Application of waste heat powered absorption refrigeration system to the LNG recovery process

The recovery process of the liquefied natural gas requires low temperature cooling, which is typically provided by the vapor compression refrigeration systems. The usage of an absorption refrigeration system powered by waste heat from the electric power generating gas turbine could provide the necessary cooling at reduced overall energy consumption. In this study, a potential replacement of propane chillers with absorption refrigeration systems was theoretically analyzed. From the analysis, it was found that recovering waste heat from a 9 megawatts (MW) electricity generation process could provide 5.2 MW waste heat produced additional cooling to the LNG plant and save 1.9 MW of electricity consumption. Application of the integrated cooling, heating, and power is an excellent energy saving option for the oil and gas industry.     

Performance characterization of gas engine generator integrated with a liquid desiccant dehumidification system

Combined heat and power (CHP) involves on-site or near-site generation of electricity along with utilization of thermal energy available from the power generation process. CHP has the potential of providing a 30% improvement over conventional power plant efficiency and a CO₂ emissions reduction of 45% or more as compared to the US national average. In addition, an overall total system efficiency of 80% can be achieved because of the utilization of thermal energy that would be wasted if only the electric power were utilized, and because of the reduction of transmission, distribution, and energy conversion losses. The current research is being carried out in a four-story educational office building. This research focuses on the design, installation, and analysis of a modular CHP system consisting of a natural gas fired reciprocating engine generator with a liquid desiccant dehumidification system. The engine generator provides 75 kW of electric power to the building load bus while the combined waste heat from the exhaust gases and jacket water are used to regenerate the liquid desiccant. The liquid desiccant unit dehumidifies and cools the ventilation air to the building and supplies it to the mixed air section of the roof top unit. This paper discusses the various aspects involved in the design and installation of the system such as the heat recovery loop design and the electrical interconnection with the building load bus. Test results are also presented and the performance is compared to a traditional power plant with a conventional heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning system.     

EFFECT OF FAR-INFRARED HEATER ON THE PHYSICOCHEMICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF GREEN TEA DURING PROCESSING

ABSTRACT

The green tea leaves (Camellia sinensis var. sinensis) were irradiated by a far‐infrared (FIR) heater during the roasting and drying step, resulting in three different treatments produced. Green tea was extracted by soaking the leaves in water, and the components were analyzed. FIR irradiation, combined with fryer heating during the roasting step and additionally applied after the drying step, increased total phenolic contents of green tea from 116.30 to 171.77 mg/g, and total flavanol contents from 17.54 to 24.76 mg/g, compared with the non‐irradiated control. Ascorbic acid contents also increased from 3.07 to 4.20 mg/g. The amounts of epicatechin gallate and epigallocatechin gallate were significantly increased from 2.41 to 4.59 mg/mL and 20.61 to 28.54 mg/mL, respectively, compared with the non‐irradiated control. FIR irradiation increased Nitrite Scavenging Ability of green tea at pH 3.0 and pH 4.2, while there was no significant difference at pH 6.0. Sweetness, umami and aroma of green tea were enhanced by FIR irradiation, while bitterness and astringency were decreased compared with those of the control. These results show that FIR heating during the green tea process affected the chemical properties of green tea, and the FIR heater can be applied to increase the physicochemical qualities of green tea.

PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS

Green tea, a widely consumed drink, has received much attention because of the beneficial biological effects attributable to its excellent antioxidant activity. In this article, a far‐infrared (FIR)‐heater for industrial application was used during the processing of green tea leaves, and the chemical characteristics and quality of FIR‐treated green tea were determined. FIR irradiation, combined with fryer heating during the roasting step and additionally applied after the drying step, significantly increased phenolic, flavanol, ascorbic acid, epicatechin gallate, epigallocatechin gallate contents and nitrite‐scavenging activity compared with non‐irradiated control. Sensory evaluation also showed a positive effect of FIR irradiation. The results indicated that FIR heater could be easily applied to increase the quality of green tea in the processing line.     

High efficiency micro trigeneration systems

This work focuses on micro polygeneration research in three areas: prime movers, cooling devices, and novel system integration options. An original analysis of matching prime mover heat sources to thermally-driven devices is presented, and waste heat for eight prime movers used in micro CHP is characterized using a T-Q diagram. “Micro” is roughly defined as 1–50 kW electric, and an emphasis is placed on systems of <5 kW electric. With regard to cooling technologies, the increasing demand for tight control of humidity and ventilation represents distinct opportunities for integrated energy systems. Polygeneration can provide efficient ways to accomplish better comfort, such as by separating sensible and latent cooling loads. The increasing legislation dealing with GWP of refrigerants for vapor compression systems also provides a driving force for thermally-activated cooling. Advances are being made both for vapor compression and thermally-activated cooling cycles, and a review is provided of research in the areas of transcritical cycles, subcooling, adsorption cooling, desiccant dehumidification, and integrated systems. Many new adsorbent working pairs and desiccant dehumidification materials have driving temperatures low enough to utilize heat from reciprocating engine coolant or even a vapor compression condenser. This enables smaller installations to benefit from combined cooling, heating and power; and opens new possibilities for separating sensible and latent cooling to extend the operating range of sorption-based heat pumps and improve solar cooling efficiency.     

