Upgrading coal-derived liquids to diesel fuel

Distilled fractions of a coal-derived liquid from the H-Coal process were upgraded to diesel fuel by catalytic hydrotreatment. The total hydrotreated products were distilled into naphtha (<180°C) and diesel fuel fractions (>180°C) and the diesel fractions were analysed for hydrocarbon-type composition, hydrogen content and some diesel fuel properties. GC—MS-analyses were carried out on the hydrocarbon-type fractions to identify individual chemical compounds. To investigate the effect of different distillation cut points on diesel fuel yield and properties, cut points for one hydrotreated product were varied. The diesel fuel cetane numbers were correlated with percentage hydrogen, total aromatics and saturates. Cetane numbers above 40 were obtained for diesel fuels containing (i) more than 75% saturates, (ii) less than 15% total aromatics and (iii) a hydrogen content above 12.8%. Compounds identified by GC—MS-analyses (in the diesel fractions) were typical aromatic and cycloparaffin compounds. Normal-and iso-paraffin compounds were not detected. By varying the distillation cut point from 135 to 180°C, the cetane number of the residual diesel fraction improved from 37 to 44. This increase is ascribed to the removal of aromatic compounds in the 135–180°C boiling point range.     

The heater test at the Grimsel Rock Laboratory: The thermo-mechanical response of the rock mass to a heat flux

The Grimsel Test Site (Felslabor Grimsel — FLG) is situated at a depth of 450 m in the Juchlistock massif of the Bernese Oberland. It is managed by the National Cooperative for the Storage of Radioactive Waste (NAGRA-Switzerland).By means of a heater test, the power output of canisters filled with high-level waste is simulated. This heater test is performed by the German Gesellschaft für Strahlen- und Umweltforschung — GSF. Two electrical heaters, with a heatable length of 6 m, a diameter of 0.3 m and an available power of 4 kW/m, are installed in two vertical boreholes. One of them is located in the granite adjacent to a strongly fractured lamprophyre vein, the other one directly within this disturbed zone. They are operating since August 1986.The thermo-mechanical reaction of the rock mass is registered by a large number of measurement devices which are installed in an array of instrument boreholes around the heaters. They record the deformation and the alteration of rock stresses, the pore water pressure and the water conductivity caused by heating.     

ALUM SHALE BITUMEN MATURATION AND MIGRATION: IMPLICATIONS FOR GOTLAND'S OIL

Thermal maturation of Swedish Alum Shale kerogen and bitumen has been determined from core samples from Eastern and Central Sweden. In samples from Eastern Sweden (Öland and Gotland), the kerogen and bitumen are thermally immature with respect to petroleum generation. In some areas of Central Sweden (Närke, ÖstergÖtland, and Kinnekulle in VästergÖtland), the kerogen is immature, whereas the bitumen is marginally mature to mature. In other areas of Central Sweden (Halleberg-Hunneberg in VästergÖtland), the kerogen is supermature and the bitumen mature. This suggests that bitumen from a mature source-rock has migrated into the Alum Shales of Central Sweden. Migration in Central Sweden is further evidenced by the occurrence of obviously-migrated bituments in vugs and voids in the organicpoor Ordovician limestone overlying the Alum Shale in Central Sweden, and in concretions within the Alum Shale itself. Based on biomarker distributions of extracted bitumen, Alum Shale kerogen pyrolysate and obviously-migrated oils, and the fact that the Alum Shale in most of the areas studied is the only petroleum source-rock extant, it is suggested that the migrated bitumen in Central Sweden is from the Alum Shale itself. Bitumen has migrated from areas where the Alum Shale is in close proxmity to Permo-Carboniferous intrusions, such as Halleberg-Hunneberg, into nearby areas such as Närke and ÖstergÖtland, where there is no evidence of intrusion and the indigenous organic matter is thermally immature. Other areas, where Alum Shales were associated with intrusions and consequently sourced oil, may have been eroded away. There are producing wells on the island of Gotland, where the Alum Shale is also thermally immature. It is therefore assumed that heating which was responsible for generating Gotland's oil was very localized (such as by an intrusion) or that the oil has migrated from a thermally moremature, distant area. On the basis of reservoir rock porosity, and the fact that the Alum Shale of Gotland contains no migrated component, localized heating is favored.     

Fine-line conductor manufacturing using drop-on demand PZT printingtechnology

An emerging selective metallization process to fabricate fine-line conductors based on drop-on-demand (DOD) ink jet printing and novel nano-particle fluid suspensions (NPFS) was studied. The suspensions consist of 1-10 nm silver or gold particulates that are homogeneously suspended in an organic carrier. A piezo-electric droplet generator driven by a bipolar voltage signal is used to dispense 50-70 μm diameter droplets traveling at 1-3 m/s before impacting a compliant polyimide substrate. The deposit/substrate composite is subsequently processed at 300°C for 15 min to allow for complete evaporation of the carrier and for sintering of the nano-particles, thereby yielding a finished circuit interconnect. Test vehicles created using this technique exhibit features as fine as 120 μm wide and 1 μm thick with resistivities on the order of 3.5×10^-5 Ωcm. The circuitry performed well under environmental conditioning. As expected, repeatability of circuitry fabrication showed sensitivity to the generation of steady, satellite-free droplets. In an effort to generate droplets consistently, it is essential to develop a strong fundamental understanding of the correlation between device excitation parameters and dispensed fluid properties, and to resolve the microrheological behavior of the NPFS when flowing through the droplet generator     

Scrubbing Hydrogen Sulfide from Gases. A Rational Approach

Worsening of the environmental situation in many regions of Russia in recent decades is to a great degree due to production and refining of oil and gas with a high hydrogen sulfide content. Industrial methods of utilization of hydrogen sulfide are extremely irrational: it is either burned in flares or used for production of sulfur whose quality and quantity pose new problems related to its use.     

Solution of process flowsheets by formal gauss elimination

The paper describes the principles involved in two computer programs which calculate mass and heat balances for ammonia and methanol loops. Non-linear conditions are solved in an outer loop whereas the inner loop solves a set of linear equations by a formal Gauss triangulation and numerical back substitution.     

A Compositional Framework for Hardware/Software Co-Design

We describe a compositional framework, together with its supporting toolset, for hardware/software co-design. Our framework is an integration of a formal approach within a traditional design flow. The formal approach is based on Interval Temporal Logic and its executable subset, Tempura. Refinement is the key element in our framework because it will derivefrom a single formal specification of the system the software and hardware parts of the implementation, while preserving all properties of the system specification. During refinement simulation is used to choose the appropriate refinement rules, which are applied automatically in the HOL system. The framework is illustrated with two case studies. The work presented is part of a UK collaborative research project between the Software Technology Research Laboratory at the De Montfort University and the Oxford University Computing Laboratory.