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For several years, ethanol is being used in controlled but unmarked fashion (levels less than 5%) in gasoline worldwide. Several problems associated with ethanol have put a restriction in using gasoline-ethanol blends with higher ethanol percentage, as it is in an existing engine. Changed physico-chemical properties of high ethanol percentage gasoline blend needs several challenges to be overcome in order to harness the potential of high ethanol content in the blend. The present paper highlights the results of investigation carried out with three different ethanol-gasoline blends i.e 10, 30 and 70 % ethanol blended with gasoline (E10, E30 and E70 respectively). An electronically controlled online fuel blending mechanism was designed and developed to ensure correct blending of two fuels in desired percentage.

In this study some experiments were carried out to evaluate fuel consumption and exhaust emissions of carbon monoxide (CO), oxides of nitrogen (NOx)) and hydrocarbons (HC) with compressed natural gas (CNG) and gasoline in a single cylinder engine. Compressed natural gas showed 3 to 5 percent higher thermal efficiency and 15 percent lower specific fuel consumption as compared to gasoline. Also CO emissions were lower by 30-80 percent in rich zone and NOx by about 12 percent at an equivalence of 1.0. At wide open throttle CNG operation resulted in 10 to 12 percent lower power output. However, thermal efficiency and brake specific fuel consumption (bsfc) was better with CNG as compared to gasoline. Dual spark plug operation increased power output by 3 to 5 percent.