Modelling vehicle emissions using the TEMIS program: Part 2: Case studies

Author(s):  
W Saleh ◽  
J D Nelson

Many challenges are associated with the ever increasing level of energy consumption and the damage to the environment caused by the pollutants from all sectors, On the local level the problem is associated with matters such as noise and air pollution, while on the global level the problems are associated with acid rain, ozone layer depletion and the greenhouse effect (global warming). The transport sector is a major contributor in this respect. The use of appropriate decision-making tools to assist in the assessment of alternative transport policies is required urgently. One such tool is the TEMIS program which was described in Part 1 of this investigation, where the methodology for the enhancement of TEMIS was reported. The enhanced version of TEMIS has subsequently been used to model the effects of different transport scenarios in order to improve future fuel economy and the adverse effects of air emissions as well as the greenhouse gases. In the present paper, three main case studies have been considered to test the effect of different scenarios (in terms of alternative fuels and technical advances) on energy consumption and emissions: firstly, the switch to alternative fuels, through investigating the effects of switching from petrol to diesel, secondly, the effects of switching from diesel to bio-diesel (for buses) and, finally, the effects of technical advances (three-way catalytic converters) and the effects on fuel consumption and emissions are considered.

2008 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 21
Author(s):  
Raymond R. Tan ◽  
Alvin B. Culaba

The Philippine automotive transport sector accounts for a significant portion ofthe country's petroleum consumption and air emissions. Research in alternative fuels for road vehicles is thus an essential element in the country's long-term-electrical environmental management strategy. Two radical vehicle technologies propulsion systems and fuel hydrogen for fuel cells - are widely considered to be the most promising energy vectors from an environmental standpoint. Electric vehicles (EV) and fuel cell vehicles (FCV) are driven by electric motors; the former use electricity stored in batteries, while the latter generate electricity from the oxidation of hydrogen. Potentially, both electric power and fuel hydrogen can be sustainably produced using renewable energy sources, and their use in vehicles generates almost no direct pollution. However, life-cycle assessment (LCA) may reveal significant environmental impacts from the infrastructure required to produce and distribute these energy vectors on a commercial scale. This study quantifies the life-cycle air emissions and energy balances associated with the use of electricity and hydrogen for motor vehicle propulsion in order to determine which fuel offers more environmental benefits. The assessment uses a modified version of the GREET 1.Sa fuel cycle inventory model, with corrections made to account for Philippine conditions. Sensitivity analysis is performed in the model to determine the effect of marginal power generation mix and system transmission losses on the life-cycle inventories of both energy vectors. The results of the simulation indicate that for a given marginal power generation mix, there is no clear-cut advantage in terms of environmental performance for either hydrogen or electricity.


Author(s):  
Nicolas Poirel ◽  
Claire Sara Krakowski ◽  
Sabrina Sayah ◽  
Arlette Pineau ◽  
Olivier Houdé ◽  
...  

The visual environment consists of global structures (e.g., a forest) made up of local parts (e.g., trees). When compound stimuli are presented (e.g., large global letters composed of arrangements of small local letters), the global unattended information slows responses to local targets. Using a negative priming paradigm, we investigated whether inhibition is required to process hierarchical stimuli when information at the local level is in conflict with the one at the global level. The results show that when local and global information is in conflict, global information must be inhibited to process local information, but that the reverse is not true. This finding has potential direct implications for brain models of visual recognition, by suggesting that when local information is conflicting with global information, inhibitory control reduces feedback activity from global information (e.g., inhibits the forest) which allows the visual system to process local information (e.g., to focus attention on a particular tree).


Resources ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 67
Author(s):  
Katarzyna Guzik ◽  
Krzysztof Galos ◽  
Alicja Kot-Niewiadomska ◽  
Toni Eerola ◽  
Pasi Eilu ◽  
...  

Major benefits and constraints related to mineral extraction within the EU have been identified on the examples of selected critical raw materials’ deposits. Analyzed case studies include the following ore deposits: Myszków Mo-W-Cu (Poland), Juomasuo Au-Co (Finland), S. Pedro das Águias W-Sn (Portugal), Penouta Nb-Ta-Sn (Spain), Norra Kärr REEs (Sweden) and Trælen graphite (Norway). They represent different stages of development, from the early/grassroot exploration stage, through advanced exploration and active mining, up to reopening of abandoned mines, and refer to different problems and constraints related to the possibility of exploitation commencement. The multi-criteria analysis of the cases has included geological and economic factors as well as environmental, land use, social acceptance and infrastructure factors. These factors, in terms of cost and benefit analysis, have been considered at three levels: local, country and EU levels. The analyzed cases indicated the major obstacles that occur in different stages of deposit development and need to be overcome in order to enable a new deposit exploitation commencement. These are environmental (Juomasuo and Myszków), spatial (Juomasuo) as well as social constraints (Norra Kärr, Juomasuo). In the analyzed cases, the most important constraints related to future deposit extraction occur primarily at a local level, while some important benefits are identified mainly at the country and the EU levels. These major benefits are related to securing long-term supplies for the national industries and strategically important EU industry sectors.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 5848
Author(s):  
Isaías Gomes ◽  
Rui Melicio ◽  
Victor M. F. Mendes

