Diesel Particulate Filter Characterization and Modeling
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ruled that heavy duty diesel particulate be reduced 90% by 2007. Such a ruling requires that aftertreatment devices be developed.
Diesel particulate filters developed to address the problem of diesel emissions provide technical hurdles that must be addressed, including plugging, thermal failure (such as cracking and melting), less than desirable performance (in trapping effectiveness and sulfate particulate production), and high cost.
Researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory are developing a sub-grid model of a diesel particulate filter, using the Lattice-Boltzmann technique, a simulation method for modeling continuum flow and transport in complex systems. Through this modeling, researchers are attempting to determine how the soot burn rate term can best be expressed, and the soot cake layer intrinsic properties.
The Lattice-Boltzmann technique is based on a statistical mechanics approach and is extensively used for simulating transport in porous materials.