Study of performance, combustion, and NOx emission behavior of an SI engine fuelled with ammonia/hydrogen blends at various compression ratio

Abstract

In the present paper, an experimental investigation has been performed under variable CR and 1400&1800RPM speed at a fixed spark timing of 24ºCA BTDC under wide-open throttle conditions. The hydrogen blending is performed based on energy fractions from 5% to 21% of the total fuel energy. With increasing compression ratio (CR), the flame development gets faster, and the flame propagation speed improves, leading to a short combustion period. Similarly, increasing hydrogen fraction improves combustion, resulting in a rapid rise in pressure and temperature. Despite a 13.64% decrease in volumetric efficiency from 5% to 21% hydrogen fraction at 1400 and 1800 RPM, BP and BTE increased by 16.89% and 33%, respectively. The slow-burning properties of NH3 extend the combustion period, resulting in a long-delayed burning period. As a result, the temperature of the low-hydrogen fraction of the exhaust gas is higher. As the hydrogen fraction and CR increase, this effect decreases, resulting in lower EGT. The hydrogen addition increases the peak temperature; therefore, NOx increases continuously with increasing hydrogen despite reducing ammonia. Ammonia is a key element used to reduce NOx from vehicles. A practical solution for controlling the NOx due to the ammonia/hydrogen blend is selective catalytic reduction (SCR).