Objectives
This project covers research and demonstration on 2nd generation vegetable oil fuels in advanced engines. It responds to the mentioned challenges while keeping the principle
advantages of pure vegetable oil compared to other biofuels. The concept of this work includes the following central elements:
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combining the adaptation of the engine with an adaptation of the fuel;
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widening the potential for pure vegetable oil fuels by considering a broader range of oil seeds, in particular camelina sativa which can be grown in combined culture (mixed-cropping) with cereals or leguminosae, thus increasing the fuel potential tremendously in EU, and jatropha which increases considerably the fuel potential in hot arid and tropical countries (also important for EU Mediterranean countries once climate change will have turned these countries into rather arid areas) without harming the environment;
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introducing additives to the oil filtering process in small decentralized oil-presses for achieving ultra-pure vegetable oil with reduction of undesired substances to the limit of traceability;
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introducing fuel additives without giving up the non-toxicity and to rise the flammability in a controlled manner (additives rising the flammability could be added at a very late stage, e.g. just when fuelling the vehicle, thus keeping the flammability low during the major part of the logistics chain);
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introducing engine oil additives to better adapt with the corresponding vegetable oil fuel;
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focussing on engine concepts allowing profiting from the advantages of vegetable oil under quasi-steady-state conditions, such as hybrid engines, thereby exploiting to the maximum the specific advantages of vegetable oil compared to other biofuels.
The specific objectives are:
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to widen the range of considered oils, in order to increase the available fuel potential;
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to investigate and demonstrate cleaning and fuel additives for vegetable oils and engine oil additives, in order to better adapt the oil properties to present and future diesel engines and to ensure a homogeneously high quality;
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to investigate and demonstrate improved engine oils;
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to achieve EU Stage 4 (US TIER4) emission levels in medium-scale demonstration fleets;
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to transfer the engine and fuel concepts to hybrid engines, preparing the base to achieve EURO 6 emission levels in road vehicles (comparable to EU Stage 4/ US TIER 4);
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to prepare proposals for future European fuel standards.
Achievements in the first year of the project
The first stage, to be achieved is to optimise oil press parameters and to set up a reference press. This should enable supplying the whole demonstration fleet and the experiments with the hybrid engine with 2nd generation vegetable oil.
The first stage is defined by < 3.5 mg/kg P/Mg/Ca and will be used for all stage 3A and 3A mod engines in the demonstration fleet.
About 330.333 litres of the first stage 2nd generation vegetable oil from rape seeds are planned to be produced in this project.
Achievements in the second year of the project
The 2nd generation vegetable oils will be further optimised through further improvement of the after-treatment of the pressed oil and with the aid of additives. Here, attention will be paid that additives are considered which are widely available on the market, in order to avoid that independent oil presses will not become dependent on a single or limited number of suppliers of an additive if they want to achieve a high 2nd generation vegetable oil quality.
The second stage of oil development in this project is defined by < 1 mg/kg P/Mg/Ca and will be used for all demonstration engines with higher emission class than stage 3A mod.
66.000 litres of second stage 2nd generation vegetable oil from rape seeds are planned to be produced in this project.
