Feasibility of New Liquid Fuel Blends for Medium-Speed Engines

Several sustainable liquid fuel alternatives are needed for different compression ignition (CI) engine applications. In the present study, five different fuel blends were investigated. Rapeseed methyl ester (RME) was used as the basic renewable fuel, and it was blended with low-sulfur light fuel oil (LFO), kerosene, marine gas oil (MGO), and naphtha. Of these fuels, MGO is a circulation economy fuel, manufactured from used lubricants. Naphtha is renewable as it is a by-product of renewable diesel production process using tall oil as feedstock. In addition to RME, naphtha was also blended with LFO. The aim of the current study was to determine the most important properties of the five fuel blends in order to gather fundamental knowledge about their suitability for medium-speed CI engines. The share of renewables within these five blends varied from 20 to 100 vol.%. The properties that were investigated and compared were the cetane number, distillation, density, viscosity, cold properties, and lubricity. According to the results, all the studied blends may be operable in medium-speed engines. Blending of new, renewable fuels with more conventional ones will help ease the technical transitional period as long as the availability of renewable fuels is limited.