Ford and CBBP Lead North American Consortium Demonstrating Renewable, High Energy-Density Fuels for Diesel Engines
(From the International DME Association’s DME Insider Briefing – April 2021)
A consortium involving global industry members and major academic and research institutions has revealed its work in North America related to the development of renewable, high-energy density drop-in automotive fuels produced from various renewable feedstocks including biomass, municipal solid waste and waste plastics.
Ford Powertrain Engineering Research and Development Centre Canada (PERDC) in Windsor, Ontario, led by Dr. Jimi Tjong in conjunction with Dr. Werner Willems (Research & Advanced Engineering – Germany) and Ryan Delaney (Commercial Vehicles Engineering – USA) have been playing a critical role in the multi-discipline consortium to reduce the carbon footprint of future Ford vehicles by developing technologies related to renewable high energy-density drop-in fuels, including polyoxymethylene dimethyl ethers (OMEs). Like DME, OMEs are synthesized from methanol, which can be produced from various types of feedstock containing carbons such as biomass, municipal solid waste, and waste plastics via gasification and syngas conversion utilizing recycled CO2. Consortium members contributing technological expertise include Enerkem (Dr. Stéphan Marie-Rose), the University of Toronto (laboratories of Dr. Mohini Sain, Dr. Cathy Chin and Dr. Geoff Ozin), and the University of Windsor (Clean Combustion Engine laboratory of Dr. Ming Zheng). Enerkem is supporting the project with expertise in technology scale-up gained with the company’s pioneering technology for the production of liquid fuels from biomass, waste plastics and recycled CO2.
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