The Dairy Farm Model With Low Cost Alternative Energy

In South Africa there is currently no notable use of modern small-scale hydrokinetic (HK) energy systems, mainly due to formerly low-cost coal-powered electricity. This renewable energy option makes use of the kinetic energy from flowing water, rather than potential energy, which is more often used in conventional hydropower. Updated refined versions of this technology are now being investigated and manufactured due to the global drive towards reducing carbon emissions and increasing energy efficiency. These modular units allow for installation of HK turbines into existing water infrastructure with very little civil works. The study’s objective was to develop a simplified design and implementation process for HK devices within the South African legislative and regulatory environment. Approximately 66% of South Africa’s water supply is used by the agricultural sector with more than 6 500 km of canal systems running through many areas which could benefit from alternative energy sources. The recent electricity crisis in the country allowed for problem resolution through funding opportunities and thereby an introduction of an innovative and sustainable technology to provide renewable electricity where otherwise not feasible. A pilot HK project was implemented in an applicable section on the Boegoeberg irrigation canal in the Northern Cape Province and tested for optimum functionality and correct application. This process allowed evolution of a development process for the implementation of HK devices in existing water infrastructure.

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Designing and Fabricating of Low Cost Thermoelectric Power Generators

Applied Mechanics and Materials ◽

10.4028/www.scientific.net/amm.110-116.4101 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 110-116 ◽

pp. 4101-4105 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Tosawat Seetawan

Keyword(s):

Transition Metal Oxides ◽

Thermoelectric Materials ◽

Alternative Energy ◽

Low Cost ◽

Thermoelectric Module ◽

Clean Energy ◽

Energy Resources ◽

Renewable Energy Resources ◽

Thermoelectric Coolers ◽

P Type

Fossil fuel is the main energy resources of the world. About 80-90% of its primary energy need to supply by oil, coal, natural gas, and oil shale [1]. These energy resources will also be of importance in the future but non-renewable and cause problems to the environment as a result of their relatively high amount of carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), and other environmentally harmful emissions. We are investigating to look for alternative energy resources which are clean, safe, and long-term reliable. Thermoelectricity is one of the renewable energy resources that has been widely investigated and is expected to be feasible in the near future. Moreover, it is a clean energy generation, since it can directly convert heat to electrical energy by using non-polluting thermoelectric devices. These are reasons for the growing interest in further research and development of the thermoelectric technology. The search for new thermoelectric materials is important that the transition metal oxides were interested such as p-type Ca3Co4O9 [2-7] and n-type CaMnO3 [8-12]. There have been synthesized using different techniques in the form of powder and bulk. However, the doped metals have been expected to be one of the candidates for good thermoelectric materials, including thermoelectric module consists of two or more materials of p-type and n-type [13-15]. Recently, the thermoelectric module is also being used as the thermoelectric generators, thermoelectric coolers, etc. [16-17].

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The dynamic North Florida dairy farm model: A user-friendly computerized tool for increasing profits while minimizing N leaching under varying climatic conditions

Computers and Electronics in Agriculture ◽

10.1016/j.compag.2005.07.001 ◽

2005 ◽

Vol 49 (2) ◽

pp. 286-308 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

Victor E. Cabrera ◽

Norman E. Breuer ◽

Peter E. Hildebrand ◽

David Letson

Keyword(s):

Dairy Farm ◽

Climatic Conditions ◽

N Leaching ◽

Farm Model ◽

User Friendly

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Adapting to socioeconomic, operational and environmental challenges of dairy farm effluent purification in Uruguay through the use of surface flow constructed wetlands

Water Practice & Technology ◽

10.2166/wpt.2011.040 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 6 (3) ◽

Author(s):

C. T. Avellán ◽

D. P. L. Rousseau ◽

P. N. L. Lens

Keyword(s):

Water Quality ◽

Constructed Wetlands ◽

Low Cost ◽

Treatment Options ◽

Sewage Treatment ◽

Dairy Farm ◽

Surface Flow ◽

National Standards ◽

Effluent Purification ◽

Small Catchment

The 3600 dairy farms in south-western Uruguay, with about 750,000 cows in 2008, play an important economic role. Only about 200 of the farms have a sewage treatment system, since no legal regulations for the disposal of effluents exist, the cost of construction is high and neither direct benefits nor incentives are given. The current systems are mainly lagoons that often lack maintenance, resulting in the eutrophication of rivers. One of our goals was to implement a low cost, robust surface flow constructed wetland using native plants, in order to test the acceptance and willingness to pay of the farmers and to see if the effluent water quality met the national standards even if operating under the lack of maintenance. Within a small catchment, 6 farmers attended a seminar series on water(shed) quality, importance of wetlands and sewage treatment options, explaining the functioning of constructed wetlands and the costs of construction. One of the farmers decided to construct a double lagoon system followed by a surface flow CW using Scirpus americanus. However, construction of the ponds occurred by the farmer himself resulting in inadequate dimensioning. The exceptionally dry summer 2008/2009 also delayed planting but by now plants have established themselves and other emergent macrophytes have followed. So far visual water quality as well as biodiversity has improved. Furthermore, farmers and technicians have become interested in the use of CW and other implementations are envisioned. Also, the legislation on dairy farm effluent is about to change which will boost the necessity for all kinds of sewage systems.

