The high energy demand in the industrial world and domestic sector as well as the pollution problems caused by emission from the use of fossil fuels as lead to an intensive research in alternative fuels sources with lesser environmental impact. One possible alternative to fossil fuel is biodiesel from vegetable oils which are currently being investigated in detail for application in compression ignition (CI) engines to increase energy security, reduce gas emissions and enhance its usage in diesel engines with little or no modifications. The objective of this study is to investigate the effects of biodiesel blends from Neem oil in CI engine and its corrosion rate in copper and mild steel samples. The corrosion rate of Neem biodiesel and diesel were both tested in copper and mild steel respectively. The test revealed that Neem biodiesel corrodes both test samples more than diesel. Combustion performance and emission characteristics of a single cylinder, four strokes and air-cooled diesel engine when fuelled with diesel and Neem-diesel blends at various loads was evaluated. The results showed that specific fuel consumption is better with diesel than the blends. Blends up to B20 showed higher torque, brake power and brake thermal efficiency than diesel at all loads. NOx emission increased with increase load in all the tested samples, with diesel having the least value. Fuel-Air ratio values of Neem oil biodiesel blends are less than diesel, it increases with increased load and decreased with increased blend ratio. However, there was an appreciable decrease in HC and CO emissions with increased load while there was variation in CO emissions with increased blend ratio and a decrease in HC emission. This behaviour is better with the blends than diesel due to higher oxygen content and lower carbon to hydrogen ratio in biodiesel compared to diesel.
The intermittent nature of solar energy limits a 24 hour operation and the effectiveness of solar thermal devices. Affordable and environmentally friendly materials for storing solar energy are currently in search. A natural convection solar cabinet dryer coupled with thermal energy storage bed (gravels) is modeled and simulated for space heating application (tomatoes drying) using TRNSYS 16 software. Performance of the solar thermal system (solar cabinet dryer) with a thermal storage bed will serve as a guide in developing a gravel-pit (GP) and or water-gravel pit storage system (WGPS) on a medium to large scale to facilitate solar thermal storage of heat for space and water heating applications in homes, health care and educational facilities. Thermal storage volume and thickness of gravel bed were determined and an optimized solar collector area obtained using TRNSYS 16 software for drying 6kg of tomatoes slices. A computer program was written to predict the product drying temperature, mass of moisture removed, moisture content and drying rate at two different trays including solar collector efficiency, heat storage bed temperature profile using meteorological data input of dryer location, gravel properties, solar collector parameters and solar cabinet dryer chamber variables. The month of August was used as the design month bearing in mind that it has the least solar radiation in Bauchi and thus, predicted the least drying performance while, the month of March with the most solar radiation predicted the optimum drying performance. The maximum predicted gravel bed temperatures were 44 and 59.3°C for the months of August and March respectively. Predicted performance of the solar cabinet dryer was compared to a similar cabinet dryer without thermal storage bed. Predicted maximum product drying temperatures of 48 and 69°C were obtained for solar cabinet dryer with thermal storage bed as against 46 and 66°C for solar cabinet dryer without thermal storage bed in the month of August and March corresponding to solar intensity value of 575.4 and 1049.2W/m 2 respectively. To attain 4.5% moisture content for 3kg of tomatoes slices placed on each tray containing 94% of moisture, requires 37 (20 hours of sunshine and 7 hours of supplementary heat stored) and 53 (26 hours of sunshine and 6 hours of supplementary heat stored) hours of drying for solar cabinet dryer with thermal storage bed and, 52 (25 hours of sunshine) and 75 (34 hours of sunshine) hours under same weather condition for similar solar cabinet dryer without thermal storage bed for the month of March and August respectively. The average moisture extraction rate is 0.0759 and 0.0531kg per hour in the month of March for solar cabinet dryer with and without thermal storage bed and, 0.0540 and 0.0374kg per hour the month of August respectively. Predicted maximum solar collector efficiency for cabinet dryer with thermal storage bed is 50.12 and 43.85% for the month of March and August whereas, it was 45.83 and 37.66% for cabinet dryer without thermal storage bed r...
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