Performance and Emissions of Sunflower, Rapeseed, and Cottonseed Oils as Fuels in an Agricultural Tractor Engine

Athanasios Balafoutis,George Papadakis,Athanasios Natsis,Spyros Fountas

doi:10.5402/2011/531510

Athanasios Balafoutis, George Papadakis + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.5402/2011/531510

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Abstract

A comparative experimental investigation was conducted to evaluate the performance and exhaust emissions of an agricultural tractor engine when fueled with sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, and cottonseed oil and their blends with diesel fuel (20/80, 40/60 and 70/30 volumetrically). Tests were also carried out with diesel fuel to be used as a reference point. Engine power, torque, BSFC, thermal efficiency, NOx and CO2 were recorded for each tested fuel. All vegetable oils resulted in normal operation without problems during the short-term experiments. The 20/80 blends showed unstable results, in comparison to higher oil content fuels. Power, Torque and BSFC were higher as oil content was increased in the fuel. Rapeseed oil fuels showed increased power, torque and thermal efficiency with simultaneous lower BSFC in comparison to the other two vegetable oils. Cottonseed oil fuels gave better engine performance than sunflower oil fuels. In all oil types, NOx emissions were augmented when fuel oil percentage was increased. Cottonseed oil fuels led to higher NOx emission increase compared to rapeseed oil fuels. CO2 emissions showed a tendency to be increased as the oil content was evolved. The highest CO2 emissions were given by cottonseed oil fuels, followed by rapeseed and sunflower oil.

Highlights

Nowadays, agriculture has been developed as an economical sector where mechanization plays a significant role in the final output
The conclusions extracted in terms of engine performance and exhaust emissions were as follows
(i) All vegetable oil fuels provided as fuels to the engine had resulted in normal operation without problems during the short-term experiments

Summary

Introduction

Agriculture has been developed as an economical sector where mechanization plays a significant role in the final output. According to European Energy Agency [1], agricultural sector stands for only 3.7% in EU energy profile. This percentage is low in comparison to other energy consumers. The fact that agricultural tractors count for 90– 95% of total on field agricultural energy consumption [2] shows that total fossil fuel requirements for this purpose is significant. Measures on reducing fossil fuel consumption should be adopted in this domain. To achieve such a goal, it is possible to optimize tractor engine performance or replace fossil fuel by an alternative fuel

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Conclusion