Fuel Consumption Efficiency Research Articles

Fuel consumption efficiency for electricity and water production in Abu Dhabi

Middle eastern countries are good examples of the strong link between energy and water. Indeed, most power plants are operated on a cogeneration mode and most of the water produced is a desalinated water. With growing economies and population, the demand for natural gas in the power and water sectors is increasing at sustained rates. Understanding the main drivers for the fuel consumption along with the associated (in)efficiencies is critical for designing policies aimed at rationalizing the use of natural gas. The Emirates of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates is used as a case study to quantify the effects of some key operational, economic and region specific gas consumption features on the gas requirements in the power and water sectors. A multilevel Divisia Index decomposition between 1990 and 2010 is used in this regard. We found that energy intensity has a major contribution to fuel requirements which indicates there is a room for potential efficiency improvements and fuel savings. The results show the contributions of power generation plants efficiency, annual demand profile and power requirements for water production (auxiliaries) to the fuel consumption. A monthly profile of the contributions of such factors shows the seasonality impact on the performance of the power and water production system.

Improving signalised intersections performance for better built environment

Traffic delays are still a significant part of the daily commutes in most urban areas despite significant investments in infrastructure. Policy, design and operational measures are usually taken to reduce emissions from mobile sources by reducing congestion, promoting modal diversity, or using advanced technologies. Although reduced emissions and improved fuel efficiency have resulted from proper traffic control, municipalities and public agencies often overlook the need for better traffic control through revised control schemes. Simple changes to traffic control schemes and/or incremental geometric designs improvements is all that is needed to improve traffic system performance without the need for expensive and highly advanced technologies. In this paper, the issue of using proper signal timing plans at signalised intersections and its effect on traffic operations and environment is highlighted. A real-life example is studied. Careful considerations to signal timings parameters resulted in lower traffic delay, reduced emissions, and better fuel consumption efficiency.

Cold flow simulation of an internal combustion engine with vertical valves using layering approach

Complying with emission requirements and fuel consumption efficiency are the points which drive any development of internal combustion engine. Refinement of the process of combustion and mixture formation, together with in-cylinder flow refinement, is a requirement, valves and piston bowl and intake exhaust port design optimization is essential. In order to reduce the time for design optimization cycle it is used Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). Being time consuming and highly costly caring out of experiment using flow bench testing this methods start to become less utilized. Air motion inside the intake manifold is one of the important factors, which govern the engine performance and emission of multi-cylinder diesel engines. Any cold flow study on IC is targeting the process of identifying and improving the fluid flow inside the ports and the combustion chamber. This is only the base for an optimization process targeting to increase the volume of air accessing the combustion space and to increase the turbulence of the air at the end of the compression stage. One of the first conclusions will be that the valve diameter is a fine tradeoff between the need for a bigger diameter involving a greater mass of air filling the cylinder, and the need of a smaller diameter in order to reduce the blind zone. Here there is room for optimization studies. The relative pressure indicates a suction effect coming from the moving piston. The more the shape of the inlet port is smoother and the diameter of the piston is bigger, the aerodynamic resistance of the geometry will be smaller so that the difference of inlet port pressure and the pressure near to piston face will be smaller. Here again there is enough room for more optimization studies.

A high fuel consumption efficiency management scheme for PHEVs using an adaptive genetic algorithm.

A high fuel efficiency management scheme for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) has been developed. In order to achieve fuel consumption reduction, an adaptive genetic algorithm scheme has been designed to adaptively manage the energy resource usage. The objective function of the genetic algorithm is implemented by designing a fuzzy logic controller which closely monitors and resembles the driving conditions and environment of PHEVs, thus trading off between petrol versus electricity for optimal driving efficiency. Comparison between calculated results and publicized data shows that the achieved efficiency of the fuzzified genetic algorithm is better by 10% than existing schemes. The developed scheme, if fully adopted, would help reduce over 600 tons of CO2 emissions worldwide every day.

