Unsustainable Energy Sources Research Articles

Study on the potential development of nuscale small modular reactor (smr) nuclear power plant to support the energy needs in the capital city of nusantara

Abstract In facing the dependence on unsustainable energy sources such as fossil fuels, diversifying the energy supply becomes crucial. As Indonesia’s new capital city, Nusantara significantly requires new and renewable energy sources as it can enhance energy security by reducing dependence on energy imports while also providing economic stimulus and creating new job opportunities. The potential development of new and renewable energy sources.in Nusantara is a solution to Indonesia’s dependence on fossil energy, which negatively impacts the environment and public health. One of these energy sources is the NuScale SMR type of nuclear power plant. The research method employed is a literature study based on various relevant sources related to the research topic. The results of the literature study indicate that the NuScale SMR is a nuclear reactor that possesses advantages in terms of size, high safety, reliability, resource efficiency, support for renewable energy, as well as affordable modularity and scalability, making it a prime choice to fulfil the energy needs in Nusantara. By utilising new and renewable energy sources from smaller and modular nuclear technology, Indonesia can reduce its dependence on fossil energy and promote a transition towards cleaner and more sustainable energy sources.

Taguchi optimization and analysis of variance for thermoelectric generators with forced convection air cooling

In recent years, humanity has experienced the effects of using unsustainable energy sources that pollute the environment while being inefficient. Most of the primary energy input used in energy conversion processes is lost in the form of heat. Thermoelectric generators (TEGs) have the potential to recover some of this wasted heat; however, their low energy conversion efficiency needs to be addressed. Previous literature has shown effective optimization of thermoelectric generation systems through statistical tools such as the Taguchi method that optimized all the parameters that affect the outcome of the system. To this date, no research has considered wind speed for convection heat transfer as one of the optimizable parameters. This study aims to optimize the operating conditions of commercially available TEGs that are cooled by forced convection simulating naturally occurring wind speeds and operate under low-quality waste heat temperatures to improve the TEG performance further. Two commercially available TEGs are optimized via the Taguchi method. The Taguchi method is implemented with three parameters and three levels, making an L9 orthogonal array. The objective function is the maximum output power. The optimized parameters are the hot side temperature, the heat sink size, and the wind airspeed. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is used alongside the Taguchi orthogonal array for the statistical analysis of the results. The optimization results show that the hot side temperature is the most influential parameter to the output power. In addition, the change in the heat sink size also significantly influences the output power, whereas the impact of the wind speed is not as significant. In addition, interaction analysis between the parameters is performed. The Taguchi method yields satisfactory optimization results. The optimized system yields 0.65 W of power at 140 °C hot side temperature, Model K402 heat sink, and 3.7 m·s−1 wind speed. The influence of the air velocity of 1.73% is minimal on the output power compared to the hot side temperature, with a level of influence of 75.67% and a heat sink size of 22.43% for the shorter module. The results also show that the TEG with a smaller TE leg height yields the best output power at low load resistance ranging from 0.2 Ω to 2 Ω, as the TEG with a taller TE leg renders better performance at higher load resistance ranging from 3 Ω to 16 Ω at the optimal conditions. The results show that the hot side temperature remains the most important parameter in the optimization process. Furthermore, convection cooling from naturally occurring winds has a minimal but positive effect on the output of the presented TEG system.

Multi-Objective Optimal Scheduling of a Microgrid Using Oppositional Gradient-Based Grey Wolf Optimizer

Optimal energy management has become a challenging task to accomplish in today’s advanced energy systems. If energy is managed in the most optimal manner, tremendous societal benefits can be achieved such as improved economy and less environmental pollution. It is possible to operate the microgrids under grid-connected, as well as isolated modes. The authors presented a new optimization algorithm, i.e., Oppositional Gradient-based Grey Wolf Optimizer (OGGWO) in the current study to elucidate the optimal operation in microgrids that is loaded with sustainable, as well as unsustainable energy sources. With the integration of non-Renewable Energy Sources (RES) with microgrids, environmental pollution is reduced. The current study proposes this hybrid algorithm to avoid stagnation and achieve premature convergence. Having been strategized as a bi-objective optimization problem, the ultimate aim of this model’s optimal operation is to cut the costs incurred upon operations and reduce the emission of pollutants in a 24-h scheduling period. In the current study, the authors considered a Micro Turbine (MT) followed by a Wind Turbine (WT), a battery unit and a Fuel Cell (FC) as storage devices. The microgrid was assumed under the grid-connected mode. The authors validated the proposed algorithm upon three different scenarios to establish the former’s efficiency and efficacy. In addition to these, the optimization results attained from the proposed technique were also compared with that of the results from techniques implemented earlier. According to the outcomes, it can be inferred that the presented OGGWO approach outperformed other methods in terms of cost mitigation and pollution reduction.

