Optimization of Tuned Mass Dampers to Improve the Earthquake Resistance of High Buildings

To prevent high buildings in endangered zones suffering from seismic attack, TMD are applied successfully. In many applications the dampers are placed along the height of the edifice to reduce the damage during the earthquake. The dimensioning of TMD is a multidimensional optimisation problem with many local maxima. To find the absolute best or a very good design, advanced optimization strategies have to be applied. Bionic optimization proposes different methods to deal with such tasks but requires many repeated studies of the buildings and dampers design. To improve the speed of the analysis, the authors propose a reduced model of the building including the dampers. A series of consecutive generations shows a growing capacity to reduce the impact of an earthquake on the building. The proposals found help to dimension the dampers. A detailed analysis of the building under earthquake loading may yield an efficient design.

Landslides

Landslide research is an interdisciplinary field that primarily encompasses scientists from geomorphology, engineering geology, and geotechnical engineering in collaboration with researchers from such fields as geodesy, hydrogeology, geophysics, and many others. This chapter is intended as a resource for researchers interested in landslide engineering and landslide science to acquire a summarized review of research subjects and the state-of-the-art literature. A wide range of landslide topics are presented in the following sections: landslide mapping, landslide investigation, landslide monitoring, landslide hazard and risk assessment, and landslide stabilization and remediation measures. The results of landslide studies have practical applications to society via the avoidance, prevention, and mitigation of landslide hazards and risks. Landslide avoidance and prevention are the primary interests for land-use policies based on landslide mapping, followed by the prediction of landslide processes and their consequences. Landslide mitigation includes the development of engineering technologies for landslide investigation, monitoring, and remediation.

Effects of Soil Contamination on the Selection of Remediation Method

Soil is a thin (up to 50cm) loose top layer of the Earth's surface, located between the lithosphere and atmosphere. Total available land area on Earth is limited, and the soil is extremely important, and in one generation it is a non-renewable natural resource. Unfortunately, nowadays the soil is, next to water, one of the most endangered natural resources. Among the many processes of soil damage, which is not being addressed at this point, is the growing importance placed on soil contamination. Contaminated soil is the soil in which human or natural activity has increased the content of harmful substances whose concentrations may be harmful to human activity, that is, for the production of plants or animals.

Basin-Scale, Real-Time Salinity Management Using Telemetered Sensor Networks and Model-Based Salt Assimilative Capacity Forecasts

This chapter describes a new approach to environmental decision support for salinity management in the San Joaquin Basin that focuses on Web-based data sharing using tools such as YSI Econet and continuous data quality management using an enterprise-level software tool WISKI. These tools offer real-time Web-access to sensor data as well as providing the owner full control over the way the data is visualized. The same websites use GIS to superimpose the monitoring site locations on maps of local hydrography and allow point and click access to the data collected at each environmental monitoring site. This information technology suite of software and hardware work together with a watershed simulation model WARMF-SJR to provide timely, reliable, and high quality data and forecasts of river salinity that can used by stakeholder decision makers to ensure compliance with state water quality objectives.

Modeling and Simulation of Polymer Solar Cells

Polymer solar cells are attracting attention as inexpensive versatile devices for generating electricity from sunlight. However, relatively low efficiencies are currently hindering their widespread application. The typically low efficiencies arise because of the complex physics within these devices. In particular, photons must first be absorbed to create a mobile excited state, or exciton. Then this exciton must dissociate into free charge at the interface between an acceptor and a donor polymer, and finally, the free charge must traverse the polymer solar cell to the correct electrodes. Mathematical and computer models play an important role in understanding the physics of these devices and ultimately allow us to tailor the internal structure and material properties to optimize device performance. A brief review of polymer solar cells is presented, with particular emphasis on their nanoscale architecture, before the chapter turns its attention to the simulations and models that can predict their behavior.