Effect of λ – Ratio and Depth of Cut on Draft, Fuel Consumption, Power Consumption and Field Efficiency of an Offset Rotavator under Different Type of Orchards

Rotary tillage implements are now being projected as important rotary tools that result in production of fine tilth soil however the rotavator being in line with the tractor at the back cannot be used in orchards due to the hindrance posed by narrow space between the trees. Hence there is need of some tillage tool in offset to the central line of tractor so that it can reach to the area under the tree with the tractor placed in between the rows. In the offset working condition (offset rotavator) the rotary tillage unit can easily reach the strip of soil under low trees and vegetation where tractors could not operate because of limited height. The study was undertaken to examine the influence of λ – ratio, depth of cut at different orchards fields such as mango, guava, and Sapota with dependent parameters such as draft, fuel consumption, power consumption and field Original Research Article Pal et al.; JABB, 3(2): 77-83, 2015; Article no.JABB.2015.034 78 efficiency by an offset rotavator. In this paper the results indicated that as the λ – ratio and depth of cut increases the value of draft, fuel consumption, power consumption also increase.

The effects of eco-driving motivation, knowledge and reward intervention on fuel efficiency

Every year, bus companies consume millions of litres of fuel, and their fuel costs often exceed millions of US dollars. These companies have an obvious interest in reducing their fuel consumption. One way to encourage drivers to engage in eco-driving behaviours, as well as their related beliefs, is to use a monetary reward system. The aim of this study was to explore the incentive effects of such a reward system to encourage better driving behaviours among bus drivers. This study collected fuel-efficiency data before and after the implementation of a reward system. Furthermore, to study the effects that the system had on driver behaviours, this study adopted the theory of Motivation–Opportunity–Ability (MOA) to construct the regression model. The results for the average fuel consumption efficiency for the buses before and after the reward system was introduced showed an improvement of more than 10% and thus a reduction in carbon emissions.

Trajectory Design for Improving Observability of Angles-Only Relative Navigation between Two Satellites

This study focuses on designing a relative rendezvous trajectory for angles-only navigation between two satellites. The main purpose of this paper is to design a rendezvous trajectory which provides better observability for the whole mission period. The second purpose is to improve fuel consumption efficiency. For the trade-off between the observability maneuver and fuel consumption, it is important to minimize the fuel consumption while ensuring sufficient observability since a small-size satellite has a tight mass budget. To design such a trajectory, this study proposes implementing the observability constraint at each optimization node. Then the cost function is aimed at minimizing fuel consumption. A numerical optimization technique is implemented to solve the optimization problem. Simulation for the estimator is performed to verify the designed trajectory. To get physical insight into the relationship between relative trajectory and observability, an observability analysis is also presented using a geometrical relationship between two satellites and the Fisher information matrix as a measure of observability.

Reconditioning by Welding of Rims Manufactured from Nonferrous Alloys

At present, in the automotive industry, the trend on the world plane is to fit on the wheels with rims made from nonferrous alloys, based on aluminum, magnesium or titanium. These rims have the advantage that they are lighter than the same rims made from steel, reducing the unsprung mass of the vehicle, and increasing the vehicle performances, that lead to the better handling, the faster braking and the better acceleration. Also, by using the rims made from nonferrous alloys, the increasing of the fuel consumption efficiency and the reducing of the carbon monoxide (CO) emission are obtained. During the traffic, the wheels (rim + tyre) can be subjected to accidental collisions, such as the impact with the pavement, leading to damages of the rims, which must be reconditioned. The paper presents the results of structural examinations and mechanical tests, made on car rims made from nonferrous alloys, degraded and reconditioned by specific welding technologies. The structural and mechanical characteristics determined in the zones reconditioned by welding are at the level of the base metals used to made the investigated rims, that confirm the adequate quality of them, and a low risc to cracking.

Determination of GHG Emissions, Fuel Consumption and Thermal Efficiency for Real World Urban Driving using a SI Probe Car

A SI probe car, defined here as a normal commercial car equipped with GPS, in-vehicle FTIR tailpipe emission measurement and real time fuel consumption measurement systems, and temperature measurements, was used for measuring greenhouse gas emissions including CO2, N2O and CH4 under real world urban driving conditions. The vehicle used was a EURO4 emission compliant SI car. Two real world driving cycles/routes were designed and employed for the tests, which were located in a densely populated area and a busy major road representing a typical urban road network. Eight trips were conducted at morning rush hours, day time non-peak traffic periods and evening off peak time respectively. The aim is to investigate the impacts of traffic conditions such as road congestion, grade and turnings on fuel consumption, engine thermal efficiency and emissions. The time aligned vehicle moving parameters with fuel consumption and emission data enabled the micro-analysis of the correlations between these parameters. The trip average data for fuel consumption, thermal efficiency and emissions etc were calculated. The impact of vehicle's transient movements and traffic events on emissions were studied. VSP (Vehicle Specific Power) has been used for the determination of engine power output. The results show that the transient emissions were dominated by sharp accelerations occurred at traffic light and pedestrian crossing. The trip average CO2 and CH4 emissions had a good linear correlation with vehicle's average speed which is directly related to vehicle idle periods but no clear correlation between vehicle's speed and N2O emissions.