Solar Energy Implementation for Health-Care Facilities in Developing and Underdeveloped Countries: Overview, Opportunities, and Challenges

Developing and underdeveloped countries face innumerable problems related to the accessibility and quality of energy that put the lives of patients, health-care infrastructures, and health workers at risk. Current approaches, such as grid power, unsustainable energy sources such as diesel or gas, and mobile health clinics, have proven insufficient to address this issue. In response, access to reliable health care and electricity has undergone multiple transformations in the last decade, especially in remote and rural areas. Good health and clean energy are two of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, originally designed to be a “shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future.” Unfortunately, little is known about the interaction between health-care access and energy access in developing and underdeveloped countries, mainly in remote or rural areas. For this reason, this study conducts a review of the literature, including current approaches, challenges, and opportunities for the implementation of solar energy in health centers. As a result, several challenges and opportunities in three impact areas are presented: (1) operational, (2) environmental, and (3) economic. This study delivers detailed information that allows the implementation of solar energy in the health-care sector (in a more effective manner) by sharing best practices.

The pursuit of energy in refugee contexts: Discrimination, displacement, and humanitarian energy access for the Rohingya refugees displaced to Bangladesh

Decades of discrimination under the Burmese government and the military’s campaign of ethnic cleansing drove over 671,000 Rohingyas out of Rakhine and into Bangladesh, where they were settled in make-shift camps. The provision of energy is often overlooked in refugee settlements, where energy facilities are underfunded, inefficient, or unsafe. This paper aims to serve as a scoping review and explores the energy-based needs and provision in the Rohingya refugee camps by drawing from examples and case studies conducted in refugee settlements worldwide. Common to several refugee settlements, Rohingyas rely on unsustainable energy sources like firewood to meet their household energy needs, resulting in numerous social, health, and environmental risks. Initiatives have been undertaken to address their energy needs, such as the distribution of LPG stoves and fuel, and the installation of biogas digesters and solar-powered homes, health centers, and water systems. However, such projects are underfunded or applied on a short scale. This paper calls for further research on the characterization and scale of energy requirements of the Rohingya refugees as well as the formulation of national policies that consider the synergies between energy poverty and socioeconomic, environmental, and political dimensions. Energy access must be viewed as more than just a technological issue. It must be placed as a part of a larger discourse and means for addressing issues in humanitarian crises, in collaboration with the communities concerned. In addition, it also promotes the exploration of the use of hybrid energy systems in the camps to address their energy needs.

The role of artificial intelligence in the mass adoption of electric vehicles

<h2>Summary</h2> The electrification of mass transportation is hailed as a solution for reducing global greenhouse-gas emissions and dependence on unsustainable energy sources. The annual sales of electric vehicles (EVs) has continued to rise since 2011, with a global sale of EVs of 2.1 million in 2019. This increase in sales is mainly due to continued improvement in the cost and performance of commercial EVs, increased EV options available to consumers, and environmental awareness. However, despite the positive outlook, EVs still face major challenges that hinder their rapid and widespread adoption: limited driving range, long charging times, and a lack of sufficient charging infrastructure. This review outlines the recent advances in EVs and related infrastructure, mainly from artificial intelligence (AI), which makes EVs a more attractive consumer option. The application of AI in improving EVs, facilitating EV charging stations, and EV integration with the smart grid is critically analyzed and reviewed. Finally, future trends and prospects in the area are discussed.

Separate effect of biodiesel, n-butanol, and biogas on performance and emission characteristics of diesel engine: a review

Unsustainable energy sources are one of the preeminent supply specks of power generation in the prevailing scenario. The production and utilization of energy have brought about serious ecological effects all over the globe. Exceptionally unpredictable fossil fuel expenses are making increasingly more ambiguity for the worldwide economy while simultaneously giving an ambiguous motivation for putting resources into sustainable power source advancements, which are now accepted as a viable solution. Biodiesel, higher alcohol, and gaseous fuel are considered to be suitable replacements for dwindling natural resources. These substitute fuels not only aid in enhancing the engine performance but also cooperate in contracting the injurious tailpipe emissions. In this review article, a study has been made to evaluate the domination of biodiesel, n-butanol, and biogas on the performance and emission characteristics of the diesel engine in comparison to fossil diesel. Conclusions of empirical analysis considering emission and performance characteristics with different permutation and combination are put forwarded to understand the commuted result on various characteristics of the diesel engine. The comprehensive study recommends that the performance characteristics of the engine degrade with substitute fuels, whereas its emission characteristics are depicted to have abated.