Management of Address Information to Improve Quality of Customer Contact

Customer relationship management systems are gaining importance in today's business environment since customer satisfaction is crucial to the success of an enterprise, and especially so in e-business environment where customers can find substitute suppliers quite easily. In CRM, the quality of customer information is very important, and the address information even more so. It is because the address information plays a major role for customer contact channel and for timely and effective marketing service. Furthermore, it gives the basic source of geographic information for the offline delivery, the terminal activity of the e-commerce. In this study, we analyze various standards and proposals for the address information, and propose data models for the management of the information focusing on address components, and proto-type systems for management and service.     

Concolic testing of the multi-sector read operation for flash storage platform software

In today’s information society, flash memory has become a virtually indispensable component, particularlyfor mobile devices. In order for mobile devices to operate successfully, it is essential that flash memorybe controlled correctly through flash storage platform software such as the file system, flash translation layer,and low-level device drivers. However, as is typical for embedded software, conventional testing methods oftenfail to detect hidden flaws in the software due to the difficulty of creating effective test cases. As a differentapproach, model checking techniques guarantee a complete analysis, but only on a limited scale. In this paper,we describe an empirical study wherein a concolic testing method is applied to the multi-sector read operation for flash storage platform software. This method combines a concrete dynamic execution and a symbolic execution to automatically generate test cases for full path coverage. Through the experiments, we analyze the advantages and weaknesses of the concolic testing approach on the flash storage platform software.     

Image flickering reduction by dimer and polymer stabilization in FFS liquid crystal display

Power consumption of a liquid crystal display, when it is used to display static images, can be reduced by using low frequency driving. However, when the driving frequency is decreased, the brightness of the display may change with time, a phenomenon known as image flickering. One factor responsible for the flickering issue is flexoelectric effect which is sensitive to the polarity of the applied voltage. We show that the flickering in fringe field switching (FFS) LCD can be significantly reduced by doping a liquid crystal dimer and using polymer stabilization. We demonstrated that 2 Hz driving frequency can be used to display static images.     

Oxidative transformation of micropollutants during municipal wastewater treatment: Comparison of kinetic aspects of selective (chlorine, chlorine dioxide, ferrate, and ozone) and non-selective oxidants (hydroxyl radical)

Chemical oxidation processes have been widely applied to water treatment and may serve as a tool to minimize the release of micropollutants (e.g. pharmaceuticals and endocrine disruptors) from municipal wastewater effluents into the aquatic environment. The potential of several oxidants for the transformation of selected micropollutants such as atenolol, carbamazepine, 17α-ethinylestradiol (EE2), ibuprofen, and sulfamethoxazole was assessed and compared. The oxidants include chlorine, chlorine dioxide, ferrate^VI, and ozone as selective oxidants versus hydroxyl radicals as non-selective oxidant. Second-order rate constants (k) for the reaction of each oxidant show that the selective oxidants react only with some electron-rich organic moieties (ERMs), such as phenols, anilines, olefins, and deprotonated-amines. In contrast, hydroxyl radicals show a nearly diffusion-controlled reactivity with almost all organic moieties (k ≥ 10⁹ M⁻¹ s⁻¹). Due to a competition for oxidants between a target micropollutant and wastewater matrix (i.e. effluent organic matter, EfOM), a higher reaction rate with a target micropollutant does not necessarily translate into more efficient transformation. For example, transformation efficiencies of EE2, a phenolic micropollutant, in a selected wastewater effluent at pH 8 varied only within a factor of 7 among the selective oxidants, even though the corresponding k for the reaction of each selective oxidant with EE2 varied over four orders of magnitude. In addition, for the selective oxidants, the competition disappears rapidly after the ERMs present in EfOM are consumed. In contrast, for hydroxyl radicals, the competition remains practically the same during the entire oxidation. Therefore, for a given oxidant dose, the selective oxidants were more efficient than hydroxyl radicals for transforming ERMs-containing micropollutants, while hydroxyl radicals are capable of transforming micropollutants even without ERMs. Besides EfOM, ammonia, nitrite, and bromide were found to affect the micropollutant transformation efficiency during chlorine or ozone treatment.     

Prevention of Pinking, Off-odor, and Lipid Oxidation in Irradiated Pork Loin Using Double Packaging

ABSTRACT: Lipid oxidation, color, volatiles, and sensory evaluation of double-packaged pork loin were determined to establish a modified packaging method that can improve the quality of irradiated pork loins. Vacuum-packaged irradiated samples produced dimethyl sulfide and dimethyl disulfide responsible for irradiation off-odor, whereas lipid oxidation was promoted under aerobic conditions. Exposing double-packaged irradiated pork to aerobic conditions for 1 to 3 d was effective in controlling both lipid oxidation and irradiation off-odor, regardless of packaging sequence. Sensory panels could distinguish the decrease in irradiation off-odor intensities by modifying the packaging method. However, carbon monoxide heme pigments, responsible for the increased redness by irradiation, were not effectively controlled by double packaging alone.