Comparative study of stability and properties of alcohol-diesel blends

Abstract

Present study deals with the blending of petro-diesel with ethanol and butanol, where biodiesel is added as an amphiphile (surfactant) to stabilize the blends. It is observed from the experiments that butanol forms more stable blends as compared to ethanol which has been justified by the backscattering profiles and droplet size distributions of the emulsified blends. In order to ascertain the applicability of blends as fuel, physical properties such as density, kinematic viscosity, flash point, cold filter plugging point and surface tension of most stable blends (both ethanol and butanol) have been determined as per the ASTM standards. The quality of the blends is checked using copper strip corrosion and oxidation stability. Cetane index is calculated using four variable equation method. Results suggest that all the properties are in accordance with the stipulated standard values with the only exception of flash points.