i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7

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Combustion and emission characteristics of a

hydrogen-diesel dual-fuel engine

Pavlos Dimitriou*, Madan Kumar, Taku Tsujimura, Yasumasa Suzuki

National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Renewable Energy Research Center, 2-2-9
Machiikedai, Koriyama, Fukushima 963-0298, Japan

article info abstract

Article history: Hydrogen generated from renewable sources is an eco-friendly fuel that can be used in
Received 23 January 2018 automotive industry or for energy generation purposes. Hydrogen is a high-energy content
Received in revised form gas and its carbonless chemical structure can provide significant benefits of high thermal
5 April 2018 efficiency and near zero or very low carbon emissions when combusted with other fuels.
Accepted 10 May 2018 In this study, the implementation of hydrogen fuel was tested at low and medium
Available online 21 June 2018 operating loads in a heavy-duty hydrogen-diesel dual-fuel engine. The paper provides a
detailed experimental analysis of the effects of hydrogen energy share ratio and various
Keywords: combustion strategies such as exhaust gas recirculation, diesel injection pressure and
Hydrogen diesel injection patterns.
Hydrogen-diesel At low load conditions, engine operation with an H2 energy share ratio of up to 98% was
Compression ignition engine achieved without any engine operation implications. This condition provided a simulta-
Dual-fuel engine neous reduction of carbon and NOx emission of over 90% while soot emissions were
EGR dropped by 85% compared to the conventional diesel-only operation. At medium load, the
increased NOx emission due to the high energy content of hydrogen fuel was found to be
the primary challenge.
© 2018 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The implementation of the fuel in spark-ignited (SI) en-

Introduction
Hydrogen has attracted wide attention as a fuel of the future
because it is abundant, clean and highly efficient. It can be
electrochemically converted into electricity using fuel cells or
combusted in internal combustion engines. Although fuel
cells are a promising technology for the future, the use of
hydrogen in internal combustion engines remains of high
importance mainly for energy generation purposes or heavy-
duty applications. In this direction, several research studies
have been performed on the suitability and merits of
hydrogen as a fuel for internal combustion engines.
gines has demonstrated excellent prospects to achieve
satisfactory performance with extremely low harmful
emissions [1e4]. On the other hand, due to the high auto-
ignition temperature of hydrogen, its implementation in
compression-ignition (CI) engines is challenging and can
only be achieved over a wide engine operation range with the
addition of a lower auto-ignition fuel such as diesel or bio-
diesel [5,6]. Hydrogen can be used in small energy share ra-
tios for improving the engine‘s performance and as proved in
Refs. [7e9] provide reductions in carbon, smoke and NOx
emissions. Besides, hydrogen can be used in higher energy
share ratios with the (bio)diesel fuel injected close to the

