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In order to meet the energy requirements, there has been growing interest in alternative fuels like biodiesels, methyl alcohol, ethyl alcohol, biogas, hydrogen and producer gas to provide a suitable diesel oil substitute for internal combustion engines. Vegetable oils present a very promising alternative to diesel oil since they are renewable and have similar properties. Vegetable oils offer almost the same power output with slightly lower thermal efficiency when used in diesel engine [Srivastava A, Prasad R. Triglycerides-based diesel fuels. Renew Sustain Energy Rev 2000;4:111-33. [1]; Vellguth G. Performance of vegetable oils and their monoesters as fuels for diesel engines. SAE 831358, 1983. [2]; Demirbas A. Biodiesel production from vegetable oils via catalytic and non-catalytic supercritical methanol transesterification methods. Int J Prog Energy Combust Sci 2005;31:466-87. [3]; Jajoo BN, Keoti RS. Evaluation of vegetable oils as supplementary fuels for diesel engines. Altin R, Cetinkaya S, Yucesu HS. The potential of using vegetable oil fuels as fuel for diesel engines. Int J Energy Convers Manage 2000;42:529-38, 248. [5]; Gajendra Babu MK, Chandan Kumar Das LM. Experimental investigations on a Karanja oil methyl ester fuelled DI diesel engine. SAE 2006-01-0238, 2006. [6]; Agarwal D, Kumar Agarwal A. Performance and emission characteristics of a Jatropha oil (preheated and blends) in a direct injection compression ignition engine. Int J Appl Therm Eng 2007;27:2314-23. [7]]. Research in this direction with edible oils have yielded encouraging results, but their use as fuel for diesel engine has limited applications due to higher domestic requirement [Scholl Kyle W, Sorenson Spencer C. Combustion Analysis of soyabean oil methyl ester in a direct injection diesel engine. SAE 930934, 1993. [8]; Nwafor OMI. Effect of advanced injection timing on the performance of rapeseed oil in diesel engines. Int J Renew Energy 2000;21:433-44. [9]; Nwafor OMI. The effect of elevated fuel inlet temperature on performance of diesel engine running on neat vegetable oil at constant speed conditions. Renew Energy 2003;28:171-81.[10]]. In view of this, Honge oil (Pongamia Pinnata Linn) being non-edible oil could be regarded as an alternative fuel for CI engine applications. The viscosity of Honge oil is reduced by transesterification process to obtain Honge oil methyl ester (HOME).Gasification is a process in which solid biomass is converted into a mixture of combustible gases, which complete their combustion in an IC engine. Hence, producer gas can act as a promising alternative fuel, especially for diesel engines by substituting considerable amount of diesel fuels. Downdraft moving bed gasifiers coupled with IC engine are a good choice for moderate quantities of available biomass, up to 500 kW of electric power. Hence, bioderived gas and vegetable liquids appear more attractive in view of their friendly environmental nature. Since vegetable oils produce higher smoke emissions, dual fuel operation could be adopted for improving th...

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The present investigation uses a blend of Nigella sativa biodiesel, diesel, n-butanol, and graphene oxide nanoparticles to enhance the performance, combustion and symmetric characteristics and to reduce the emissions from the diesel engine of a modified common rail direct injection (CRDI). A symmetric toroidal-type combustion chamber and a six-hole solenoid fuel injector were used in the current investigation. The research aimed to study the effect of two fuel additives, n-butanol and synthesized asymmetric graphene oxide nanoparticles, in improving the fuel properties of Nigella sativa biodiesel (NSME25). The concentration of n-butanol (10%) was kept constant, and asymmetric graphene oxide nano-additive and sodium dodecyl benzene sulphonate (SDBS) surfactant were added to n-butanol and NSME25 in the form of nanofluid in varying proportions. The nanofluids were prepared using a probe sonication process to prevent nanoparticles from agglomerating in the base fluid. The process was repeated for biodiesel, n-butanol and nanofluid, and four different stable and symmetric nanofuel mixtures were prepared by varying the graphene oxide (30, 60, 90 and 120 ppm). The nanofuel blend NSME25B10GO90 displayed an enhancement in the brake thermal efficiency (BTE) and a reduction in brake-specific fuel consumption (BSFC) at maximum load due to high catalytic activity and the enhanced microexplosion phenomenon developed by graphene oxide nanoparticles. The heat release rate (HRR), in-cylinder temperature increased, while exhaust gas temperature (EGT) decreased. Smoke, hydrocarbon (HC), carbon monoxide (CO2) and carbon monoxide (CO) emissions also fell, in a trade-off with marginally increased NOx, for all nanofuel blends, compared with Nigella sativa biodiesel. The results obtained indicates that 90 ppm of graphene oxide nanoparticles and 10% n-butanol in Nigella sativa biodiesel are comparable with diesel fuel.

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