Deep Geological Disposal of Spent Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Waste

Management of Spent Nuclear Fuel (SF) and High-Level Waste (HLW) is one of the most important and challenging problems of the modern world. Otherwise a clean, cheap, constant, and secure way to produce electricity, nuclear power plants create large amounts of highly hazardous waste. Repositories—deep Geological Disposal Facilities (GDF)—for these types of waste must prevent radionuclides from reaching the biosphere, for up to 1,000,000 years, migrating from a deep (more than 300m), stable geological environment. At present, there are no operating GDFs for SF and/or HLW, mostly due to the difficult and complex task of preparing safety cases and licensing. The purpose of this chapter is to validate the generic R&D activities in this area and present alternative concepts of Radioactive Waste (RW) management: retrievability, reversibility, regional GDFs, long-term storage, and deep borehole disposal, demonstrating the main engineering tasks in solving the problem of RW management and disposal.

Alternative, Environmentally Acceptable Materials in Road Construction

Environmental conservation and energy savings, as the fundamental assumptions for sustainable development, and financial savings are possible through the use of new, non-standard materials and technologies in the building and maintenance of roads. Different types of waste materials and industrial by-products may be used in road construction as an alternative to standard materials. In order to be applicable, alternative materials must meet certain engineering characteristics, show an acceptable level of execution, and be economical in comparison with traditional materials. The reasons for the use of alternative materials are many and largely outweigh the possible shortcomings. The use of alternative materials is significant from both the ecological and economic perspectives. Ecologically, the use of alternative materials means a lesser need for the exploitation of natural resources and the quantity of waste accumulated in landfills is reduced. Economically, the use of alternative materials reduces total construction costs. This chapter explores the use of alternative materials.

Soil Contamination

Soil, the final product of long-lasting forming processes, is a nearly non-renewable source and an environmental necessity. Soil contamination, also known as soil pollution, which is generally defined as the presence of man-made chemicals and alterations in soil, is widely capable of causing long-term health issues and a disrupted ecosystem. From a general scientific point of view, soil contaminants can be classified as Macro and Micro contaminants by quantity, while micro-contaminants divide into two groups: organic and inorganic pollutants. Contamination types can be also categorized by contamination source. Subsequent to verifying the type of contaminant and in order to amend contaminated soils, varieties of methods are provided. Physical, Chemical, and Biological (Bio-Remediation) techniques are used to extract, degrade, or immobilize soil contaminants. These methods can be utilized as a single technique or as a combination of methods. The objective of this chapter is to clarify the soil contamination and the approaches to amendment.

Greenhouse Gas Emissions from the Petroleum Industry

Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions occur, more or less, in all aspects of the petroleum industry's activities. Besides the direct emissions of some GHG, the petroleum industry is also characterised with high energy intensity usually followed by emissions of adverse gases, especially at old facilities, and also the products with high emission potential. Being the global industry and one of the major players on global market, the petroleum industry is also subjected to global regulatory provisions regarding GHG emissions. In this chapter, the impact of global climate change on the petroleum industry is discussed. The emissions from the petroleum industry are analysed with a special focus on greenhouse gases that occur in petroleum industry activities and types and sources of emissions from the petroleum industry activities. In addition, recommendations for estimation, monitoring, and reductions of GHG emissions from the petroleum industry are given.

Drilling Waste Control

The chapter describes drilling waste control by integrating Environmental Control Technology (ECT) with the drilling process. In contrast to remediating “end-of-the-pipe” methods, drilling ECT prevents environmental impact by modifying the process of drilling waste generation. The waste production process in drilling operations with emphasis given to mechanisms of waste volume buildup and the waste toxicity sources is analyzed. In addition, the source-reduction and source-separation techniques built-in the drilling process such as low-toxicity substitution of drilling mud components and high efficiency separators and closed-loop solids control mud system are addressed. The technique of drilling mud dewatering is discussed in detail by describing its principles, installations, and field application case histories. Quantitative analysis of dewatering efficiency using mud-testing results is also presented. The chapter also presents a method for assessing economic and technical feasibility of a dewatering service contracted for the well site.