Experimental analysis on the emissions of single cylinder diesel engine run with low temperature combustion (LTC) mode with diesel, palm biodiesel and ethanol-biodiesel blend: NOX reducing method

Biodiesel fuel is one of a renewable fuel cancels nearly all carbon dioxide emissions it produces in engine combustion based on its CO2 consumptions in the plants growth. Palm biodiesel is extracted from palm tree’s fruit which the tree itself have a very long productive life cycle. Alcohols is also a renewable green fuel with great potential over emissions reduction in combustion. One key problem for using biodiesels is the NOX emission increase in engine combustion as compared with regular diesel. This experiment is aimed to further investigate the effectiveness of using Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI) engine to run LTC mode as an emissions reducing strategies for palm biodiesel fuel blend combustion. Ethanol were also added as a combustion enhancer. A modified small (0.211 litre) single cylinder Compression Ignition (CI) Engine (CIE) with a compression ratio of 20:1 had been experimented with regular diesel fuel (B0), palm biodiesel fuel blend (B7), palm biodiesel (B100), palm biodiesel-ethanol fuel blend (E3B100), ethanol-diesel fuel blend (E3B0) and ethanol-biodiesel fuel blend (E3B7). It is found that all the fuels combusts well in the CIE both on normal combustion mode and in LTC mode with some adjustments. HCCI conforms as greener combustion technology as the combustion in the LTC mode records lower fuel consumption with reduction in emissions. Palm biodiesel fuel and its blends proved nearly on par with regular diesels and ethanol addition improves emission reduction in palm biodiesel combustion.

Keywords: HCCI, LTC mode, NOx, palm biodiesel, renewable fuel