Alternate Fuels

ALTERNATE FUELS

Sometime during the 21st century, crude oil and petroleum products will become very scarce and costly to find and produce. At the same time, there will likely be an increase in the number of automobiles and other IC engines. Although fuel economy of engines is greatly improved from the past and will probably continue to beimproved, numbers alone dictate that there will be a great demand for fuel in the coming decades. Gasoline will become scarce and costly. Alternate fuel technology, availability, and use must and will become more common in the coming decades. Although there have always been some IC engines fuelled with non-gasoline or diesel oil fuels, their numbers have been relatively small. Because of the high cost of petroleum products, some third-world countries have for many years been using manufactured alcohol as their main vehicle fuel. Many pumping stations on natural gas pipelines use the pipeline gas to fuel the engines driving the pumps. This solves an otherwise complicated problem of delivering fuel to the pumping stations, many of which are in very isolated regions. Some large displacement engines have been manufactured especially for pipeline work. These consist of a bank of engine cylinders and a bank of compressor cylinders connected to the same crankshaft and contained in a single engine block similar to a V-style engine.

Alcohols

Alcohols are an attractive alternate fuel because they can be obtained from a number of sources, both natural and manufactured. Methanol (methyl alcohol) and ethanol (ethyl alcohol) are two kinds of alcohol that seem most promising and have had the most development as engine fuel.

The advantages of alcohol as a fuel include:

1. Can be obtained from a number of sources, both natural and manufactured.

2. Is high octane fuel with anti-knock index numbers (octane number on fuel pump) of over 100 High octane numbers result, at least in part, from the high flame speed of alcohol. Engines using high-octane fuel can run more efficiently by using higher compression ratios.

3. Generally less overall emissions when compared with gasoline.

4.  When burned, it forms more moles of exhaust, which gives higher pressure and more power in the expansion stroke.

5.    Has high evaporative cooling (hfg) which results in a cooler intake process and compression stroke. This raises the volumetric efficiency of the engine and reduces the required work input in the compression stroke.

6. Low sulphur content in the fuel.

The disadvantages of alcohol fuels include:

1. Almost twice as much alcohol as gasoline must be burned to give the same energy input to the engine. With equal thermal efficiency and similar engine output usage, twice as much fuel would have to be purchased, and the distance which could be driven with a given fuel tank volume would be cut in half. The same amount of automobile use would require twice as much storage capacity in the distribution system, twice the number of storage facilities, and twice the volumeof storage at the service station, twice as many tank trucks and pipelines, etc. Even with the lower energy content of alcohol, engine power for a given displacement would be about the same. This is because of the lower air-fuel ratio needed by alcohol. Alcohol contains oxygen and thus requires less air for stoichiometric combustion. More fuel can be burned with the same amount of air.

2.   More aldehydes in the exhaust. If as much alcohol fuel was consumed as gasoline, aldehyde emissions would be a serious exhaust pollution problem.

3.  Alcohol is much more corrosive than gasoline on copper, brass, aluminium, rubber, and many plastics. This puts some restrictions on the design and manufacturing of engines to be used with this fuel. This should also be considered when alcohol fuels are used in engine systems designed to be used with gasoline. Fuel lines and tanks, gaskets, and even metal engine parts can deteriorate with long-term alcohol use (resulting in cracked fuel lines, the need for special fuel tank, etc). Methanol is very corrosive on metals.

4.  Poor cold weather starting characteristics due to low vapour pressure and evaporation. Alcohol-fuelled engines generally have difficulty starting at temperatures below 10°C. Often a small amount of gasoline is added to alcohol fuel, which greatly improves cold-weather starting. The need to do this, however, greatly reduces the attractiveness of any alternate fuel.

5. Poor ignition characteristics in general.

6. Alcohols have almost invisible flames, which are considered dangerous when handling fuel. Again, a small amount of gasoline removes this danger.

7.     Danger of storage tank flammability due to low vapor pressure. Air can leak into storage tanks and create a combustible mixture.

8.     Low flame temperatures generate less NOx, but the resulting lower exhaust temperatures take longer to heat the catalytic converter to an efficient operating temperature.

9.     Many people find the strong odor of alcohol very offensive. Headaches and dizziness have been experienced when refuelling an automobile.

10.          Vapour lock in fuel delivery systems.