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: p.dimitriou@aist.go.jp (P. Dimitriou).
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2018.05.062
0360-3199/© 2018 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
13606 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7
engine‘s top dead centre (TDC) working as a combustion
trigger [7,10,11]. An expansive overview of the research
studies in the implementation of hydrogen fuel in a dual-fuel
operation of compression-ignition engines can be found in
Ref. [12]. Although most of the research studies highlight the
significant reduction of carbon emissions with the imple-
mentation of hydrogen fuel, the main challenge was found to
be the increased NOx emissions at medium to high loads
operation (when high energy share ratios are implemented).
This is a result of the combustion of a high energy-content
fuel [5,9]. Hydrogen has an apparent effect on diesel com-
bustion process and is depicted as a sharp increase in peak
in-cylinder pressure and peak heat release rate [13,14]. This
often leads to an increase in the brake thermal efficiency
compared to the neat diesel operation. In contrast, at low
loads, H2 fuel can contribute to great NOx reductions by more
than 50% as reported by Karagoz et al. [15]. According to
Talibi et al. [8], the NOx reduction is due to the decrease of
diesel fuel combusted near the spray fringe where the diesel
fuel-air equivalence ratio is at an approximately stoichio-
metric ratio.
Exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) is a well-known technique
applied mainly (but not only) in compression-ignition en-
gines for the reduction of NOx emission [16]. The imple-
mentation of EGR in hydrogen-diesel dual-fuel engines can
provide significant reductions in NOx emissions. However,
high EGR rates lead to the reduction of oxygen availability in
the cylinders, poor soot oxidation and hence increase of the
exhaust soot emissions. Despite the soot emission penalty,
research studies have demonstrated a simultaneous reduc-
tion of NOx and soot emission under optimum parameters
compared to the neat diesel operation. Wu and Wu [17] re-
ported a simultaneous reduction of NOx and smoke emis-
sions compared with using neat diesel fuel by applying 20%
hydrogen-energy-share ratio and 40% EGR in a single cylin-
der DI engine. Suzuki and Tsujimura [18] achieved a simul-
taneous reduction of NOx and smoke emissions in operating
a dual-fuel engine with high hydrogen rates over 70% and
EGR.
Implementing advanced injection and combustion strate-
gies is an alternative way of controlling the harmful NOx
emissions of compression-ignition engines. As demonstrated
in the literature [19,20], optimum injection timing and multi-
ple injection strategies can provide significant reductions in
the exhaust emissions. An early diesel fuel injection can lead
to high in-cylinder pressure rise and increased NOx formation
while late injections can deteriorate engine‘s performance
and fuel efficiency. Tomita et al. [21] confirmed the increase of
NOx formation in a hydrogen-dual fuel engine when an early
diesel injection was applied. However, when the diesel injec-
tion was shifted to 33
before TDC, a reduction of NOx emis-
sions was reported. This pre-mixed charge compression
ignition (PCCI)-alike combustion strategy provided enough
