|
From what I understand, adding hydrogen into the combustion mix aids combustion and emissions under some circumstances. Whether the energy required to produce the amount of hydrogen needed for any improvement would be worth the cost depends on the energy cost of current emissions controls.
While conventional hydrolysis is power hungry, plasma, in conjunction with a catalyst can be cost effective. The Plasmatron Fuel Converter research performed by MIT for the DOE proved the concept back in the mid-90's. The study was to reform diesel, but they strayed a bit and tried injecting water vapor into the system to see how it would do. Running a rich air/fuel mix through the plasmatron should provide the hydrogen needed, without the addition of water vapor. It is vaguely similar to the jet ignition systems being used in some Formula 1 engines.
To stay in unicorn territory, GEET claims to be a similar process. I think they are correct, regarding the reactor, but I don't support the rest of their claims.
|