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The use of biomass fuels for vehicles has been a focus of attention all over the world in terms of prevention of global warming, effective utilization of resources and local revitalization. For the purpose of beneficial use of unused biomass resources, the movement of the use of bioethanol and biodiesel made from them has spread in Japan. In Japan, biodiesel is mainly made from waste cooking oil collected by local communities or governments, and in terms of local production for local consumption, it is used as neat fuel (100% biofuel) or mixed with diesel fuel in high concentration for the vehicles. On the other hand, extremely low emission level must be kept for not only gasoline vehicles but also diesel vehicles in the post new long-term regulation implemented from 2009 in Japan.

In order to discuss future technical issues for urea SCR (selective catalytic reduction) system, it is necessary to assess various technical possibilities that would be applied to urea SCR systems which is capable of complying with future emission level requirements, for example Japanese 2009 emission regulation. In this paper, three measures (enhanced insulation on a DOC (diesel oxidation catalyst), aggressive urea solution injection and idling stop) are installed on a urea SCR system of a commercial engine system in order to achieve further NOx (nitrogen oxide) reductions. With combination of these three measures, NOx is drastically reduced to the levels lower than 0.7 g/kWh, which is a NOx limit value of the Japanese 2009 emission regulation. NH3 (ammonia) and HCN (hydro cyanide) are also measured as unregulated harmful components.

The engine in the research is a single cylinder DI diesel using the emission reduction techniques such as high boost, high injection pressure and broad range and high quantity of exhaust gas recirculation (EGR). The study especially focuses on the reduction of particulate matter (PM) under the engine operating conditions. In the experiment the authors measured engine performance, exhaust gases and mass of PM by low sulfur fuel such as 3 ppm and low sulfur lubricant oil such as 0.26%. Then the PM components were divided into soluble organic fraction (SOF) and insoluble organic fraction (ISOF) and they were measured at each engine condition. The mass of SOF was measured from the fuel fraction and lubricant oil fraction by gas chromatography. Also each mass of soot fraction and sulfate fraction was measured as components of ISOF. The experiment was conducted at BMEP = 2.0 MPa as full load condition of the engine and changing EGR rate from 0% to 40 %.

The emission reduction from diesel engines is one of major issues in heavy duty diesel engines. Super Clean Diesel (SCD) Engine for heavy-duty trucks has also been researched and developed since 2002. The main specifications of the SCD Engine are six cylinders in-line and 10.5 l with a turbo-intercooled and cooled EGR system. The common rail system, of which the maximum injection pressure is 200 MPa, is adopted. The turbocharger is capable of increasing boost pressure up to 501.3 kPa. The EGR system consists of both a high-pressure loop (HP) EGR system and a low-pressure loop (LP) EGR system. The combination of these EGR systems reduces NOx and PM emissions effectively in both steady-state and transient conditions. The emissions of the SCD Engine reach NOx=0.2 g/kWh and PM=0.01 g/kWh with aftertreatment system. The adopted aftertreatment system includes a Lean NOx Trap (LNT) and Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF).

A urea SCR system was combined with a DPF system to reduce NOx and PM in a four liters turbocharged with intercooler diesel engine. Significant reduction in NOx was observed at low exhaust gas temperatures by increasing NH3 adsorption quantity in the SCR catalyst. Control logic of the NH3 adsorption quantity for transient operation was developed based on the NH3 adsorption characteristics on the SCR catalyst. It has been shown that NOx can be reduced by 75% at the average SCR inlet gas temperature of 158 deg.C by adopting the NH3 adsorption quantity control in the JE05 Mode.

Lean NOx trap (LNT) and Urea-SCR system are effective aftertreatment systems as NOx reduction device in diesel engines. On the other hand, DPF has already been developed as PM reduction device and it has been used in various vehicles. LNT can absorb and reduce NOx emission in wide range exhaust temperatures, from 150°C to 400°C, and the size of LNT component can be compact in comparison with Urea-SCR system because LNT uses the diesel fuel as a reducing agent and it is needless to install the reducing agent tank in the vehicle. In this study, authors have shown that the NOx conversion rate of LNT is high in the case of extremely low NOx concentration from the engine. Also, the effects of LNT and DPF were examined using the Super Clean Diesel (SCD) Engine, which has low NOx level before aftertreatment and has been finished as Japanese national project.

For reducing NOx emissions, EGR is effective, but an excessive EGR rate causes the deterioration of smoke emission. Here, we have defined the EGR rate before the smoke emission deterioration while the EGR rate is increasing as the limiting EGR rate. In this study, the high rate of EGR is demonstrated to reduce BSNOx. The adapted methods are a high fuel injection pressure such as 200 MPa, a high boost pressure as 451.3 kPa at 2 MPa BMEP, and the air intake port that maintains a high air flow rate so as to achieve low exhaust emissions. Furthermore, for withstanding 2 MPa BMEP of engine load and high boosting, a ductile cast iron (FCD) piston was used. As the final effect, the installations of the new air intake port increased the limiting EGR rate by 5%, and fuel injection pressure of 200 MPa raised the limiting EGR rate by an additional 5%. By the demonstration of increasing boost pressure to 450 kPa from 400 kPa, the limiting EGR rate was achieved to 50%.

