aftertreatment, went through a Euro
5 certification cycle and passed. We
were also advised that with just a
little bit of tweaking and recalibra-tion, the test agency was confident it
could meet Euro 6 as well.
“We think this is a huge break-
through, and again, this is not data
from Tenneco’s laboratories — this is
from an independent outside agency
that actually does certification testing.
We were thrilled to get that result and
we now have three large customers
down there basically in a race to see
who gets to be the launch customer
for this technology.”
Tenneco said it has also progressed
with its solid SCR technology. In the
solid SCR system, the solid — subli-
mated into an ammonia gas — acts
as the reductant, replacing conven-
tional liquid urea. The sublimation
is triggered when the heat transfer
warms the reductant. At about 140°F,
the solid reductant releases ammonia
gas, which is then injected into the
exhaust stream.
“Advantage number one is if you’re
running an EGR strategy to avoid the
use of SCR and you want to get the
engine part-way to the regulated limit
with EGR, but then instead of using
credits you want to get the rest of the
way with an aftertreatment technology,” Jackson said. “We call that a
NOx trim strategy. If you’re already
bringing the engine down somewhere
close to the tailpipe limit and you need
technology to get the rest of the way,
solid SCR is a home run.
“It totally eliminates the need for
driver refill; a canister of the solid
reductant can last the oil-change interval; you can have reduced cost versus
a urea SCR system; you completely
eliminate the compliance issue concerning ‘What if the driver doesn’t put
the urea in the tank?’ and you lose all
the cold-start problems because the
solid system can come up to temperature much more quickly than a urea
system after an overnight cold-start.
So it’s clearly a home run technology.
“For light truck and passenger car
applications, where you chassis cer-
One of Tenneco’s newest emissions-reduction
products is the T.R.U.E.-Clean Mini, a thermal management system designed to provide
diesel particulate filter regeneration
under any conditions. The smaller version
uses many of the same components as its
larger sibling, but is more compact and able to be
plumbed directly into the exhaust system.
tify rather than dyno certify, the emissions certification cycles have got
some severe cold-start stipulations
and solid SCR is a way to get the
ammonia to the catalyst much more
quickly after engine cold-start than
liquid urea SCR systems. We are also
hearing from marine customers that
they’ve got a preference for carrying
a solid reductant onboard the ship
rather than a liquid.
“Finally for what I’ll call the infrastructure customers — the guy who’s
logging on the top of the mountain
during the wintertime — the only way
he can get urea up there is to haul it
in the bed of his pickup truck. By the
time he gets the truck up there he is in
freezing conditions already, and after
the truck sits for a couple of hours the
drum of urea is frozen.
“For that customer, just the convenience factor of taking a canister
that is approximately the weight of
a large propane tank that you might
use for your gas grill at home, taking it anywhere and changing it in
a minute — literally it’s two straps
and a quick connect — and now he
doesn’t have to worry about a liquid infrastructure for delivering urea,
that’s a big value proposition.
“We have customers in all four of
those camps that are investigating
solid urea. Will it be a disruptive tech-
nology for liquid urea? I don’t think so.
I think we’re still going to be selling
liquid urea systems in the year 2020.
But is it a compelling technology for
customers who have one of those
four challenges? Clearly, yes.”
Jackson also stressed that when
it comes to meeting emissions chal-
lenges, Tenneco doesn’t take a single-
bullet approach. “Tenneco prides itself
that we’ve got a whole suite of tech-
nologies to offer,” he said. “It’s the old
paradigm — if all you’ve got is a ham-
mer then every problem looks like a nail.