Planet Earth is screaming. Will you listen?

The problem we are trying to solve is associated with air pollution caused by the use of unsustainable energy sources, especially by cars. Our aim is to inform people about the problem of air pollution and motivate them. As a solution, we are presenting the use of sustainable energy sources. The main goal of our project is to create the environmentally ideal city (based on the city we live in, New Smyrna), in which only sustainable energy sources will be used. Firstly, our project aims to make people understand the problem by presenting the consequences of the use of unsustainable energy sources through videos, researches, statistics and even games, to promote sustainable energy sources and make the advantages of them known to the people and to create a city that runs completely on sustainable energy sources, as well as the presentation of the city in a model.

The energy potential of agriculture, agroindustrial, livestock, and slaughterhouse biomass wastes through direct combustion and anaerobic digestion. The case of Colombia

In Colombia, agriculture and livestock production, and the processing agroindustry (including slaughterhouses) are a significant source of biomass wastes, which often generate significant environmental impacts. Waste-to-energy technologies, particularly direct combustion and anaerobic digestion systems are an alternative to revalorize these wastes as energy sources while reducing their environmental impacts. To this end, is necessary to identify the biomass-based energy potential from the available biomass wastes. It is additionally necessary to highlight potential applications of the biomass-based energy potential, to replace unsustainable energy sources like fossil fuels or cooking wood in the end-use energy mix. To this end, an inventory of the main crops and livestock produced in Colombia, and the share processed in agroindustry was developed to identify the available biomass wastes for energy applications. Based on the inventory, the biomass-based energy potential was calculated for the use of direct combustion and anaerobic digestion systems. The results show a bioenergy potential of 60,000 to 120,000 GWh per year, with higher potentialities for direct combustion systems than for anaerobic digestion. In particular, the biogas potential account for 90% of the use of natural gas and LPG. Moreover, using around half of the solid biomass available in direct combustion systems can potentially replace the use of solid fuels (i.e. wood and coal). In total, the combined use of direct combustion and anaerobic digestion can support from 50 to 97% of the use of gaseous and solid fuels. Using combined heat and power systems for heat and electricity production can increase the biomass share in the end-use energy mix up to 15–28%, including 27–53% of the 68,943 GWh of electricity produced in 2018.

A novel approach to the evaluation of contact thermal resistance at soil-structure interfaces

Considering the need to reduce our dependence on unsustainable energy sources and reducing the carbon footprint associated with building climate control, shallow geothermal energy represents an attractive sustainable technology for providing renewable heating and cooling. The temperature field generated around ground-coupled heat exchangers, and thus their energy efficiency, fundamentally depends on the heat transfer mechanism and the thermal properties of the materials involved. While the thermal properties of materials that make up the system can be defined with some certainty, little is known about the impact of contact thermal resistance at the soil-structure interface. Contact thermal resistance will reduce heat exchange efficiency and increase mechanical impacts associated with temperature changes within energy geo-structures. This paper describes a laboratory test method to quantify the contact thermal resistance of soil-concrete interfaces. The methodology is first evaluated using numerical analysis, and then validated against a test using a limestone aggregate concrete and fine, silica sand at differing levels of compaction.

Emerging sustainability concerns and policy implications of urban household consumption: A systematic literature review

Abstract The 2015 Paris Agreement marked a significant shift in public and scholarly discourse on climate change by laying more emphasis on stakeholder involvement and local level policies in achieving sustainability transitions. Sustainable Development Goal 12 further emphasises the importance of households in achieving sustainable consumption before 2030, especially in urban centres. However, since its adoption in 2015, no study has sought to synthesise the scholarship conducted around the emerging urban household consumption challenges that could inhibit the achievement of Goal 12. Through a systematic selection and in-depth review of relevant literature over the last five years, this paper assesses these sustainability challenges and critically examines the policy implications for achieving sustainable consumption. The review notes that in recent years, researchers have explored a range of issues including energy consumption, sustainable lifestyles, consumption footprints and class relations in urban household consumption through models and social perspectives. The urban household challenges identified include, inter alia: intensifying household consumption; rising commodification of household activities; continued reliance on unsustainable energy sources; low levels of sustainability education; high costs of sustainable lifestyles; and class differences in sustainable consumption patterns. In addressing these problems, the literature suggests strategies such as greening urban infrastructure, involving households in intervention programmes and promoting sustainability education, among others. Furthermore, to achieve Goal 12, future research and policy initiatives should consider the impact of materiality in household consumption, explore the interlinkages of household consumption with wider socio-cultural institutions and be more practice-oriented.

