Tomorrow’s internal combustion engines
“Not only can these engines look back on an impressive history, they’re also going to help take Rolls-Royce Power Systems into an even more successful future,” said Andreas Schell, CEO of Rolls-Royce Power Systems. Both the Series 4000 and the Series 2000 are to be certified to run on sustainable fuels from 2023. “Sustainable fuels are putting carbon-neutral mobility and power generation well within reach, even using internal combustion engines,” added COO Dr Otto Preiss.
Emissions driving R&D
High performance and high reliability with low emissions are at the forefront of ongoing development work. Most recently, Series 4000 engines for yachts and commercial vessels have reached the pinnacle of emissions regulations with EPA Tier 4 certification. The fact that these emission limits vary depending on engine application and country of use is an additional challenge for developers. “We’re constantly enhancing these engines, and if you look at a Series 4000 or Series 2000 engine today, we’ve redesigned most of the components to meet the higher requirements in terms of power output, consumption and emissions,” said Otto Buecheler. Nevertheless, the engines have retained their typical look and external dimensions, because one thing has always been important to the engineers: the appearance of the engines, and thus the interfaces to customer applications, were to change as little as possible to enable older vehicles to be repowered with new engines.