formulated with cold flow properties superior with respect to cloud point and comparable with respect to kinematic viscosity (v) of methyl soyate (biodiesel), either neat or blended with petroleum middle distillates. Retired     

Ethanolamines used for degumming of rapeseed and sunflower oils as diesel fuels

Pure vegetable oils can be used as alternative fuel for standard unmodified diesel engines, provided the oil viscosity has been lowered by heating before they enter the fuel injection system. In its role as diesel fuel, a vegetable oil has to have, among other parameters, a low acidity and low contents of phosphorus and the alkali earth metals Ca + Mg. Such parameters can be achieved by appropriate partial refining of oil by degumming. In this article, three common ethanolamines, monoethanolamine (MEA), diethanolamine (DEA) and triethanolamine (TEA), were used as degumming agents for removing non‐hydratable phospholipids from crude rapeseed and sunflower oils. Among the studied ethanolamines, MEA is the most effective for the removal of phosphorus. After degumming with MEA (0.5 wt‐%), the phosphorus content in rapeseed oil was reduced from 445 to 3.5 ppm, and from 163 to 2.2 ppm in sunflower oil. After oil treatment with MEA (1.0 wt‐%), the residual content of Ca and Mg decreased from 136 to 4.2 ppm and from 55.4 to 1.1 ppm in rapeseed oil. In sunflower oil, the values of Ca and Mg decreased from 23.9 to 1.5 ppm and from 24.6 to 1.0 ppm. The acid value of the oils also decreased after degumming with ethanolamines. The advantage of this oil treatment process is that it takes place at ambient temperature, resulting in lower production costs and simpler technology.     

Ethanol animal fat emulsions as a diesel engine fuel – Part 1: Formulations and influential parameters

This paper focuses on effective solution to improve the combustion of low quality animal fat by making stable emulsions with water. Animal fat emulsions are prepared by mixing the fat with water, surfactant and co-surfactant. Ethanol is chosen as the co-surfactant because of its dilution ability. SPAN 83 also called Sorbitan Sesquiolate is used as the surfactant because it well stabilizes and forms stable animal fat emulsions. Emulsions and micro-emulsions are prepared for different co-surfactant/surfactant (C/S) ratios. A number of formulations are made and the Sauter mean diameter of water droplets are estimated using electron microscope images. Results are presented in pseudo ternary diagrams. Influence of different parameters affecting the emulsion characteristics are studied experimentally. According to the stability, structure, viscosity, fat content and economical aspects, the optimum emulsion is found as the emulsion with 36.4% of ethanol, 3.6% of SPAN 83, 10% of water and 50% of animal fat by volume.     

动植物油生产清洁燃料和低碳烯烃的替代加工工艺

Since the production cost of biodiesel is now the main hurdle limiting their applicability in some areas, catalytic cracking reactions represent an alternative route to utilization of vegetable oils and animal fats. Hence, catalytic transformation of oils and fats was carried out in a laboratory-scale two-stage riser fluid catalytic cracking （TSRFCC） unit in this work. The results show that oils and fats can be used as FCC feed singly or co-feeding with vacuum gas oil （VGO）, which can give high yield （by mass）of liquefied petroleum gas （LPG）, C2-C4 oletms, tor example 45% LPG, 47% C2-C4 olefins, and 77.6% total liquid yield produced with palm oil cracking. Co-feeding with VGO gives a high yield of LPG （39.1%） and propylene （18.1%）. And oxygen element content is very low （about 0.5%） in liquid products, hence, oxygen is removed in the form of H2O, CO and CO2. At the same time, high concentration of aromatics （C7-C9 aromatics predominantly） in the gasoline fraction is obtained after TSRFCC reaction of palm oil, as a result of large amount of hydrogen-transfer, cyclization and aromatization reactions, Additionally, most of properties of produced gasoline and diesel oil fuel meet the requirements of national standards, containing little sulfur. So TSRFCC technology is thought to be an alternative processing technology leading to production of clean fuels and light olefins.     

Combustion and emission characteristics of DME as an alternative fuel for compression ignition engines with a high pressure injection system

The subject of this work is the investigation of the injection characteristics of neat dimethyl ether (DME) and the effect of DME fuel on the exhaust emission characteristics and engine performance of compression ignition engines. In order to analyze the injection characteristics of DME fuel as an alternative fuel for compression ignition engines, experiments were conducted to obtain the injection rate profile. The effective nozzle diameter and its velocity, and the discharge coefficient of the nozzle were analyzed by applying a nozzle flow model that accounted for the effect of cavitation. In addition, combustion characteristics of DME and diesel fuel in terms of combustion pressure, rate of heat release, indicated mean effective pressure (IMEP), and ignition delay at various injection timings were investigated on a constant energy input basis.When a constant pulse width was applied, the results of DME injection characterization showed that the actual injection duration of DME was longer than that of diesel fuel because the injection started faster and ended with more delay. The DME fueled engine showed slightly higher IMEP and NO_x emission with drastically lower CO and HC emissions and the possible reasons for the higher IMEP of DME fuel was discussed.