Reducing Fuel Consumption of Hybrid Vehicles by Replacing Diesel Engines with Gas Turbine Engines

One of the options being examined in last decades in the development of environmentally sustainable, energy-efficient and lightweight vehicles is the replacement of piston engines by gas turbine engines, especially in hybrid vehicles. A lot of effort has been consistently put in design and production of concept hybrid automobiles powered by gas turbine engines by leading automobile producers such as Toyota, Chrysler, Jaguar, Rover, General Motors and many others in recent decades (see [1-8]), and the application of gas turbine engines in commercial hybrid buses operating in different parts of the world which started 15 years ago has been very successful (see [8]). The Design Line EcoSaverIV [7], a hybrid transit bus operating globally, uses a diesel-fueled micro gas turbine instead of a diesel engine to generate electricity. The stored electricity is used to power traction motors. Design Line boasts a 100% improvement in fuel economy over diesel buses, and can achieve seven to eight miles per gallon compared to traditional hybrid buses which achieve 3 to 4 miles per gallon. Note that in the past the main obstacle to wide application of gas turbine engines in different types of vehicles was their relatively weak performance in terms of fuel consumption. In the paper we show that in view of significant progress made in development of highly efficient micro gas turbines in recent years, and the potential progress which is expected in the near future, this obstacle has completely lost its actuality. Moreover, the reduction in fuel consumption can be achieved by replacing diesel engines by gas turbine engines in different types of hybrid vehicles in the Reducing Fuel Consumption of Hybrid Vehicles by Replacing Diesel Engines with Gas Turbine Engines