The United States’ Environment Protection Agency (EPA) has developed a diesel engine that would meet near-zero emissions standards without the need for elaborate after-treatment devices.
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According to Automotive News (AN), the agency wants companies to commercialise the engine for vehicles, including light-duty trucks and cars.
AN said the first company to try that will be International Truck and Engine Corp. of Chicago and added that an anonymous EPA official said the agency also expects to reach agreement with an unidentified car company.
The agency hopes companies will take the technology “from the lab and put it in a truck,” the official reportedly added.
Automotive News said the EPA and International are forming a testing and development partnership to make diesel engines more applicable to passenger vehicles, build cost-effective light-duty and heavy-duty diesel engines without after-treatment devices for oxides of nitrogen (which contribute to lung-damaging smog) and expand employment in the diesel engine industry.
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By GlobalDataAN noted that the US government in late 1999 adopted strict car and light-truck tailpipe emission standards which are being phased in during the 2004-2011 model years.
The report said that the rules are designed in such a way that cars and light trucks ultimately will be required to comply with them whether the vehicles burn petrol, diesel or some other fuel.
Automotive News also said some motor industry officials have warned that they might not be able to build competitive diesel engines that meet the tougher phase of standards that takes effect in 2007 unless they add costly and cumbersome after-treatment devices.
Consequently, they reportedly said, Americans would miss out on advantages of diesel technology, including greater fuel efficiency and more torque.
EPA engineers and officials believe the engine they have developed may overcome these obstacles using a technology they call “clean diesel combustion”, AN said.
Automotive News also noted that another federal rule requires sharp reductions in the sulphur content of fuel beginning in 2006 – sulphur contaminates emission control equipment and contributes to pollution.
European-based vehicle makers have recently told just-auto that they have held back from launching some models in the US, despite the growing pro-diesel lobby, because their engines could not meet US emission laws without the low-sulphur diesel already available on this side of the Atlantic.
