With a growing concern of climate change due to increased levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, carbon sequestration has been suggested as a possible solution for climate change mitigation. Biochar,a highly carbonaceous product produced through pyrolysis, is considered a viable option due to its content of stable carbon. This work covers the investigation of the possibility to produce biocharfrom four different feedstocks, namely peat, straw, horse manure and sewage sludge. The study includes a literature study and a five-week trial period at a 500 kW pilot plant, PYREG 500, in Högdalen. The thermal behaviour of the feedstocks, including garden waste, was investigated using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). The TGA results were used to decide the optimal pyrolysis temperature for peat and straw at the pilot plant. The TGA results showed that the feedstocks behave differently when pyrolysed; the mass loss rate as well as the final mass loss varied. Physiochemical characterisation of the biochar was completed and the results were in agreement with previous studies. The produced biochar from straw and two types of peat had a C content above50 wt.% (76.6, 80.7, 79.2 wt.%) and low molar ratios of H/C (0.33, 0.36, 0.38) and O/C (0.032,0.023, 0.024). The pH increased as a consequence of pyrolysis and the biochars were alkaline (pH10.1, 8.5, 8.3). Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) were found in biochar from both strawand peat (8.26, 1.03, 5.83 mg/kg). In general, nutrients and heavy metals were concentrated in the biochar, except for Cd which decreased and Hg which could not be determined. The specific surface area of biochar from straw was considered small (21 m2/g) while biochar from peat had a higher specific surface area with a greater span (102-247 m2/g). The properties of the produced biochar were compared to the criteria included in the European Biochar Certificate and some of them were fulfilled, including the content of C, PAH and heavy metals. A flue gas analysis was completed when operating the pilot plant on straw pellets and it was showed that several emissions were released, including NO2, SOX, HCl and particulates, however, solely the emissions of NO2 exceed the regulations which will be applied in 2020. Regarding process design of a future pyrolysis plant, it is suggested that the means of material transport, particle separation, temperature control and quenching of biochar should be improved.

In this study, the goal is to optimize the process and to reduce the clogging tendency during the continuous casting process. The focus is on clogging when the refractory base material (RBM) in the SEN is in contact with the liquid steel. It is difficult or impossible to avoid non-metallic inclusions in the liquid steel, but by a selection of a good RBM in the SEN clogging can be reduced.   Different process steps were evaluated during the casting process in order to reduce the clogging tendency. First, the preheating of the SEN was studied. The results showed that the SEN can be decarburized during the preheating process. In addition, decarburization of SEN causes a larger risk for clogging. Two types of plasma coatings were implemented to protect the RBM, to prevent reactions with the RBM, and to reduce the clogging tendency. Calcium titanate (CaTiO3) mixed with yttria stabilized zirconia (YSZ) plasma coatings were tested in laboratory and pilot plant trials, for casting of aluminium-killed low-carbon steels. For casting of cerium alloyed stainless steels, YSZ plasma coatings were tested in laboratory, pilot plant and industrial trials. The results showed that the clogging tendency was reduced when implementing both coating materials.   It is also of importance to produce clean steel in order to reduce clogging. Therefore, the steel cleanliness in the tundish was studied experimentally. The result showed that inclusions originated from the slag, deoxidation products and tundish refractory and that they were present in the tundish as well as in the final steel product. / <p>QC 20170227</p> / VINNOVA

Made available in DSpace on 2016-12-23T14:07:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao_WALLAS_Final.pdf: 2098098 bytes, checksum: fd85081c515eea7e1921beb926a980cc (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-05-07 / O objetivo deste trabalho é mostrar o desenvolvimento do modelo de uma planta didática não linear e multivariável usando a resposta ao degrau. Esta planta didática é do curso técnico de automação industrial do IFES SERRA (ES). A partir das equações físicas do processo são desenvolvidas as relações entre as variáveis controladas e as variáveis manipuladas em regime permanente para qualquer ponto de operação. Utilizando a resposta ao degrau, de acordo com sua amplitude, são mapeadas as constantes de tempo do processo. O atraso do modelo é encontrado utilizando os mínimos quadrados. Por fim é desenvolvido um simulador a fim de comparar a resposta no tempo da planta real com a do modelo proposto. / The objective of this dissertation is to show the development of one nonlinear pilot plant model and multivariable using the step response. The pilot plant belongs to the course of industrial process control of IFES - SERRA (ES). From the physical equations of the process, are developed relationships of controlled variables in steady state at any point of operation. Using the step response, are mapped onto the time constants of the process according to the changes of the manipulated variables. The delay model is found using the least squares and step response. Finally we developed a simulator to compare the time response of the real plant with the proposed model.