An On-Demand Hydrogen Cell for Automobile Fuel Consumption Efficiency

The effect of a homemade complete hydroxyl system on automobiles’ performance under real operation conditions has been investigated on three gasoline-fueled four-stroke four-cylinder engine automobiles. All measured parameters were carried out by using the AVL DiTEST Abgas test and the Lancom 9 gas analyzer. The exhaust gases CO2, O2, CO, NOx, and CxHy, at the exhaust tail pipe and before the catalytic converter were measured. A significant reduction of 35–45% in the specific fuel consumption was observed. An in-cylinder chemical reaction model was developed to understand the impact of hydroxy gas on the combustion chemistry of engine. The in-cylinder pressure results showed about 3-bar increase in pressure peak at 1.2% H2 addition to the engine air/fuel mixture. Also, the mixture ignition temperature was reduced from 600 to 560 K. The exhaust gas species showed a 12% increase in H2O. Furthermore, the comparative t-test showed that the average CO volumetric concentration was reduced by 12%, while the average O2 was increased by 11%. On the other hand, hydrocarbon concentration was randomly varying with a maximum reduction of 35% at 2420 rpm. The origin of the observed significant influence of introducing H2 and O2 molecules on the combustion reaction mechanism and flame front stability has been explained.

Effect of slope on spread of a linear flame front over a pine needle fuel bed: experiments and modelling

This paper experimentally evaluates the effect of slope on spread of a linear flame front over a pine needle fuel bed in still air. The slope angle of the fuel bed varied from 0 to 32°. The fuel mass consumption in flaming fire spread, temperature over the fuel bed, velocities of the flow around the flame front and heat fluxes (total and radiant) near the end of the fuel bed were measured. The mass loss rate and rate of fire spread both increased with increasing slope, whereas the fuel consumption efficiency varied in the opposite way. It was shown that a weak reverse inflow and an upslope wind (induced by the flame itself) exist respectively ahead of and behind the flame front, and their significant difference in velocity (causing a pressure difference) plays an essential role in the forward tilting of the flame front. This mechanism promotes burning, especially on higher slopes. Natural convective cooling has a remarkable effect on the fuel pre-heating in the spread of linear flame fronts under slope conditions. A fire spread model for a linear flame front was developed to consider the natural convective cooling and the fuel consumption efficiency. The model agrees well with the experimental data on fire spread rate. Its reliability, especially for higher slopes, was verified by comparison with other models.

Enhanced fuel cell hybrid electric vehicle power sharing method based on fuel cost and mass estimation

In this paper, we investigate an adaptive energy management and power splitting system for a fuel cell hybrid electric vehicle. The battery pack is the main power source whereas the fuel cell is considered as a range extender that cannot sustain alone the vehicle traction power. In addition, the fuel cell contributes to reduce the battery pack degradation by limiting its depth-of-discharge (DoD). This energy management system is based on a two layer architecture in which the upper layer computes the anticipated end-of-trip DoD using online mass estimation. The lower layer is designed to split the driver power demand by minimizing a cost function which includes the hydrogen/electricity cost ratio. Therefore, the best trade-off between reducing battery pack degradation and using cost effective energy is provided. Furthermore, the system allows the fuel cell to operate at its maximum efficiency. Comparative study results indicate that using online mass estimation improves the overall fuel consumption efficiency whilst contributing at the same time to DoD reduction.

