The effects of a changing oil industry on marine fuel quality and how new and old analytical techniques can be used to ensure predictable performance in marine diesel engines

摘要

This paper reviews how marine fuels have changed over the last ten years, the effects on the reliable operation of ships' prime movers, how our research and Development efforts have increased our understanding of the root causes and the measures that can be taken to reduce the risk of machinery problems or even breakdown, to a minimum It briefly reviews the effects of changes to refinery configuration necessary to meet the ever-increasing demands for automotive, domestic and industrial heating fuels. This in turn has changed the way marine fuels are sourced. It reviews a number of real incidents where fuels that apparently fully met ISO 8217 specifications, have caused significant damage to compression ignition engines or given rise to serious operational problems. It reviews the analytical techniques used to identify the root causes of the problems. In particular it reviews a relatively new technique, the FIA, for assessing the ignition and combustion characteristics of residual fuels and how, based on our R&D activities, the data obtained from this technique relates to engine derived data. Finally the paper discusses residual fuel oil stability, i.e. how some proprietary methods of assessing stability can give very misleading results, and how in some instances, particularly with low sulphur fuels, normal blending rules do not seem to apply.