Nitrogen-Based Alternative FuelGenís Guillem, Yamit Pisman, Kadya Wittenberg

Advisors: Alon Grinberg Dana, Lea Winter

The current global energy and environmental crisis has demonstrated thatthe carbon-based energy paradigm is unsustainable. Our society requires acontinuous power supply, but major renewable sources are intermittent. Inorder to provide a viable alternative, renewable energy must be stored tomake it transferable over space and time1. The most convenient storagemethod is via fuels. We investigate a nitrogen-based alternative fuel, giventhe abundance of nitrogen in the atmosphere. The proposed fuel consists ofan aqueous solution of Urea and Ammonium Nitrate (UAN)2.

Our objective is to determine the effect of pressure on the productcomposition and thermal profile of the fuel.

• 400µl of UAN (15% urea, 60% ammonium nitrate and 25% water)

• Combustion took place in the minibatch reactor, (Figure 1)

• Data was analyzed by Differential Thermal Analysis (DTA) and Gas Chromatography (GC)

We would like to thank Alon Grinberg Dana and Lea Winter for their guidance, and Prof. Gideon S. Grader for hosting us in his lab. Weare also very grateful to Mr. Ed Satell and the Grand Technion Energy Program for facilities and support. Thank you to CiMs+CELLEXScholarship, the Gilbert Foundation, and the Michael and Morven Heller Charitable Foundation, for their generous donations.

[1] J. A. Turner,Science, 1999, 285, 687 ;[2] A. Grinberg Dana, G. E. Shter and G. S. Grader,RSC Adv., 2014, 4, 10051

Figure 2 – Ignition Pressure vs. Ignition TemperatureThe data correlates to a polynomial fit. The graph of the boilingpoint of pure water at the corresponding pressures has beenadded.

Ignition temperature increases with pressure.

Temperature difference between water boiling and ignition decreases with increase in pressure.

N2 yield increases with pressure.

N2 yield decreases when two ignitions occur.

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Figure 3 – N2 YieldYield is the percentage of actual moles of nitrogen relative tothe amount of nitrogen produced in the ideal reaction.Ignition pressure is the system pressure just before ignition.

Two ignitions observed

Ignition pressure

R² = 0.9311

R² = 0.919

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Figure 1