An Experimental Assessment of Brake Thermal Efficiency and Exhaust Emissions of a Non-road Genset Diesel Engine Fueled with Aloevera Emulsified Diesel Fuel

In the present study, an experimental attempt has been made on a stock non-road diesel engine using an aloe vera emulsified diesel (AD) fuel. The experiments have been performed at various engine loads from 1.55 to 5.56 bar BMEP to reduce the stock engine emission and to improve the brake thermal efficiency (BTE). The obtained results from AD fuels have been compared with the conventional diesel operation performed on the same stock engine to study the performance and emission behavior. The surfactants such as Span 80 and Tween 80 have been used for preparing an emulsion of aloe vera oil with diesel fuel. The prepared AD fuels were checked for the stability and observed that the fuel is homogeneous for 7 h. The experimental results proved that the AD fuels reduced nitric oxide and smoke emissions simultaneously compared to CDO. The AD fuels have reduced the exhaust gas temperature due to the cooling effect caused by the aloe vera substitution. The specific fuel consumption increased for AD fuels operation compared to CDO due to higher viscosity and lesser calorific value. However, the overall diesel fuel consumption reduces when comparing the total diesel percentage used for CDO with that of the diesel percentage available in AD fuels. The AD fuels reduced the compression work and improved the BTE of the stock engine at lower BMEP conditions. Overall, the use of AD fuels in a stationary engine reduces the exhaust emissions and fossil fuel (diesel) percentage without compromising the existing stock engine performance.