An article " The next generation" that appeared in Hydrocarbon Engineering explains why new automotive fuels demand a new take on environmental control. Beyond the traditionally predominant liquid fuels (petrol and diesel) of two decades ago, newer generations fuels, such as hydrogen, LPG/ propane, CNG and LNG, ULSD and LSD, ethanol and biodiesel are increasingly being used. The new fuels have brought with them significant shifts in technology and production models, however sound environmental management is still very strongly required.
While automotive vehicle emissions have certainly become less harmful, more robust environmental management is being demanded at the fuel production sources and across the distribution supply chain. One example is ethanol being added to petrol; while there can be tail pipe emissions benefits from using ethanol over petrol, the environmental impact shifts to agriculture in terms of land usage, fertiliser production and usage, VOC emissions from the highly volatile ethanol, as well as the highly energy intensive fermentation and distillation process, that also creates emissions typical of any combustion process.
New emissions legislation is calling for a spectrum of additional process control calibration gases and emissions monitoring gases. These new specialty gases must not only meet higher purity and accuracy standards, they must often also be certified and fully traceable with a scheme of accreditation, such as ISO17025.