Assessment of Carbon Capture Options for Super-Critical Coal-based Power Plants

Power generation is one of the industrial sectors with major contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. For climate change mitigation, a special attention is given to the reduction of CO2 emissions by applying capture and storage techniques in which CO2 is captured and then stored in suitable safe geologic locations. Carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies are expected to play a significant role in the coming decades for curbing greenhouse gas emissions and to ensure a sustainable development of power generation and other energy-intensive industrial sectors (e.g. cement, metallurgy, petro-chemical etc.). This paper evaluates super-critical coal-based power plants with and without carbon capture. The analysis is geared toward quantification of main plant performance indicators such as: fuel consumption, gross and net energy efficiency, ancillary energy consumption, carbon capture rate, specific CO2 emissions, capital costs, specific capital investments and operational costs etc. For CCS configurations, two post-combustion CO2 capture options were considered. The first option is based gas-liquid absorption using a chemical solvent (methyl-diethanol-amine – MDEA etc.). The second option is based on calcium looping cycle, in which the carbonation/calcination sequence of CaO/CaCO3 system is used for carbon capture. The power plant case studies investigated in the paper produces around 950 – 1,100 MW net power with at least 90 % carbon capture rate. The mathematical modelling and simulation of the whole power generation schemes will produce the input data for quantitative techno-economic and environmental evaluations of power plants with carbon capture (similar power plant concept without CCS was used as reference for comparison). Mass and energy integration tools were used to assess the integration aspects of evaluated carbon capture options in the whole power plant design, to optimise the overall energy efficiency and to evaluate the main sources of energy penalty for CCS designs.

Performance and emission characteristics of double biodiesel blends with diesel

Recent research on biodiesel focused on performance of single biodiesel and its blends with diesel. The present work aims to investigate the possibilities of the application of mixtures of two biodiesel and its blends with diesel as a fuel for diesel engines. The combinations of Pongamia pinnata biodiesel, Mustard oil biodiesel along with diesel (PMD) and combinations of Cotton seed biodiesel, Pongamia pinnata biodiesel along with diesel (CPD) are taken for the experimental analysis. Experiments are conducted using a single cylinder direct-injection diesel engine with different loads at rated 3000 rpm. The engine characteristics of the two sets of double biodiesel blends are compared. For the maximum load, the value of Specific Fuel consumption and thermal efficiency of CPD-1 blend (10:10:80) is close to the diesel values. CPD blends give better engine characteristics than PMD blends. The blends of CPD are suitable alternative fuel for diesel in stationary/agricultural diesel engines.

Research on Drag Reduction in Hydraulic System of Construction Machines

In recent years, improvement of fuel consumption efficiency of transport machines have been desired including the vehicles, trucks and construction machines in relation to recent environmental energy issue. Especially, in the construction machines, the power supplied by diesel engine is transferred through the hydraulic system and the working oil with high-pressure flows in hydraulic piping. The energy loss of construction machines caused on hydraulic piping is estimated about 5% or more of total power source, there is some room here for fuel consumption improvement. This paper shows the research on drag reduction in hydraulic piping focusing the Toms effect.

고분자 전해질 연료전지를 이용한 무인비행체 동력시스템 설계

3 Agency for defense development, chochiwongil 462, Yuseong-Ku, Daejeon 305-152, Korea Abstract >> In this paper, the development and performance analysis of a fuel cell-powered unmanned aerial vehicle is described. A fuel cell system featuring 1 kW proton exchange membrane fuel cell combined with a highly pressurized fuel supply system is proposed. For the higher fuel consumption efficiency and simplification of overall system, dead-end type operation is chosen and each individual system such as purge system, fuel supply system, cooling system is developed. Considering that fluctuation of exterior load makes it hard to stabilize fuel cell performance, the power management system is designed using a fuel cell and lithium-ion battery hybrid system. After integration of individual system, the performance of unmanned aerial vehicle is analyzed using data from flight and laboratory test. In the result, overall system was properly operated but for more duration of flight, research on weight lighting and improvement of fuel efficiency is needed to be progressed.