PetrÃleo Brasileiro S/A / O objetivo principal à determinar a atividade catalÃtica residual e as causas da desativaÃÃo de amostras de catalisadores de uma unidade de HDT de lubrificantes. Foram realizadas corridas em unidade piloto, caracterizaÃÃo dos catalisadores e coletados dados do histÃrico operacional da unidade industrial. A atividade catalÃtica foi determinada atravÃs das conversÃes das reaÃÃes de HDA, HDS e HDN bem como pelos parÃmetros cinÃticos aparentes de um modelo de lei das potÃncias e lei de Arrhenius. Os catalisadores dos leitos principais de entrada e saÃda dos reatores industrial foram os mais desativados e o menos desativado o do leito intermediÃrio sendo estabelecida a seguinte ordem de atividade catalÃtica residual: R1L3 (meio) > R1L2 (topo) &#61619; R2L2 (fundo). Os resultados de teor e caracterÃsticas do coque, contaminantes e propriedades texturais sugerem que mecanismos distintos tenham causado a desativaÃÃo desses catalisadores: deposiÃÃo de metais e deposiÃÃo de coque. Os mecanismos de desativaÃÃo foram fortemente influenciados pelo posicionamento das amostras no interior do leito catalÃtico. No inÃcio do leito, a contaminaÃÃo por metais (notadamente Si e As) revelou-se o principal mecanismo de desativaÃÃo. Jà no final do leito, a deposiÃÃo de coque foi o mecanismo preponderante e a temperatura de reaÃÃo identificada como a principal causa para o maior envelhecimento do coque. / The main objective of this work is to study the residual catalyst activity and the mechanisms of deactivation of catalyst from a lube-oil hydroprocessing industrial unit. In order to accomplish this, pilot plant tests were carried out followed by spent catalysts characterization. The residual catalytic activity was determined by HDA, HDS and HDN conversions and adjusted by a power law apparent kinetic model. Pilot plant tests revealed different levels of residual activity for spent catalyst samples. Catalyst samples taken from the first and last of the five catalytic beds showed higher deactivation than others. Catalyst characterization results pointed out two mechanisms as the main reason for the catalytic deactivation through the industrial reactor: poisoning by metal deposition (mainly Si and As) and coke deposition. Poisoning was the main deactivation mechanism for the first bed spent catalyst sample, while coke deposition was predominant at the last catalytic bed sample. Reactor temperature was identified as the most important operational parameter considering coke aging.

