Energy potential of modern wind turbines in the Krasnodar Krai

Krasnodar Krai is an intensively economically developing region. In terms of the activity in the construction of residential and industrial facilities, it ranks among the leaders in Russia. At the same time, the region is experiencing a serious shortage of energy produced on its territory. The power system of the Krasnodar Krai is characterized by a high specific consumption of electric energy per capita, comparable in size to the largest cities of the Russian Federation. Also, the territory of the Krasnodar Krai is a recreational area, a valuable ecological object, where the construction of carbon-burning power plants is undesirable due to the high degree of environmental pollution. The construction of a nuclear power plant is also unacceptable due to the seismic activity of the territory. Based on the above, it is necessary to analyze the possible use of alternative energy sources, in particular, wind energy, since the wind potential of the territory of the region is large. In the paper, the wind potential of the coast of the Krasnodar Krai was studied - water space, estuaries and reservoirs that are not used or are poorly used for recreational and economic purposes, which have indicators of wind speed and constancy more than on land, and which are not considered by most researchers due to unusual location.

Chlorodifluoromethane Hydrodechlorination on Carbon-Supported Pd-Pt Catalysts. Beneficial Effect of Catalyst Oxidation

Previously tested 2 wt % palladium-platinum catalysts supported on Norit activated carbon preheated to 1600 °C have been reinvestigated in CHFCl2 hydrodechlorination. An additionally adopted catalyst oxidation at 350–400 °C produced nearly an order of magnitude increase in the turnover frequency of Pd/C, from 4.1 × 10−4 to 2.63 × 10−3 s−1. This increase is not caused by changes in metal dispersion or possible decontamination of the Pd surface from superficial carbon, but rather by unlocking the active surface, originally inaccessible in metal particles tightly packed in the pores of carbon. Burning carbon from the pore walls attached to the metal changes the pore structure, providing easier access for the reactants to the entire palladium surface. Calcination of Pt/C and Pd-Pt/C catalysts results in much smaller evolution of catalytic activity than that observed for Pd/C. This shapes the relationship between turnover frequency (TOF) and alloy composition, which now does not confirm the Pd-Pt synergy invoked in the previous work. The absence of this synergy is confirmed by gradual regular changes in product selectivity, from 70 to 80% towards CH2F2 for Pd/C to almost 60% towards CH4 for Pt/C. The use of even higher-preheated carbon (1800 °C), completely free of micropores, results in a Pd/C catalyst that does not need to be oxidized to achieve high activity and excellent selectivity to CH2F2 (>90%).

Hydrodechlorination of CHClF2 (HCFC-22) over Pd-Pt catalysts supported on thermally modified activated carbon. Beneficial effect of catalyst oxidation.

Pd-Pt catalysts supported on carbon preheated to 1600°C have been reinvestigated in CHFCl2 hydrodechlorination. An additionally adopted catalyst oxidation at 350-400°C produced an order of magnitude increase in the catalytic activity of Pd/C. This increase is not caused by changes in metal dispersion or possible decontamination of the Pd surface from superficial carbon, but rather by unlocking the active surface, originally inaccessible in metal particles tightly packed in the pores of carbon. Burning carbon from the pore walls attached to the metal changes the pore structure, providing easier access for the reactants to the entire palladium surface. As upon calcination the performance of the rest of the Pd-Pt/C catalysts changes less than for Pd/C, the relation between the turnover frequency and alloy composition does not confirm the Pd-Pt synergy invoked in our previous work. The use of even higher-preheated carbon (1800°C), completely free of micropores, results in a Pd/C catalyst that does not need to be oxidized to achieve high activity and excellent selectivity up to CH2F2 (>90%).

