FAPESP and Peugeot Citroën to fund Engineering Research Center

The institutions announced a public call for proposals to select a project for the creation of an center aimed at the development of biofuel-powered combustion engines.

By Elton Alisson

Agência FAPESP – FAPESP and Peugeot Citroën signed a cooperation agreement on November 13 to fund scientific research and cooperative technology between researchers in São Paulo State and the company.

The two institutions also announced a public call for proposals to select a project for the creation of an Engineering Research Center aimed at the development of biofuel-powered combustion engines.

Headquartered at a research institution in São Paulo State, the Center will be funded by FAPESP and Peugeot Citroën for up to ten years to develop projects involving internal combustion engines adapted or specifically developed for biofuels, as well as projects involving biofuel sustainability.

The Center will bring members of various universities and research institutions together to carry out multidisciplinary projects at the frontier of knowledge, as well as transferring technology, educating researchers and disseminating the knowledge produced.

The topics to be investigated include developing new configurations for motors powered by different biofuels(including motors for hybrid cars), improving biofuel efficiency , reducing biofuel emissions, and, in the future, reducing the impacts and improving the economic and environmental viability of biofuels.

Up to R$ 1.6 million annually is expected in financial support over the ten-year period. This financial support will be divided equally among the partner institutions.

The agreement was signed by FAPESP President Celso Lafer and Peugeot Citroën do Brasil President Carlos Gomes. Also present at the ceremony were François Sigot, director of Research, Development and Style of PSA Peugeot Citroën for Latin America; Damien Loras, French Consul General in São Paulo; Jean-Pierre Garino, attaché for Cooperation and Cultural Action for the French Consul General in São Paulo; José Arana Varela, CEO of FAPESP’s Executive Board; and Carlos Henrique de Brito Cruz, Scientific Director of FAPESP’s Executive Board.

“The agreement is extremely important on a number of fronts because of the topics it involves, because it is a cooperative agreement between a company and a research support institution, and because it deals with issues of great importance to FAPESP, such as promoting technological innovation that will make Brazil more competitive,” Lafer noted.

“We are very pleased to enter into this agreement with FAPESP in an area that we are already working on in Brazil and that represents a line of research that is very important to us,” said Lafer.

During the signing ceremony, Brito Cruz emphasized that the Engineering Research Center is a pioneering project for FAPESP, which has promoted similar activities before but on a smaller scale. “FAPESP has had a very successful program since 1998, which is the Research, Innovation and Dissemination Centers (CEPID) program, offering funding for researchers to carry out bold projects over a period of up to 11 years, under the condition that they seek out partnerships with companies or in society to use the technology and knowledge that they create,” said Brito Cruz.

“We see the partnership with Peugeot Citroën as an opportunity to encourage researchers in São Paulo State by organizing a center  such as this, with a financial partner. It will be a center focused on biofuel-powered combustion engines and related topics,” he affirmed.

Brito Cruz emphasized that, in addition to increasing research in São Paulo State, the scientific and technological cooperation agreement with Peugeot Citroën will help bolster the division of the FAPESP Program for Research on Bioenergy (BIOEN) that  addresses biofuel applications in automotive engines.

Inaugurated in 2008, BIOEN has five divisions: “Biomass for Bioenergy" (primarily from sugarcane), "The Biofuel Fabrication Process," "Biorefineries and Alcohol Chemistry," "Ethanol Applications for Automotive Engines: internal combustion and fuel cell engines" and "Research on sustainability, social and economic impacts and land use."

“The agreement with Peugeot Citroën offers the opportunity to strengthen the motor division of BIOEN so that it could even become the strongest of the five divisions. With a research plan lasting ten years, we are certain to have strong results,” said Brito Cruz.

The agreement will also make it possible to increase the number of scientists performing research within BIOEN. Today there are 300 scientists involved in the program—240 in São Paulo State and 60 in other countries.

Reducing emissions and pollutants

According to Sigot, the Engineering Research Center will make it possible to create biofuel-powered engines, as opposed to adapting engines that were designed to operate on gasoline, as auto assemblers have been doing in recent years. “We hope this scientific and technological cooperation agreement will allow us to optimize biofuel engines because, basically, what we had been doing was using engines developed in Europe and the United States and adapting them for Brazilian biofuels,” Sigot told Agência FAPESP.

“But, in adapting our engines, we made some discoveries and saw that there is an unexplored path not only for adapting engines but also for conceiving of and creating new biofuel-powered engines. But, in order to do this, we need to understand more about the combustion of biofuels, their interaction with engine components and a series of other issues,” he affirmed.

According to Sigot, the research carried out under the auspices of the agreement will make it possible to develop engines that run more cleanly than those in existence today and that will meet the automobile emissions-reduction regulations that are being established in many countries.

The European Commission has established legislation calling for the mandatory reduction of fleet average CO₂ emissions by light vehicles from today’s average of 135 grams/kilometer to 130 grams/kilometer by 2015 and 95 grams/kilometer by 2020.

In Brazil, where no specific CO₂ emissions-reduction regulations have been established, a decree is nearly ready to be signed that will establish that new passenger vehicles sold in Brazil must have reduced CO₂emissions, from today’s average of 174 grams/kilometer to 154 grams/kilometer by 2017. The goal for 2020 is 135 grams/kilometer.

“The auto emissions reduction race has already started, and clients are demanding more efficient, cleaner-running cars. The partnership will allow us to do research to this end that we wouldn’t be able to carry out alone,” evaluated Sigot.

The Brazilian Peugeot Citroën subsidiary was chosen by the world headquarters of the French auto assembler in 2010 to be the global hub of excellence in biofuel and green materials research. Because of this choice, Peugeot Citroën began to centralize all of the company’s investments in biofuel and green materials research here.

To coordinate the studies carried out in this and other areas and maximize the usefulness of their results, the company has, in recent years, created what it calls “Open Labs,” in partnership with universities and research institutes.

Aimed at exploration of a specific area of research such as biofuels, combustion and materials, the company has already opened six Open Labs in France and one in China—the first and to date the only one outside the company’s home country—and these laboratories are controlled by a central research laboratory.

The company has plans for inaugurating other Open Labs in Brazil, and these could become part of the Engineering Research Center resulting from the agreement with FAPESP. “This type of long-term partnership with a research funding institution such as FAPESP, which has a tradition of carrying out projects in partnership with companies, is a great honor and motivates us to build something with practical applications that can in some way increase Brazil’s intellectual capital in our field,” affirmed Gomes.

According to Gomes, Peugeot Citroën, which was the most recent auto assembler to arrive in Brazil when it built its factory ten years ago, has three research and development centers worldwide: one in Paris, another in Shanghai and another in São Paulo, where over 500 engineers work.

More information about the agreement and the call for proposals is available at: www.fapesp.br/acordos-pcba