Spreadsheet Technique Research Articles

Application of the Delayed Royalty Framework for Onshore Petroleum Investment in Nigeria Using the 1993 Production Sharing Contract

The 1993 production sharing contract (PSC) in Nigeria specifies different royalty rates for oil and gas investment. The royalty rates were fixed. This makes the fiscal arrangement to be regressive in nature. Royalty rate of 20% is to be paid for onshore investment using the 1993 PSC. Hence, there is a need to make the fiscal arrangement progressive. The delayed royalty framework was incorporated into the1993 PSC as a progressive measure to make it dynamic. Two economic models were developed using spreadsheet technique to evaluate the impact of the delayed royalty framework on onshore petroleum investment. The 1993 PSC fiscal framework was used to develop the economic models. The delayed royalty framework was incorporated into one of the models. The delay in royalty payment hinged on the payout period of the investment. It was observed that the delayed royalty framework increased the contractor’s revenue during the period of low oil price. Thus, increasing the sustainability of the investment during period of low oil price.

A Higher Order Runge-Kutta Method for Solving System of Ordinary Differential Equations Using MS Excel

The differential equations, solved numerically, are often implemented on simulation and computational tools. This requires programming skills. Excel spreadsheet has been used frequently for statistical analysis, however it is rarely used for computation in mathematics, instead of having great usability and usefulness. It also easily enables a non-programmer to perform programming-like tasks in a visual tabular pen and paper approach. Many physical phenomena are modelled in terms of odes and PDEs, so solving these types of equations, by cooperative iterative methods, are very important there are several iterative methods. The Euler and Runge-Kutta are the most famous ones among the numerical methods for solving the differential equations as well as system(s) of the differential equation(s). Euler's method has slow convergence; therefore, methods of a higher order of accuracy are often needed. Since the iterative methods manually with pen-paper are quite tedious and laboring because it involves numerous repetitive calculations. The spreadsheet technique in Excel is in cooperated to solve the system of an ode by applying the RK5 methods, but one of the pitfalls of an excel spreadsheet is that it is limited containing less than 256 variables (columns) and 65536 records (rows).

Heap Leach Production Modeling: a Spreadsheet-Based Technique

A variety of modeling techniques can be utilized to forecast metal production at heap leaching operations. These approaches reflect a wide range of complexity, flexibility, time to implement, cost, and accuracy. For many operators, a spreadsheet-based modeling technique is attractive since the calculations are directly accessible, models can often be developed by site staff, and the results are generally easy to extract and interpret. The authors have developed a spreadsheet-based modeling technique that provides a high degree of flexibility, while still considering detailed operating information for ore properties, leach kinetics, scale-up factors, lift height, and in-heap metal inventories. The technique involves establishing kinetic leach curves for each ore type to characterize metal extractions, followed by application of separate metal recovery curves to define the rate at which leached metals exit the heap in pregnant solution, taking into account delays due to the in-heap solution inventory. At any point in time, the difference between total metal extracted and total metal recovered is equal to the in-heap inventory of the leached metal. This modeling technique is particularly useful for larger multi-lift heaps where delays in metal recovery are appreciable due to in-heap solution holdup. The technique is also applicable to sites with multiple heaps, leach cycles, and/or metal recovery plants (e.g., carbon columns for gold; solvent extraction for copper). This paper describes the modeling technique, including input data required and methods for defining kinetic leach curves and metal recovery curves. The technique is compared against an alternative spreadsheet technique using a simplified in-heap solution inventory calculation to forecast metal production, which has proven to be effective at a number of sites.

An uncertainty spreadsheet for the k0-standardisation method in Neutron Activation Analysis

This paper focuses on the use of the spreadsheet technique to set up the uncertainty budget for the k0-standardisation method in Neutron Activation Analysis. The adopted measurement model included most of presently recognized error sources and was written to limit the covariances between input quantities. The calculations were implemented in a worksheet file and tested in a multi-elemental analysis of a biological material. Besides, it was demonstrated that the k0-standardisation turns to the relative-standardisation when the monitor element corresponds to the analyte element. The developed worksheet is available and suitable for the analysis of other materials in different experimental conditions.

