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A simulation has been developed at the Japan Automobile Research Institute to predict the fuel economy of HEVs, which are currently being developed in the advanced clean energy vehicle research and development project of MITI/NEDO (ACE Project). The ACE Project includes six types of HEV. The effect of hybrid components efficiency on fuel economy was evaluated by sensitivity coefficient. The results show that the fuel economy of HEVs can improve that of the base vehicle by two times. The sensitivity coefficient of the battery is largest in the FCEV, while that of the motor is largest in the series or series/parallel HEVs.

The Advanced Clean Energy Vehicle Project (ACE Project) has been initiated to develop the vehicles which can utilize oil-alternative and clean fuels and achieve twice the energy efficiency of conventional vehicles. To achieve the project objectives, Japanese automobile manufactures are developing six types of hybrid vehicles. Technologies of the developing vehicles include many kinds of hybrid elements, such as series and series/parallel types, alternative fuels (natural gas, DME, methanol) internal combustion engines and a fuel cell, as well as flywheels, ultra-capacitors and Li-ion batteries. This paper introduces the outline of ACE project.

Intermittent Dual-fluid Exhaust Burner (IDEB) has been developed to reduce emissions from methanol fueled vehicles during the warm-up period after a cold start. The IDEB does not need any special fuel injector or blower, and has been built mainly through software modification of an ECU. An FTP mode test while operating an IDEB confirmed that the catalyst temperature was rapidly increased to significantly reduce the emissions to meet a level of ULEV standards.

This study describes the ignition of methanol spray formed by an ultrasonic atomizer under sub-zero conditions and the design of the methanol combustor as a H2+CO generator, based on partial oxidation reaction, for cold starting methanol engines. The methanol spray formed by the ultrasonic atomizer was observed to be ignited using a conventional ignition system even at sub-zero temperatures. Analysis of the spray characteristics showed that this successful ignition was attributed to the high amount of methanol vapor generated, which results from the fine spray and low momentum. The combustor using the ultrasonic atomizer was designed and tested. The combustor produced gaseous starting fuel (H2+CO) satisfactorily by using an adequate air register.

The poor cold startability is one of the problems in using methanol as the fuel for Otto-type engines. A method for solving this problem is to mix some additives for cold start improvement. The effects of various additives and their concentrations on the improvement of cold startability were studied, and the following results were obtained: (1) The cold startability was studied using actual engines in relation to the preliminary results of cold mixture formation obtained by using an equilibrium air evaporation apparatus. It was found from this study that the cold startability of actual engines shows a high correlation with the excess air ratio of fuel mixture observed using the equilibrium air evaporation apparatus.