This work describes a procedure for a soft sensor design to predict the top composition of a methanol-water distillation column. Soft sensor is a mathematical model that is used to estimate variables of interest from secondary variables easy to measure. This technique comes from an operational difficulty or high cost obtaining the desired variable. The approach to build a soft sensor was an artificial intelligence modeling, a black-box type, using a hybrid neuro-fuzzy technique. The data acquisition to train and validate the soft sensor comes from a mathematical model validated from pilot plat data. One of the limitations of neuro-fuzzy system is that it works with a limited number of inputs, depending on the combinatorial explosion of fuzzy rules. To minimize these effects and to reduce the number of rules in the training data sets of virtual analyzer, a data clustering technique called substractive clustering was used. To obtain a better performance of soft sensor for the dynamic process, distillation column, a regression of lone sampling time in selected variables was used, changing the number of entries from 9 to 18 variables, nine variables at actual sampling time and nine variables at previous sampling time. The distillation column is a good process for the present study because composition measurements are the main objective of this process and are difficult to obtain. The computational strategy for a soft sensor design produced good results in estimating the top composition of the methanol-water distillation column. / Este trabalho descreve um procedimento para o desenvolvimento de um analisador virtual, para predição da composição de topo de uma coluna destilação metanol-água em uma planta piloto. Analisador virtual é um modelo matemático que é usado para estimar variáveis de interesse a partir de variáveis secundárias de fácil medição. Esta tecnologia surge de uma real dificuldade operacional ou do alto custo de obtenção da variável desejada. O modelo utilizado nesta abordagem de construção do analisador virtual utiliza técnicas de sistemas inteligentes, tipo caixa preta, através da técnica híbrida neuro-fuzzy. A aquisição dos dados para treinar e validar o analisador virtual foi feita através de um modelo matemático validado a partir de dados experimentais da planta piloto. Uma das limitações do sistema neuro-fuzzy é que ele trabalha com um número limitado de entradas, dependendo da explosão combinatória das regras fuzzy. Para minimizar estes efeitos e conseguir reduzir o número de regras nos conjuntos de treinamento da rede neuro-fuzzy, foi utilizada a técnica de agrupamento de dados, denominada agrupamento substrativo. Com a intenção de se obter um melhor desempenho do analisador virtual no processo dinâmico, que é a coluna de destilação, foi empregada uma regressão de um tempo de amostragem nas variáveis de entrada selecionadas, alterando o número de entradas de 9 para 18, sendo 9 variáveis no tempo de amostragem atual e 9 variáveis em um tempo de amostragem anterior. O processo de destilação mostrou-se adequado para o presente estudo, pois as medições de composições são de difíceis obtenções. A estratégia computacional para um projeto de analisador virtual produziu bons resultados, de forma a estimar a composição do topo da coluna de destilação binária metanol-água.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-08T15:00:09Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivototal.pdf: 2486004 bytes, checksum: 58c7f8984b6313c965d4ab70e1483555 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-09-30 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / The present paper describes an theoretical-experimental study of an double effect absorption refrigeration machine in series that uses the waste heat from the exhaust fumes of an internal combustion engine as an energy source for the steam generator. Stress that the machine being used was designed and built on the premises of the Federal University of Paraíba in the Institute of Sustainable Energy and recog-IES laboratory, Cooperative Research Network North / Northeast Natural Gas. This study aims to describe the constructive aspects of a pilot plant with cooling capacity of around 0.5 TR, emphasizing discussion relation to the accuracy, errors, difficulties, problems identified and solutions found during the construction processes, testing, operation, data acquisition and evaluation of the pilot plant. / O presente trabalho descreve um estudo teórico-experimental de uma máquina de refrigeração por absorção de duplo efeito em série usando o par água brometo de lítio e que utiliza o rejeito de calor proveniente dos gases de escapamento de um motor de combustão interna como fonte energética para o gerador de vapor de vapor de alta. A máquina está sendo desenvolvida nas próprias instalações da Universidade Federal da Paraíba no laboratório do Instituto de Energia Sustentável IES e RECOGÀS, Rede Cooperativa de Pesquisa Norte/Nordeste de Gás Natural. Este estudo visa descrever os aspectos construtivos de uma unidade piloto com capacidade frigorífica em torno de 0,5 TR, dando ênfase a discussões em relação aos acertos, erros, dificuldades obtidas, problemas identificados e soluções encontradas durante os processos de construção, testes, funcionamento, aquisição de dados e avaliação da unidade piloto. É feito também uma comparação dos dados experimentais com os resultados obtidos de um modelo termodinâmico baseado nos conceitos de energia e exergia. O código computacional é desenvolvido em plataforma EES (Engineering Equation Solver), aproveitando a facilidade de obtenção das propriedades, sobretudo, da solução água brometo de lítio.

Yes / In order to improve the performance of the reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plant powered by photovoltaic (PV), two cooling systems were proposed in this study to cool the PV and preheating the RO feed water as well. In the cooling design (1), the cooling fluid flows in direct contact with the back surface of the PV through channels of half circular cross-sections. While in the design (2), it flows through channels of squar cross-sections fixed on the PV back surface. Two nano-fluids were also tested as cooling fluid: H2O/CuO and H2O/Al2O3, in addition to distilled water for the purpose of comparison. The effect of changing the weight concentration of the nano-fluid (0.05, 0.1, and 0.15%) on the PV performance was also investigated. The results showed that the PV integrated with the cooling design (1) achieves better performance compared to design (2) at all studied cooling fluids. The improvements in the electric efficiency of the PV integrated with design (1) reached 39.5, 34.8 and 27.3 % when CuO and Al2O3 nano-fluids and distilled water were used as cooling fluid, respectively, compared to the uncooled PV. Based on the obtained experimental results, the PV integrated with design (1) was selected to power the RO with H2O/CuO nano-fluid of weight concentration 0.15% and flow rate 0.15 kg/s being used as the coolant. The RO powered by the improved PV was tested at different salinities of brackish water when the preheating technique was implemented. The results showed that the proposed PV-RO desalination system produces 366 l/day when brackish water of salinity 3000 ppm was used.

In this study, the goal is to optimize the process and to reduce the clogging tendency during the continuous casting process. The focus is on clogging when the refractory base material (RBM) in the SEN is in contact with the liquid steel. It is difficult or impossible to avoid non-metallic inclusions in the liquid steel, but by a selection of a good RBM in the SEN clogging can be reduced.   Different process steps were evaluated during the casting process in order to reduce the clogging tendency. First, the preheating of the SEN was studied. The results showed that the SEN can be decarburized during the preheating process. In addition, decarburization of SEN causes a larger risk for clogging. Two types of plasma coatings were implemented to protect the RBM, to prevent reactions with the RBM, and to reduce the clogging tendency. Calcium titanate (CaTiO3) mixed with yttria stabilized zirconia (YSZ) plasma coatings were tested in laboratory and pilot plant trials, for casting of aluminium-killed low-carbon steels. For casting of cerium alloyed stainless steels, YSZ plasma coatings were tested in laboratory, pilot plant and industrial trials. The results showed that the clogging tendency was reduced when implementing both coating materials.   It is also of importance to produce clean steel in order to reduce clogging. Therefore, the steel cleanliness in the tundish was studied experimentally. The result showed that inclusions originated from the slag, deoxidation products and tundish refractory and that they were present in the tundish as well as in the final steel product. / VINNOVA

