Detroit Diesel Corp. announced that it has surpassed seven million miles of demonstrated testing on its BlueTec selective catalytic reduction (SCR) technology. BlueTec SCR was selected by Detroit Diesel in 2005 to meet the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 2010 emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks.
“We started our engineering development and validation activities several years ago to optimize BlueTec SCR for the 2010 North American market,” says David Siler, director of marketing for Redford, Mich.-based Detroit Diesel Corp. “We are excited about how successful we’ve been in our validation program, and we feel our customers will benefit from this positive experience.”
BlueTec SCR will incorporate the performance of Detroit Diesel’s recently introduced DD15 and DD13 engines, the ACRS common rail fuel system, a diesel particulate filter already in use today, and a SCR NOx aftertreatment system that utilizes diesel exhaust fluid (DEF), commonly known as urea.
Detroit Diesel says its extensive validation testing isn’t complete, and that its reliability test vehicle fleet is expanding monthly and will continue to log millions of miles prior to production launch in January 2010. Detroit Diesel says it also has conducted several rounds of vehicle validation testing under extreme operating and environmental conditions that may be experienced by the end-user, such as below-zero winter conditions in northern climates, as well as temperatures above 120 degrees in the desert regions of Arizona, Nevada and California.
“We have leveraged our relationship with Daimler Trucks North America by jointly conducting our design, packaging and validation testing activities,” says Rakesh Aneja, Detroit Diesel’s 2010 program manager. “This ensures that the vehicle is optimized as an integrated system with respect to lifecycle cost, including fuel economy, durability and reliability.”
Daimler says its BlueTec System is modular and will be adaptable for use in vocational applications, buses and RVs, as well as hybrids and biodiesel powered trucks. Daimler says that since adapting the technology in early 2005, it has delivered more than 200,000 trucks and buses around the world utilizing BlueTec SCR.
“We’re slowly seeing the rest of the North American truck and engine market begin to understand the same benefits we saw several years ago as they reverse course in favor of SCR technology to competitively meet the EPA 2010 emissions targets,” Siler says. “It was only a matter of time before customers would demand not only improved fuel economy, but also clean emissions. In fact, nearly 100 percent of all big bore engines in production today for the U.S. and Canada that will be manufactured after Jan. 1, 2010, will utilize SCR technology.”
