Exergoeconomic and exergoenvironmental comparison of diesel-biodiesel blends in a direct injection engine at variable loads

• Autor(a) principal: Cavalcanti, Eduardo José Cidade
• Data de Publicação: 2019
• Outros Autores: Carvalho, Monica, Ochoa, Alvaro A.V.
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Institucional da UFRN
• Texto Completo: https://repositorio.ufrn.br/handle/123456789/31615
• topic: LCA; Diesel; Biodiesel; Exergoeconomics; Exergoenvironmental analysis

The use of biodiesel produces less pollution than petroleum diesel, and any application that utilizes diesel fuel can use biodiesel. However, the intention is not to fully substitute petroleum diesel but to help extend the usefulness of petroleum, supporting the longevity and cleanliness of diesel engines, and possibly create a ba- lanced energy policy. This study employed exergy, exergoeconomic and exergoenvironmental analyses to verify the effect of engine load and biodiesel concentration in a stationary, direct injection diesel engine. The Life Cycle Assessment methodology was applied within Simapro software to quantify the environmental impacts associated with the consumption of diesel and biodiesel, utilizing the Eco-indicator 99 environmental impact assessment method. Analyses included the calculation of exergy efficiency, specific cost, specific environmental impacts, and exergoeconomic and exergoenvironmental impact factors. It was verified that full load operation presented the best results in all analyses. Exergy analysis revealed that low biodiesel concentration presented slightly higher efficiency. Although the specific cost of biodiesel was double the specific cost of diesel (1.55 US$/kg versus 0.76 US$/kg), biodiesel presented lower environmental impacts (55.8 mPt/kg versus 240 mPt/kg for diesel). It was verified that exergy efficiency increased along with capacity load, but increases in the concentration of biodiesel yielded lower exergy efficiencies. The exergoeconomic factor decreased as exergy destruction and exergy losses increased, and specific environmental impacts decreased with increases in power or in biodiesel concentration. A case is made for the outstanding benefits around understanding how environmental impacts are formed to pinpoint where changes should be implemented (herein, focus is on fuel and pollutant formation)