OAT 551 AUTOMOTIVE SYSTEM UNIT-5 ALTERNATIVE FUEL BRIEF INTRODUCTION

1. Presented By:
Prof.S.Sathishkumar
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Vel Tech ( Owned By RS Trust)
Avadi-Chennai-62
sathishkumar@veltechengg.com

2. What is there besides gasoline?
Well there are a few alternatives:
 Biodiesel
 Electrical Power
 Ethanol
 Hydrogen
Methanol
 Natural Gas
 Propane
 P-Series

3. Biodiesel
What is Biodiesel?
• Biodiesel is a fuel made from vegetable oil, animal
fats, and used restaurant grease
Why is a good alternative to traditional fuels?
• Lower emissions
• Renewable
• Little/no engine
modification
• Can be blended with
traditional fuel
• Biodegradable
• Infrastructure exists

4. How can Biodiesel help the environment?
• In a blended state with traditional fuel it can lower emissions such as a 20% blend lowers
CO2 emissions by 15%
• 100% Biodiesel can lower CO2 emissions by 75%
• Biodiesel produces fewer particulate matter, carbon monoxide, and sulfur dioxide
emissions
• It’s safe to store, handle, and transport cause of a high flash point of 150 degrees Celsius
instead of 77 degrees Celsius for traditional fuels.
Is Biodiesel practical?
• Yes, it uses the current infrastructure and technology and costs $1 to $1.50 per gallon

5. Electrical Power
How is it used as fuel?
• Electricity is used as fuel in the form of batteries and fuel cells.
Are they practical?
• Batteries are a source of power but have limited range and require frequent charging and
are more suited to short range community use
• Fuel Cells are more promising because they use other fuels to create the electrical energy

6. How does a fuel cell work?
• A fuel cell uses a hydrogen and oxygen reaction resulting in the production of energy
• If pure hydrogen is used the car produces only two by-products: Water and Heat
What are the benefits of using electricity?
• For electric cars it would mean no emissions
• Although batteries have a short range, vehicles that use them can be used in communities to
get around
• For fuel cells, if hydrogen is used it can have a longer range vehicle with no emissions.
Electricity

7. Ethanol
What is Ethanol?
• Ethanol is an alcohol-based fuel made from corn, wheat, barley, trees, grass, etc.
What are the benefits?
• Ethanol is renewable because it comes from fermenting crops
• Ethanol lowers carbon monoxide emissions
• Ethanol is widely available and can/is used in a 10% Ethanol blend commercial vehicles today,
with many other vehicles using higher blends
• Ethanol (with government tax incentives) is competitively priced
• Since ethanol can be made from a wide variety of plant life, it is very abundant and with
depleting petroleum reserves, is a promising alternative

8. Hydrogen
Why use hydrogen?
• Hydrogen gas is the most abundant element on the planet
• Hydrogen mixed with natural gas can be used in internal combustion engine
• Hydrogen is the perfect fuel to run fuel cells cause pure hydrogen reacts only with oxygen
releasing water thus no emissions
• Hydrogen burns more efficiently and creates energy more efficiently than gasoline

9. Hydrogen
What are some cons?
• When the public thinks of hydrogen, the explosion of the famous Hindenburg airship
and this makes for low public opinion
• Hydrogen is extremely reactive with oxygen and makes it highly flammable
• Because of hydrogen’s reactive nature, concept hydrogen cars have/are going through
many crash tests and results are good

10. Methanol
What is methanol?
• Methanol is wood alcohol, which can be made from natural gas, coal, or wood
What are the benefits?
• Lower emissions
• Higher performance
• Lower risk of flammability
• Methanol can be used to easily make hydrogen
• Can be used in flexible fuel vehicles
What are the cons?
• The biggest is the lack of vehicles to use it, manufactures have stopped making vehicles
to run on Methanol

11. Natural Gas
Why use natural gas?
• Lower emissions
• Lower smog producing gases (60-90% Light-Duty use, 90% in Mid to Heavy-duty use)
• Can be used to make hydrogen to power the future fuel cell technology
What is the future of natural gas?
• Natural gas is now being installed in 1 out of 5 transit buses today
• Fueling systems can/are being installed in home or public facilities
• Aftermarket systems can convert vehicles to a natural gas system

12. Propane
What is propane?
• Propane is a liquefied gas made up of propane, propylene, butane, and butylene from
petroleum
What are the benefits?
• A 98% reduction in toxic emissions in light-duty bi-fuel vehicles
• In the quantities needed it costs less than gasoline
• Very accessible compared to other alternative fuels (4,000 publicly accessible facilities
in the US)

13. Propane
What does the future hold?
• Currently 200,000 vehicles in the US use propane (mostly fleet vehicles like taxis and
police cars)
• Since the current infrastructure can easily be converted to dispense propane it makes for
a cost effective solution to gasoline by using the current fuel dispensing system

14. Conclusion
Alternative fuels generally lower emissions making them appealing for
environmental concerns. Many of these fuels are renewable and would lessen the
need for petroleum products. A lot of these fuels are going to be used with the
developing fuel cell technology. With making the public aware of these alternatives it
could hasten the development of these fuels and the technologies to run them. For
more information visit the links below:

15. ***WishYouHappyLearning***