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Promising Alternative Fuels and Sustainability
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Promising Alternative Fuels and Sustainability

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Energy Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 May 2025 | Viewed by 2137

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Chenxi Ji

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Global Sustainability Centre, American Bureau of Shipping (ABS), Houston, TX 77389, USA
Interests: alternative fuels; fuel combustion and emission; carbon capture and storage; AI-driven sustainability projection; maritime decarbonization; process systems engineering
Dr. Qingsheng Wang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department fo Chemical Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-3122, USA
Interests: process safety; machine learning; flammability; composites
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to invite you to submit your recent findings to the Special Issue with the title “Promising Alternative Fuels and Sustainability”.

The green energy transition is a complex and ongoing process that involves multiple industrial stakeholders. It represents a departure from conventional fossil fuels towards cleaner and more sustainable sources of energy. To achieve carbon neutrality and carbon net zero goals, many industries put alternative fuels at the top of decarbonization drivers. To date, many alternative fuels have shown promising characteristics in the decarbonization journey, including methanol, ammonia, hydrogen, biofuels, etc. The evaluation factors of alternative fuels may involve safety, sustainability, affordability, scalability, availability, technology, and infrastructure readiness levels. Many researchers have contributed to the field of alternative fuels in recent years, but more cutting-edge studies are needed to debottleneck the challenges of renewable energy applications.

This Special Issue aims to collect wide-ranging high-quality scientific papers focused on pioneering techniques for boosting and evaluating alternative fuel applications and innovative solutions for the energy transition along alternative fuel value chains.

Alternative fuel studies are driven by a combination of environmental, safety, economic, and energy security concerns, with the goal of reducing GHG emissions and fostering a more sustainable and resilient energy system. Original research articles and reviews are welcome. Topics may include (but are not limited to) the following:

  • Lifecycle assessment (LCA) and carbon footprint analysis for alternative fuel pathways;
  • Quantitative/qualitative risk assessment for alternative fuel operations;
  • Fire/explosion consequence modeling and toxic dispersion modeling;
  • Theoretical calculation and simulation of low-carbon fuel pathways;
  • Techno-economic/feasibility studies for alternative-fuel-based facilities/fleet;
  • Process modeling and process intensification for alternative fuel production and transportation;
  • Green corridors toward carbon net zero;
  • Data/AI-driven sustainability prediction and validation;
  • Social and economic impacts of emerging alternative fuels.

In this Special Issue, research papers, case studies, reviews, and short communications will be accepted.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Chenxi Ji
Dr. Qingsheng Wang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • renewable energy
  • green fuel pathways
  • GHG emissions
  • sustainable technology
  • transportation decarbonization
  • carbon neutrality
  • oil and gas value chain
  • AI-driven sustainability projection
  • marine alternative fuels

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Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

22 pages, 4879 KiB  
Article
Experimental Evaluation of the Impact on Turbo Engine’s Performance and Gaseous Emissions While Using n-Heptane Octanol/Jet-A Blends
by Valentin Silivestru, Grigore Cican, Radu Mirea, Sibel Osman and Razvan Ene
Sustainability 2025, 17(9), 3924; https://doi.org/10.3390/su17093924 - 27 Apr 2025
Viewed by 157
Abstract
This paper investigates how octanol, used as a renewable additive in Jet A fuel, influences the performance and emissions of aviation micro-turbo engines. Blends containing 10%, 20%, and 30% octanol, with an additional 5% n-heptane, were tested to closely replicate Jet A’s physical–chemical [...] Read more.
This paper investigates how octanol, used as a renewable additive in Jet A fuel, influences the performance and emissions of aviation micro-turbo engines. Blends containing 10%, 20%, and 30% octanol, with an additional 5% n-heptane, were tested to closely replicate Jet A’s physical–chemical properties. Mathematical models validated using density and viscosity data achieved accurate predictions, with maximum absolute errors of 0.0018 g/cm3 for density and 0.4020 mm2/s for viscosity. Performance assessments showed that fuel consumption increased due to octanol’s lower calorific value, requiring higher fuel flow to sustain engine speed. Combustion temperature variations ranged from a decrease of 5.38% in Regime 1 (30% octanol) to increases of up to 1.47% and 1.13% in Regimes 2 and 3, respectively, without compromising engine stability. Thrust variations were minimal, with decreases up to 0.72% observed at 30% octanol concentration. Emission analysis indicated significant reductions in CO and NOx levels with increased octanol content, attributed to enhanced combustion completeness and additional oxygen availability. SO2 emissions also decreased slightly due to the lower sulfur content. Thermal efficiency marginally declined from 5.04% (Jet A) to approximately 4.92–4.97% for octanol blends. These findings support octanol as a viable sustainable additive, offering substantial emission benefits with only minor efficiency trade-offs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Promising Alternative Fuels and Sustainability)
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19 pages, 3667 KiB  
Article
Enhancing Sustainable Development: Assessing a Solar Air Heater (SAH) Test Bench through Computational and Experimental Methods
by Badis Bakri, Hani Benguesmia, Ahmed Ketata, Slah Driss, Haythem Nasraoui and Zied Driss
Sustainability 2024, 16(14), 6055; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16146055 - 16 Jul 2024
Viewed by 1282
Abstract
A solar air heater is a device that gathers solar radiation and converts it into heat. The core principle involves air moving through a solar collector, where sunlight naturally increases the air temperature within the collector. The benefit of this technology lies in [...] Read more.
A solar air heater is a device that gathers solar radiation and converts it into heat. The core principle involves air moving through a solar collector, where sunlight naturally increases the air temperature within the collector. The benefit of this technology lies in its affordability and simplicity. The implementation of a solar air heater (SAH) test bench holds significant promise in addressing both global change and sustainable development objectives. The primary goal of this study is to examine the aerodynamic configuration of a novel solar air heater test bench accessible at the Laboratory of Electro-Mechanic Systems (LASEM). This study was carried out using the standard k-ω turbulence model with the use of the ANSYS Fluent 17.0 software. The results indicate that the velocity at the inlet directly influences the velocity fields, temperature, static pressure, and characteristics of turbulence. Furthermore, the numerical findings confirmed that the temperature and velocity profiles in the second channel are in good concordance with the experimental findings in the case of a fan, placed alongside the insulation, operating in a delivery mode. Based on these results, the computational approach is validated. When comparingforced convection to natural convection under identical conditions, there was a notable increase in the energy efficiency, with forced convection showing a significant improvement of approximately 31.8%. Indeed, the range of temperatures reached with the proposed design, is highly beneficial for both industrial and household applications. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Promising Alternative Fuels and Sustainability)
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