An ethanol injection for diesel engines
PALO ALTO, Calif.--This is sort of like the "two, two, two mints in one" solution for the clean-tech set.
Australia's Terra Fuel Technologies has come up with a device that, when added to a diesel car, bus or truck, lets the vehicle also run partly on ethanol. You need to add a second gas tank on the vehicle to hold ethanol, but in the end, it's an ethanol-diesel car. The device, a black box, controls the flow of ethanol into the engine.
The company has tested it and will start selling it in the United States.
Who in their right mind would want this? Adding ethanol to a diesel engine actually improves performance of the vehicle by about 10 percent while reducing emissions, said Alexander Daniel, vice president of Business Strategies International, which is trying to help Terra Fuel get traction in the States.
Running a diesel engine on vegetable oil, a clean alternative, can degrade performance a little, even according to biodiesel fans.
Diesel drivers, of course, can reduce emissions by running their cars on a mix of regular diesel and biodiesel. But biodiesel is made from oil, Alexander and others at BSI noted, and a lot of countries don't have a lot of spare vegetable oil. Australia, for instance, grows sugarcane, which can be turned into ethanol.
So who knows?
The company presented its objectives at the AlwaysOn Stanford Summit here Wednesday.
Wow, a diesel vehicle that can also run on diesel! This is truly revolutionary!
:)
in all seriousness, though, I'm not sure where they got their info about biodeisel. Having worked with it first hand, I personally have witnessed performance increases at all times when it's been used, due to it having a very good cleaning effect on the engine, and having a much more efficient burn.
For example ethanol made from corn yields 77,000 BTU's of energy per gallon, yet it requires 131,000 BTU's of energy per gallon to make. The energy must com from somewhere else, like electricity, which may be generated from fossil fuel to begin with.
Alternative energy can be a great idea, ethanol however, is just a big CON. But it makes great news right?
Those numbers seem a bit much, but I guess maybe they're correct. Either way, Ethanol isn't exactly practical yet (if ever.) The other problem is that if we want to continue to eat, we can't use it exclusively to power our cars (something like 15% of the corn crop in the US goes to ethanol production which is roughly 5% of the gasoline supply.)
1) How does the 10% ethanol effect fuel economy of the diesel engine? Don't forget to factor in the ethanol. Gasoline engines running ethanol get better performance but less fuel economy.
2) I understand it reduces the emissions of the diesel engine as well, by what percentage? Do any of the emissions increase?
3) Does the decrease in emissions equal or exceed that of a gasoline engine converted to run on ethanol? In other words, for a given amount of ethanol would the planet be better off if we ran it in a diesel or a converted gasoline engine?
Given that the last gas engine I drove went to 364,000 miles and needed a clutch, not an engine rebuild, when I sold it, something must be right with ethanol. It used a quart of oil every 1800 miles, not burned it.. I'm not about to pull an engine to replace a gasket..
2. As for ethanol production being exothermic - also crap. Any wine-maker / amateur chemist can tell you that. As for distillation being an energy hog - also nonsense - I distilled wine into high-"octane" ethanol for years with a solar still, & ran tractors and pickups on a gas-ethanol mix. In winter, the still was powered with wood, which we have in abundance as scrap, & we often have grey days "on end". I've never cut a living tree for a fire, since you Americans waste, waste, waste.
3. With all the biomass out there that can & does ferment, it's silly to rely on corn, which is an expensive item to produce. Having farmed for a good chunk of my life, I know the cost of producing corn. Basically, if a vegetable material can be made to ferment, it will produce ethanol. My vote is for potatoes. They're much cheaper to produce, will grow almost anywhere, they rot faster, & produce plenty of ethanol, being mostly starch, and the Russians have been "running" on vodka for how long??
4. As for running a diesel engine on diesel & ethanol - I'm still interested. Judging from the garbage passing as 'science' regarding gas-ethanol, I expect diesel-ethanol will be a winner, too. My still has been down for awhile, but now that fuel prices are outta sight, I guess I'll have to get it back up & start mixing & see how it goes. One thing's likely - it will be easier to mix diesel with ethanol & run the pickup than to titrate vegetable oil, filter it, and keep it warm in the winter so it doesn't gel. Ethanol doesn't gel; it protects against gelling.
5. In re the question about emissions - a diesel engine will always beat a gasoline engine on emissions. Our Holy Mother the Earth is always better off if we run diesel. Which is why Detroit refuses to change, being in bed with Big Oil - or is that 'joined at the hip'? No matter - diesels produce particulates, but nowhere near the noxious chemistry of gasoline combustion, and it's easier to produce diesel - requires less energy to crack it out of crude, so it's far better for the Earth. Particulates are easy to filter, and many diesel fleets are running secondary filters that take care of the particulates, now. Diesel burns hotter so burns cleaner than gas engines. I've changed to diesel & it's a far bettersystem.
- by Indn Maid August 19, 2008 9:35 AM PDT
- 1. I have run gasoline engines on ethanol mixes for over 20 years and have never had fuel economy drop. Period. It either stayed the same or improved, & it improved more often than it stayed the same. So much for the crap about ethanol decreases fuel economy. I believe this an urban legend started by someone from Big Oil.
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(9 Comments)Given that the last gas engine I drove went to 364,000 miles and needed a clutch, not an engine rebuild, when I sold it, something must be right with ethanol. It used a quart of oil every 1800 miles, not burned it.. I'm not about to pull an engine to replace a gasket..
2. As for ethanol production being exothermic - also crap. Any wine-maker / amateur chemist can tell you that. As for distillation being an energy hog - also nonsense - I distilled wine into high-"octane" ethanol for years with a solar still, & ran tractors and pickups on a gas-ethanol mix. In winter, the still was powered with wood, which we have in abundance as scrap, & we often have grey days "on end". I've never cut a living tree for a fire, since you Americans waste, waste, waste.
3. With all the biomass out there that can & does ferment, it's silly to rely on corn, which is an expensive item to produce. Having farmed for a good chunk of my life, I know the cost of producing corn. Basically, if a vegetable material can be made to ferment, it will produce ethanol. My vote is for potatoes. They're much cheaper to produce, will grow almost anywhere, they rot faster, & produce plenty of ethanol, being mostly starch, and the Russians have been "running" on vodka for how long??
4. As for running a diesel engine on diesel & ethanol - I'm still interested. Judging from the garbage passing as 'science' regarding gas-ethanol, I expect diesel-ethanol will be a winner, too. My still has been down for awhile, but now that fuel prices are outta sight, I guess I'll have to get it back up & start mixing & see how it goes. One thing's likely - it will be easier to mix diesel with ethanol & run the pickup than to titrate vegetable oil, filter it, and keep it warm in the winter so it doesn't gel. Ethanol doesn't gel; it protects against gelling.
5. In re the question about emissions - a diesel engine will always beat a gasoline engine on emissions. Our Holy Mother the Earth is always better off if we run diesel. Which is why Detroit refuses to change, being in bed with Big Oil - or is that 'joined at the hip'? No matter - diesels produce particulates, but nowhere near the noxious chemistry of gasoline combustion, and it's easier to produce diesel - requires less energy to crack it out of crude, so it's far better for the Earth. Particulates are easy to filter, and many diesel fleets are running secondary filters that take care of the particulates, now. Diesel burns hotter so burns cleaner than gas engines. I've changed to diesel & it's a far bettersystem.