EGR vs SCR * USA - Or, Navistar against the world

To Cut Smog, Navistar Blazes Risky Path of Its Own

(Photo by Peter Wynn Thompson/The New York Times)

Warrenville,ILL,USA -The New York Times, by By TOM ZELLER Jr. and NORMAN MAYERSOHN -4 April 2011: -- In a testing cell tucked deep in the bowels of Navistar’s engine plant and technical center here, a hulking prototype of a truck engine sits behind a large glass window like a patient on an operating table. A snarl of sensors and wires is attached to nearly every part of the humming engine, feeding reams of data to a battery of computers and watchful engineers in the adjacent control room... One measurement — for nitrogen oxide emissions, or NOx — is of particular concern to Navistar. From 2010 onward, all new truck engines must achieve tough, near-zero limits for NOx, a chief ingredient of smog. Virtually every truck maker besides Navistar chose to use an add-on system to their existing engines that uses a fluid cocktail to help neutralize the pollutant as it makes its way out of the exhaust...

Navistar went a different route, deciding to invest hundreds of millions of dollars to refine an engine that produces minimal NOx in the first place. At the same time, the company attacked the competing systems, suing federal air quality regulators and claiming that the add-on technology was so flawed that it failed to meet the clean-air requirements...   If Navistar’s engine works — the company recently submitted test results for the latest version to the Environmental Protection Agency for certification — it could be the simplest, most elegant solution to the vexing engineering problem of how to reduce smog created by diesel truck exhaust...  But the company would also have to persuade skeptical fleet owners to buy the engines. If those owners do not see a clear advantage in operating costs and fuel efficiency, Navistar could find itself stuck as the only engine maker promoting an alternative technology to the rest of the industry’s E.P.A.-approved approach...  The company has already paid a price for choosing the road less traveled. While its engines have been in development, its share of the United States market for the heaviest trucks fell to 20.2 percent this year, down from 28.5 percent in 2009, according to researchers at JPMorgan...  Diesel engines in the nation’s 18-wheelers, buses and other heavy-duty vehicles power less than 10 percent of all vehicle traffic in the United States, but they account for an outsize portion of the haze of pollution that hangs over many American cities — as much as 25 percent by some estimates...  Though the E.P.A. does not prescribe technologies for meeting its standards, it did suggest, back in 2001, that liquid urea would be an unlikely candidate. The system would require a whole new infrastructure for making urea available at truck stops across the country and would rely on drivers monitoring and refilling an on-board urea tank...  Even as it struggled to refine its technology, Navistar attacked its rivals’ approach. The company argued that the urea-based technology was ineffective in some circumstances, such as stop-and-go traffic — precisely when control of emissions is most needed. In addition, the company claimed that the urea system could be easily bypassed with simple tricks like putting water into the urea storage tank...

Caterpillar, a vehicle maker that recently unveiled a short-haul truck that uses a Navistar engine, said the Navistar approach would ultimately prove to be a winner. “The customer is looking for simplicity,” said George Taylor, general manager of Caterpillar’s on-highway truck group, “not technology.”

* USA - Navistar DT MaxxForce midrange gets EPA certification

Warrenville,ILL,USA -Today's Trucking -6 April 2011: -- Navistar International is inching closer to the EPA's 2010 0.20g NOx limit for its 2011 model year MaxxForce DT mid-range diesel...  The truckmaker announced that it has received certification from the EPA for the MaxxForce DT at 0.39 g/bHpHr NOx using Navistar’s EGR emissions solution...  The company says the certification represents a 22 percent emissions reduction from the original 0.50g certification and demonstrates progress to achieving the 0.20g standard... (Image from dieselpowermag: Nnavistar building the legendary assembly line)