Fuel Oil News

Fuel Oil News March 2011

The home heating oil industry has a long and proud history, and Fuel Oil News has been there supporting it since 1935. It is an industry that has faced many challenges during that time. In its 77th year, Fuel Oil News is doing more than just holding

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ULTRA-LOW SULFUR Ultra-Low Sulfur Fuel Oil Effects A new possible compatibility problem BY STEPHEN BENNETT New York State has passed a mandate for use of the fuel start- ing in 2012. But field and lab testing has turned up a possible problem: the fuel might not be fully compatible with seals on residential oil pumps. The technical concerns need to be resolved before ultra-low sul- fur (ULS) fuel oil goes into wide distribution, John E.Batey, technical director for the Oil Manufacturers Association (OMA) said in a report to the association. “We do have a bit of an issue here,” Batey said in an interview A with Fuel Oil News.The potential problem with seals on residen- tial oil burner pumps was discovered during in-depth field tests sponsored by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and in lab tests at Brookhaven National Laboratory.Testing turned up the possibility of shortened lifetimes of the seals. This increases the potential for fuel oil releases in homes, Batey reported,which needs to be fully evaluated and corrected before widespread use of ULS in residential oil burners.Research is ongo- ing, he said, but is not likely to be completed until late in 2012 - nearly two years from now. The ULS heating oil field demonstration in homes funded by NYSERDA was headed up by Batey and personnel at Brookhaven National Laboratory, including Roger McDonald, a senior project engineer at Brookhaven.(McDonald,well-known for his research during a decades-long career at Brookhaven, died in December.) The field test involved 100 houses using ULS (15 ppm) fuel oil and a control group of another 100 using conventional fuel oil.The goal was to evaluate the benefits and potential operational prob- lems associated with burning ULS heating oil in homes. The tests indicated potential shortening of pump seal lifetimes both with ULS heating oil and with ULS/B5 fuel oil blends. Industry support is growing for accepting a ULS/ B5 blend as a standard fuel in the near future,Batey noted.Pumps with viton seals (developed for biofuel) failed quickly—“on the order of a year,” Batey said— both in the lab and in the field. Conventional nitrile seals that are frequently found in home oil burners may last only four to five years, compared to eight to 10 years with heating oil containing normal levels of sulfur. Even shorter lifetimes were observed in pumps tested with ULS/B5 blends. Of four pumps tested, two failed after the equiva- 18 MARCH 2011 | FUEL OIL NEWS | www.fueloilnews.com He summarized them in a report to the OMA: • PM emissions from oil burners are very low compared to wood burning equipment • Ultra-Low Sulfur Oil (15 ppm) and biofuel blends in heating oil produce PM emissions approaching zero and are similar to nat- ural gas burners. • PM emissions are becoming very important as air emission control groups are now focusing on PM health effects and envi- ronmental haze • Oil heating equipment can be one of the lowest PM emissions sources. • When combined with the reduced global warming potential produced by biofuel blends (even with biofuel blend as low as 10% to 20% in heating oil), oil burners using ULS heating oil can be shown to be the environmental fuel of choice for home heating. The Brookhaven findings on particulate matter confirm low emis- sions levels for flame retention head burners at 0.00397 pounds ofPM S THE INDUSTRY LOOKS FORWARD TO WIDESPREAD USE OF ultra-low sulfur fuel oil, it is facing a deadline in at least one Northeastern state that might be difficult to meet. lent of 1.5 to 2.5 years of operation, Batey reported.“This is a con- cern as B5 blends are approved by UL [Underwriters Laboratories] for residential oil burners,”Batey reported. An extension of the project has been approved by NYSERDA that will allow all 100 fuel pumps from the ULS test group to be collected. The pump seals, which by now have gone through two years of operation with ULS heating oil,will be examined to deter- mine their condition. OMA is supportive of the use of ULS heating oil, Batey noted. The emissions performance of ULS is very similar to that of nat- ural gas, Batey said.“That’s why we have to follow up on the pump seals”—because that level of emissions performance by ULS would be a powerful competitive factor in favor of fuel oil. Batey reported that Brookhaven has also carried out an in-depth evaluation of particulate matter (PM) emissions from residential oil, gas,and wood heating equipment. The findings are notewor- thy, Batey said,because the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on June 4,2010, proposed new air emission standards for commer- cial, institutional, and industrial oil burners that could seriously restrict the sales of new oil heating equipment. The evaluation by Brookhaven,funded by NYSERDA, resulted in some important findings related to oil burner emissions and the impact of fuel sulfur content, Batey said.

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