Investigation of bioethanol low-carbon fuel for diesel engines under idling conditions: Combustion, engine performance and emissions

Abstract

In this study, the low idle operation is defined as the engine running at the lowest engine speed with a few slight loads. Idling is necessary for most vehicles, especially for buses and trucks that frequently travel long distances, as drivers often rest inside the vehicle. However, under idling conditions, weak air flow and low air-fuel ratio result in poor air to fuel mixture, ultimately causing incomplete combustion and the production of more harmful exhaust emissions. Bioethanol, as a low-carbon fuel, has great potential for application in diesel engines due to its unique properties. In this research, the influences of different diesel-bioethanol blends (BE0, BE5, BE10, BE15) on combustion and emissions of a diesel engine were investigated under idle conditions. The main results show that there was no phase separation phenomenon even up to 15% bioethanol was directly blended with diesel by volume. And adding bioethanol to diesel had no significant impact on combustion pressure peak, but it postponed the start of combustion (SOC). Surprisingly, the nitrogen oxide (NO_x) and smoke were simultaneously decreased by over 52% and 78% with the intervention of bioethanol, respectively.

Keywords

Diesel engine / Low-carbon fuel / Combustion / Engine performance / Idling emissions

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Jun Cong Ge: Data curation; Funding acquisition; Investigation; Methodology; Roles/Writing - original draft; Lifeng Wang: Funding acquisition; Investigation; Methodology; Writing - review & editing. Hongliang Luo: Funding acquisition; Investigation; Methodology; Resources; Writing - review & editing. Nag Jung Choi: Funding acquisition; Investigation; Methodology; Project administration; Resources; Writing - review & editing.

Declaration of competing interest

All authors of this article declare that there is no conflict of interest.

Acknowledgements

This study is financially supported by the Open Research Subject of Key Laboratory of Fluid Machinery and Engineering (Xihua University), Sichuan Province (LTJX-2024 002) and the National Key Laboratory of Marine Engine Science and Technology (LAB-2023-01) and the Open Fund of Key Laboratory of Oil & Gas Equipment, Ministry of Education (Southwest Petroleum University) (OGE202302-04) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (3072023CFJ0304).

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