This paper presents a computer application to assist in decisions about sustainability enhancement due to the effect of shifting demand from less favorable periods to periods that are more convenient for the operation of a microgrid. Specifically, assessing how the decisions affect the economic participation of the aggregating agent of the microgrid bidding in an electricity day-ahead market. The aggregating agent must manage microturbines, wind systems, photovoltaic systems, energy storage systems, and loads, facing load uncertainty and further uncertainties due to the use of renewable sources of energy and participation in the day-ahead market. These uncertainties cannot be removed from the decision making, and, therefore, require proper formulation, and the proposed approach customizes a stochastic programming problem for this operation. Case studies show that under these uncertainties and the shifting of demand to convenient periods, there are opportunities to make decisions that lead to significant enhancements of the expected profit. These enhancements are due to better bidding in the day-ahead market and shifting energy consumption in periods of favorable market prices for exporting energy. Through the case studies it is concluded that the proposed approach is useful for the operation of a microgrid.


Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (6) ◽  
pp. 1538
Author(s):  
Felipe Andrade Torres ◽  
Omid Doustdar ◽  
Jose Martin Herreros ◽  
Runzhao Li ◽  
Robert Poku ◽  
...  

The worldwide consumption of fossil hydrocarbons in the road transport sector in 2020 corresponded to roughly half of the overall consumption. However, biofuels have been discreetly contributing to mitigate gaseous emissions and participating in sustainable development, and thus leading to the extending of the commercial utilization of internal combustion engines. In this scenario, the present work aims at exploring the effects of alternative fuels containing a blend of 15% ethanol and 35% biodiesel with a 50% fossil diesel (E15D50B35) or 50% Fischer–Tropsch (F-T) diesel (E15FTD50B35) on the engine combustion, exhaust emissions (CO, HC, and NOx), particulate emissions characteristics as well as the performance of an aftertreatment system of a common rail diesel engine. It was found that one of the blends (E15FTD50B35) showed more than 30% reduction in PM concentration number, more than 25% reduction in mean particle size, and more than 85% reduction in total PM mass with respect to conventional diesel fuel. Additionally, it was found that the E15FTD50B35 blend reduces gaseous emissions of total hydrocarbons (THC) by more than 25% and NO by 3.8%. The oxidation catalyst was effective in carbonaceous emissions reduction, despite the catalyst light-off being slightly delayed in comparison to diesel fuel blends.


Author(s):  
Bikash Ranjan Parida ◽  
Somnath Bar ◽  
Nilendu Singh ◽  
Bakimchandra Oinam ◽  
Arvind Chandra Pandey ◽  
...  

To curb the spread of novel coronavirus (COVID-19), confinement measures were undertaken, which altered the pattern of energy consumption and India’s anthropogenic CO2 emissions during the effective lockdowns periods (January to June 2020). Such changes are being analyzed using data of energy generated from coal and renewable sources and fossil-based daily CO2 emissions. Results revealed that coal-fired (fossil-based) energy generation fell by –13% in March, –29% in April, and –20% in May, and –16.6% in mid-June 2020 as compared with the same period in 2018–2019. Conversely, the renewable energy generation increased by 19% in March, 12% in April, 17% in May, and 7% in June 2020. The share of fossil-based energy fell by –6.55% in 2020 compared with mean levels, which was further offset by increases of renewable energy. India’s daily fossil-based CO2 emissions fell by –11.6% (–5 to –25.7%) by mid-June 2020 compared with mean levels of 2017–2019 with total change in fossil-based CO2 emission by –139 (–62 to –230) MtCO2, with the largest reduction in the industry (–41%), transport (–28.5%), and power (–21%) followed by the public (–5.4%), and aviation (–4%) sectors. If some levels of lockdown persist until December 2020, both energy consumption and CO2 emissions patterns would be below the 2019 level. The nationwide lockdown has led to a reduction in anthropogenic CO2 emissions and, subsequently, improved air quality and global environment and has also helped in reducing atmospheric CO2 concentrations at the local level but not on the global level. With suitable government policies, switching to a cleaner mode of energy generation other than fossil fuels could be a viable option to minimize CO2 emissions under increasing demand for energy.


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