RESUMEN
The sustainable utilization of waste cooking oil (WCO) as an alternative to fossil fuels has gained considerable attention due to its potential for delivering substantial environmental and economic benefits. This research attempts to explore the impact of incorporating aluminum oxide nanoparticles (AONP) into WCO on the emissions, combustion characteristics, and overall performance of a single-cylinder compression ignition (CI) engine. Comparative analyses were conducted against conventional commercial diesel fuel and pure WCO, as well as varying blends of WCO with AONP at 25 ppm, 50 ppm, and 75 ppm concentrations. The experimental results demonstrate a notable enhancement in brake thermal efficiency (BTE), with a 13.2% increase observed in the WCO + 75 AONP fuel blend compared to neat WCO. Engines fueled by WCO nanoparticle blends showed significant augmentation in-cylinder pressure and heat release rates. Furthermore, these blends exhibited a substantial reduction in carbon monoxide (CO), hydrocarbons (HC), and soot emissions by 44%, 31%, and 48%, respectively, while nitrogen oxide (NO) emissions increased by 7% compared to neat WCO. Among the assessed fuel mixtures, the WCO + 75 AONP blend demonstrated higher engine performance. This study underscores the potential of aluminum oxide nanoparticle-enhanced WCO blends as viable and environmentally responsible options for sustainable energy solutions. However, challenges such as production costs and long-term fuel stability must be addressed to establish nano-fuels as financially viable alternatives.
RESUMEN
The present research work was conducted on a compression ignition engine to assess the engine characteristics fueled with the blend of diesel and high-oxygenated additives such as ethanol. Ethanol does not easily blend with diesel. In order to attain a homogeneous mixture, a small amount of additive is added to the blend. Different additives were added to the blend to form a homogeneous mixture. Stability test was conducted on the blend to ensure prolonged homogeneity. The additives used for the test purpose were isopropanol, oleic acid, and ethylene acetate. From the stability results, it was found that oleic acid was the best additive which produces a better homogenous mixture for the blend of ethanol and diesel. One percentage of oleic acid is used as an additive to blend ethanol and diesel. The different combinations of blend ratios used for the test purpose were D90E10, D80E20, and D70E30. All the aforementioned blends have low cetane number because of ethanol, which was compensated by adding 1% DEE (diethyl ether) to all the blends. Experimental results exhibit that there is an improvement in the performance characteristics, such as brake thermal efficiency (BTE) and specific energy consumption (SEC), with the enrichment of DEE in ethanol-diesel blend. It is also noticed that the blend without DEE exhibited lower magnitude. This is mainly due to higher energy content and cetane number of DEE. Emission characteristics, like hydrocarbon (HC) and carbon monoxide (CO), were found to drastically increase with the increase in the ethanol concentration in the diesel blend. This is attributed to higher latent heat of vaporization (LHV) of ethanol present in the blend. Combustion pressure and heat release rate of the DEE-enriched ethanol blends were higher by 2.2 % and 2.4 %, respectively, when compared with their corresponding blends without DEE. This is a result of higher volatility of DEE which leads to better combustion. Graphical abstract.