For the reduction of greenhouse gas emission in the transportation sector, various countermeasures against CO₂ emission have been taken. The eco-driving has been paid attention because of its immediate effect on the CO₂ reduction. Eco-driving is defined as a driving method with various driving techniques to save fuel economy. The eco-driving method has been promoted to the common drivers as well as the drivers of carriers. Additionally, there are many researches about improvement of fuel efficiency and CO₂ reduction. However, the eco-driving will have the reduction effect of CO₂ emission, the influence of the eco-driving on air pollutant emission such as NOx is not yet clear. In this study, the effect of the eco-driving on real-world emission has been analyzed using the diesel freight vehicle with the on-board measurement system.

Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI) is effective for the simultaneous reduction of soot and NOx emissions from diesel engine. In general, high octane number and volatility fuels (gasoline components or gaseous fuels) are used for HCCI operation, because very lean mixture must be formed during ignition delay of the fuel. However, it is necessary to improve fuel injection systems, when these fuels are used in diesel engine. The purpose of the present study is the achievement of HCCI combustion in DI diesel engine without the large-scale improvements of engine components. Various high octane number fuels are mixed with diesel fuel as a base fuel, and the mixed fuels are directly applied to DI diesel engine. At first, the cylinder pressure and heat release rate of each mixed fuel are analyzed. The ignition delay of HCCI operation decreases with an increase in the operation load, although that of conventional diesel operation does not almost varied.

Nitrous oxide (N2O) is a strong green house effect gas and three-way catalyst is one of the major sources. N2O is mostly emitted at temperatures during the process of light off in the catalyst and the frequency of this temperature range over total temperature range distribution affects strongly on N2O emission. The effect of cold ambient on N2O emission was analyzed based on N2O-catalyst temperature characteristics and catalyst temperature data gained by road driving test at north part of Japan in winter. As results, N2O emission may drastically increase in colder cities and winter city traffic conditions.

Fuel composition is investigated as a parameter influencing fuel/air mixing of direct injected fuel and the subsequent consequences for particulate emissions. Presumably, enhanced mixing prior to ignition results in a larger portion of fuel burning as a premixture and a smaller portion of diffusion burning around fuel-rich regions. This would potentially lower particulate emissions without overly compromising hydrocarbon emissions or high load operation. Using mixtures of n-paraffin fuels, particulate emissions were measured and the results were compared with in-cylinder visualization of the injection process and two-color method calculations of flame temperature. In general, lower boiling point fuels exhibited higher flame temperatures, less visible flame, and lower particulate emissions.

The effect of boiling point difference as well as the flash boiling of two-component normal paraffin fuels on combustion and exhaust emission has been examined under different test conditions. To obtain a wide variation in boiling point between components different high boiling point fuels (n-undecane, n-tridecane and n-hexadecane) were blended with a low boiling point fuel (n-pentane) and different low boiling point fuels (n-pentane, n-hexane, and n-heptane) were blended with a high boiling point fuel (n-hexadecane). In addition the volume fraction of n-pentane was varied to have the best mixture ratio with n-tridecane. These fuel combinations exhibit different potential for flash boiling based on a certain ambient condition. The results indicate that though the potential for flash boiling is the highest for a mixture of n-pentane and n-hexadecane it emits about 20% higher PM than a mixture of n-pentane and n-tridecane.

To clarify the effect of fuel properties on diesel exhaust emissions, direct injection of two component fuels with approximately zero aromatic content and sulfur were attempted in a diesel engine. Fuels were prepared using paraffins having different cetane numbers and boiling points. Parameters considered are the Average Boiling Point (ABP) by volume and the difference of component characteristics for the same ABP. The results indicate that the trade off relation between NOx and particulate matter (PM) emissions depends significantly on ABP or density and is independent of the fuel component. On the other hand, components of the mixed fuels have significant influence on SOF and THC emissions. Fuels having higher amount of low boiling point components emit higher THC. Mixtures of low boiling point-high cetane number fuel and high boiling point-low cetane number fuel or fuel that contains normal paraffins only emit higher SOF.

