Fuel-Operated Auxiliary Heaters Are a Major Additional Source of Vehicular Particulate Emissions in Cold Regions

Abstract

Fuel-operated auxiliary heaters (AHs) can be notable sources of particle emissions from vehicles. The emissions of AHs are unregulated, and the number of devices is high; therefore, they make considerable contributions to local air quality, and even the global emissions budget. Experiments for studying the emissions were performed in Finland for a total of eight selected vehicles with Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) AHs installed, including both diesel- and gasoline-operated heaters. We present the numerical results of particle emissions and compare the particle concentrations in the AH exhaust to values found in the tailpipe exhaust of the same vehicle. Our results show that the emissions from auxiliary heaters are typically several orders of magnitude higher than of a car exhaust when idling. This raises the question of whether the use of heaters is justified based on the goal to reduce total emissions from vehicle use; furthermore, whether fuel-operated heaters should also be applied in electric vehicles for cabin heating. More research will be needed to characterize the emissions more thoroughly to understand the air quality and climate effects from AHs, and to provide further recommendations on the use of these heaters.

Particle Number Concentration and SEM-EDX Analyses of an Auxiliary Heating Device in Operation with Different Fossil and Renewable Fuel

“…Our results, measured at 15 • C, are, on average, three orders of magnitude lower than the permissible emissions of a vehicle engine. Research results of [26], which examined the particle number concentration of passenger cars in the cold (−10 • C) conditions, are, on average, three orders of magnitude higher than the EURO 5-6 particle number limit values. This device must be a heater with a power output of a few kW heat performance, compared to a vehicle with an engine of more times ten or more than 100 kW.…”

“…There are few research results regarding the particle number testing of additional heating devices. There are two pieces of literature [25,26], but they do not investigate the effect of renewable fuel on the particle number. In Section 4, Results and Discussion, we can refer to these two results and results that can be found based on similar tests of internal combustion engines.…”

Effect of Operation Pressure on the Response of ePNC Particle Number Concentration Sensor

“…Recently, a DC-based particle number sensor (ePNC, manufactured by Dekati Ltd.) was introduced, combining a diffusion charger and a diffusion battery (DB) in a series configuration. Karjalainen et al used the ePNC sensor in the solid particle number measurement (SPN) to study the operation of auxiliary heaters of passenger cars and compared the results with other methods [14]. The ePNC sensor based PEMS system was featured in recent PTI sensor studies by Melas et al [15] and Vasilatou et al [16] with different particle materials and morphology.…”

“…⁄ ℎ < 0.0156 0.8191𝑒 −7.314ℎ + 0.0975𝑒 −44.6ℎ + 0.0325𝑒 −114ℎ ℎ ≥ 0.0156 (14) Approximating the collector as multiple parallel tubes of same length and diameter the particle collection efficiency of the diffusion collector 𝐸 𝑑𝑖𝑓𝑓 is given by…”

Editorial for the Special Issue “Impacts of Transport Systems on Air Pollution and Human Health”

“…This global vision should apprehend all aspects without harming the economy, employment and people's way of life, and furthermore, should be more effective and should be shared through international networks. Regulations, the technological development of transportation systems and their management should meet the challenges of this ongoing energy transition [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9].…”