Associate Prof. Yudai Yamasaki, Department of Mechanical Engineering, and other researchers received the Award Paper 2019 (AP5) of the Japan Institute of Marine Engineering

Associate Professor Yudai Yamasaki, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Yoshifuru Nitta(*1), Yasuhisa Ichikawa(*1), Koichi Hirata(*1)  and Yudai  Yamasaki(*2), received the Award Paper 2019 (AP5) of the Japan Institute of Marine Engineering.

*1, National Maritime Research Institute

<About awarded research>
Paper title:  “Study with Micro-reactor on Deactivation of Pd Methane Oxidation Catalyst for Marine Lean Burn Gas Engines”

Marine lean burn gas engines （gas engines） use natural gas as a fuel and contribute to reducing both NOx and CO2 emissions. On the other hand, the unburned methane emitted from the marine lean burn gas engines may have an impact on global warming. In this study, to develop an aftertreatment catalyst system to reduce the methane, the performance of the Pd catalyst to oxidize the methane in the surrounding gas condition assuming the exhaust gas from the gas engine in experiments. It revealed that the quantity of active sites can relate to the CH4 oxidation performance.

<Your impression & future plan>

In international shipping, reduction of the total annual greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions by 50% or more by 2050 compared to 2008 has been set internationally, further developments for saving fuel technologies and utilization technologies of alternative fuel needs to make a progress urgently. The knowledge of this research is useful to develop aftertreatment systems to reduce GHG emitted from ships. In the future, the amounts of active sites of the methane oxidation reaction under the actual exhaust gas will be evaluated and availability of such systems are clarified.