Search Results

The heavy duty Particle Measurement Programme (PMP) inter-laboratory exercise consists of three parts: 1) the exploratory work to refine the measurement protocol, 2) the validation exercise where each lab will measure the emissions of a “golden” engine with two “golden” particle number systems simultaneously sampling from full and partial flow dilution systems, and 3) the round-robin where the emissions of a “reference” engine will be determined with a lab’s own particle number instrumentation. This paper presents the results of the exploratory work and describes the final protocol for testing in the validation exercise (and round robin) along with the necessary facility modifications required for compliance with the protocol. Key aspects of the protocol (e.g. filter material, flow rates at the full and partial flow systems, the pre-conditioning etc.) are explained and justified.

Human health and the environment are heavily impacted by air pollution. Air quality standards for Nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and particulate matter (PM) are commonly exceeded in Europe, particularly in urban areas with high density of traffic. Road transport contributed to 39% of NOx emissions, and 11% of PM emissions in the European Union (EU) in 2017. Measurements with Portable Emissions Measurement Systems (PEMS) showed that most Euro 5 and Euro 6b diesel vehicles emitted significantly more NOx on the road than their permissible limit in the laboratory type-approval test. In that context, EU Real Driving Emissions (EU-RDE) regulation aims at securing low on-road emissions of light duty vehicles under normal conditions of use. This paper assesses the tailpipe emissions performance of Euro 6d-TEMP gasoline and diesel passenger cars, type-approved after the entry into force of the RDE regulation in September 2017.

Since 2011 a particle number (PN) limit was introduced in the European light-duty diesel vehicles legislation. The PN measurement systems consist of i) a hot diluter and an evaporation tube at 300-400°C for the removal of the volatiles (Volatile Particle Remover, VPR) and ii) a particle number counter (PNC) with a 50% cut-point (cut-off) at 23 nm. The PN measurement systems are calibrated and validated annually with monodisperse aerosol: The VPR for the particle concentration reduction factor (PCRF) and the PNC for the linearity and the cut-off size. However, there are concerns that the PN measurement systems can drift significantly over this period of time, raising concerns regarding the validity of the previous measurements, especially if the yearly validation fails.

Recently, a particle number (PN) limit was introduced in the European light-duty vehicles legislation. The legislation requires measurement of PN, and particulate mass (PM), from the full dilution tunnel with constant volume sampling (CVS). Furthermore, PN measurements will be introduced in the next stage of the European Heavy-Duty regulation. Heavy-duty engine certification can be done either from the CVS or from a partial flow dilution system (PFDS). For research and development purposes, though, measurements are often conducted from the raw exhaust, thereby avoiding the high installation costs of CVS and PFDS. Although for legislative measurements requirements exist regarding sampling and transport of the aerosol sample, such requirements do not necessarily apply for raw exhaust measurements. Thus, measurement differences are often observed depending on where in the experimental set up sampling occurs.

Due to the stringent emission standards set worldwide, particulate matter (PM) emissions from diesel vehicles have been significantly curtailed in the last decade, and are expected to be reduced even further in the future. This evolution has brought forward two main issues: whether PM emissions should only be regulated for diesel vehicles and whether gasoline powered vehicles can be further neglected from PM emission inventories. This paper addresses these issues comparing the characteristics of particle emissions from a current diesel passenger car, a gasoline one and two small two-wheelers. It is shown that the gasoline car is a negligible source of particle emissions while the two-wheelers may be even more significant particle sources than the diesel car.

The measurement of the particle number (PN) concentration of non-volatile particles ≻23 nm was introduced in the light-duty vehicles regulation; the heavy-duty regulation followed. Based on the findings of the Particle Measurement Program (PMP), heavy-duty inter-laboratory exercise, the PN concentration measurement can be conducted either from the full dilution tunnel with constant volume sampling (CVS) or from the partial flow dilution system (PFDS). However, there are no other studies that investigate whether the PN results from the two systems are equivalent. In addition, even the PMP study never investigated the uncertainty that is introduced at the final result from the extraction of a flow by a PN system from the PFDS. In this work we investigate the uncertainty for the three possible cases, i.e., considering a constant extracted flow from the PFDS, sending a signal with 1 Hz frequency to the PFDS, or feeding back the extracted flow to the PFDS.

A proposal for sub-23 nm Solid Particle Number (SPN) measurement method was developed by the Particle Measurement Programme (PMP) group, based on the current SPN measurement method. In the proposal, a Particle Number Counter (PNC) having (65 ± 15)% counting efficiency at 10 nm and >90% at 15 nm (PNC10) replaces the current regulation PNC efficiency of 50±12% at 23 nm and >90% at 41 nm. Additionally, a catalytically active evaporation tube (CS) is required for sub-23 nm measurement method instead of the non-reactive evaporation tube (ET) of the current regulation. Here experimental work carried out at the JRC to address the issues of sub-23 nm SPN-measurement method is presented. The PNC10 was shown to be less dependent on the particle material than the PNC23, thus soot-like particles are still allowed for PNC-calibration. The high charging probability of soot-like particles was shown to have a low effect on PNC calibration uncertainties.