A Preliminary Numerical Study of a Medium Speed Marine Engine Fueled by Methanol

The work presents a study of a marine four-stroke medium speed engine fueled by methanol. This study arises from the current interest in developing marine engines with alternative fuels, such as methanol, verifying performance and polluting emissions, in particular CO2 which also represents a cause of concern in the naval sector. Methanol is considered as a renewable energy source which features some better physicochemical properties compared to the traditional fossil fuels. In fact, methanol has higher laminar flame speed and wide lean-burn limitation, potentially reducing nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide and unburned hydrocarbon emissions with a higher combustion efficiency. The used approach is based initially on a zero-dimensional model developed in Matlab ©-Simulink.