This thesis presents a novel approach to planning under uncertainty in resource constrained environments. Such environments feature in many real-world applications, including planetary rover and autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) missions. Our focus is on long-duration AUV missions, in which a vehicle spends months at sea, with little or no opportunity for intervention. As the risk to the vehicle and cost of deployment are significant, it is important to fully utilise each mission, maximising data return without compromising vehicle safety. Planning within this domain is challenging because significant resource usage uncertainty prevents computation of an optimal strategy in advance. We describe our novel method for online plan modification and execution monitoring, which augments an existing plan with pre-computed plan fragments in response to observed resource availability. Our modification algorithm uses causal structure to interleave actions, creating solutions without introducing significant computational cost. Our system monitors resource availability, reasoning about the probability of successfully completing the goals. We show that when the probability of completing the mission decreases, by removing low-priority goals our system reduces the risk to the vehicle, increasing mission success rate. Conversely, when resource availability allows, by including additional goals our system increases reward without adversely affecting success rate.

Many small communities depend on groundwater sources for drinking water and they often use septic tanks for their sewer system needs. However, nitrates and other pollutants from septic systems can percolate to the aquifers and deteriorate quality of the groundwater, threatening the public health. This study has developed a groundwater model using Visual MODFLOW for an aquifer that is used as a water supply source for the cities of Beaumont and Cherry Valley, California. Septic systems are the suspected major source of nitrate contamination of the aquifer. The model has been developed to clarify the extent of interactions between nitrate pollutants, infiltration and percolation from a recently established series of artificial recharge ponds, groundwater recharge from natural sources, and pumping activities to meet local water uses. The primary objective of this study is to evaluate alternative hydraulic solutions that would limit the movement of the contaminants and minimize the risk of affecting the pumping wells. The study attempts to identify the best way to recharge the aquifer and influence movement of the nitrates so that polluted waters may have lower nitrate concentrations in the future, rather than allowed to encroach on critical production wells or led away from production wells to become a problem for future generations or neighboring areas. The data needed to build the model, including geological logs, precipitation, evapotranspiration, well locations, pumping schedules, water levels, and nitrate concentrations have been obtained from the Beaumont Cherry Valley Water District. The model has been calibrated to simulate the observed groundwater levels and the extent of pollution corresponding to the historical pumping rates, recharge rates and climate. The calibrated model has been used to evaluate alternative hydraulic solutions that would either localize the nitrate pollution thus limiting the impact on public welfare, or remove the nitrate pollution for potential treatment and remediation on the surface. The study results show that increased pumping of production wells or strategic placement of additional artificial recharge may reduce the concentrations of nitrate in the Beaumont Basin.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Meteorology and Physical Oceanography, 1982. / Supervised by Nelson Hogg. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 108-109).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 1982. / Bibliography: p. 139-140.

In water conveyance systems, sudden changes in the flow velocity cause a phenomenon called waterhammer associated with high pressure head changes. Unless a control device is used as a precaution, waterhammer may result in costly damages and even in some cases, loss of human lives. In light of this concept, different control devices that can protect the systems against waterhammer are introduced so that the great pressure differences are absorbed and the system is maintained undamaged. In this thesis, the main functions, the requirements for its construction and the different types of the surge tanks are explained. The governing differential equations defining the flow conditions of the surge tanks and their solutions are provided. In addition, for the use of design engineers a procedure to determine proper dimensions of a surge tank is developed. For the sake of dimensioning the surge tank effectively, empirical equations, which calculate the height of three different types of surge tanks with dimensionless parameters, are obtained. With the help of regression analysis, the correlation between the parameters of the developed equations are determined, and found to be relatively high. Finally, the economical aspect of a surge tank is discussed and comparison parameters are introduced to the designer.

No description available.

There exist various applications of transportation of slurries through pipelines all over the world. In the present study, the problem is formulated as a &quot / transportation problem&quot / to determine the pipe diameters and amounts of slurry to be transported from the demand (production) points to the processing (factory) points. The minimization of the cost consisting of the pipe and energy cost terms is considered as the objective function to determine the stated decision variables. Pipe cost is given as the function of pipe diameters and the energy cost is defined as function of pipe diameters and slurry amounts. Energy cost is obtained by using the relation that is previously determined after the experimental studies made for the magnetite ore. The optimization method used in the study is genetic algorithm method. A commercially available software written in C language is used and modified for the present study The proposed methodology to solve this nonlinear programming problem is applied to a transportation system and it is seen that the methodology made the complex, labor intensive equation solution process very convenient for the users.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 148-149).

The first objective of this investigation was to derive and compare scour depth equations in a long contraction using the most widely used sediment transport equations and a variety of other equations. The second objective was to determine a procedure to find an equivalent rectangular section which would convey the same water discharge and sediment load at same slope as an irregular, natural channel in order to simplify numerical computations of scour depth and to allow appropriate application of long contraction scour theory. Some of the transport equations were manipulated algebraically to develop equations for scour depth and slope in a long contraction; others were manipulated using computer programs written especially for each equation, thus deriving scour depth equations. A computer program was written to compare characteristics of a non-rectangular section with rectangular sections of different widths in order to derive a procedure to find an equivalent rectangular transport section (a triangular section was used in this investigation) but the procedure is equally valid for any irregular, natural section. This investigation indicated that depth in the contraction is greater than in the wider approach channel. How much greater depended on which sediment-transport equation was used. Most of the derived scour equations, based on the different sediment transport equations, predicted that the y₂/y₁ ratio decreases as slope, velocity, c, and τₒ'/τ(c) or √τ/ρ)/ω increase; a few do not. Most of the analysis predicted S₂ < S₁, but a few do not. Field and experimental data provided extra evidence that the depth in the contracted section is greater than in the approach reach and how much greater. The evidence that the slope is flatter is not sufficient to be completely convincing. The equivalent rectangular transport section which can carry the same water and sediment discharge at the same slope as the natural section has a depth which is a large fraction of the deepest part of the original section, and the width is considerably narrower than the top width of the original section. Results of the investigation also indicated that the slope, velocity, sediment concentration, and sediment size have little effect on the geometry of the equivalent rectangular section.

No description available.