English

English

Incorporating the Participatory Margin When Teaching the Bathtub Model of the Labor Market

The textbook bathtub model attributes a minor role to labor force participation. Recent empirical research shows that participation accounts for around one-third of the fluctuations in unemployment. This article outlines a for introducing the intermediate macroeconomics student to an augmented bathtub model, enhancing the student's understanding of how participation impacts the unemployment rate within a dynamic context. Further, the flow-based approach correctly demonstrates the mild counter-cyclicality of labor market participation. International evidence is analyzed by utilizing available labor market flow data for the US and the UK. Finally, a pedagogically effective simulation exercise incorporating a spreadsheet technique is demonstrated.

How to calculate uncertainties of neutron flux parameters and uncertainties of analysis results in k0-NAA?

A novel method is presented for the calculation of uncertainties of neutron flux parameters and element mass fractions and their uncertainties in k0-neutron activation analysis (k0-NAA) using the Kragten universally applicable spreadsheet technique. The results obtained are compared with other approaches for evaluation of uncertainties of the neutron flux parameters and element mass fractions, namely with the Kayzero for Windows, k0-IAEA and ERON programs. The differences observed are discussed in terms of how the above programs take into account various uncertainty sources and their correlations.

A new iterative heuristic to solve the joint replenishment problem using a spreadsheet technique

In this paper, a heuristic method is presented which gives a novel approach to solve joint replenishment problems (JRP) with strict cycle policies. The heuristic solves the JRP in an iterative procedure and is based on a spreadsheet technique. The principle of the recursion procedure is to find a balance between the replenishment and inventory holding costs for the different items by adjusting the replenishment frequencies. The heuristic is also tested according to an extensive test template and shows pleasing results. It also performs well in comparison with many other heuristics.

Visual Exploration and Analysis of Historic Hotel Visits

Understanding the spatial and temporal characteristics of individual and group behavior in social networks is a critical component of visual tools for intelligence analysis, emergency management, consumer analysis, and human geography. Identification and analysis of patterns of recurring events is an essential feature of such tools. In this paper, we describe an interactive visual tool for exploring the visitation patterns of guests at two hotels in central Pennsylvania from 1894 to 1900. The centerpiece of the tool is a wrapping spreadsheet technique, called reruns, that reveals regular and irregular periodic patterns of events in multiple overlapping artificial and natural calendars. Implemented as a coordinated multiple view visualization in Improvise, the tool is in ongoing development through an iterative process of data collection, transcription, hypothesis, design, discovery, analysis, and evaluation in close collaboration with historical geographers. Numerous discoveries have driven additional data collection from archival newspaper and census sources, as well as plans to enhance analysis of spatial patterns using historic weather records and railroad schedules. Distributed online evaluations of usability and usefulness have resulted in feature and design recommendations that are being incorporated into the tool.

Uncertainty Budget for k0-NAA

The concepts of the Guide to the expression of Uncertainties in Measurements for chemical measurements (GUM) and the recommendations of the Eurachem document "Quantifying Uncertainty in Analytical Methods" are applied to set up the uncertainty budget for k0-NAA. The "universally applicable spreadsheet technique", described by Kragten, is applied to the k0-NAA basic equations for the computation of uncertainties. The variance components — individual standard uncertainties — highlight the contribution and the importance of the different parameters to be taken into account.

A spreadsheet (lotus 1-2-3) based technique for analysing storm suspended sediment data with particular reference to logging disturbance in tropical forests

The procedure describes a simple and functional method using a commercial spreadsheet (Lotus 1-2-3) to calculate water and sediment yields from measured or given data sets. Suspended sediment concentrations are located on a storm hydrograph and concentrations for unsampled points on the hydrograph are estimated using the principle that the change in concentration between two sampled points will be proportional to the change in discharge between the same two points. The relationships are then solved by a cross-correlation equation using simple formulae in the form of triangle-square equations to calculate water and sediment yields between each sample time. The technique is applied to a 51 month data set from a long-term monitoring programme assessing the impacts of commercial logging operations in Sabah, East Malaysia. Yields for the monitoring period derived by the spreadsheet technique are compared with results from the application of more traditional discharge-sediment rating techniques. In the undisturbed catchment, yields derived from some rating equations compare favourably with the spreadsheet technique. However, in the disturbed catchment, rating techniques proved less applicable because of the continuously changing nature of the catchment in relation to vegetation recovery, exacerbating variation and scatter in the data set. The application of the spreadsheet technique provides detailed information at an individual storm level; however, working with the method on long-term discharge records requires a significant commitment of time as compared to the straightforward application of rating equations. (C) 1998 John Wiley Bi Sons, Ltd.

