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Diesel engine is being used widely in many industrial fields, as it provides merits in the aspects of higher thermal efficiency and less CO₂ emission. However, NOx regulations for diesel engines are being strengthened and it is impossible to meet the emission standard without aftertreatment systems such as SCR (Selective catalytic reduction), LNC (Lean NOx catalyst), and LNT (Lean NOx trap). Among the NOx reduction aftertreatments, Urea-SCR system is known as the most stable and efficient method to solve the problem of NOx emission. But this device has some issues associated with the ammonia slip phenomenon which is occurred by shortage of evaporation and thermolysis time, and that makes it difficult to achieve uniform distribution of the injected urea.

Nowadays, automobile manufacturers are focusing on reducing exhaust-gas emissions because of their harmful effects on humans and the environment, such as global warming due to greenhouse gases. Direct injection combustion is a promising technology that can significantly improve fuel economy compared to conventional port fuel injection spark ignition engines. However, previous studies indicate that relatively high levels of nitrogen oxide (NOx) emission were produced with gasoline fuel in a spray-guided-type combustion system as a result of the stratified combustion characteristics. Because a lean-burn engine cannot employ a three-way catalyst, NOx emissions can be an obstacle to commercializing a lean-burn direct injection engine. Liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) fuel was proposed as an alternative for reducing NOx emission because it has a higher vapor pressure than gasoline and decreases the local rich mixture region as a result of an improved mixing process.

A Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) is an effective technology for reducing Particulate Matter (PM) emitted from diesel engines. In modern light duty diesel engines, DPF is regenerated by the post-fuel-injection method. In this method, the fuel is injected into the combustion chamber during the expansion stroke to produce heat to burn out the PM trapped in the DPF. However, this method also causes several problems, such as complicated engine torque control and oil dilution by fuel. In this study, a rotating plasma burner was developed for DPF regeneration as an alternative to the postfuel-injection method. Since it is important to reduce the electric energy consumption for plasma generation, which is directly related with electric noise and system cost, several design factors, such as the boosting voltage of transformers, electrode gaps, and plasma frequency were evaluated. A transformer with a low boosting voltage is desirable to ensure low electric noise.

One of most effective NOx control technology of modern diesel engines is SCR with ammonia. Current NOx reduction systems are designed to use a solution of urea dissolved in water as a source of ammonia. However, the liquid urea systems have technical difficulties, such as a freezing point below −11°C and solid deposit formation in the exhaust temperature below 200°C. The objective of this study is to investigate the possibility of a new ammonia generation system that uses low-cost solid ammonium salt, such as solid urea and ammonium carbonate. The result shows that ammonium carbonate is more suitable than solid urea because of low decomposition temperature and no change to the other ammonium salt during the decomposition process. This paper also shows the NOx reduction capability of the new ammonia delivery system that uses ammonium carbonate.

Diesel burners have been used to regenerate diesel particulate filters (DPF) because of their simplicity in engine torque control and less oil dilution by fuel compared with the commonly used in-cylinder post fuel injection method. We previously developed a novel diesel burner using rotating plasma as an ignition source and found it to be effective in DPF regeneration. Here, we carry out in-depth studies on combustion efficiency of this plasma-ignited diesel burner and investigate the effects of influential factors such as plasma power, the amount of fresh air supplied, and O2 concentration in the exhaust gas on combustion characteristics of the burner. The obtained results show that fresh air supplied to the burner plays an important role in ignition and the early stage of combustion, and O2 concentration in the exhaust gas is identified as the most dominant factor for combustion efficiency.