The Study of Key Reactions Shaping the Post-Main Sequence Evolution of Massive Stars in Underground Facilities

The chemical evolution of the Universe and several phases of stellar life are regulated by minute nuclear reactions. The key point for each of these reactions is the value of cross-sections at the energies at which they take place in stellar environments. Direct cross-section measurements are mainly hampered by the very low counting rate and by cosmic background; nevertheless, they have become possible by combining the best experimental techniques with the cosmic silence of an underground laboratory. In the nineties, the LUNA (Laboratory for Underground Nuclear Astrophysics) collaboration opened the era of underground nuclear astrophysics, installing first a homemade 50 kV and, later on, a second 400 kV accelerator under the Gran Sasso mountain in Italy: in 25 years of experimental activity, important reactions responsible for hydrogen burning could have been studied down to the relevant energies thanks to the high current proton and helium beams provided by the machines. The interest in the next and warmer stages of star evolution (i.e., post-main sequence and helium and carbon burning) drove a new project based on an ion accelerator in the MV range called LUNA-MV, able to deliver proton, helium, and carbon beams. The present contribution is aimed to discuss the state of the art for some selected key processes of post-main sequence stellar phases: 12C(α,γ)16O and 12C+12C are fundamental for helium and carbon burning phases, and 13C(α,n)16O and 22Ne(α,n)25Mg are relevant to the synthesis of heavy elements in AGB stars. The perspectives opened by an underground MV facility will be highlighted.

X-rays observations of a super-Chandrasekhar object reveal an ONe and a CO white dwarf merger product embedded in a putative SN Iax remnant

The merger of two white dwarfs (WDs) is a natural outcome of the evolution of many binary stars. Recently, a WD merger product, IRAS 00500+6713, was identified. IRAS 00500+6713 consists of a central star embedded in a circular nebula. The analysis of the optical spectrum of the central star revealed that it is hot, hydrogen, and helium free, and it drives an extremely fast wind with a record breaking speed. The nebula is visible in infrared and in the [O III] λ5007 Å line images. No nebula spectroscopy was obtained prior to our observations. Here we report the first deep X-ray imaging spectroscopic observations of IRAS 00500+6713. Both the central star and the nebula are detected in X-rays, heralding the WD merger products as a new distinct type of strong X-ray sources. Low-resolution X-ray spectra reveal large neon, magnesium, silicon, and sulfur enrichment of the central star and the nebula. We conclude that IRAS 00500+6713 resulted from a merger of an ONe and a CO WD, which supports earlier suggestion for a super-Chandrasekhar mass of this object. X-ray analysis indicates that the merger was associated with an episode of carbon burning and possibly accompanied by an SN Iax. In X-rays, we observe the point source associated with the merger product while the surrounding diffuse nebula is a supernova remnant. IRAS 00500+6713 will likely terminate its evolution with another peculiar Type I supernova, where the final core collapse to a neutron star might be induced by electron captures.

Experimental Investigation on Mixed Combustion Characteristics of Coal, Tobacco Straw, and Cinder in an Energy-Saving Bake Process

In view of high-energy consumption, high baking cost, and serious pollution emission during the baking process of tobacco leaves, thermogravimetric analysis is employed to investigate the combustion characteristics of coal, tobacco straw, and cinder. Analyzing thermogravimetric-derivative of thermogravimetric (TG-DTG) characteristics of samples with different blending ratios and based on the ignition temperature and burnout temperature, the combustion characteristics of the samples are obtained. Compared with the individual combustion of coal, the blending ratio of the optimal positive effect is obtained. It is illustrated that different blending ratios of coal, tobacco straw, and cinder result in different effects between promotion and inhibition. Tobacco straw is beneficial to burn on fire but adverse to keep combustion of fixed carbon. Compared with the TG and DTG characteristics in different blending ratios of coal, tobacco straw, and corresponding combustion characteristic parameter, it is illustrated that the best blending ratio of tobacco straw is 40%. According to the TG and DTG characteristics of different blending ratios of coal, cinder, and corresponding combustion characteristic parameter, it is shown that the more blending ratio of cinder, the more adverse effect to fixed carbon burning. The composite fuels with 40% tobacco straw, 10% coal cinder, and 50% coal have two obvious advantages. On the one hand, it can maintain quick burning and the volatile combustion of the tobacco straw at low-temperature stage. On the other hand, it can keep continuous combustion of the fixed carbon in coal at high-temperature stage.

