Ammonia Powered Engine Developed By HEC |
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Anthony Fontanelle
June 7, 2007
The Hydrogen Engine Center or HEC recently announced and demonstrated the use of ammonia as fuel. Before an annual meeting of the center’s shareholders, the ammonia and hydrogen powered engine was unveiled by the HEC. The engine has been in development for the past three years and now that it was complete, the company sees it fit that it demonstrates the capability of the engine.
The test was conducted with HEC’s Oxx Power™ 4.9-liter six-cylinder engine. The engine used the Oxx Boxx™ engine controller and a dual-fuel injection system. The test was done with the engine running on a mixture of hydrogen and ammonia. The fuel used is composed of 95 percent ammonia and 5 percent hydrogen. The hydrogen in the fuel combination is used as a combustion catalyst.
The use of ammonia with hydrogen gives more power to the engine. As far as emission is concerned, the result of burning ammonia and hydrogen in an internal combustion engine is water vapor and trace amounts of nitrogen oxide. The amount of water vapor released by the engine is considerably more than the amount of water vapor produced by engines designed to run on hydrogen. The fact that ammonia does not contain carbon points out that ammonia is a clean alternative fuel.
“We have been awaiting the day when we could add ammonia to the world's list of potential fuels and today is the day,” says HEC President Ted Hollinger during the demonstration of the engine. “The performance of the engine is very impressive. This demonstration clearly shows that anhydrous ammonia can be used as a fuel,” he added further.
Ammonia is considered as a promising alternative fuel because of its abundance and clean burning attribute. Initially, the use of ammonia as fuel is confined to rockets. Currently though, as the price of gasoline increases and alternative fuels are being developed, the promise of ammonia as a good substitute to gasoline became apparent and was developed by companies such as HEC. The only problem faced with using ammonia as fuel is that in the production of this fuel, carbon dioxide is produced. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas which is responsible for the global warming phenomenon.
When being used as fuel, it is more reliable if mixed with hydrogen. HEC pointed out that hydrogen can be produced by an engine which will then be used in conjunction with ammonia which in turn will be stored in a tank.
“We will continue our endurance testing, and then we will install an ammonia/hydrogen-fueled engine in the Oxx Power™ hydrogen-fueled genset that is currently powering our dyno room,” says Don Vanderbroook, the HEC’s Chief Operating Officer. “By doing this we can reduce our hydrogen storage requirements and gather valuable data on the operation of this engine. Solving the hydrogen storage problem by use of ammonia opens up the market for zero emission engines and systems by providing fuel cost competitive and logistically viable alternate energy systems. Ammonia is a fuel that is available today through cost-effective delivery and storage systems that have been proven over time,” he added.
Whether ammonia can be applied as a practical alternative fuel is still undergoing scrutiny. But by the fact that it produces almost zero potentially harmful gases, it looks as if ammonia will be a great substitute to gasoline and a great complement to vehicles equipped with EBC rotors.
Source: Amazines.com