A simple spreadsheet for the assessment of options for the mitigation of world carbon dioxide emissions

Emissions of carbon dioxide are classified into three categories arising from the generation of electricity, from mobile sources, and from all other stationary sources by fossil fuel type in a simple 4 × 4 spreadsheet. The selection of these groupings reflects the deep natural divisions in the energy economy. Another column is added to list the primary energy contributed by each fuel and another row at the bottom to account for primary electricity derived from hydraulic, nuclear, and, in the future, other similar sources such as photovoltaics and wind power. The spreadsheet technique is illustrated by linking two selected scenarios, the first for the capture and sequestering of carbon dioxide emitted from coal-based generation and the second for an aggressive co-generation scenario based upon natural gas, with a base oil supply scenario chosen to be sufficient to meet the foreseen ‘business-as-usual’ needs of the transportation industry until 2030. It is shown that both the sequestering and co-generation options are helpful in meeting a control scenario requiring emissions of carbon dioxide to be stabilized at 6.0 gigatonnes carbon per year (GT C/y) on a world basis by 2010 and thereafter, but that additional measures would be needed to reach a sustainable level of 3.0 GT C/y by 2030.

Tutorial review. Calculating standard deviations and confidence intervals with a universally applicable spreadsheet technique

A quick and universally applicable spreadsheet method is outlined for the calculation of standard deviations based on the general formula for error propagation: “graphic omitted” With this method, standard deviations are calculated numerically without violating the condition of mutual independence, with a substantial time gain and with no risk of calculating errors. Satterthwaite's approximation of the degrees of freedom is a logical extension of the technique with which confidence intervals can be easily established. Direct insight is obtained about the separate contributions of the different error sources.

Oxidational wear modelling: I

This paper is the first of a series in which increasingly complex oxidational wear models are applied to a tribosystem involving the unlubricated sliding of high chromium ferritic steel pins against austenitic stainless steel discs at speeds between 0.23 and 3.3 m s −1. The most simple oxidational wear model assumes that there is no significant oxidation of the contacting surfaces at the general surface temperature of the pin nor at the general surface temperature of the disc. The model also assumes that a very small number of dominant large plateaux of contact oxidize (at a contact temperature, which is normally much higher than the general surface temperatures of either the pin or the disc) until they reach critical thicknesses which are related to the Archard K factor. The contact temperature is itself related to the division of heat at the plateaux interfaces, a quantity which can be estimated in terms of a surface model in which N circular contacts (each of radius A) are assumed to occur at each of the contacting plateaux of thickness on the pin and on the disc. Since the simple oxidational wear theory also involves both the number N of contacts and the thicknesses of the oxide film on either the pin or the disc, it can be seen that it should be possible to find suitable values of N that will satisfy both the experimentally measured division of heat and the experimental wear rate coefficient, provided that the oxide thicknesses are known. The main thrust of this paper is to show that, by measuring the critical oxide thicknesses on the pin and on the disc in the scanning electron microscope, it is possible to compute tentative tribological oxidation constants for these particular steels from associated measurements of the wear rate coefficient and the division of heat, using a computer spreadsheet technique which is particularly user friendly. The importance of computer modelling for finding definitive values for the tribological oxidation constants of a tribosystem, and hence for predicting the magnitudes of the contact temperature and the wear rate of a triboelement undergoing oxidational wear in that system, is also discussed.

A database/spreadsheet application for equipment selection

A computerized system of selecting construction equipment is described. A database of technical criteria for a backhoe/loader machine is assembled and analysed with a spreadsheet technique. The process of selection uses the Kepner and Tregoe method to arrive at the best choice of excavator for a particular job.

Teaching Microeconomics with Microcomputer Spreadsheets

The mastery of the spreadsheet technique has become almost universal in economics departments. The authors explain, step-by-step, how the spreadsheet can be used as an instructional aid to teach basic microeconomic concepts.