available time for the diesel fuel to mix with the air and
hydrogen before the ignition, leading to a lean mixture with
diesel fuel becoming the ignitor source for a wide range of the
cylinder. Therefore, very slow combustion with smooth heat
release was achieved. However, so early diesel fuel injections
can only be applied for low equivalence ratios with an
unstable combustion performance to be quite likely. Also,
diesel injection pressure has a significant effect on the per-
formance and emissions generation of compression-ignition
engines. Although in dual-fuel operation part of the diesel
fuel is substituted with H2 fuel, it is expected that diesel
pressure still plays a significant role in the control of engine‘s
performance and emissions.
In this paper, a heavy-duty multi-cylinder compression-
ignition engine is operated in a dual-fuel mode with
hydrogen and diesel. The experimental analysis presented
focuses on two engine operating conditions of 20 kW and
40 kW representing low and medium engine loads respec-
tively at a fixed speed of 1,500 rpm. The target of this experi-
mental study was to achieve the maximum H2 energy share
ratios for each engine load enabling smooth operation and
minimum carbon emissions while controlling NOx and soot
emissions by means of exhaust gas recirculation and
advanced injection strategies.
Experimental apparatus
A 5.2L four-cylinder heavy-duty compression-ignition engine
was used as the platform for testing and measuring the per-
formance and emissions output of hydrogen-diesel dual-fuel
operation. The conventional engine, running on diesel fuel
only, is equipped with an intake throttle valve, a high-
pressure Exhaust Gas Recirculation (EGR) system and a Vari-
able Geometry Turbocharger (VGT) boosting system.
The engine was coupled to a 346 kW transient AC dyna-
mometer (HORIBA DYNAS3 ULI340) and the four cylinders
were instrumented with pressure sensors (KISTLER 6056A) for
measuring the instantaneous in-cylinder pressure and
calculating the heat release rate of the engine. For the engine-
out emissions, three exhaust gas analysers (HORIBA MEXA-
ONE, BEST SOKKI BOB-2000FT and AVL micro soot sensor
483) were implemented for recording the CO, CO2, THC, NOx,
soot and unburned hydrogen emissions.
The detailed engine layout and specifications are given in
Fig. 1 and Table 1.
Four injectors were used to supply the engine with
hydrogen fuel into a dedicated gas fuel chamber prior the
intake manifold of the engine. Hydrogen fuel was homoge-
neously delivered to the four cylinders of the engine after
passing an air-hydrogen mixer. The hydrogen supply system
consisted of compressed gas cylinders, pressure regulators
and flow rate measurement devices as shown in Fig. 2. The
hydrogen injection pressure was set to 4 bar (gauge) for all
experiments in this paper while the injection quantity was
controlled by the frequency and period of the hydrogen in-
jectors' valves opening times. Compressed nitrogen (N2) gas
was used to purge the hydrogen gas out of the engine system
after the end of the experimental procedure for safety
reasons.
Results and discussion
All the experimental testing for both conventional and dual-
fuel operation presented in this paper was performed at a
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7 13607