Artificial salmon tracking algorithm: Preliminary designing approach for optimizing the integrated mixed energy composition

Recently, an energy mix providing becomes an important problem to face unsustainable energy sources fuelled by coal derivation. The optimal composition between various energy sources also leads to the generated portion of the unit commitment. By considering this issues, these works are subjected to find out the optimal scheduled production of the energy mix throughout an optimization problem considered conventional and renewable energy sources. Moreover, these studies also introduce Artificial Salmon Tracking Algorithm for carrying out the problem. By considering technical requirements, results show that the total energy mixing is produced dynamically to feed the hourly demand. The contribution of the conventional and renewable energy sources affect to discharged pollutants.

Online Ski Rental for ON/OFF Scheduling of Energy Harvesting Base Stations

The co-existence of small cell base stations (SBSs) with conventional macrocell base station is a promising approach to boost the capacity and coverage of cellular networks. However, densifying the network with a viral deployment of SBSs can significantly increase energy consumption. To reduce the reliance on unsustainable energy sources, one can adopt self-powered SBSs that rely solely on energy harvesting. Due to the uncertainty of energy arrival and the finite capacity of energy storage systems, self-powered SBSs must smartly optimize their ON and OFF schedule. In this paper, the problem of ON/OFF scheduling of self-powered SBSs is studied, in the presence of energy harvesting uncertainty with the goal of minimizing the operational costs consisted of energy consumption and transmission delay of a network. For the original problem, we show an algorithm can solve the problem in the illustrative case. To reduce the complexity of the original problem, an approximation is proposed. To solve the approximated problem, a novel approach based on the ski rental framework, a powerful online optimization tool, is proposed. Using this approach, each SBS can effectively decide on its ON/OFF schedule autonomously, without any prior information on future energy arrivals. By using competitive analysis, a deterministic online algorithm (DOA) and a randomized online algorithm (ROA) are developed. ROA is shown to achieve the optimal competitive ratio in the approximation problem. Simulation results show that, compared to a baseline approach, the ROA can yield performance gains reaching up to 15.6% in terms of reduced total energy consumption of SBSs and up to 20.6% in terms of per-SBS network delay reduction. The results shed light on the fundamental aspects that impact the ON time of SBSs while demonstrating that the proposed ROA can reduce up to 69.9% the total cost compared to a baseline approach.

The Great Bifurcation and Prospects for Solar Communism in the Twenty-First Century

Confronting the challenge of dangerous climate change will require radical changes in the global physical and political economies. There is not much time left to act to reduce global carbon emissions. Unsustainable energy sources must be replaced with a high efficiency renewable energy infrastructure sufficient to bring atmospheric carbon dioxide down to a safe level and to eliminate energy poverty that now afflicts most of humanity. Success will greatly increase the prospects for ecosocialist transition to solar communism in this century. The prerequisites and necessary conditions for this transition are discussed in this paper.

News Briefs: Many developing countries could "leapfrog" from polluting, unsustainable energy sources to renewable technologies,

ADVERTISEMENT RETURN TO ISSUEPREVNewsNEXTNews Briefs: Many developing countries could "leapfrog" from polluting, unsustainable energy sources to renewable technologies,Cite this: Environ. Sci. Technol. 2000, 34, 7, 167APublication Date (Web):June 9, 2011Publication History Published online9 June 2011Published inissue 1 April 2000https://doi.org/10.1021/es003191eRIGHTS & PERMISSIONSArticle Views69Altmetric-Citations-LEARN ABOUT THESE METRICSArticle Views are the COUNTER-compliant sum of full text article downloads since November 2008 (both PDF and HTML) across all institutions and individuals. These metrics are regularly updated to reflect usage leading up to the last few days.Citations are the number of other articles citing this article, calculated by Crossref and updated daily. Find more information about Crossref citation counts.The Altmetric Attention Score is a quantitative measure of the attention that a research article has received online. Clicking on the donut icon will load a page at altmetric.com with additional details about the score and the social media presence for the given article. Find more information on the Altmetric Attention Score and how the score is calculated. Share Add toView InAdd Full Text with ReferenceAdd Description ExportRISCitationCitation and abstractCitation and referencesMore Options Share onFacebookTwitterWechatLinked InReddit PDF (2 MB) Get e-AlertsSUBJECTS:Energy Get e-Alerts