/INS. Ricardo, a global strategic, environmental, and engineering consulting company, has worked in collaboration with Achates Power, one of the world’s leading engine design companies to develop the next generation of opposed-piston gasoline compression ignition engines for light duty vehicles.

The multi-phased project (‘BERYL'), funded by the US Government’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (‘ARPA-E'), aims to create a fuel efficient, lightweight engine. With a minimum power output of 270HP, it will demonstrate a pathway to meet Tier 3 Bin 125 criteria emissions. First fire and controls commissioning were recently completed, along with early-stage test phases.

Ricardo experts have undertaken design and systems integration and achieved the target of a 60% weight reduction, compared to the first generation of the engine. The project team expects that when fully developed the engine can achieve up to 20% fuel economy improvement over the baseline and can deliver an unadjusted corporate average fuel economy and combined 35 MPG, for a full-sized pickup truck, alongside diesel-like torque from a gasoline engine.

Matt Beasley, President of Established Mobility at Ricardo, said: “The project is a great example of how Ricardo is working in collaboration with Achates Power to develop the next generation of gasoline engines for light commercial application, offering efficiency, and meeting emissions targets. We have over 100 years of engineering experience in the design, building and testing of traditional fuel type engines, in addition to working with customers on future fuel propulsion technologies. This means we are best placed to advise customers on creating clean efficient solutions for the future of mobility, across a broad spectrum of specialist areas. We look forward to continuing to work with the team on future developments.”

Dave Crompton, President & CEO of Achates Power said: “As we move to more sustainable transportation, we need to look for a whole range of solutions that reduce CO2 and criteria emissions as we enable reliable and cost-effective transportation. The opposed-piston engine operating with gasoline compression ignition can be part of the solution because it offers an immediate and important improvement in efficiency without compromising power, torque or cost and enables the use of existing infrastructure to be quickly deployed and adopted.”

Achates Power works with leading engine companies, offering engineering services, and licensing designs, development and test tools, software, and patents that enable opposed-piston engines for a range of applications that reduce carbon dioxide and criteria emissions and provide robust compliance in a cost-effective manner.