[911]

Cleaning OIL

In order to convert more people to using GTL-added diesel, Shell has gone
into the high profile campaign of racing at the 24-hour Le Mans

WIWAT CHANG


- Need for cleaner diesel

With the European car makers making their diesel-powered cars ever more
efficient, more European drivers have been switching to diesels.

But diesel fuel has always been a target as it emits huge amounts of
visible soot or black particles and acid rain-causing sulphur dioxide.

Aware that exhaust emissions from cars contribute to air pollution and
other environmental health issues, European legislators have been trying to
curb the emissions down.

The last step up in diesel standard was the Euro 4 in 2005 with 50ppm
sulphur limit and next up is the Euro 5 next year with a mere 10ppm. In
Thailand, it's still Euro 3.

Fuel makers are getting tougher time to produce cleaner fuel and make profit.

- Bio-diesel - a solution

Shell has achieved synthesising diesel fuel from natural gas for some time
now and it's simply called gas-to-liquid or GTL.

It contains no sulphur, burns so efficiently that it creates hardly any
soot and provides far better detergency to clean the fuel injectors in
modern diesel engines.

Shell also claims that the man-made fuel offers better fuel economy due in
part to its ability to resist foaming - a negative property of ordinary diesel.

But with production cost still relatively high, a 100% man-made diesel is
still out of the question for mass distribution.

Shell has been marketing such a blend in Europe and Thailand for five years
now and is the first major oil firm in the world to do so.

In Thailand, it was originally called Pura Diesel which was later changed
to V-Power Diesel to conform with the trademark used in Europe.

Shell charges customers a little premium for the added gain, but claims
that the benefits is worth the extra pay.

- Diesel race fuel

In order to convert more people to using GTL-added diesel, Shell has gone
into the high profile campaign of racing at the 24-hour Le Mans.

With its long-time technology partner Volkswagen Group, they pushed for a
win last week with diesel-powered Audi race cars.

The Audi R10 TDI won its very first Le Mans on its debut in 2006 and
repeated the success in 2007 both with the V-Power Diesel.

Coincidentally, 2006 was the year sales of diesel cars surpassed those of
petrol in Europe.

The diesel race fuel used in 2006 and 2007 was a special blend of ordinary
diesel and an undisclosed amount of GTL, although the percentage is higher
than in commercially available V-Power Diesel.

- The future of diesel

Synthesising fuel from petroleum - albeit a cleaner source than crude oil -
was never going to be a long term answer to clean and sustainable energy.

So, when an alternative fuel research specialist company in Germany named
Choren succeeded in turning bio wastes (wood chips leftover from various
wood production) into natural gas, Shell took up shares in that company.

Shell simply synthesises diesel from the natural gas created by Choren.

However, the product in this case is called Biomass To Liquid (BTL).

BTL has the same properties as GTL and one of the two differences is the
raw material source.

The second difference and its main virtue is that BTL production process
creates 90% less CO2 than ordinary petroleum-based diesel.

This form of BTL is regarded as second-generation biodiesel with the first
generation being one produced directly from recycled cooking oil or other
crops. So pure are the GTL and BTL that they are colourless and odourless.

Again, to prove the quality of the BTL, Shell has also added it to the
diesel-GTL race fuel for the 2008 Le Mans event.

Richard Karlstetter, Shell's global technology manager for racing fuels,
said that it is still early days for commercial BTL.

As for the currently available Shell V-Power Diesel with GTL, it
contributes to around 5-14% of its diesel around the world with Thailand
ranking as the third best-seQ3è
©Cleaning OIL

In order to convert more people to using GTL-added diesel, Shell has gone
into the high profile campaign of racing at the 24-hour Le Mans

WIWAT CHANG


- Need for cleaner diesel

With the European car makers making their diesel-powered cars ever more
efficient, more European drivers have been switching to diesels.

But diesel fuel has always been a target as it emits huge amounts of
visible soot or black particles and acid rain-causing sulphur dioxide.

Aware that exhaust emissions from cars contribute to air pollution and
other environmental health issues, European legislators have been trying to
curb the emi