The Energy available in the natural environment that humans change for their own benefit, is becoming more and more varied and differentiate.
Within few years we will be necessarily obliged to switch from fossil power source to other power source.
A great challenge
In this situation, the industry will face a great challenge: Energy storage for transport.
The hydrogen fuel cells and the energy reformers, that was supposed to start mass production within 2005, is now scheduled around 2025.
Hybrid vehicles as well as electric ones are still too few and last too short time.
Meanwhile, the industry invests strongly on electrical-mechanical devices to improve the engine combustion efficiency.
Polluting substance reduction
A big amount of investment is addressed to the polluting emissions reduction, especially carbon dioxide reduction (CO2), substance that improve the greenhouse effect. The dioxide has a strong influence on human life, since it maintains the atmosphere temperature high enough to allow human life through a mechanism based on solar radiation reflection.
Carbon cycle
The carbon is exchanged between the biosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere and atmosphere of the Earth; for an extremely long time this cycle hasn’t changed and the percentage level of CO2 remained steady around 300ppm in the atmosphere.
The industrial development, based on fossil fuels combustion, altered this equilibrium because the combustion process releases the underground carbon directly in the atmosphere.
Global warming
Human activities has surely changed the carbon cycle dynamics, specifically we are responsible for the increase of CO2 atmospheric concentration.
The main consequence of CO2 increase is global warming, which is maybe the main and clearest example of environmental changes on a global scale.
The Earth overheating is a threat to all ecosystems and biodiversity.
CO2 concentration reduction
It is possible to reduce CO2 concentrations and at the same time to have power supplying without depending on potential International political crisis by employing not fossil fuels like ethanol or CNG.
Ethanol is a renewable type of fuel resulting from biomass and it reduces the CO2 emissions from 20 to 80 %, depending on the biomass source.
When Methane, also known as CNG (Compressed Natural Gas), combusts inside a bi-fuel engine, it produces CO2 emissions, but 25% less compared to an equivalent gasoline engine.
Magneti Marelli supplies specific solutions for this kind of alternative powertrain systems.
Methane (CNG) and Gasoline bifuel
Ethanol and gasoline (Flexfuel)
Ethanol, gasoline and CNG (Tetrafuel)