Development of a Technology Roadmap for the Energy and Water Nexus

Author(s):  
Clifford K. Ho ◽  
M. Michael Hightower ◽  
Ronald C. Pate ◽  
Wayne Einfeld ◽  
Christopher P. Cameron ◽  
...  

Energy and water are critical resources that are inextricably and reciprocally linked. The production of energy requires large volumes of water, and the treatment and distribution of water depends upon readily available, low-cost energy. For example, electricity production from thermoelectric power plants can use ∼140,000 million gallons of water per day for cooling—accounting for 39% of all freshwater withdrawals in the nation, second only to agriculture in the United States (Figure 1). Significant amounts of water are also needed for hydropower, extraction/refining of minerals for energy, and bio-fuel production. Electrical energy, on the other hand, is needed for water treatment (e.g., desalination, wastewater), pumping, and distribution. The amount of electricity used in water and wastewater industries is equivalent to the amount used in chemical, petroleum refining, and paper industries. These interdependencies, coupled with increasing demands for energy and diminishing availability of freshwater supplies, pose significant challenges to ensure the sustainability of these two critical resources. Examples of the interrelationships between energy and water use are shown in Figure 2.

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 414-421
Author(s):  
Bahareh Hashemlou ◽  
Hossein Sadeghi ◽  
Arashk Masaeli ◽  
Mohammadhadi Hajian ◽  
Shima Javaheri

Organizations, institutions, and different sectors of manufacturing, services and agriculture are constantly making decisions. Each of the aforementioned sectors, have strategies, tactics, and various functions that play a basic role in reaching the objectives. On the other hand, energy demand in developing countries is increasing day by day. The exact calculation of the cost per unit of electricity generated by power plants is not easy. Therefore, this study according to four sources of natural gas, nuclear energy, renewable energy and other fossil fuels other than natural gas that are used in a variety of electricity production plants is trying to clarify the ranking of generation electricity approach using "fuzzy preference relations" analysis. Accordingly, three models were used and the results showed that natural gas, with regard to the four criteria of low investment cost, low power, lack of pollution and the safety and reliability of electrical energy has priority over other alternatives. Full preferred model results also suggested that the energy of natural gas, renewable energies, nuclear and other fossil fuels should be considered in a priority for power generation. Sensitivity analysis results moreover demonstrated that the above models are not affected by the threshold values ​​and the full stability of the models is observed.


2013 ◽  
Vol 291-294 ◽  
pp. 2366-2374
Author(s):  
Ye Fei Liu ◽  
Huan Qi ◽  
Su Qin Sun

China's needs of energy increased dramatically in these years. In China, Electrical energy are mainly generated by thermal power plants that use coal as fuel, thus electricity supply are linked to the power fuel (coals) storage of power plants. Henan has been changed form an energy exporter province to an energy importer province. Therefore, the fuel storage and supply of power plants are keys to the security of the province's social development, economics and energy supply. Research the margin of power fuel storage and supply can help the policy makers to learn the security conditions and trends of electricity production microscopically, reducing the risks in the power production process, and improving the efficiency of production and the efficiency of energy. Environmental and economic issues brought by the excessive storage can be reduced. This article describes the ideas and development of early warning system for power fuel storage and supply margin of Henan province.


Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. 2576
Author(s):  
Cristina Moliner ◽  
Elisabetta Arato ◽  
Filippo Marchelli

This work analyses and discusses data on thermochemical plants in Southern Italy that are fed with solid biomass. The analysis takes into account the biomass availability and potential together with the cost-benefit analysis using technology development and economic indicators (LCOE). A total of 63,762 units have been categorised according to the employed technology and produced energy: power plants for electricity production or cogeneration plants for combined heat and electricity production (53 plants) and thermal units for heat production (63,709 units). The eight regions of the area have noteworthy differences. In terms of electricity generated from solid biomass Calabria is by far the largest producer, followed by Apulia. Sicily, Sardinia and Molise provide lower amounts while Abruzzo, Basilicata and Campania generate almost negligible amounts. Regarding thermal production, Campania and Calabria are the largest producers, but Basilicata, Molise and Abruzzo generate the highest amount per capita. The area is far from fully exploiting its biomass potential, and there are also no district heating grids. Bioenergy can be remarkably competitive, provided that capital costs are relatively low and low-cost biomass is available, as it is the case of Italy. New applications and markets for sub-products (i.e., char, ash) would help in lowering the still not competitive economic indicators (LCOE).