A study on the optimum arrangement of prime movers in small scale microturbine-based CHP systems

Flexibility in connection methods as well as the capability to be stacked in parallel in order to reliably supply larger demands are amongst the significant features which have attracted considerable interest in microturbines for distributed generation applications. One of the leading applications of microturbines is operating as the prime mover of a Combined Heat and Power (CHP) system. There is an increasing trend towards CHP systems due to their high fuel consumption efficiency as a result of simultaneous production of heat and power. These systems deal more effectively with the environmental issues, since they emit less pollution in comparison with a separate production of the same amount of electricity and heat. In order to optimally benefit from combined heat and power generation, the proper sizing of prime movers is of paramount importance. We have developed a technical-economic approach to selecting the optimum arrangement of microturbines (i.e. number of units and nominal power) and planning its operational strategy in small scale combined heat and power systems (capacities up to 500 kW) for three modes of operation: one-way connection (OWC) mode, two-way connection (TWC) mode, and heat demand following (HDF) mode. The economic decision making is based on Net Present Worth (NPW) method.In addition to the common practice of using identical models, a novel method for stacking microturbines is studied and the results are compared. Performance characteristics of microturbines as well as economic parameters play a crucial role in the proposed sizing procedure; hence appropriate relations are presented to estimate the technical and economic parameters of the system and a detailed sensitivity analysis is conducted. A carbon tax legislation is being considered now in Australia and we have also included in our analysis the impact of this on the economics of the system.

CVS-75모드에서 차량의 주행거리, 주행패턴 및 엔진 예열상태에 따른 배출가스 특성

: 되어 왔다 본 연구는 한국에서 운행 중인 차량에서 이산화탄소 배출가스 영향인자 특성을 파악하고자 . Abstract: Recently green house gas emission problem has been issued because CO2 emission is known to cause global warming. Hence, introduces more stringent emission and fuel economy requirements in various countries, including Korea. In this research, CO2 emission factor characteristics of in-use cars, which are the most dominant vehicle type in Korea, were studied, and129gasolinevehicles, 100diesel vehicles, and34LPGvehiclesweretestedonachassisdynamometer. Inthetests, COandCO2 emissionsaswell asfuel reductionratesweremeasured. ThetestswereconductedintheCVS-75mode, whichhas been considered for developing emission factors for regulating emissions from light-duty vehicles in Korea. Through experiments, correlations among displacement, fuel consumption efficiency, fuel type, mileage, driving pattern, and CO2 emission were investigated.

METHODOLOGY OF THE HYBRID PROPULSION SYSTEM (DMP & DEP) FOR TRIMARAN TYPE FAST PATROL BOAT

There are lot of research done to develop a patrol boat, from the modification of hull model until propulsion system equipment. For example the model ship type AMV (Advanced Marine Vehicle) was developed starting from the Catamaran, Trimaran and Pentamaran model. Everything is aimed at obtaining the ship design that has the speed and stability. In addition to achieving high-speed vessel must be equipped with propulsion (Main Power) is great, that means the main engine dimensions, auxiliary equipments and fuel tanks is too large. Many Limitations of space on the ship's engine room trimaran vessel is the main obstacle in designing propulsion system. Beside that Patrol boat should have many missions speed, so propulsion system should be designed at that conditions. Hybrid propulsion is a combination of Diesel Mechanical Propulsion (DMP) with Diesel Electric Propulsion (DEP). DMP system is connected directly to the propeller shaft (or through a reduction-gear). DMP has provide more efficiency rate of 95%. While DEP is only able to provide efficiency by 85% - 89% is slightly lower than DMP, but the DEP offers many advantages such as simplicity and suitability in the rotational speed settings, control systems, engine power production Redundancy, Flexibility in the design of equipments layout in engine rooms, noise, vibration and fuel consumption efficiency which affects the lower pollution. Design of Hybrid Propulsion system can be satisfied and achieved the Power requirements and optimally at all speed condition of patrol boat. Therefore the author made using modeling Maxsurf-11.12 software and carried out various optimization of the choice of main engine, propeller and system conditions for fast patrol boat cruise.

선박의 연료소모량 절감을 위한 항해 속력에 관한 연구

Recently, due to the rapid rise of the international oil price, the burden of fuel oil expense is relatively increasing in a ship. And the international restriction of the greenhouse gas which was generated from the burning of fuel oil is also rapidly strengthened. Therefore, to reduce the greenhouse gas and fuel oil consumption, many shipping company adopted the low speed navigation and it was focused on the improvement of fuel consumption efficiency and the usage of alternative energy in the marine engine development field. In this paper, the fuel oil consumption according to the ship`s speed was measured in the actual seas and analyzed the shop test results in the shipyard and the ship navigation data from the abstract log. And then it was proposed that the ship`s economic speed was 14~15kts and the optimum rpm was 140~150 in specific sea conditions.