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Experimental Studies On Reduction of Nox Emission of Biodiesel Fuelled Engine Using A Novel Natural Additive

10.21203/rs.3.rs-582827/v1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Kapilan Natesan ◽

Rana Pratap Reddy ◽

Abu Saleh Ahmed

Keyword(s):

Energy Demand ◽

Alternative Energy ◽

Low Cost ◽

Oxidation Stability ◽

Experimental Studies ◽

Energy Resources ◽

Nox Emission ◽

Clove Oil ◽

Compression Ignition Engine ◽

Natural Additive

Abstract The world’s energy demand increases because of increase in human population. The conventional fossil energy resources will be depleted and burning of these conventional fuels increases greenhouse gases and causes global warming. These problems can be overcome using renewable alternative energy resources such as biofuels. In recent years biodiesel is considered as a renewable alternative to the fossil diesel. The utilisation of biodiesel as a fuel in compression ignition engine results in lower CO, HC and Smoke emissions as the biodiesel is an oxygenated fuel. The major problem with the biodiesel is its higher NOx emission and different techniques were used to minimise NOx emission. The use of synthetic and nano-metal additives to the biodiesel may affect the environment and hence it is necessary to identify non-toxic, low cost, biodegradable, and sustainable additives to reduce the NOx emission. Hence an attempt was made to use clove oil as a natural additive for the honge oil biodiesel as it has better antioxidant property. The engine tests were conducted with various dosages of clove oil such as 1000 and 2000 ppm and the engine load were increased with an increment of 25% up to full load. The addition of clove oil to the honge oil biodiesel significantly affects the engine NOx and clove oil can be substituted as an additive to reduce the NOx emission of the biodiesel fuelled CI engine and without altering the engine hardware. The clove oil enhances the oxidation stability of the honge oil biodiesel.

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Pivotal Role of Chirality in Photoelectrocatalytic (PEC) Water Splitting

Current Chinese Science ◽

10.2174/2210298101999200819110254 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 1 (1) ◽

pp. 115-121

Author(s):

Wenyan Zhang ◽

Fei Liu ◽

Yingfei Hu ◽

Weimin Yang ◽

Hangmin Guan ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Water Splitting ◽

Alternative Energy ◽

Light Harvesting ◽

Low Cost ◽

Research Field ◽

Pivotal Role ◽

Enthalpy Of Combustion ◽

High Enthalpy ◽

Production Of Hydrogen ◽

Pec Water Splitting

For decades, the over-exploitation of fossil fuel has made it urgent to develop alternative energy. Photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting is a promising approach to generate hydrogen, which is referred to as the fuel of the future due to its high enthalpy of combustion and zero pollution. Though impressive progress has been made over the years, PEC water splitting efficiency is still far from volume production of hydrogen, and more efforts are required to reduce the overpotential, inhibit the yield of hydrogen peroxide by-product, improve the PEC current density, improve light-harvesting capability, and develop low-cost earth-abundant catalysts. Recently, chirality has shown to play a pivotal role in addressing the issues of PEC water splitting via the effect of chiralinduced spin controlling and chiral-enhanced light harvesting. It is high time to pay attention to the art of chirality in promoting water splitting efficiency. Herein, recent progress in this field is reviewed, the approaches to introducing chirality into photo/electronic catalysts for PEC water splitting are summarized, characterization techniques applied in this research field are summed up, the challenges of chirality-enhanced PEC water splitting are discussed, and based on the present achievements, its bright future is anticipated.

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Integrated Assessment of the EU’s Greening Reform and Feed Self-Sufficiency Scenarios on Dairy Farms in Piemonte, Italy

Agriculture ◽

10.3390/agriculture8090137 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 8 (9) ◽

pp. 137 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Stefano Gaudino ◽

Pytrik Reidsma ◽

Argyris Kanellopoulos ◽

Dario Sacco ◽

Martin van Ittersum

Keyword(s):