The formation of type Ia supernovae from carbon–oxygen–silicon white dwarfs

ABSTRACT The carbon–oxygen white dwarf (CO WD)+He star channel is thought to be one of the promising scenarios that produce young type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia). Previous studies found that if the mass-accretion rate is greater than a critical value, the He-accreting CO WD will undergo inwardly propagating (off-centre) carbon ignition when it increases its mass close to the Chandrasekhar limit. Previous works supposed that the inwardly propagating carbon flame would reach the centre, leading to the production of an oxygen–neon (ONe) WD that may collapse into a neutron star but not an SN Ia. However, it is still uncertain how the carbon flame propagates under the effect of mixing mechanisms. In the present work, we aim to investigate the off-centre carbon burning of He-accreting CO WDs by considering the effect of convective mixing. We found that the temperature of the flame is high enough to burn the carbon into silicon-group elements in the outer part of the CO core even if convective overshooting is considered, but the flame would quench somewhere inside the WD, resulting in the formation of a C–O–Si WD. Owing to the inefficiency of thermohaline mixing, the C–O–Si WD may explode as an SN Ia if it continues to grow in mass. Our radiation transfer simulations show that SN ejecta with silicon-rich outer layers will form high-velocity absorption lines in Si ii, leading to some similarities to a class of high-velocity SNe Ia in spectral evolution. We estimate that the birthrate of SNe Ia with Si-rich envelopes is ∼$1\times 10^{-4}\, \mbox{yr}^{-1}$ in our Galaxy.

Missing red supergiants and carbon burning

ABSTRACT Recent studies on direct imaging of Type II core-collapse supernova progenitors indicate a possible threshold around MZAMS ∼ 16–20 M⊙, where red supergiants (RSG) with larger birth masses do not appear to result in supernova explosions and instead implode directly into a black hole. In this study, we argue that it is not a coincidence that this threshold closely matches the critical transition of central carbon burning in massive stars from the convective to radiative regime. In lighter stars, carbon burns convectively in the centre and result in compact final pre-supernova cores that are likely to result in explosions, while in heavier stars after the transition, it burns as a radiative flame and the stellar cores become significantly harder to explode. Using the $\rm {\small {kepler}}$ code we demonstrate the sensitivity of this transition to the rate of 12C(α, γ)16O reaction and the overshoot mixing efficiency, and we argue that the upper mass limit of exploding RSG could be employed to constrain uncertain input physics of massive stellar evolution calculations. The initial mass corresponding to the central carbon burning transition range from 14 to 26 M⊙ in recently published models from various groups and codes, and only a few are in agreement with the estimates inferred from direct imaging studies.

An increase in the 12C+12C fusion rate from resonances at astrophysical energies

Carbon burning powers pivotal scenarios that influence the fate of stars, such as the late evolutionary stages of massive stars (exceeding eight solar masses), superbursts from accreting neutron stars and progenitors of Type Ia supernovae. It proceeds through the 12C+12C fusion reactions that produce an \( \alpha \) particle and neon-20 or a proton and sodium-23 —that is, 12C(12C, \( \alpha \) )20Ne and 12C(12C, \( p \))23Na— at temperatures greater than \( 0.4 \cdot 10^9 \) K, corresponding to astrophysical energies exceeding a megaelectronvolt (MeV), at which such nuclear reactions are more likely to occur in stars. The cross-sections for those carbon fusion reactions (probabilities that are required to calculate the rate of the reactions) have never been measured below 2 MeV because of exponential suppression arising from the Coulomb barrier (the Coulomb barrier is around 6 MeV). The reference rate at temperatures below \( 1.2\cdot 10^9 \) K relies on extrapolations that ignore the effects of possible low-lying resonances. In Tumino et al. (2018), we report the measurement of the 12C(12C, \( \alpha_{0,1} \)) 20Ne and 12C(12C, \( p_{0,1} \)) 23Na reaction rates (where the subscripts 0 and 1 stand for the ground and first excited states of 20Ne and 23Na, respectively) at centre-of-mass energies from 2.7 to 0.8 MeV using the Trojan Horse method and the deuteron in 14N. This is an indirect technique aiming at measuring low-energy nuclear reactions unhindered by the Coulomb barrier and free of electron screening. The deduced cross-sections exhibit several resonances that are responsible for a very large increase of the reaction rate at the relevant temperatures. In particular, around \( 5\cdot 10^8 \) K, the reaction rate is more than 25 times larger than the reference value. This finding may have significant implications such as lowering the temperatures and densities required for the ignition of carbon burning in massive stars and decreasing the superburst ignition depth in accreting neutron stars in the direction to reconcile observations with theoretical models.