Fig. 1 e Overview of the experimental apparatus.

Table 1 e Specifications of the compression ignition constant engine speed of 1,500 rpm. Table 2 shows the oper-
engine. ating conditions of the conventional engine operation used as
Engine type Inline-4 the baseline for comparison with the dual-fuel operation. A
Displacement (L) 5.2 thorough uncertainty analysis for the performance and
Bore  Stroke (mm) 115  125 emissions output of the engine has been performed based on
Compression ratio 17.5:1 the error ranges of the sensors. However, as the error levels
Fuel Hydrogen (port injection) are generally small and each of the graphs presented in the
Diesel (direct injection)
paper cover a wide range of values, the error range bars
13608 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7

Fig. 2 e Overview of the hydrogen supply system.

Table 2 e Experimental conditions of the conventional

engine.
Power (kW) 20 40
Engine speed (rpm) 1500
IMEP (bar) 4.2 7.2
EGR rate (%) 24.6 24.8
H2 energy share ratio (%) 0
Pre-injection quantity (mm3/stroke) 2.8 2.9
Main injection quantity (mm3/stroke) 31.8 58.7
Pre-injection start timing (deg ATDC) 24.3 25.1
Main injection start timing (deg ATDC) 0.8

cannot be successfully illustrated (markers size and lines

thickness are often larger than the error bars). For this reason,
the error ranges have been neglected.

Performance of dual-fuel engine

In this Section, the EGR valve of the engine was shut and the
recirculation of the exhaust gas was replaced by the intro-
duction of hydrogen gas fuel. The H2 energy share ratios
tested ranged from 0 (conventional diesel without EGR) up to
98% as shown in Table 3 and the performance of the engine
was evaluated.
20 kW
The low load operation of the engine allows high hydrogen
energy share ratios to be achieved without pre-ignition
Fig. 3 e In-cylinder pressure and heat release fate for
different H2 energy share ratios, 20 kW.
occurrence. Fig. 3 shows that for this condition the engine
can operate at hydrogen energy share ratios of up to 98%.
However, this was an extreme condition that the engine
operated only for a limited time due to the risk of misfiring.

Table 3 e Main experimental condition differences between hydrogen-diesel dual-fuel and conventional diesel engine.
Operation Conventional Dual-fuel
Power (kW) 20 40 20 40
EGR rate (%) 24.6 24.8 0
H2 energy share ratio (%) 0 0e98 0e85
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7 13609

Fig. 4 e Combustion performance for different H2 energy share ratios, 20 kW.

It is obvious in the Figure that the introduction of hydrogen
(42% share ratio) leads to an earlier start of combustion closer
to TDC compared to the conventional diesel. The cases with
higher hydrogen energy share ratios lead to a significant early
SOC at the compression stroke with the help of the pre-
injected diesel fuel almost 20BCA degrees bTDC. The very
early start of combustion leads to opposing forces to the pis-
ton and high in-cylinder pressures which are increased with
the increase of the hydrogen fuel ratio. However, the case of
extreme hydrogen energy share ratio leads to smoother
combustion with low in-cylinder pressure due to the very
small amount of diesel pre-injection (0.6 mm3 compared to
3 mm3 for the rest of the cases) and no main diesel injection.
Despite the large energy content of hydrogen fuel, Fig. 4
illustrates that the substitution part of the diesel fuel with
hydrogen (H2 rates less than 80%) leads to a reduction of the
brake thermal efficiency (BTE) of the engine. This is happening
due to the high levels of unburned hydrogen emissions at the
exhaust of the engine (Fig. 5) after an incomplete combustion.
However, as the H2 energy share ratio increases, the unburned
hydrogen levels are reduced while the flame propagation
leads to advanced CA50 values (location where 50% of the

Fig. 5 e Engine-out emissions for different H2 energy share ratios, 20 kW.

