Numerical assessment of fuel physical properties on high-dilution diesel advanced compression ignition combustion

Flavio D．F． Chuahy; C. Scott Sluder; Scott J. Curran; Goutham Kukkadapu; Scott W. Wagnon; Russell Whitesides

doi:10.1016/j.jaecs.2022.100102

Numerical assessment of fuel physical properties on high-dilution diesel advanced compression ignition combustion

Flavio D．F． Chuahy, C. Scott Sluder, Scott J. Curran, Goutham Kukkadapu, Scott W. Wagnon, Russell Whitesides

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

Using traditional lean air-fuel mixture aftertreatment technologies to reduce NO_x at low exhaust temperatures is limited below 175°C. Recent low engine load NO_x emission regulations encouraged researchers to explore the potential of fuel physical properties to enable low-temperature, low-NO_x combustion under challenging conditions in which the selective catalytic reduction device might be unable to treat engine-out NO_x. Three diesel range fuels were developed to explore how the distillation profile affects and may enable low-load diesel advanced-compression ignition. The least volatile fuel is a conventional, commercially available diesel #2 fuel with a cetane number of 45.3. The second-most volatile fuel is diesel #1 fuel, which can also be found commercially. The last fuel, which is the most volatile, is a new formulation designed to target a final boiling point approximately 50 K below diesel #1 fuel and was termed diesel #0 fuel. A computational fluid dynamics model was developed and validated against experimental data to investigate the underlying effects of each of the developed fuels in the combustion process. Finally, each fuel physical property (e.g., density, viscosity, etc.) was changed independently to assess its effect under the same operating conditions and identify potential directions for fuel formulation that may enable improved NO_x emissions and reduce the reliance on aftertreatment systems for NO_x control. The results showed that although changes in the fuel distillation curve and other physical properties affect the air-fuel mixtures substantially, changes were not sufficient to result in a large impact to low-load NOx formation. The maximum predicted NOx reduction was 11% uncorrected by combustion phasing. The results suggest that further research efforts should focus on changing the chemical properties of the fuel, like the cetane number, to allow higher EGR dilution and stable combustion.

Original language	English
Article number	100102
Journal	Applications in Energy and Combustion Science
Volume	13
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaecs.2022.100102
State	Published - Mar 2023

Funding

This research was conducted as part of the Co-Optima initiative sponsored by DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy and Bioenergy Technologies and Vehicle Technologies Offices. Co-Optima is a collaborative project of multiple national laboratories initiated to simultaneously accelerate the introduction of affordable, scalable, and sustainable biofuels and high-efficiency, low-emission vehicle engines. Special thanks to program managers Kevin Stork, Gurpreet Singh, and Mike Weismiller. Thanks to Convergent Science for providing licenses to CONVERGE. This research used resources of the Compute and Data Environment for Science (CADES) at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which is supported by DOE's Office of Science under contract no. DE-AC05-00OR22725. Work by SWW, GK and RW was performed under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under Contract DE-AC52-07NA27344. This document was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States government. Neither the United States government nor Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC, nor any of their employees makes any warranty, expressed or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States government or Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States government or Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC, and shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes. This manuscript was authored by UT-Battelle LLC under contract no. DE-AC05-00OR2272 with the US Department of Energy (DOE). The US government retains—and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the US government retains—a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript or allow others to do so for US government purposes. DOE will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan ( http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan ).

Funders	Funder number
CADES
Data Environment for Science
Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy and Bioenergy Technologies
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Science	DE-AC05-00OR22725
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory	DE-AC52-07NA27344
UT-Battelle	DE-AC05-00OR2272

Keywords

ACI
Compression ignition
Diesel
EGR
Physical properties

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10.1016/j.jaecs.2022.100102

Cite this

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title = "Numerical assessment of fuel physical properties on high-dilution diesel advanced compression ignition combustion",

abstract = "Using traditional lean air-fuel mixture aftertreatment technologies to reduce NOx at low exhaust temperatures is limited below 175°C. Recent low engine load NOx emission regulations encouraged researchers to explore the potential of fuel physical properties to enable low-temperature, low-NOx combustion under challenging conditions in which the selective catalytic reduction device might be unable to treat engine-out NOx. Three diesel range fuels were developed to explore how the distillation profile affects and may enable low-load diesel advanced-compression ignition. The least volatile fuel is a conventional, commercially available diesel #2 fuel with a cetane number of 45.3. The second-most volatile fuel is diesel #1 fuel, which can also be found commercially. The last fuel, which is the most volatile, is a new formulation designed to target a final boiling point approximately 50 K below diesel #1 fuel and was termed diesel #0 fuel. A computational fluid dynamics model was developed and validated against experimental data to investigate the underlying effects of each of the developed fuels in the combustion process. Finally, each fuel physical property (e.g., density, viscosity, etc.) was changed independently to assess its effect under the same operating conditions and identify potential directions for fuel formulation that may enable improved NOx emissions and reduce the reliance on aftertreatment systems for NOx control. The results showed that although changes in the fuel distillation curve and other physical properties affect the air-fuel mixtures substantially, changes were not sufficient to result in a large impact to low-load NOx formation. The maximum predicted NOx reduction was 11% uncorrected by combustion phasing. The results suggest that further research efforts should focus on changing the chemical properties of the fuel, like the cetane number, to allow higher EGR dilution and stable combustion.",

