Several sustainable liquid fuel alternatives are needed for different compression ignition (CI) engine applications. In the present study, five different fuel blends were investigated. Rapeseed methyl ester (RME) was used as the basic renewable fuel, and it was blended with low-sulfur light fuel oil (LFO), kerosene, marine gas oil (MGO), and naphtha. Of these fuels, MGO is a circulation economy fuel, manufactured from used lubricants. Naphtha is renewable as it is a by-product of renewable diesel production process using tall oil as feedstock. In addition to RME, naphtha was also blended with LFO. The aim of the current study was to determine the most important properties of the five fuel blends in order to gather fundamental knowledge about their suitability for medium-speed CI engines. The share of renewables within these five blends varied from 20 to 100 vol.%. The properties that were investigated and compared were the cetane number, distillation, density, viscosity, cold properties, and lubricity. According to the results, all the studied blends may be operable in medium-speed engines. Blending of new, renewable fuels with more conventional ones will help ease the technical transitional period as long as the availability of renewable fuels is limited.
We mainly aimed to determine how alternative liquid fuels affect the exhaust particle size distributions (PSD) emitted by a medium-speed diesel engine. The selected alternative fuels included: circulation-origin marine gas oil (MGO), the 26/74 vol. % blend of renewable naphtha and baseline low-sulfur marine light fuel oil (LFO), and kerosene. PSDs were measured by means of an engine exhaust particle sizer from the raw exhaust of a four-cylinder, turbocharged, intercooled engine. During the measurements, the engine was loaded by an alternator, the maximum power output being set at 600 kW(e) at a speed of 1000 rpm. The partial loads of 450, 300, 150 and 60 kW(e) were also used for measurements. At each load, the PSDs had a distinct peak between 20 and 100 nm regardless of fuel. Relative to the other fuels, circulation-origin MGO emitted the lowest particle numbers at several loads despite having the highest viscosity and highest density. Compared to baseline LFO and kerosene, MGO and the blend of renewable naphtha and LFO were more beneficial in terms of total particle number (TPN). Irrespective of the load or fuel, the TPN consisted mainly of particles detected above the 23 nm size category.
The alcohols ethanol and 1-butanol are interesting options as blending components for renewable fuels. We studied whether it is possible to mix these alcohols with a little refined material, rapeseed oil, to obtain stable fuel samples. At room temperature, the stable samples consisted of rapeseed oil blended with butanol at 5 vol-%, 10 vol-%, 20 vol-%, 30 vol-% and one sample of rapeseed oil with 5 vol-% of ethanol. The samples’ fuel properties analysed were kinematic viscosity (at 40 °C), density (at 15 °C) and surface tension. Cold filter plugging point was measured for rapeseed oil with 20 vol-% and 30 vol-% of butanol. Stability of butanol or ethanol and rapeseed oil blends can be achieved at the studied volumes. The density of neat rapeseed oil and all the alcohol–rapeseed oil blends met the requirements set for residual marine fuels. The 30 vol-% butanol–rapeseed oil blend met the requirements for distillate marine oil for density, and almost for kinematic viscosity. The blends appeared most suitable for power plants and marine engines. More detailed analyses of their properties are needed before recommendations for use can be given.
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