Synthesis of cracked Calophyllum inophyllum oil using fly ash catalyst for diesel engine application
Type
ArticleAuthors
Muthukumaran, N.Saravanan, Chinnusamy G.
Prasanna Raj Yadav, S.
Vallinayagam, R.
Vedharaj, S.
Roberts, William L.

KAUST Department
Clean Combustion Research CenterMechanical Engineering Program
Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division
high-pressure combustion (HPC) Research Group
Date
2015-04-17Online Publication Date
2015-04-17Print Publication Date
2015-09Permanent link to this record
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/564198
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
In this study, production of hydrocarbon fuel from Calophyllum inophyllum oil has been characterized for diesel engine application, by appraising essential fuel processing parameters. As opposed to traditional trans-esterification process, the reported oil was cracked using a catalyst, as the latter improves the fuel properties better than the former. In a bid to make the production process economically viable, a waste and cheap catalyst, RFA (raw fly ash), has been capitalized for the cracking process as against the conventional zeolite catalyst. The fuel production process, which is performed in a fixed bed catalytic reactor, was done methodologically after comprehensively studying the characteristics of fly ash catalyst. Significantly, fly ash characterization was realized using SEM and EDS, which demarcated the surface and internal structures of fly ash particles before and after cracking. After the production of hydrocarbon fuel from C. inophyllum oil, the performed compositional analysis in GC-MS revealed the presence of esters, parfins and olefins. Followed by the characterization of catalytically cracked C. inophyllum oil, suitable blends of it with diesel were tested in a single cylinder diesel engine. From the engine experimental results, BTE (brake thermal efficiency) of the engine for B25 (25% cracked C. inophyllum oil and 75% diesel) was observed to be closer to diesel, while it decreased for higher blends. On the other hand, emissions such as HC (hydrocarbon), CO (carbon monoxide) and smoke were found to be comparable for B25 with diesel. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.Citation
Muthukumaran, N., Saravanan, C. G., Prasanna Raj Yadav, S., Vallinayagam, R., Vedharaj, S., & Roberts, W. L. (2015). Synthesis of cracked Calophyllum inophyllum oil using fly ash catalyst for diesel engine application. Fuel, 155, 68–76. doi:10.1016/j.fuel.2015.04.014Publisher
Elsevier BVJournal
Fuelae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1016/j.fuel.2015.04.014