13610 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7
Fig. 6 e In-cylinder pressure and heat release fate for
different H2 energy share ratios, 40 kW.
combustion process is achieved) closer to TDC. This contrib-
utes to the increase of the BTE of the engine at the same level
or even higher compared to the conventional diesel operation.
The coefficient of variance (COV) of the indicated mean
effective pressure (IMEP) given by Equation (1) slightly in-
creases with the induction of H2 due to uneven distribution of
the gas fuel among the cylinders.
sIMEP
SIMEP ¼  100
mIMEP
where SIMEP is the COV of IMEP, sIMEP is the Standard deviation
of IMEP and mIMEP is the mean value of IMEP over a number of
consecutive combustion cycles.
The hydrogen-diesel dual-fuel operation contributes to
almost zero carbon emissions due to the replacement of a
carbon-based fuel with hydrogen. The reduction of CO emis-
sion is of up to 94% for the extreme case of 98% hydrogen
energy share ratio while CO2 emission is reduced by up to 97%.
Fig. 7 e Combustion performance for different H2 energy share ratios, 40 kW.
Soot emission is also reduced up to 85% compared to the
conventional diesel. This is happening due to the lower
equivalence ratio of diesel fuel and the EGR-free operation
when H2 fuel is introduced. On the other hand, NOx emission
showed an increase for H2 rates up to 80% due to the increased
in-cylinder combustion temperatures resulting from the
earlier combustion phase. For higher H2 rates, the NOx emis-
sion is reduced due to the significant reduction of O2 in the
cylinders, and hence combustion temperature, as a big
portion of the inducted air is replaced by the low-density H2
gas. NOx emission is reduced by up to 91% for the case with
98% H2, while the reduction is 23% when a H2 rate of 93% is
applied.
40 kW
For the medium load operation, a maximum H2 energy share
ratio of 85% was achieved. Higher ratios led to pre-ignition and
imbalanced combustion. The in-cylinder combustion trends
shown in Fig. 6 exhibit similar behaviour as of the low load
operation. However, the increased amount of both H2 and
diesel fuels led to very early SOC, increase flame propagation
and very high in-cylinder pressures.
The early CA50 (Fig. 7) close to TDC obtained with high H2
energy share ratios combined with the high energy content of
the fuel and low unburned H2 emission (Fig. 8) led to an in-
crease of the engine's BTE up to 3% (absolute difference).
The implementation of high hydrogen rates has a negative
effect on the maximum in-cylinder pressure rise rate which
results in a significant increase of the engine‘s noise. More-
over, hydrogen addition increases the cylinder-to-cylinder
coefficient of variance (COV) for the Indicated Mean Effective
Pressure (IMEP) of the engine.
(1)
In a similar trend to the 20 kW condition, the CO emission
is reduced by up to 88% while CO2 is decreased by up to 84%.
The soot formation of the engine is up to 87% reduced for the
dual-fuel operation due to the lack of EGR. For the 85%
hydrogen rate, soot formation is 71% lower than the conven-
tional engine. On the other hand, the lack of EGR caused a
dramatic increase in NOx emission by up to four times higher
than the conventional engine. The NOx penalty is at a lower
level for cases with reduced H2 energy share ratios and
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7
Fig. 8 e Engine-out emissions for different H2 energy share ratios, 40 kW.
elevates with the addition of larger amounts of H2 fuel due to
the increase in combustion temperatures. Finally, the total
hydrocarbons (THC) are of the same level as in the conven-
tional diesel operation and only slightly increased for H2 rates
over 80%.
EGR addition
Exhaust gas recirculation is a widely adopted technique in
compression ignition engines for reducing the in-cylinder
combustion temperatures and NOx formation. In this
Fig. 9 e In-cylinder pressure and heat release rate for
different EGR rates (%), H2 share ratio of 60% at 20 kW.
13611
Section, two of the optimum cases with the lowest NOx and
soot balance for each engine load have been tested with
various EGR rates to assess the effect of the inert gases on
the combustion and emissions characteristics. The two
cases tested are those of 60% and 80% H2 rate for the 20 kW
load and 42% and 62% H2 rate for the 40 kW load. Exhaust
gas recirculation ratios of up to 32% were provided for the
low load operation and up to 24% for the medium load
cases.
20 kW
The in-cylinder behaviour of the engine is significantly
affected with the addition of EGR. As shown in Fig. 9, the
ignition delay for the case with 60% hydrogen rate is slightly
prolonged with the increase of the EGR rate. This small delay
results in a more rapid flame propagation and a slightly less
intense diffusion combustion phase after the main injection
of diesel fuel. Moreover, the in-cylinder pressure trace shows
that cases with higher EGR rates exhibit a reduced pressure
before the SOC due to the lower mass flow of the exhaust gas
driving the turbine as a higher rate of the exhaust gas is
recirculated to the intake side.
The high-intensity flame propagation caused by the
introduction of EGR led to a CA50 closer to the TDC of the
engine and a significant increase of the BTE up to 3% ab-
solute as shown in Fig. 10. The implementation of EGR
balances the IMEP COV among the cylinders at the same
levels as the conventional diesel operation. The maximum
in-cylinder pressure rise rate follows an opposite trend for
the two hydrogen energy share ratios. The implementation
13612 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7

