A CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF LAND COST ELEMENTS ON PRIVATE HOUSING DEVELOPMENT IN AWORI LAND, OGUN STATE, NIGERIA. A CASE OF ADO/ODO-OTA LGA.

This study examines the cost elements associated with land acquisition and development and the effect it has on public housing development using Awori land in Ado/Odo-Ota LGA in Ogun state, Nigeria, as a case study. To achieve this, a survey was administered to estate surveyors & valuers and officers of the Bureau of Lands and Survey who are involved in property developments. The findings revealed that land registration cost, lease cost, deeds of assignment were ranked as important. It is also found that there is also a significant relationship between land cost elements and rate of housing development. The study further revealed that there is a positive relationship between the land cost elements and the rate of housing development. In conclusion, this implies that an increase in one of the land cost elements will affect housing development.

Techno-Economic Assessment of Solar-Driven Steam Gasification of Biomass for Large-Scale Hydrogen Production

Solar biomass gasification is an attractive pathway to promote biomass valorization while chemically storing intermittent solar energy into solar fuels. The economic feasibility of a solar gasification process at a large scale for centralized H2 production was assessed, based on the discounted cash-flow rate of return method to calculate the minimum H2 production cost. H2 production costs from solar-only, hybrid and conventional autothermal biomass gasification were evaluated under various economic scenarios. Considering a biomass reference cost of 0.1 €/kg, and a land cost of 12.9 €/m2, H2 minimum price was estimated at 2.99 €/kgH2 and 2.48 €/kgH2 for the allothermal and hybrid processes, respectively, against 2.25 €/kgH2 in the conventional process. A sensitivity study showed that a 50% reduction in the heliostats and solar tower costs, combined with a lower land cost of below 0.5 €/m2, allowed reaching an area of competitiveness where the three processes meet. Furthermore, an increase in the biomass feedstock cost by a factor of 2 to 3 significantly undermined the profitability of the autothermal process, in favor of solar hybrid and solar-only gasification. A comparative study involving other solar and non-solar processes led to conclude on the profitability of fossil-based processes. However, reduced CO2 emissions from the solar process and the application of carbon credits are definitely in favor of solar gasification economics, which could become more competitive. The massive deployment of concentrated solar energy across the world in the coming years can significantly reduce the cost of the solar materials and components (heliostats), and thus further alleviate the financial cost of solar gasification.

Optimal Sanitary Landfill Site Selection for Solid Waste Disposal in Durgapur City Using Geographic Information System and Multi-criteria Evaluation Technique

The government authorities in developing countries are awfully concerned with coping out the problems of the rising issues related to the disposal of solid wastes. Most of the Indian cities still dispose of solid waste unscientifically causing to severe environmental as well as public health problems. Geographic information systems (GIS) and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) have emerged as efficient tools for multiple criteria decision analysis (MCDA) in effective solutions of solid waste management. The present study focuses on the integration of GIS and AHP in identifying potential sanitary landfill areas for solid waste disposal in Durgapur city, West Bengal, India. Eleven criteria were selected viz. land elevation, slope, soil, geology, land use land cover, distance to surface water, distance to tube wells, distance to roads, distance to industrial belts, distance to sensitive places, and land cost. All the criteria were aggregated using weighted overlay analysis in GIS environment. The study identified three potential landfill areas for MSW disposal covering the areas of 13.83854, 33.80678, and 27.20085 ha, respectively, in Durgapur city. The result found that land cost value was the most significant criterion in the model with a weight of 0.25258. Followed by land cost value, sensitive places and roads were the second and third most important criteria with a weight value of 0.1409 and 0.1233, respectively.

Comparative Analysis of Ground-Mounted vs. Rooftop Photovoltaic Systems Optimized for Interrow Distance between Parallel Arrays

The aim of this research is to perform an in-depth performance comparison of ground-mounted and rooftop photovoltaic (PV) systems. The PV modules are tilted to receive maximum solar irradiance. The efficiency of the PV system decreases due to the mutual shading impact of parallel tilted PV modules. The mutual shading decreases with the increasing interrow distance of parallel PV modules, but a distance that is too large causes an increase in land cost in the case of ground-mounted configuration and a decrease in roof surface shading in the case of rooftop configuration, because larger sections of roof are exposed to sun radiation. Therefore, an optimized interrow distance for the two PV configurations is determined with the aim being to minimize the levelized cost of energy (LCoE) and maximize the energy yield. The model of the building is simulated in EnergyPlus software to determine the cooling load requirement and roof surface temperatures under different shading scenarios. The layout of the rooftop PV system is designed in Helioscope software. A detailed comparison of the two systems is carried out based on energy output, performance ratio, capacity utilization factor (CUF), energy yield, and LCoE. Compared to ground-mounted configuration, the rooftop PV configuration results in a 2.9% increase in CUF, and up to a 23.7% decrease in LCoE. The results of this research show that installing a PV system on a roof has many distinct advantages over ground-mounted PV systems such as the shading of the roof, which leads to the curtailment of the cooling energy requirements of the buildings in hot regions and land cost savings, especially for urban environments.

Design Optimization and Sizing for Fly-Gen Airborne Wind Energy Systems

Traditional on-shore horizontal-axis wind turbines need to be large for both performance reasons (e.g., clearing ground turbulence and reaching higher wind speeds) and for economic reasons (e.g., more efficient land use, lower maintenance costs, and fewer controllers and grid attachments) while their efficiency is scale and mass independent. Airborne wind energy (AWE) system efficiency is a function of system size and AWE system operating altitude is less directly coupled to system power rating. This paper derives fly-gen AWE system parameters from small number of design parameters, which are used to optimize a design for energy cost. This paper then scales AWE systems and optimizes them at each scale to determine the relationships between size, efficiency, power output, and cost. The results indicate that physics and economics favor a larger number of small units, at least offshore or where land cost is small.

Tradeoffs in the value of biodiversity feature and cost data in conservation prioritization

Decision-support tools are commonly used to maximize return on investments (ROI) in conservation. We evaluated how the relative value of information on biodiversity features and land cost varied with data structure and variability, attributes of focal species and conservation targets, and habitat suitability thresholds for contrasting bird communities in the Pacific Northwest of North America. Specifically, we used spatial distribution maps for 20 bird species, land values, and an integer linear programming model to prioritize land units (1 km2) that met conservation targets at the lowest estimated cost (hereafter ‘efficiency’). Across scenarios, the relative value of biodiversity data increased with conservation targets, as higher thresholds for suitable habitat were applied, and when focal species occurred disproportionately on land of high assessed value. Incorporating land cost generally improved planning efficiency, but at diminishing rates as spatial variance in biodiversity features relative to land cost increased. Our results offer a precise, empirical demonstration of how spatially-optimized planning solutions are influenced by spatial variation in underlying feature layers. We also provide guidance to planners seeking to maximize efficiency in data acquisition and resolve potential trade-offs when setting targets and thresholds in financially-constrained, spatial planning efforts aimed at maximizing ROI in biodiversity conservation.