Novel insights into the NOx emissions characteristics in PEMS tests of a heavy-duty vehicle under different payloads.

Real Drive Emission (RDE) test with Portable Emission Measurement System (PEMS) is a widely adopted way to assess vehicle emission compliance. However, the current NOx emissions calculation method stipulated in the China VI emission standard easily ignores the NOx emissions during cold start and low-power operation. To study the effect of cold start and low-power operation on the calculation of NOx emissions in the PEMS test, in this study, a China VI Heavy-Duty Vehicle (HDV) for urban use was used to conduct PEMS tests under various vehicle payload conditions. The data analysis results show that the increase in vehicle payload is beneficial to reducing the specific NOx emissions and passing the NOx emission compliance test because the increased payload improves the NOx conversion efficiency of the SCR system. Cold start duration has no obvious relationship with vehicle payload, accounting for only about 4∼6% in each test, but contributing more than 30% of NOx emissions. Due to the effect of the power threshold and the 90th cumulative percentile, the cold start data has little influence on the result of the NOx emissions assessment and the maximum variation of the NOx emissions result in this study is an 8% rise. For the HDV for urban use, the variation of the power threshold resulting from vehicle payload is small, no more than 2% in this study. The presence of the power threshold makes almost only the low-power operation in the second half of urban driving have an impact on the NOx emissions calculation, which may make more than 50% of NOx emissions in the PEMS test be neglected. The impact of the low-power operation on NOx emissions calculation result will be significantly enhanced if all windows are considered in the Moving Average Window (MAW) method. In the meantime, the degree of variation is closely related to the NOx emissions level during the first half of urban driving. The maximum deterioration of NOx emission assessment result can be more than 90% in this study.

Comparative Study on the Macroscopic Characteristics of Gasoline and Ethanol Spray from a GDI Injector under Injection Pressures of 10 and 60 MPa.

To reduce particulate matter (PM) emissions from vehicles powered by gasoline direct injection (GDI) engines, increasing the fuel injection pressure has been one promising approach. However, a comparison of macroscopic characteristics between gasoline and ethanol from a GDI injector under an ultrahigh injection pressure of more than 50 MPa has not been reported. The experimental study presented in this paper can provide some new and valuable information about comparing and analyzing the macroscopic characteristics of gasoline and ethanol spray from a GDI injector in both front and side views under injection pressures of 10 and 60 MPa. The experimental results show that compared to ethanol, gasoline spray has a slight advantage in L S (penetration of whole spray), L C (penetration of core region of spray), θS (spray cone angle), and R I (irregularity of spray boundary) under both P I (injection pressure) = 10 MPa and P I = 60 MPa, which would promote a more homogeneous mixture of air and fuel. Furthermore, the advantage of gasoline in θS is more pronounced under P I = 60 MPa. At the end of injection, S S (area of whole spray) of gasoline is around 2% larger than ethanol, while its advantage in S C (area of core region of spray) can be around 5%. With the increase of P I from 10 to 60 MPa, a marked increase of R S (the ratio of S C to S S) and R I indicates that atomization and air-fuel mixture homogeneity can be significantly improved for both gasoline and ethanol spray. Besides, a minor revision to the Dent model helps achieve a significant improvement in the prediction accuracy of L S for both gasoline and ethanol spray under injection pressures of 10 and 60 MPa.

Implementation of Oxy-Fuel Combustion (OFC) Technology in a Gasoline Direct Injection (GDI) Engine Fueled with Gasoline-Ethanol Blends.

Nowadays, to mitigate the global warming problem, the requirement of carbon neutrality has become more urgent. Oxy-fuel combustion (OFC) has been proposed as a promising way of carbon capture and storage (CCS) to eliminate carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. This article explores the implementation of OFC technology in a practical gasoline direct injection (GDI) engine fueled with gasoline-ethanol blends, including E0 (gasoline), E25 (25% ethanol, 75% is gasoline in mass fraction), and E50 (50% ethanol, 50% is gasoline in mass fraction). The results show that with a fixed spark timing, φCA50 (where 50% fuel is burned), of E50 and E25 is about 4.5 and 1.9° later than that of E0, respectively. Ignition delay (θF) and combustion duration (θC) can be extended with the increase of the ethanol fraction in the blended fuel. With the increase of the oxygen mass fraction (OMF) from 23.3 to 29%, equivalent brake-specific fuel consumption (BSFCE) has a benefit of 2.12, 1.65, and 1.51% for E0, E25, and E50, respectively. The corresponding increase in brake-specific oxygen consumption (BSOC) is 21.83, 22.42, and 22.58%, respectively. Meanwhile, θF, θC, and the heat release rate (HRR) are not strongly affected by the OMF. With the increase of the OMF, the increment of θF is 0.7, 1.8, and 2.2° for E0, E25, and E50, respectively. θC is only extended by 1, 1.1, and 1.4°, respectively. Besides, by increasing the intake temperature (T I) from 298 to 358 K under all of the fuel conditions, BSFCE and BSOC present slight growth trends; θF and θC are slightly reduced; in the meantime, φCA50, φPmax (crank angle of peak cylinder pressure), and the position of the HRR peak are advanced by nearly 1°.

Source analysis of particulate-phase polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in an urban atmosphere of a northern city in China.

Particle-associated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) concentrations were investigated at six sampling sites in the heating (February to March 2001) and nonheating (August to September 2001) periods in an industrial city in Northern China. Thirteen PAHs were measured. The total average concentrations (nanograms per meter cubed) of PAHs ranged between 78.93 and 214.63 during the heating period and from 31.48 to 102.26 in the nonheating period. Benzo(a)pyrene occurred at the highest level at a site near an industrial area but occurred at low concentrations far from the city center and industrial areas. In addition, ambient PAH profiles were studied. The five and six-ring species occurred in high fractions at the sampling site. By diagnostic ratio analysis, the major source at each sampling site in the city was coal combustion in the heating period; in the nonheating period, the major sources were relatively complex. Finally, the similarities among the six regions were assessed by principal component analysis, cluster analysis, and coefficient of divergence. These multivariate statistical analyses produced similar results, which agreed with the results from the diagnostic ratio analysis.