Alternative fuel produced from thermal pyrolysis of waste tires and its use in a DI diesel engine

Alternative fuels from waste material have been receiving attentions due to the increasing demand of fossil fuels. Pyrolysis has been a considerable solution for processing waste tires because it gives clean emissions and produces valuable liquid or solid products. Pyrolysis oil from waste tires has become a potential replacement for petroleum diesel due to the similar physical and chemical properties to diesel fuel. In this study, waste tires were pyrolyzed in a lab-scale fixed bed reactor with various reaction temperatures. The liquid, solid and gas product yields from different pyrolysis temperatures were compared, as well as the analyses of property and element for the oil product. Due to the energy and economic consideration, the pre-treatments of TPO before adding into regular diesel were avoided. The TPO derived from various pyrolysis temperatures were mixed with regular diesel at different proportions and subsequently tested in a DI diesel engine. The engine performance, such as fuel consumption, cylinder pressure, engine power, and SO2 emission, were examined and discussed. The results indicated that increasing the TPO fraction in diesel lead to worse engine performance, but it can be recovered using TPOs produced from higher pyrolysis temperatures. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.