Potential of GCI Technology – Higher Reactivity Gasoline Fuel to Reduce CO₂ Footprint of a Euro 6d Compliant Passenger Vehicle

Authors

Dr.-Ing. H. Won, A. Bouet BSc, Dr. V. Manente, Aramco Overseas Company B.V., Rueil-Malmaison;
J. Kermani MSc, F. Duffour MSc, IFP Energies nouvelles, Rueil-Malmaison

Year

2019

Print Info

Fortschritt-Berichte VDI, Reihe 12, Nr. 811

Summary

Strict regulations for pollutants, real driving emissions compliance and CO₂ reduction mandates are stretching the boundaries of traditional internal combustion engine (ICE) development. Historically, gasoline engines are less complex to manage for very low vehicle emissions and high CO₂, while diesel engines exhibit the opposite behavior. Saudi Aramco believes that by combining a clean fuel-like gasoline with a high efficiency thermodynamic cycle (compression ignition), it is possible to create a powertrain that is clean, both globally
and locally, and so breaking the historical trade-off between decreasing CO₂ vs. criteria pollutants. Recent works have demonstrated the potential of higher reactivity gasoline-like fuels (HRG) to reduce NO_X and particulate emissions when used in compression ignition (CI) engines. In this context, a refinery stream derived from the atmospheric crude oil distillation process has been identified as a highly valuable HRG. The combustion chamber design has been adapted to this fuel and assessment of different air-path and aftertreatment systems (ATS‘s) has been performed on a multi-cylinder CI engine. The full engine calibration for the HRG has been done on the engine test cell. Injection settings and air-loop calibration, taking into account cold behavior and after-treatment trough a specific Design of Experiment (DoE) methodology, were performed successfully. The results show 5.5% of CO₂ benefit of HRG compared to diesel (17% of CO₂ benefit compared to a modern SI vehicle) while fulfilling upcoming Euro 6 emission requirements. In addition, roller tests were conducted on a vehicle adapted to HRG specificities. Cycle emissions and CO₂ levels were compared with diesel reference, and Euro 6 emissions regulations were successfully met on the WLTC homologation cycle.