Fuelling the future

Peak oil production is between 10 and 20 years’ away, according to Europe’s biggest car maker, Volkswagen, writes Andrew English

After that, failing supplies and increasing demand will push fuel prices even higher. VW is calling for a drive towards a second generation of biofuels, claiming that first-generation fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel, compressed natural gas and liquid petroleum gas have different molecular structures, require the release of large amounts of carbon to produce (in some cases they release more CO2 than their equivalent fossile fuels) and require new production, storage and delivery infrastructures.

VW claims that second-generation fuels derived from biomass emit only the carbon dioxide taken up by the plants when they grow. The resulting synthetic fuels are known as ‘’sun fuel” when derived from biomass – as opposed to ‘’syn fuel” when derived from a natural gas. The manufacture of both involves the gas-to-liquid process and results in chemically identical fuels that can be blended with conventional fuels.
advertisement

More pertinently, the fuels can be chemically tweaked to allow them to be used in the next generation of combined combustion system engines, which combine the low emissions of spark-ignition petrol engines and the high economy of a compression-ignition diesel engine. VW has such an engine on test in its Touran compact MPV and claims it is on the cusp of putting the supercharged and turbocharged unit on sale.

Telegraph