Fuelling transport and industry with HVO

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Fuelling transport and industry with HVO

Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO) and renewable diesel provide an array of advantages for fuelling the future of sustainable power. At Rolls-Royce, they offer the opportunity to bring our existing engines further towards achieving net zero.

What is HVO fuel?

To create HVO, waste vegetable and animal fats and used vegetable oils can be used as base materials and converted into hydrocarbons through a catalytic reaction with the addition of hydrogen. In this way, fats and vegetable oils can be used as a more sustainable fuel to either supplement or replace diesel completely.

HVO offers clean combustion with a reduction in particulate emissions of up to 80 per cent, nitrogen oxide emissions by an average of eight per cent and CO2 emissions by up to 90 per cent compared to fossil diesel. And because it's produced from renewable raw materials, its production, transport and combustion generate only about as many greenhouse gases as were absorbed by the plants during the growth of the biomass. If the fuels are produced with the help of renewable energy and green hydrogen through Power-to-X processes, CO2 emissions can be completely eradicated.

Readying our customers for the energy transition

For years, we’ve been working to support our customers through the energy transition by rigorously testing our products with sustainable fuel alternatives like HVO as a drop-in replacement for fossil fuels.

Michael Stipa, Vice President Strategy, Business and Product Development Stationary Generation at Rolls-Royce Power Systems explains: “The first inquiries as to whether we could approve our engines for HVO came as early as 2019. We then tested our mtu engines intensively for three years to make sure that our customers could operate them with HVO just as safely, efficiently, and reliably as with fossil diesel.

“In April 2022, we then approved the first engines – at that time PowerGen engines in the Series 1600 and 4000 – for use with fuels complying with the EN 15940 standard, which includes HVO. Since then, we have released more and more engines – based on many hours of experience with HVO-powered engines on the test bench but also with our customers. The interest of our customers is really high and demand is continuously increasing.”

Since 2022, we’ve been working in partnership with one of the world’s largest producers of HVO fuel, Neste, to help ensure the availability of HVO as we work towards greener power.

Rail on track to near carbon-neutrality

Many of our existing rail engines can already be operated in a completely CO2-neutral manner using HVO, including the mtu Series 4000, 1800, 1600, 1500 and 1300.

To ensure the best possible performance, we’ve been working with our partners DB Cargo and RDC Deutschland Group since 2021 to conduct a series of engine bench tests and operational trials. The results have been positive. “We were able to use HVO without any problems in our vehicles, without compromising performance and reliability,” said Ali Dogru, Head of Assets and Maintenance at DB Cargo.

Industry, agriculture and mining becoming more sustainable with HVO

These advancements also have applications in the fields of construction, industry, agriculture and mining, where the use of paraffinic diesel fuels with the mtu Series 1000, 1100, 1300 and 1500 engines already enables almost CO2-neutral mobility.

For power generation, the Series 1600 and Series 4000 engines are already approved for use with sustainable fuels. "There is already a lot of interest in HVO in particular from many customers in the power industry and data centres who want to improve their carbon footprint," explains Tobias Ostermaier, president of the Stationary Power Solutions business unit at Rolls-Royce Power Systems.

Ben Pritchard, the CEO of AVK, the UK's largest provider of emergency power solutions for data centres and exclusive partner of Rolls-Royce in the provision of our mtu gensets, adds: “Simply by switching diesel for HVO, our clients are reducing their net CO2 greenhouse gas emissions by up to 90% right away - well to tank.”

Proven success at sea

At sea, mtu Series 2000 and 4000 engines are also on course to full approval for the use of synthetic fuels, thanks to years of successful HVO testing.

The Golden Gate Ferry shipping company in San Francisco began trialling HVO in six of its ferries in 2019. After more than 41,000 operating hours, their engines have continued to perform equally well when using HVO compared to diesel in terms of maximum power, load response and fuel consumption. Jim Swindler, Managing Director of Golden Gate Ferry, is particularly pleased: " The visible smoke that was seen at the dock with conventional diesel has been reduced with the switch to HVO.”

Today, our mtu engines continue to power all six of the ferry company’s vessels and with new mandatory rules stipulating that all commercial harbour craft operating in Californian waters must run on HVO instead of fossil diesel, other Rolls-Royce Power Systems customers in the region have also made the switch.

Proving the continued benefits of HVO

After years of testing, we’re proud to say that not only will most of our engines be able to run reliably and effectively on HVO, but it may also be beneficial for their longevity.

“We can already give the green light for most mtu engines,” confirmed Arnd Lierhammer, HVO expert in the Rolls-Royce engineering team. He and his colleagues examined the components of mtu engines that had run at least 3,000 and, in some cases, up to 9,000 hours on HVO.

“Used in the engine versions we have approved so far – which is in fact the majority of mtu engines – HVO does not shorten the service life of individual engine components,” he explains. “We're looking at whether some engine components run with HVO will actually have a lower maintenance requirement.”

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