Advanced Emission Controls and E-fuels on a Gasoline Car for Zero-Impact Emissions 2022-01-1014

The electrified internal combustion engine can contribute to further improving air quality and reducing impact on climate change. A previous publication looked into ultra-low initial cold-start emissions with the implementation of a state-of-the-art emission control system on a gasoline vehicle with market E10 gasoline. This paper reports additional investigations on different drop-in sustainable renewable fuels, including e-fuels. The gasoline demonstrator vehicle is equipped with a 48V mild-hybrid powertrain with a 1.5 L direct injection engine. The innovative emission control system consists of an electrically pre-heated catalyst (EHC) and first three-way catalyst (TWC) in close-coupled position, in combination with an underfloor catalysed gasoline particulate filter (cGPF), second TWC and ammonia slip catalyst (ASC). Pollutant emission tests are conducted on a challenging chassis dyno test for cold-start emissions at 23 °C and -10 °C. Tests that were done before on reference E10 fuel are repeated on Blue Gasoline and two e-gasoline fuels. Similar ultra-low pollutant emissions are measured on the sustainable renewable fuels compared to the reference E10. A Well-to-Wheel analysis is conducted to investigate the potential to reduce CO₂ emissions. The analysis follows the methodology of the JEC report v5 (JRC-EUCAR-Concawe). The results show that already significant reduction is possible today with Blue Gasoline. The e-gasoline shows potential for near-zero CO₂ emissions. With the combination, of advanced emission control technologies and sustainable renewable fuels, research is evolving towards reaching zero-impact emissions for both air quality and climate change.