15 Diesel Pollution Facts: Does Diesel Engines Affect Air Pollution?

Diesel exhausts are the types of harmful and toxic emissions that are emitted by any sort of internal combustion diesel engine, mostly found in petrol and diesel cars.

Not only does it contain toxic fumes but also harmful particulates like soot and particulate matter, or PM, that play a major role in polluting the environment. However, the type of composition usually varies with the type of fuel, the engine operating speed, consumption rate, or type of engine.

Machinery like farm vehicles, on-road vehicles, marine vessels, locomotives, and stationary generators are built differently.

Diesel exhaust is extremely toxic if exposed to humans for a long time and might have adverse health effects in the long term. The toxic fumes emitted from diesel engines have been labeled as Group 1 carcinogens that promote lung cancer as well as bladder cancer.

However, many methods to reduce toxic nitrogen dioxide as well as PM emissions by car exhausts have been inculcated worldwide by the car industry and the latest emissions technology advancements. Other fuels like gas pollute less than petrol.

In this article, you will find some of the most informative facts about air pollution caused by vehicle fleets, car exhausts, and industries that rely on fossil fuels.

You will also find man-made solutions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, such as petrol emissions systems, internal combustion engines, gasoline engines, and the car industry to curb this raging man-made problem that is slowly destroying the land humans inhabit.

If you liked our article on how diesel vehicles and petrol vehicles release harmful greenhouse gases, you can check out other articles about important topics such as coal pollution facts and factory pollution facts.

Diesel Pollution Meaning With Example

Diesel pollution is the combustion of diesel fuel in engines, resulting in emissions that lead to air pollution. It poses serious human health risks and adverse environmental effects.

Pollution from diesel emissions includes soot or particulate matter and other dangerous air pollutants and toxins that can be primarily responsible for the production of ground-level ozone.

This results in damage to vegetation, trees, and crops and also results in acid rain, which harms soil and water bodies like lakes and streams, and also causes damage to buildings and infrastructure as well.

It can pose great health risks to humans as it can penetrate the human food chain through water and produce like crops, meat, and fish.

To approach this raging problem, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has established mandatory standards for regulating the sulfur content of diesel and also the emissions from the new petrol and diesel engines.

When compared with petrol, diesel is slightly more effective in nature than petrol, and the emissions are also comparatively higher. Diesel vehicles are larger, heavier, and far more productive than the petrol engine in most cars.

Diesel is extensively used for traveling long distances. It has been proven that diesel engines, on average, pollute significantly more than petrol engines and gas engines.

Diesel Pollution Sources

Internal combustion of diesel engines converts chemical energy in the fuel into mechanical power, and the main sources of diesel emissions are primarily diesel-powered engines that release diesel fumes, such as diesel trucks and cars, farms, mining equipment, construction, locomotives, ships, and more.

Diesel fuel contains hydrocarbons which usually produce carbon dioxide and water vapor during the combustion process.

The main noxious gas components found in diesel exhaust are carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, and nitric oxide.

Most diesel pollutants are emitted from non-ideal processes through combustion, such as unfinished fuel combustion, when a mixture of fuel components undergoes a reaction under high pressure and high temperature, the combustion of oil additives and engine lubricating oil, as well as the combustion of non-hydrocarbon components of diesel, such as sulfur compounds and fuel additives.

Common pollutants consist of unburned carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, particulate matter, or nitrogen oxides.

As per the studies of the U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that in the year 2019, diesel consumption resulted in 502.6 million US ton (456 million metric tons) of carbon dioxide emission in the transportation sector, which is a harmful greenhouse gas, which is equal to 24% of total CO2 emissions and additionally equal to nearly 9% of CO2 emissions that year.

Effect Of Diesel Pollution On Environment

Diesel effusions also include pollutants that can have fatal health and or environmental effects.

Studies say that exposure to petrol and diesel gases emitted by diesel and petrol vehicles can cause serious health ailments such as respiratory illnesses like asthma and can exacerbate existing lung and heart disease, especially in kids and the venerable. 

Short-term exposures to toxic gas produced by diesel combustion have been known to cause acute headaches, lightheadedness, coughing, nausea, breathing difficulties, chest congestion, and irritation of the throat, nose, and eyes. Long-term exposures can cause chronic health problems such as heart disease, lung disease, and cancer.

