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posted by Fnord666 on Monday May 25 2020, @03:23PM   Printer-friendly
from the no-more-knock-knock-jokes dept.

Onboard separation technology set to improve fuel economy:

A technology developed by researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory could pave the way for increased fuel economy and lower greenhouse gas emissions as part of an octane-on-demand fuel-delivery system.

Designed to work with a car's existing fuel, the onboard separation technology is the first to use chemistry—not a physical membrane—to separate ethanol-blended gasoline into high- and low-octane fuel components. An octane-on-demand system can then meter out the appropriate fuel mixture to the engine depending on the power required: lower octane for idling, higher octane for accelerating.

Studies have shown that octane-on-demand approaches can improve fuel economy by up to 30 percent and could help reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent. But so far, the pervaporation membranes tested for octane on demand leave nearly 20 percent of the valuable high-octane fuel components in the gasoline.

In proof-of-concept testing with three different chemistries, PNNL's patent-pending onboard separation technology separated 95 percent of the ethanol out of commercial gasoline. The materials are also effective for separating butanol, a promising high-octane renewable fuel component.

More information: Katarzyna Grubel et al. Octane-On-Demand: Onboard Separation of Oxygenates from Gasoline, Energy & Fuels (2019). DOI: 10.1021/acs.energyfuels.8b03781


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  • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday May 26 2020, @05:38PM

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Tuesday May 26 2020, @05:38PM (#999299)

    Do you have any idea how much an F1 car costs, or how much labor goes into producing it? Carbon fibre is notoriously labor-intensive, and not really automate-able. It works well for high-end bicycles (ones that cost a good fraction of what a car does) with Chinese or Taiwanese labor rates, but there's no way you're going to make a $20k car out of CF unless someone figures out a much cheaper way of making it.

    Also, F1 cars aren't even remotely similar to normal passenger cars in design; they have small "safety cells" that the driver sits in, and everything else is bolted to. When they crash, the wheels and engine and everything else fly off while the driver is protected. Moreover, the driver is wearing a lot of safety gear that is impossible to use in a normal car: a crash helmet, and a 5-point safety harness especially. Other types of race cars have this kind of equipment too, but if you think you can get soccer moms and their kids or anyone else to wear this stuff for a grocery run, I have a bridge to sell you. It's not just the chassis that lets the drivers survive these crashes; it's the entire approach to safety, which is absent in passenger cars.

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