EXTREME

In this project will be investigated and developed highly innovative engine technologies to achieve an extreme increase in efficiency in spark ignition engines. They will be considered, as a starting point, engines with a high compression ratio, fueled with methane, bio-methane or renewable alternative fuels whose entire production chain, it should be remembered, is included in the national territory. These technologies aim to achieve a thermal efficiency of more than 50% (currently the efficiency of a methane engine is c.a. 40%).
The project will focus on three macro themes:
• Ultra-lean combustion: innovative combustion activation and control technologies.
• Fast combustion: innovative technologies for the control of chemical combustion kinetics and charge turbulence.
• Mixed cycle with supercritical fluid: revolutionary injection technologies in the expansion phase of a fluid under supercritical conditions for direct conversion of residual heat of combustion into mechanical work.
The developed technologies can be applied to all internal combustion engines with efficiencies to reduce to zero the emission contribution of CO2 and remain the only viable alternative to electric propulsion in terms of CO2 emissions (approach “from the well to the wheels”).
These technologies can also be industrialised directly on national soil (in the case of electrification, most components are imported) acting as a driving force for the revaluation and relaunch of skills and production facilities already present in Italy and in particular in the areas of convergence and transition.