Fig. 10 e Combustion performance for different EGR rates (%), H2 share ratio of 60% and 80% at 20 kW.

of EGR slightly reduces the pressure rise rate for the me-
dium H2 rates while this rate is increased for the H2 rate of
80%.
Fig. 11 illustrates that the EGR addition assists in a com-
plete combustion with lower unburned H2 emissions due to
the higher in-cylinder temperatures. The carbon emissions
and THC have no significant effect with the addition of EGR.
On the other hand, NOx emission is reduced by up to 40%
with the addition of 32% EGR compared to the conventional
diesel operation. Soot emission do not significantly change in
the case with 80% EGR (57e69% reduced than the conven-
tional engine) due to the meagre amount of diesel main fuel
injection. However, the introduction of such a high EGR rate
caused a dramatic increase of soot formation for the case of
60% H2 rate. This increase is a result of the limited oxygen
availability for soot oxidation to occur and the increased
amount of main diesel injection compared to the 80% H2 rate
case.

Fig. 11 e Engine-out emissions for different EGR rates (%), H2 share ratio of 60% and 80% at 20 kW.
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7
Fig. 12 e In-cylinder pressure and heat release rate for
different EGR rates (%), H2 share ratio of 42% and 62% at
40 kW.
40 kW
Fig. 12 illustrates the in-cylinder pressure and heat release
rate of the 40 kW case with different EGR rates. It is clear that
the same trend and characteristics as in the 20 kW operation
can be observed.
The BTE of the engine increased with the introduction of
EGR as shown in Fig. 13 due to an improved combustion of H2
fuel (Fig. 14) closer to the TDC of the engine. In a similar trend
to the 20 kW load, the introduction of EGR led to an increase of
the maximum in-cylinder pressure rise rate for the case with
the high H2 rate only.
The inert gases recirculation provides a significant reduc-
tion of NOx emission by up to 75% compared to the case of
hydrogen operation without EGR. The NOx emission forma-
tion of the 42% H2 rate case with 24% EGR is slightly lower than
the conventional diesel operation. However, the introduction
of such a high amount of EGR combined with the existence of
hydrogen fuel significantly reduced the oxygen availability in
the cylinders and led to an inadequate soot oxidation process
and high exhaust soot levels. A lower amount of EGR (17%)
Fig. 13 e Combustion performance for different EGR rates (%), H2 share ratio of 42% and 62% at 40 kW.
13613
was found to provide NOx emission reasonably higher than
the conventional engine (0.29 g/kWh or 37% increase) while
soot formation was close to that of the conventional engine
(0.009 g/kWh or 23% increase).
Injection pressure
In this Section, four different diesel fuel injection pressures
(600e1200 bar) have been tested for an H2 energy share ratio of
42% and various EGR rates at a power output of 40 kW. The
effects of the injection pressure on engine performance and
emissions output are presented below.
40 kW
It is clear in Fig. 15 that an increased diesel injection pressure
leads to an enhanced engine brake thermal efficiency and
fewer soot pollutants. This is due to the improved fuel atom-
ization and higher momentum of the fuel jet which leads to a
faster and improved combustion with fewer soot pollutants as
shown in Fig. 16. The faster combustion of the injected fuel
can be also observed by the CA50 chart where cases with
increased injection pressure benefit from an earlier combus-
tion phase. However, the advanced start of combustion and
combustion phasing generated high opposing forces to the
cylinder during the compression stroke and led to a reduced
power output compared to the cases with lower diesel injec-
tion pressures. It was also observed from the data that
increasing the injection pressure led to a reduction of the
amount of diesel fuel injected and hence an increase of the
hydrogen energy share ratio from 42% up to 45.5%. This in-
crease combined with the fact that the higher injection pres-
sures reduced the ratio of the unburned hydrogen (same or
lower g/kWhr of unburned H2 for increased H2 share ratios) as
shown in Fig. 16 led to an increase of the engine‘s brake
thermal efficiency. Moreover, the maximum in-cylinder
pressure rise rate increased with the increase of the injec-
tion pressure.
The CO and CO2 emissions of the engine are reduced
simultaneously due to the increase of the H2 energy share
ratios. As expected, the NOx emission increased with high
13614 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7

Fig. 14 e Engine-out emissions for different EGR rates (%), H2 share ratio of 42% and 62% at 40 kW.

injection pressures as a result of an improved combustion Injection strategy

with higher in-cylinder pressures. The effect of the injection
pressure on the NOx formation seems to be minimum when
high EGR ratios are implemented. On the other hand, the in-
crease of injection pressure provides a significant benefit on
the soot formation and this magnifies with the implementa-
tion of EGR. Finally, increased diesel injection pressure
contributed to a marginal reduction of the unburned THC
emissions.
In this Section, the amount of diesel pre-injected fuel as well
the dwell angle between the pre-injection and main injection
were modified while the total fuel amount was kept constant.
For this study, the case of 40 kW with optimum NOx and soot
balance was chosen (42% H2 energy share ratio, 17% EGR rate,
1,000 bar diesel injection pressure), aiming at a further

Fig. 15 e Combustion performance for different diesel fuel injection pressures, H2 share ration of 42% and various EGR rates
at 40 kW.
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7 13615

Fig. 16 e Engine-out emissions for different diesel fuel injection pressures, H2 share ration of 42% and various EGR rates at
40 kW.

