Many industries are heavily dependent on fossil fuels to carry out their daily operations. As the deposits of fossil fuels deplete, the need for sustainable energy sources rises as well as the need to develop sustainable solution such as electric vehicles and drones. Companies have begun incorporating drones in their operations; from autonomous drone taxis to using drones for parcel deliveries. This work proposes an energy management system consisting of multiple energy sources integrated in a drone/robot to optimize the switching between different sources to increase the drone/robot's flight time and travel distance. Different constraints will be considered, primarily the state of charge of the batteries. The concept of scheduling components in a system to generate the optimal operating sequence could be used in many areas. By altering the inputs and constraints, this algorithm could be used to optimize the operations of electric vehicles, smart homes, and other applications.
The use of non-corrosive fiber-reinforced polymers (FRPs) in reinforced concrete structures started in the 1960s as alternatives to steel reinforcements. Basalt fiber-reinforced polymers (BFRPs) have recently been introduced as new FRP bars for reinforced concrete structures. In this study, three dimensional (3D) finite element (FE) modelling is performed to evaluate the structural performance of BFRP reinforced concrete (BFRP-RC) columns subjected to eccentric loading, using Abaqus?. This paper discusses the details of the FE model created for the BFRP-RC columns, followed by the model verification and the results. The 3D FE model was verified in the light of BFRP-RC columns tested experimentally under eccentric loading. After that, a parametric study was conducted to evaluate the effects of changing longitudinal reinforcement ratio and eccentricity on the behavior of the columns. Finally, several interaction diagrams were developed for the BFRP-RC columns using the FE model.
In 2007 the government of Abu Dhabi published a plan for the year 2030, in which a thorough strategy of growth was shared, with Masdar City as a sustainable neighborhood to portray to the world what a zero-carbon emission city would look like. Nevertheless, the project has not reached the milestones at the times it was originally thought, and the transportation infrastructure has not made justice to the sustainability claims of the development. The built environment of Masdar City makes great proposals for environmentally friendly alternatives of transportation, but the isolation of the neighborhood has hindered this objective. In this research, different factors are compared to the travel mode and travel time of the people who work/study at Masdar City in order to compare the influence the neighborhood has on commute to work/studies and on nonwork or studies related travel.
The paper aims at the last mile of a business to consumer delivery system, where the parcels ordered by a consumer online are delivered at the doorstep of the customer. Currently it is estimated that on average, the Last mile can contribute more than 15 % of the total logistics costs. This can be attributed to missed deliveries, cancelled orders, fuel price hikes, constant traffic blocks, unreasonable time windows for delivery. in addition consider, that a customer order a product from two different companies. Each company will delivery separately. contributing to the environmental pollution and each has its own delivery cost. This paper proposes a consolidation in the deliveries from all the companies. A delivery box (DB) system is proposed, where several deliveries, from several companies are consolidated according to the region at the Urban consolidation centers and are then delivered to a location that is within a close range of the customer. The DBs are delivered once every day and collected back every night, the uncollected parcels are added to the pool of deliveries for the next day. hence no additional costs are incured. the proposed model should decrease the total B@C logistics costs by a high margin.
The passivating properties provided by Al2O3 layers deposited by thermal ALD on p-type crystalline silicon is presented. Minority carrier lifetimes of 8.5 ms were obtained corresponding to an SRV of 1.5 cm/s after forming gas anneal. Similar lifetimes of 8.3 ms are achieved following an anneal in air of a 25 nm thick Al2O3 film. The passivation mechanisms are studied using C-V measurements, very low density of interface traps (<1011eV>2x1012cm-2) are largely responsible for this. We have shown that the lifetime can be maintained at reasonably high values of 3.4 ms for films of 10 nm. Further reduction of the film thickness results in a large decrease in lifetime down to 0.3 ms, a study is undertaken to determine the contribution of the field effect passivation and chemical passivation respectively in these films.