Studies have shown that traffic-related air pollution has resulted in decreased cognitive function in older men.

Diesel engines' emissions also produce ground-level ozone, which leads to widespread damage to trees, crops, and other vegetation.

Toxic acid rain caused by the accumulation of diesel fumes and nitrogen oxides in the air affects the fertility of the soil as well as water bodies like lakes and streams, which results in harmful substances entering our food chain via water, fresh produce, fish, and meat.

These emissions also contribute to property damage and reduced visibility.

It further results in the emission of greenhouse gases that have been known to be the major cause of global warming and climate change, which not only affects air and water, but has also resulted in the rise of sea levels, the destruction of ecosystems, and agriculture, as well as drastic weather patterns that have caused major natural disasters.

Reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from diesel vehicles and engines by using improved fuel-saving strategies, environmentally friendly fuel, introducing new petrol vehicles or diesel cars, or switching to electric vehicles can easily help address climate change.

Prevention Of Diesel Pollution

Diesel gas emissions have considerably damaged the environment, so countless preventive measures to prevent diesel pollution have been inculcated.

Diesel engines are being designed to have fewer pollutants and cleaner exhaust. One such example is the requirement for light-duty trucks to have less than 0.001 oz (0.03 g) NOx emissions per 1 mi (1.6 km) in the U.S.

Moreover, other countries like Europe, and Japan have emissions control rules as well. Adopting methods to use less fuel or even changing to a different fuel is quite an effective way to reduce pollutants from diesel vehicles, like diesel cars.

Dimethyl ether (DME) is a comparatively more environment-friendly fuel that has near-nonexistent particulate matter emissions and can be obtained from food, animal, and agricultural waste. It can even become a carbon-neutral fuel.

Several other processes to curb diesel pollution have been inculcated as well.

One such process is selective catalytic reduction (SCR) in which a reductant such as ammonia or aqueous urea is injected into diesel-powered engine exhausts to transform nitrogen oxides into gaseous water and nitrogen.

Another effective process is exhaust gas recirculation (EGR), which is used to obtain a richer fuel to air mixture at a lower temperature of peak combustion in diesel engines.

Both of these effects are known to reduce NOx emissions but can have a negative impact on the performance and the generation of soot particles.

Technological advancement has also led to the discovery of many such methods to reduce diesel pollution.

There is one that was tested in 2016 by Air Ink, which works by collecting carbon particles using a cylindrical device known as 'Kaalink' fitted into the exhaust systems of diesel vehicles, to remove carcinogens and heavy metals, and uses the carbon to produce ink.

Another similar process is being researched for desert troops to recover drinkable water from the exhaust gases of vehicles.

Diesel, which is obtained from refined crude oil, is known to produce harmful emissions when burned, and diesel-fueled vehicles like diesel cars are the major sources of these toxic pollutants.

To solve this problem, the EPA established measures for the amount of sulfur content of diesel fuel as well as for discharges from the latest models of diesel cars and engines.

It has set fuel standards that aim to achieve a major reduction in the content of sulfur in diesel fuel.

To go by the EPA norms, the petroleum industry has started sourcing a fuel called Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel (ULSD), which is a cleaner-burning diesel fuel that contains at most 15 parts-per-million sulfur.

Most diesel fuel sold in the U.S. for vehicular use is ULSD fuel. The EPA has also sanctioned emissions standards for highway vehicles whose engines are diesel-powered for 2007 models and even later, and these engines are devised to run only with ULSD fuel.

Studies show that the use of advanced exhaust emission control systems as well as environment-friendly fuel like ULSD fuel will significantly reduce vehicular emissions of particulate matter, as well as nitrogen compounds.

This type of fuel reduces emissions in older engine models as well.

However, air pollution is still a problem in the U.S. despite these methods to resolve it and will continue to be a problem because it will take quite a lengthy period of time for cleaner and newer diesel engine vehicles to replace older and more polluting diesel engine vehicles and diesel cars.

We can also take another option into consideration regarding this problem, and that is switching to electric cars instead of diesel cars. Electric cars not only help reduce CO2 emissions but fine particle emissions as well.

However, we must keep in mind that nothing is ever fool-proof, completely eco-friendly, and green. It is all about reducing our carbon footprint on transportation and thereby reducing air pollution as well.

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