Interview with Isidro Benito, head of product of Power Solutions Inc.

The culture of efficiency is tradition around the world. Provide more efficient products that its predecessors, which stand out the competition and involve a plus for consumers, has historically been a primary goal of any good businessman. For that reason, Transdiesel divided into Spain and Portugal products of Power Solutions, Inc. (PSI), and Isidro Benito, his new Chief of product, hopes to offer all that and, moreover, help customers achieve their goals.

The gas engine holds a special place for the technology that uses and because sometimes the professional dedicated to use tend to see these teams as 'black boxes', whose understanding is beyond their capabilities, or even need not know anything about them. The alternative gas engine is a really simple, and in most cases is technologically simpler than an automotive engine, for example. This means that a technician that it plans to work with this kind of technology for the understanding of the technical foundations of the main components of the basic instructions of operation and maintenance is very simple, and that by my enterprise policy should be to your alcance… is more for me in particular as head of product is an obligation that I can not escape. This commitment to care for and go hand in hand with the manufacturer to the launch of its first team, is what mainly I hope to contribute to my company to go to expand the market.

The integration of our gas engines in the creation of groups of cogeneration and micro-cogeneration. Natural gas is the energy of most used to run these large or small cogeneration facilities, but other sources of energy and even waste can also be used. There are thus, cogeneration plants intended for the use of biogas produced by the waste energy. But, whether they be of greater or lesser dimension, there is a range of possibilities much higher for cogeneration facilities. Since that is the same process of useful heat and electric power generation, it can be used in virtually all industries and facilities that consume hot or cold and those that use steam or hot water, from the residential and tertiary sector with heated swimming pools companies chemical, paper and food, not to mention others that require processes of drying, such as mining, pottery and similar.

In order to satisfy the needs of virtually any user who decided to work in this sector, the company has worked during this time in order to provide a solution tailored according to your field (grupista, engineering, consulting, ESCO…). In this sense, we can offer from the supply of our gas engines that covers a range of powers ranging from 5 up to the 310 kW electrical and that they can be fed by different types of fuels (natural gas)(, propane in liquid and gaseous state and biogas), a set of our engines with heat exchangers to recover heat from the gas exhaust and the water of the shirts and even own cogeneration module fully completed to be directly connected to the mains (parallel) or a system of batteries (Island) and by two connections, the circuit of water to be heated.

It must be borne in mind that the majority of diesel engines in order to fulfil as restrictive as this, regulation of emissions needs typically include one of the two following solutions: the first is a complex system that adds two stages in series supercharger with a variable geometry turboa system for recirculation of exhaust gas with cooling for the control of NOx and in addition, the incorporation of a filter in the exhaust which on the one hand contains a catalyst for oxidation to react with these gases reducing carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons and latera porous filter to trap the so-called small particles that are eventually oxidized through a system of car cleaning called passive regeneration. In order to control all these processes the engine requires a control unit with a processor twice as fast, four times more memory capacity and a 40% increase in the number of sensors.

A system called selective catalytic reduction (SRC) for alternative NOx reduction through the provision of a second fluid in the exhaust system and that is well known, the Urea. In the measure that is also effective requires the installation of a separate tank in the machine or vehicle, a sophisticated urea injection system and a system of manipulation-proof diagnosis required for the regulation. Since addition, urea freezes the incorporation of a system of global warming for the tank and supply lines is necessary.

Our company has invested heavily in the development of the line of gas engines to avoid all this kind of solutions so costly and complicated for the end customer, with the only addition of a system consisting of an oxygen sensor that works in unison with the engine management unitin order to maintain the composition of the mixture of fuel and air to an optimal level for the conversion process, and a three-way catalyst which is currently the form of more economic, efficient exhaust gas purificationsecurely and reliably available for engines. As its name suggests, the three-way catalyst converts three pollutants, in particular hydrocarbons (HC), carbon monoxide (CO) and nitrogen oxides (NOx into less harmful gases). The catalyst consists of a material of metal or ceramic substrate coated by a precious metal (Platinum, rhodium, Iridium). The catalyst converts about 90 percent of the pollutants in carbon dioxide (CO₂), nitrogen (N₂) and water (H₂or).

"Power Solutions Inc. is very committed to the environment and proof of this is to obtain ISO 14001 certification"

Obviously our company is very committed to the environment around us and a test more than clear, indisputable, it is the recent acquisition of ISO 14001 with respect to our environmental management system certification. With regard to the benefit than gas engines can offer, I would like to emphasize, first, enabling the noise arising from the combustion are reduced up to 50% on the engineering diesel, helping to reduce noise pollution, which, together with the low emission of particles, making it a very attractive fuel for use in urban areas. Secondly, it does not contain toxic components and has lower levels of emissions of CO₂. If he prevails in the butane mixture lower NOx levels are achieved and if propane is the predominant gas reduces the levels of co. Finally, poliaromáticos hydrocarbons and aldehydes emissions are considerably lower than those of diesel and the of benzene, toluene and xyleno lower the gasoline.

In relation to the gasoline has a higher calorific power and a lower formation of smoke in the summer. Compared with diesel smoke formation is lower in winter. These are some of the reasons why their use contributes to sustainability in the measure that helps to improve the quality of the air of the city. The environmental benefits and energy diversification is added the cost savings resulting from its use.

Since then that Yes, starting with the interest shown by the distribution of fuels like Repsol companies with whom we have signed an agreement by committing themselves to give a grant to the customer for the purchase of this type of engines if used fuel is your brand and even according to the annual consumption, the installation of supply and free maintenance deposits. But there is much work to do, that you should control somehow the consumption of fuel oil C so propane can compete with the diesel price and represent an alternative as an economic option.

Especially note the great effort that our company is carried out in conjunction with our represented House, to develop the baby of the House, a motor for continuous work that develops a power of 5 kW for use in generating electricity and above all, cogeneration in communities of neighbors with buildings of up to 100 housing fulfilling the consumption of ACS to replace the use of much more expensive solar panels in initial investment. In addition, we now have a range of engines that can work with biogas, according to the characteristics of this. But this type of engines are not only designed, as already mentioned in this interview, to work in urban waste EP plants or manure, but that more recently, thanks to the great technological progress has suffered in recent years represented us, to use in the plants of gasification, which is a termoquímico process by which biomass and organic matter, is transformed into fuel gas.