Dairy Farm ◽

Cropping System ◽

Dairy Farms ◽

Economic Incentives ◽

Environmental Indicators ◽

Current Form ◽

Sustainable Systems ◽

Self Sufficiency ◽

Farm Model ◽

Ecological Focus Areas

Specialised dairy farms are challenged to be competitive and yet respect environmental constrains. A tighter integration of cropping and livestock systems, both in terms of feed and manure flows, can be beneficial for the farm economy and the environment. The greening of the direct payments, which was introduced in the European Union’s greening reform in 2013, is assumed to stimulate the transition towards more sustainable systems. The aim of this study was to quantitatively assess the impacts of greening policies on important economic and environmental indicators of sustainability, and explore potential further improvements in policies. The Farm System SIMulator (FSSIM) bioeconomic farm model was used to simulate the consequences of scenarios of policy change on three representative dairy farms in Piedmont, Italy, i.e., an ‘intensive’, an ‘extensive’, and an ‘organic’ dairy farm. Results showed that in general, there is a large potential to increase the current economic performance of all of the farms. The most profitable activity is milk production, resulting in the allocation of all of the available farm land to feed production. Imposing feed self-sufficiency targets results in a larger adaptation of current managerial practice than the adaptations that are required due to the greening policy scenario. It was shown that the cropping system is not always able to sustain the actual herd composition when 90% feed self-sufficiency is imposed. Regarding the greening policies, it is shown that extensive and organic farms already largely comply with the greening constrains, and the extra subsidy is therefore a bonus, while the intensive farm is likely to sacrifice the subsidy, as adapting the farm plan will substantially reduce profit. The introduction of nitrogen (N)-fixing crops in ecological focus areas was the easiest greening strategy to adopt, and led to an increase in the protein feed self-sufficiency. In conclusion, it is important to note that the greening policy in its current form does not lead to reduced environmental impacts. This implies that in order to improve environmental performance, regulations are needed rather than voluntary economic incentives.

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Photochemical Water Oxidation Using {PMo12O40@Mo72Fe30}n Based Soft Oxometalate

Journal of Molecular and Engineering Materials ◽

10.1142/s2251237317500010 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 05 (01) ◽

pp. 1750001 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Santu Das ◽

Soumyajit Roy

Keyword(s):

Water Oxidation ◽

Oxidation Reaction ◽

Alternative Energy ◽

Low Cost ◽

High Surface ◽

High Surface Area ◽

Energy Resource ◽

Clean Energy ◽

Reaction Conditions ◽

Reaction Cycles

Finding an alternative energy resource which can produce clean energy at a low cost is one of the major concerns of our times. The conversion of light energy into chemical energy is one key step forward in the direction. With that end in view photochemical water oxidation to produce oxygen plays a crucial role. In the present paper we have synthesized a soft oxometalate {PMo[Formula: see text]O[Formula: see text]@Mo[Formula: see text]Fe[Formula: see text]}n(1) from its well-known precursor polyoxometalate constituent [Muller et al., Chem. Commun. 1, 657 (2001)]. It is known that in the matter of catalysis, high surface area, possibility of heterogenization, recoverability makes soft oxometalates (SOMs) attractive as catalytic materials. Here we exploit such advantages of SOMs. The SOM based material acts as an active catalyst for photochemical water oxidation reaction with a maximum turnover number of 20256 and turnover frequency of 24.11[Formula: see text]min[Formula: see text]. The catalyst material is stable under photochemical reaction conditions and therefore can be reused for multiple photo catalytic water oxidation reaction cycles.

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Silicon Electrodeposition on Glassy Carbon, Silver, and Tungsten Substrates

Advanced Materials Research ◽

10.4028/www.scientific.net/amr.1088.429 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 1088 ◽

pp. 429-433

Author(s):

S.I. Zhuk ◽

L.M. Minchenko ◽

O.V. Chemezov ◽

V.B. Malkov ◽

O.V. Grishenkova ◽

...

Keyword(s):

High Purity ◽

Alternative Energy ◽

Energy Use ◽

Low Cost ◽

Common Knowledge ◽

Lithium Ion ◽

Nanocrystalline Silicon ◽

Research Attention ◽

High Purity Silicon ◽

Si Nanostructures

Increasing concerns on global warming and current environmental issues have directed research attention to the problems of energy saving, alternative energy sources, as well as to the improvement of the efficiency of existing chemical current sources. A particular focus is currently concentrated on solar energy use. High-purity silicon plates are employed as details in solar cells. Over the past ten years researchers have sought to create silicon nanomaterials able to significantly improve the efficiency of lithium-ion electrochemical batteries and photovoltaic cells. It is a common knowledge that the principle industrial method for producing high-purity silicon is based on vapor deposition; for example Siemens process [1]. However, it has a number of drawbacks in terms of power consumption, costly reagents, and sophisticated equipment. The development of a low-cost production process for solar and nanocrystalline silicon seems therefore an interesting research task. An alternative approach to the production of silicon is electrodeposition from molten salts containing silicon ions [2-7]. This method can be applied to obtain both coherent covers and Si-nanostructures, such as nanopowders and nanofibres.

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