The thesis deals with the use of dissolved air flotation (DAF) in water treatment technology in the Czech Republic. It summarizes the knowledge gained at pilot plant studies as well as the experience with full-scale flotation units which have been built in potable water treatment plants in the Czech Republic in years 2006-2018. This thesis provides a broad background of experimental studies of a modern separation process, which does have great advantages in the removal of natural organic matter and microorganisms from water in the drinking water treatment industry. In this thesis, there are presented some examples of the excellent efficiency of the microorganisms removal, both under the experimental conditions as well as water treatment plants, which were improved by DAF units installation in full scale. In addition to the high separation efficiency, it is shown, how DAF units could influence the subsequent separation steps as for example filtration through the granular media. The negative influence of the pre-ozonization on the DAF separation efficiency in Hradec Králové WTP is demonstrated too. The results of the pilot experiments support the idea, that the key condition for high removal efficiency is the optimal coagulation process chemistry. Design of pilot experiments was based on the factorial planning theory and some results are discussed in this thesis. The very big portion of the pilot experiments was made for estimating of the full-scale DAF design parameters before the water treatment plants reconstruction phase

Le biogaz doit être purifié pour devenir un combustible renouvelable. De nombreux traitements actuels ne sont pas satisfaisants car, pour des raisons de coûts les procédés de séparation privilégiés aboutissent souvent au rejet direct ou indirect du sulfure d'hydrogène (H2S) à l’atmosphère, c’est le cas de la séparation à l’eau sous pression. Les objectifs de la thèse portent d’abord sur l’étude et la modélisation des méthodes connues de séparation de l'hydrogène sulfuré du méthane. Les concentrations typiques varient de 200 à 5000 ppm, et la séparation devra réduire la teneur résiduelle en H2S à moins de 1 ppm. Parallèlement seront étudiées les méthodes de traitement de H2S. Une fois la (ou les) méthode(s) de séparation sélectionnée(s), des essais de validation seront effectués sur un système traitant de l’ordre de 85 Nm3/h de méthane où seront injectées des quantités de H2S variant entre 1 et 100 ppm.Cette thèse requiert des modélisations réalistes sous Aspen Plus® ou sous un code équivalent pour établir a priori des efficacités de séparation selon différentes conditions opératoires et en prenant en compte le paramètre température. L’énergie dépensée pour la séparation effective sera un des critères fort de la comparaison, de même que l’économie de matière.Une approche système est indispensable pour étudier la rétroaction de la méthode de valorisation du H2S sur la ou les méthodes séparatives. A priori c’est aussi l’outil Aspen Plus® ou équivalent qui permettra cette approche système.L’étude du procédé sera menée selon la double approche modélisation et expérimentation, pour l’étude expérimentale des méthodes séparatives, l’échelle du banc sera semi-industrielle et le banc permettra d’étudier les méthodes de séparation jusqu’à -90°C. / Biogas must be purified for becoming a renewable fuel. At now, the most part of the purification techniques are not satisfactory because they imply hydrogen sulfides (H2S) rejection to the atmosphere. One example of these methods is the treatment with high pressure water. The first objective of the thesis is modeling the conventional methods for separating H2S from methane. Typical concentrations of H2S in methane vary from 200 to 5000 pm. Separation methods must decrease the concentration of H2S in methane to less than 1 ppm. At the same time, methods for H2S treatment will be studied.Once the most appropriated separation methods will be selected, some test will be carried out on a pilot plant capable of treating 85 Nm3/h of methane, where quantities of H2S ranging from 1 and 100 ppm will be injected. These tests will allow validating the modeling of the separation process. On the basis of the obtained results, a specific test bench will be conceived and constructed for validating the selected process.The thesis work requires simulating the separation process using the software Aspen Plus® or an equivalent one. The effectiveness of different operative conditions will be tested, varying also the parameter temperature. The energy necessary for the separation will be one of the most important criteria for the comparison, as well as the mass consumption of the different fluids involved in the process.A system approach is fundamental for evaluating the backward effect of the H2S valorization method on the separation techniques. The process simulator (Aspen Plus® or equivalent) will allow the system approach.The study will involve modeling and experimental parts. The experimental part will be carried out taking advantage of a semi-industrial size test bench, allowing studying the separation methods down to -90°C.