Grant: Automotive Partnership Canada Project

Compression-ignition natural-gas engines can achieve very low emissions and may be a viable way to reduce operating costs and greenhouse gas emissions in many heavy-duty applications. To remain competitive, the technology developed by Westport Innovations must take advantage of the advances in conventional heavy-duty engines, as well as explore fundamental questions specific to natural gas combustion. The proposed program will test advanced fuel injection strategies and unconventional low-temperature combustion modes for extremely low NOx and particulate emissions. Most of the effort is directed towards single-cylinder engine testing, but injection visualization and modeling will play important supporting roles in understanding fundamental causes of soot formation as well as identifying engine hardware and operating parameters necessary to achieve very low soot emissions over a wide range of operating conditions.