Reduction of exhaust emissions and BSFC was studied for high pressure, wide range, and high EGR rates in a Super-clean Diesel six-cylinder heavy duty engine. The GVW 25-ton vehicle has 10.52 L engine displacement, with maximum power of 300 kW and maximum torque of 1842 Nm. The engine is equipped with high-pressure fuel injection of a 200 MPa level common-rail system. A variable geometry turbocharger (VGT) was newly designed. The maximum pressure ratio of the compressor is about twice that of the previous design: 2.5. Additionally, wide range and a high EGR rate are achieved by high pressure-loop EGR (HP-EGR) and low pressure-loop EGR (LP-EGR) with described VGT and high-pressure fuel injection. The HP-EGR can reduce NOx concentrations in the exhaust pipe, but the high EGR rate worsens smoke. The HP-EGR system layout has an important shortcoming: it has great differences of the intake EGR gas amount into each cylinder, worsens smoke.

Degradation of the deNOx performance has been found in in-use heavy-duty vehicles with a urea-SCR system in Japan. The causes of the degradation were studied, and two major reasons are suggested here: HC poisoning and deactivation of pre-oxidation catalysts. Hydrocarbons that accumulated on the catalysts inhibited the catalysis. Although they were easily removed by a simple heat treatment, the treatment could only partially recover the original catalytic performance for the deNOx reaction. The unrecovered catalytic activity was found to result from the decrease in conversion of NO to NO2 on the pre-oxidation catalyst. The pre-oxidation catalyst was thus studied in detail by various techniques to reveal the causes of the degradation: Exhaust emission tests for in-use vehicles, effect of heat treatment on the urea-SCR systems, structural changes and chemical changes in active components during the deactivation were systematically investigated.

N₂O is known to have a significantly high global warming potential. We measured N₂O emissions in engine-bench tests by changing the NO/NH₃ ratio and exhaust gas temperature at the oxidation catalyst inlet in a heavy-duty diesel engine equipped with a urea SCR (selective catalytic reduction) system. The results showed that the peak N₂O production ratio occurred at an exhaust gas temperature of around 200°C and the maximum value was 84%. Moreover, the N₂O production ratio increased with increasing NO/NH₃. Thus, we concluded that N₂O is produced via the NO branching reaction. Based on our results, two methods were proposed to decrease N₂O formation. At low temperatures ~200°C, NO should be reduced by controlling diesel combustion to lower the contribution of NO to N₂O production. This is essential because the SCR system cannot reduce NOx at low temperatures.

Reduction of exhaust emissions and BSFC has been studied using a high boost, a wide range and high-rate EGR in a Super Clean Diesel, six-cylinder heavy duty engine. In the previous single-turbocharging system, the turbocharger was selected to yield maximum torque and power. The selected turbocharger was designed for high boosting, with maximum pressure of about twice that of the current one, using a titanium compressor. However, an important issue arose in this system: avoidance of high boosting at low engine speed. A sequential and series turbo system was proposed to improve the torque at low engine speeds. This turbo system has two turbochargers of different sizes with variable geometry turbines. At low engine speed, the small turbocharger performs most of the work. At medium engine speed, the small turbocharger and large turbocharger mainly work in series.

Under heavy load condition, single fuel operation with diesel fuel was studied experimentally for the homogeneous charge diesel combustion (HCDC) method. HCDC engine, in which pre-mixture was formed by fuel injected into an intake manifold and mixed with air beforehand then ignited by small amount of fuel directly injected into a cylinder, can reduce NOx and smoke simultaneously from the diesel engine. In HCDC the higher the premixed fuel ratio was, the lower the emissions were. Accordingly, it was indicated that homogeneous pre-mixture contributed to improvement of exhaust emissions. However, a diesel knocking due to uncontrolled self-ignition may occur under high premixed fuel ratio conditions in the case of operating heavy loads. Thus, the maximum amount of premixed fuel was restricted by these knocking limits.

Urea SCR (Selective Catalytic Reduction) system has high potential of reducing NOx. But such as system durability and safety under deteriorated catalysts conditions have not been well enough clarified because it is new technology for vehicles. In this paper, current NOx emission level of an engine equipped with urea SCR system is discussed and then exhaust emission characteristics were analyzed when the SCR catalyst and/or oxidation catalyst lose their functions. When both SCR and oxidation catalyst were de-activated, not only NOx but also PM increased remarkably, which were much more than the engine-out emissions. Oxidation catalyst downstream of SCR catalyst was effective to suppress such deteriorations.

To find a clue to reduction techniques for Nitrous Oxide (N2O) emission from three-way catalyst equipped vehicles, four test samples of three-way catalysts with typical noble metal compositions were fabricated by way of experiment and their N2O formation characteristics have been experimentally studied. Then, these catalyst samples were conditioned artificially by aging with real automotive exhaust gas and the N2O formation characteristics after aging has been also observed. As results, catalyst temperature zones and concentration levels of N2O formation varies greatly by the catalyst composition. In general, a catalyst with lower metal content showed lower N2O mass emission at both fresh and after aging conditions. The tendency of the increase in N2O mass emission due to the deterioration is also different among the tested catalyst samples.