Presenter(s)

Allison Ann Coburn

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Description

Sustainable aviation fuels are the near term solution for greenhouse gas emission reduction associated with the aviation sector. There are extensive safety requirements established by an ASTM committee that the alternative aviation fuel must meet in order to achieve approval. Freeze point is one of the safety requirements that allow fuel to remain in liquid state under severe weather conditions. Methods and models to predict the freeze point of hydrocarbon blends are scarce in current literature. In the model that is currently being used, the validated temperature range for freeze point prediction is higher than the typical range for the jet fuel hydrocarbons. For other existing prediction models, an interaction coefficient determined by an experimental result is needed in the calculation to improve the accuracy of the prediction. The goal of this study is to develop an accurate freeze point blending rule for the jet fuel range hydrocarbons to evaluate eligibility for sustainable aviation fuel purposes. Here, a wide range of hydrocarbons with various freeze points were tested. Binary and ternary blends containing Bicyclohexyl, cis1-2 Dimethylcyclohexane, and an alternative jet fuel were tested. The experimental values obtained from varying compositions of each component for the binary and ternary blends were compared with linearly predicted values by volume percent and mole percent. While the linear prediction was comparable to the experimental values, there is still an aspect hindering more accurate predictions. The speculated missing aspect is the molecular structure. From other sources, it is known that molecules with the same chemical composition but varying structure can exhibit starkly different freezing points. Due to this, further testing is being conducted on molecules with these traits.

Publication Date

4-22-2021

Project Designation

Independent Research

Primary Advisor

Joshua S. Heyne, Zhibin Yang

Primary Advisor's Department

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Keywords

Stander Symposium project, School of Engineering

United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

Climate Action

Determination of a Freeze Point Blending Rule for Jet Fuel Range Hydrocarbons

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