Abstract
Abstract: Like all alcohols, ethanol offers significant opportunities in order to decrease the main emissions levels, to the improvement of the energetic performances of the internal combustion engines and to diminish the consumption of the classic petroleum products. The special ethanol properties allow engine operation at leaner dosages compared to the case of using only gasoline, this fact assuring an increase of the engine efficiency and a decrease of the emissions level. Research works performed at University POLITEHNICA from Bucharest have used ethanol-gasoline mixtures in different proportion (E15, E20) for supplying a spark ignition engine. The studies have emphasized the possibility of engine to work with leaner dosage than in that case when only gasoline is used, performing an increase of engine performance and decreasing of the emissions level. Moreover, using ethanol - gasoline mixtures an increase of the engine power is obtained compared with gasoline only, at the same energetic consumption. The paper presents some results of the experimental investigations of an SI engine fuelled with E15 and E20 at deferent operation regimens.
Keywords: ethanol, leaner dosage, emissions, combustion, homogenous mixtures