Research shows that there is a great value for the alternative sources of energy that are sustainable and that are of less cost. This research is a mixed methods research that aims at evaluating the potential of success of landfill gas energy in the UAE. The researcher conducted semi-structured interviews with UAE families to estimate their awareness of biofuel gas energy. Researchers reviewed the literature systematically and prototyped the project of entrepreneurship in this field of industry. The aim of this research is to evaluate the readiness of UAE nationals and institutions to start this kind of alternative energy. To achieve this aim the researcher interviewed 60 respondents before and after prototyping the idea of this type of alternative energy. Researcher interviewed the decision makers in DEWA to test the acceptance of the prototype and the readiness for application.
Biomass thermal conversion is currently widely used for the production of renewable energy. The process involved high temperature processing of organic (carbonaceous) material in a controlled environment (reactor). Depending on the reactor operating condition (temperature and residence time) the process can be optimized to predominantly produce bio-gas (gasification), bio-oil (pyrolysis) or bio-char (carbonization). This study presents the details of commissioning and optimization of the biomass feeding in an augur reactor as part of a newly built lab-scale gasification/pyrolysis system. This reactor and its operating principles are less understood compared to other conventional types. The reactor feeding system comprises a biomass hopper, primary motor and screw feeder, a drop tube and a secondary motor connected to a main screw feeding directly to the heated reactor. Various biomass particle sizes and aeration gas flow rates have been tested to determine a correlation between the biomass mass flow and the motor speed (rpm). The results will be used for future mapping of the reactor performance in terms of the product yield, biomass feeding rate and particle size.
Sabkha is a salt flat that contains different types of evaporates like gypsum (CaSO4.2H2O) which is a semisoluble salt. Gypsum rocks dissolves when it is subjected to water flow creating cavities in the subsurface threating by this the underground and above ground infrastructure safety. This research aims at assessing the risks associated with evaporites by focusing on the gypsum behavior when it react with flowing water. Artificial gypsum samples are subjected to flow under confining pressures to simulate the underground conditions. The flow rate effect on the gypsum samples kinetics is studied.
The results show that when the flow rate increases, the concentration decreases but the total amount of the gypsum dissolved is higher when compared to the lower flow rate experiments. Also, the existence of an initial fracture (hole within the sample), increases the dissolution rate by increasing the contacting area between the flowing water and the gypsum.
Smart homes are an integral part of smart city and can generate energy consumption data in the order of Petabytes. This thesis proposes an effective methodology on how to collect, transmit, store, analyze and visualize big data and develop meaningful insights to improve energy delivery and consumption. The thesis utilizes the recent open source distributed file system techniques and map-reduce algorithms. The data processing, analysis and presentation will be developed individually to monetize the insight value of data in the form of dashboards consisting of charts, graphs, and reports. The dashboards can be accessed by utility and consumers to better operate and manage their energy generation, distribution, and consumption. Finally, a performance evaluation test will be conducted for each architecture implementation based on different qualitative parameters such as scalability, latency, and throughput. The outcome of the proposed techniques will be compared with the conventional existing dimensional modeling framework.
The aridity of climate requires accurate assessments of land suitability for optimum exploitation of irrigated agriculture which accounts for non-renewable sources. This research aims at assessing and prioritizing areas in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi for large-scale agriculture using a number of datasets (climate conditions, water potential, soil capabilities, topography, and land management). All datasets were systematically aggregated using an AHP-GIS model. A hierarchal structure is built and pairwise comparisons matrices are used to calculate weights of the criteria. In order to preserve some flexibility for future agricultural pathways, different types of crops are considered. Results show that jojoba and sorghum show the best capabilities to survive under the current conditions, followed by date palm, fruits, and forage. Introducing desalinated water and TSE enhanced land capability for irrigated agriculture. These findings have positive implications for the decision-making process of land alteration for agricultural use and addressing sustainable land management and food security.
