Blends of low carbon and conventional fuels with improved performance characteristics
AssigneeFuel Blending Solutions, LLC
InventorsRobert Schuetzle, Dennis Schuetzle
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present invention provides a blended fuel and methods for producing the blended fuel, wherein a low carbon fuel derived from a renewable resource such as biomass, is blended with a traditional, petroleum derived fuel. A blended fuel which includes greater than 10% by volume of low carbon fuel has an overall improved lifecycle greenhouse gas content of about 5% or more compared to the petroleum derived fuel. Also, blending of the low carbon fuel to the traditional, petroleum fuel improves various engine performance characteristics of the traditional fuel.
Claims9
A blended fuel consisting of:
- (a) a petroleum fuel;
- and
- (b) a low carbon fuel,
- wherein the low carbon fuel has a well-to-wheels greenhouse gas content which is at least about 50% lower than a well-to-wheels greenhouse gas content of the petroleum fuel, and the low carbon fuel has at least two performance characteristic values which are at least about 30% improved than corresponding performance characteristic values of the petroleum fuel;
- and
- wherein the blended fuel has a well-to-wheels greenhouse gas content which is at least 5% lower than the well-to-wheels greenhouse content of the petroleum fuel, and the blended fuel has at least two performance characteristic values, selected from a group of performance characteristic values consisting of cetane number, sulfur content, lubricity and oxidative stability, which are at least about 5% improved than corresponding performance characteristic values of the petroleum fuel.
A process for producing a blended fuel wherein the process comprises the following steps:
- producing a low carbon fuel from a renewable biomass feedstock using a first process, wherein the first process consists of the following steps:
- generating syngas from a renewable biomass feedstock;
- subjecting the syngas to cleanup and conditioning steps to provide clean syngas;
- catalytically reacting the clean syngas to produce a low carbon fuel, wherein the low carbon fuel has a well-to-wheels greenhouse gas content which is lower than a well-to-wheels greenhouse gas content of the petroleum fuel, and the low carbon fuel has at least two performance characteristic values which are at least about 30% improved than corresponding performance characteristic values of the petroleum fuel, and wherein the performance characteristic values are cetane number and oxidative stability;
- blending the low carbon fuel with a petroleum diesel fuel using a second process, wherein the second process consists of adding the low carbon fuel and petroleum diesel fuel to one another to produce the blended fuel, wherein the blended fuel has a well-to-wheels greenhouse gas content which is at least 5% lower than the well-to-wheels greenhouse content of the petroleum fuel, and the blended fuel has at least two performance characteristic values which are at least about 5% improved than corresponding performance characteristic values of the petroleum fuel, and wherein the performance characteristic values are cetane number and oxidative stability.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.