Over the past two decades there has been a considerable effort to develop and introduce alternative transportation fuels to replace conventional fuels, gasoline and diesel. Environmental issues are the principal driving forces behind this effort. To date the bulk of research has focused on the carbon-based fuels such as reformulated gasoline, methanol and natural gas. One alternative fuel to carbon-based fuels is hydrogen which is considered to be low polluting fuel. In the present experimental investigation hydrogen was injected into the intake manifold by using an injector. Using an electronic control unit (ECU) the injection timing and the duration were controlled. From the results it is observed that the optimum injection timing is at gas exchange top dead center (GTDC). The efficiency improved by about 15% with an increase in NOx emission by 3% compared to diesel. The smoke emission decreased by almost 100%. A net reduction in carbon emissions was also noticed due to the use of hydrogen. By adopting manifold injection technique the hydrogen-diesel dual fuel engine operates smoothly with a significant improvement in performance and reduction in emissions. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.