Author(s):  
M. Edwin Syah Effendy ◽  
RD Kusumanto ◽  
Carlos RS

The utilization of renewable energy is slowly starting to become one thing that to be interesting inside the development of science technology. The utilization of renewable energy is from at least two renewable energy (Solar Power Plants and Wind Power Plants), State Electricity Enterprise (PLN), and Generator Sources. This device could be operated automatically and integrated on the internet, which has a monitoring system such as voltage, inside which will be used to control everything inside that system. This device is designed to be operated in a combinational manner. This means to be operated based on the voltage value which qualified to activate the load. The utilization of the 3.3V microcontroller is able to design an efficient and low-cost board. Besides that, the device also uses the PLN and Generator set sources as the power backup when the main power runs out. Base on the research noted, this device will distribute the electric source to the houses, which means beneficial for the local society. This device might be applied automatically to four different sources with C++ Programming language to set the point value.


2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 3790-3794

modern society entirely depends on electricity for daily life. It has become the key component for modern technology, without electricity most of the equipments which we are using daily will not work at all. Internet is our gateway for knowledge and we also depend on it a lot to get the things which are surrounding us very easily. Under this situation we are not using proper electrical energy in case of street lights. Street lights are perfect solution for night base loads at most of the utility companies during 1930’s were seeking for night timed base loads especially coal based power plants. In India approximately 40 million street lights are there which will generates a total demand of 4000 MW. The cost required to satisfy this demand will also very high. In most of the places maintenance of street lights is very poor. Even though several technologies have used to automatic control of street light but they may turn into several failures because of high cost, improper maintenance, environmental effects on the components or some other major issues. In this paper a low cost maintenance free automatic street light control system is proposed which can be used with relay al well as without relay by using basic electronics components. A small experimental set up has done in laboratory and it can be concluded that the street light automatically turns on and off depends on the darkness of the environment. It can be implemented anywhere irrespective of environmental conditions without any maintenance


Author(s):  
James R. Meldrum ◽  
Kristen B. Averyt ◽  
Jordan E. Macknick ◽  
Robin L. Newmark ◽  
John Rogers ◽  
...  

Electricity generating technologies require substantial amounts of water for cooling in steam cycle processes and for other operational processes [1,2]. This study expands on recent research [3,4] that uses estimates of operational water consumption and withdrawal factors for electricity generating technologies, collected from published primary literature [1,5], and power plant statistics provided by the Energy Information Administration (EIA), to calculate and understand the water use by thermoelectric power plants in the United States.


2014 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 3-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Kalnacs ◽  
J. Kalnacs ◽  
A. Mutule ◽  
U. Persis

Abstract The authors propose methods for estimation of the potential of riverflows for electricity production at hydrokinetic power plants. The methods can be applied to any river or its span where it is possible to move using a floating means. The methodical part includes validation of the flow velocity and bed depth measurement data using the available statistics as well as a case study. Analysis of the in-river measurement results for the selected spans of river Daugava shows that the flow rate variations exert only a minor influence on the flow velocity at particular sites. This testifies the hydrokinetic power plants as stable and predictable sources of electrical energy, both in a long term and, especially, in a short one. The proposed estimation methods could be useful in explorations of rivers, making them simpler and cheaper.


2017 ◽  
Vol 140 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Durusu ◽  
Ali Erduman

A secure and reliable supply of energy is important for economic stability and even in social life. Increasing human population, industrialization, and rising living standards lead to increased electrical energy demand. Uncertainties in oil prices, shortage of fossil fuel reserves, and environmental pollution from conventional fuels leads solar energy as an alternative resource for electricity production. The share of installed photovoltaic (PV) capacity as a percent of total installed power generating capacity is increasing every year. In this study, an improved methodology to design large-scale PV power plant is proposed. The proposed methodology is performed for designing optimal configurations of PV power plants. The design methodology is performed using commercially available PV modules and inverters. In addition, solar radiation, ambient temperature, wind speed, shadow effect, and location and shape of plant field are taken into consideration as input parameters. The alternatives and parameters are evaluated with the purpose of minimizing the levelized cost of generated electricity (LCOE). The methodology includes the use of a genetic algorithm (GA) for determining the optimal number of PV modules and inverters, optimum tilt angle of PV modules, required installation area for the plant and optimum cable cross section and lengths. In the paper, the methodology is implemented, and case studies and results using pvsyst software for the same case studies are compared with each other.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document