reduction of the emissions without impairing the engine‘s
performance.
40 kW
Fig. 17(a) shows that increasing the amount of pre-injection
leads to a more intense SOC closer to the TDC of the engine
and hence an increase of the brake thermal efficiency is
observed as shown in Fig. 18. However, as expected, the high
in-cylinder pressures and increased combustion intensity
contribute to a significant increase in the maximum in-
cylinder pressure rise rate and hence engine‘s noise.
The dwell angle between the two diesel injections also
contributed to the combustion phasing of the engine. A long
dwell angle (early pre-ignition) led to an enhanced flame
propagation and an early CA50. The effect of the dwell angle
magnifies with the increase of pre-injection ratio as this
contributes to an earlier and intense start of combustion. An
early low ratio pre-injection led to an increased brake thermal
efficiency. However, this is not the case when higher pre-
injections are implemented because the combustion phasing
takes place during the compression stroke of the engine as
shown in Fig. 17(b). The opposing forces generated by
advanced combustion deteriorate the power output of the
engine and increase the combustion noise.
Fig. 19 shows that an increased pre-injection rate, as well
as a long dwell angle, provide a positive effect on the un-
burned H2 emissions due to the high-intensity combustion.
The improved combustion efficiency can also be confirmed
by the reduction of CO emission and the slight increase of
CO2 emission as the pre-injection ratio is enhanced. On the
hand, NOx emission is deteriorated with the increase of the
pre-injection and dwell angle due to the higher in-cylinder
combustion temperatures. It is evident in Fig. 19 that for
high pre-injection ratios, the case with the shortest dwell
angle provided the best combination of NOx and soot
emissions.

Fig. 17 e In-cylinder pressure and heat release rate for (a) different pre-injection ratios at a 12.4 deg dwell angle and (b)
different dwell angles at a 31% pre-injection ratio.
13616 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7

Fig. 18 e Combustion performance for different injection strategies (dwell angle and pre-injection %), H2 share ratio of 42%
and 17% EGR at 40 kW.

Fig. 19 e Engine-out emissions for different injection strategies (dwell angle and pre-injection %), H2 share ratio of 42% and
17% EGR at 40 kW.

 For low load conditions, smooth operation without pre-

Conclusions
A multi-cylinder compression ignition engine has been tested
at low and medium loads under different hydrogen-diesel
energy share ratios. The effects of exhaust gas recirculation,
diesel injection pressure and injection strategy have been
analysed and the main conclusions are drawn below.
ignition was achieved for H2 energy share ratios of up to
98%. At medium loads, the maximum H2 energy share ratio
dropped to 85%. Higher rates led to pre-ignition and
cylinder-to-cylinder unbalanced operation.
 A simultaneous reduction of all harmful emissions and
BTE of the same level as in the conventional engine were
observed at low load conditions. Carbon and NOx
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f h y d r o g e n e n e r g y 4 3 ( 2 0 1 8 ) 1 3 6 0 5 e1 3 6 1 7
emissions were reduced by over 90% while the soot emis-
sions were 85% lower than the conventional engine when
an H2 energy share ratio of 98% was applied. For H2 energy
share ratios lower than 93%, NOx emission was increased
compared to the conventional engine.
 At medium engine loads, a similar trend on carbon and
soot emissions was observed. However, the NOx emission
was increased by up to four times compared to the con-
ventional engine. This increase is the result of the high in-
cylinder temperatures generated by the combustion of a
high energy content fuel.
 Exhaust gas recirculation provided a significant reduction
of NOx emission by up to 75%. However, the introduction
of high EGR rates deteriorated the soot oxidation process
and engine-out soot emissions. At medium loads, a
simultaneous reduction of NOx and soot emissions
compared to the conventional diesel operation could not
be achieved.
 The improved fuel atomization as a result of the increase of
the diesel injection pressure shifted the combustion phase
closer to TDC and enhanced the BTE of the engine. As a
result, NOx emission was negatively affected while soot
formation was reduced.
 An increased pre-injection rate, as well as a long dwell
angle, was found to provide a positive effect on the com-
bustion efficiency because of the advanced, high-intensity
combustion near the TDC.
It is clear from the above conclusions that the addition of
hydrogen fuel can provide dramatic reductions in carbon
emissions of CI engines. However, the primary challenge is
the control of the in-cylinder combustion temperature at
medium and high load conditions. Exhaust gas recirculation
can contribute to this, but it comes with a penalty on soot
emission. Alternative technologies such as water injection
and low-temperature combustion techniques seem to be un-
avoidable for the simultaneous reduction of NOx, soot and
carbon emissions.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge the technical staff of
the Hydrogen Energy Carrier Team and Ms. Mihiro Kobayashi
for the help and support received during the experiments.
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