keywords = "ACI, Compression ignition, Diesel, EGR, Physical properties",

author = "Flavio D．F． Chuahy and Sluder, {C. Scott} and Curran, {Scott J.} and Goutham Kukkadapu and Wagnon, {Scott W.} and Russell Whitesides",

note = "Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022",

year = "2023",

month = mar,

doi = "10.1016/j.jaecs.2022.100102",

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volume = "13",

journal = "Applications in Energy and Combustion Science",

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AU - D．F． Chuahy, Flavio

AU - Sluder, C. Scott

AU - Curran, Scott J.

AU - Kukkadapu, Goutham

AU - Wagnon, Scott W.

AU - Whitesides, Russell

PY - 2023/3

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N2 - Using traditional lean air-fuel mixture aftertreatment technologies to reduce NOx at low exhaust temperatures is limited below 175°C. Recent low engine load NOx emission regulations encouraged researchers to explore the potential of fuel physical properties to enable low-temperature, low-NOx combustion under challenging conditions in which the selective catalytic reduction device might be unable to treat engine-out NOx. Three diesel range fuels were developed to explore how the distillation profile affects and may enable low-load diesel advanced-compression ignition. The least volatile fuel is a conventional, commercially available diesel #2 fuel with a cetane number of 45.3. The second-most volatile fuel is diesel #1 fuel, which can also be found commercially. The last fuel, which is the most volatile, is a new formulation designed to target a final boiling point approximately 50 K below diesel #1 fuel and was termed diesel #0 fuel. A computational fluid dynamics model was developed and validated against experimental data to investigate the underlying effects of each of the developed fuels in the combustion process. Finally, each fuel physical property (e.g., density, viscosity, etc.) was changed independently to assess its effect under the same operating conditions and identify potential directions for fuel formulation that may enable improved NOx emissions and reduce the reliance on aftertreatment systems for NOx control. The results showed that although changes in the fuel distillation curve and other physical properties affect the air-fuel mixtures substantially, changes were not sufficient to result in a large impact to low-load NOx formation. The maximum predicted NOx reduction was 11% uncorrected by combustion phasing. The results suggest that further research efforts should focus on changing the chemical properties of the fuel, like the cetane number, to allow higher EGR dilution and stable combustion.

AB - Using traditional lean air-fuel mixture aftertreatment technologies to reduce NOx at low exhaust temperatures is limited below 175°C. Recent low engine load NOx emission regulations encouraged researchers to explore the potential of fuel physical properties to enable low-temperature, low-NOx combustion under challenging conditions in which the selective catalytic reduction device might be unable to treat engine-out NOx. Three diesel range fuels were developed to explore how the distillation profile affects and may enable low-load diesel advanced-compression ignition. The least volatile fuel is a conventional, commercially available diesel #2 fuel with a cetane number of 45.3. The second-most volatile fuel is diesel #1 fuel, which can also be found commercially. The last fuel, which is the most volatile, is a new formulation designed to target a final boiling point approximately 50 K below diesel #1 fuel and was termed diesel #0 fuel. A computational fluid dynamics model was developed and validated against experimental data to investigate the underlying effects of each of the developed fuels in the combustion process. Finally, each fuel physical property (e.g., density, viscosity, etc.) was changed independently to assess its effect under the same operating conditions and identify potential directions for fuel formulation that may enable improved NOx emissions and reduce the reliance on aftertreatment systems for NOx control. The results showed that although changes in the fuel distillation curve and other physical properties affect the air-fuel mixtures substantially, changes were not sufficient to result in a large impact to low-load NOx formation. The maximum predicted NOx reduction was 11% uncorrected by combustion phasing. The results suggest that further research efforts should focus on changing the chemical properties of the fuel, like the cetane number, to allow higher EGR dilution and stable combustion.

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KW - Compression ignition

KW - Diesel

KW - EGR

KW - Physical properties

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VL - 13

JO - Applications in Energy and Combustion Science

JF - Applications in Energy and Combustion Science

M1 - 100102

ER -

Numerical assessment of fuel physical properties on high-dilution diesel advanced compression ignition combustion

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