Bacterial Biomass along the Kuroshio Extension

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445

Logistics management and costs of biomass fuel supply

Discusses part of a project conducted by the authors into the logistics planning and management and costs of supplying biomass fuels to biomass-fired power stations in the UK. Defines biomass fuels and the reasons for the growth in interest in their use for electricity generation. The activities and parties involved in the biomass fuel supply chain are discussed together with the management of the chain in order to achieve smooth and consistent flow of biomass fuel to power stations. Explains the approach used to modelling the delivered costs of biomass fuels for four types of biomass fuel included in the project: forest fuel, short rotation coppice, straw and miscanthus. Comments are given on the environmental impacts of the fuel supply chains. The results indicate that straw supply systems are capable of producing the lowest delivered costs of the four fuels studied. Short rotation coppice and miscanthus, two new energy crops, are likely to have the highest delivered costs at present. This is due to the cost of growing these fuels and the financial incentives required by farmers to persuade them to grow these crops. Logistics costs (i.e. transport, storage and handling) are shown to represent a significant proportion of total delivered cost in biomass supply. Careful supply chain planning and logistics management will be of central importance to the success of the biomass industry.

Forest resources in Graciosa Island (Azores) : biomass availability for sustainable energetic use

Dissertação de Mestrado em Ambiente, Saúde e Segurança.

Cleanup of industrial effluents containing heavy metals: a new opportunity of valorising the biomass produced by brewing industry

Heavy metal pollution is a matter of concern in industrialised countries. Contrary to organic pollutants, heavy metals are not metabolically degraded. This fact has two main consequences: its bioremediation requires another strategy and heavy metals can be indefinitely recycled. Yeast cells of Saccharomyces cerevisiae are produced at high amounts as a by-product of brewing industry constituting a cheap raw material. In the present work, the possibility of valorising this type of biomass in the bioremediation of real industrial effluents containing heavy metals is reviewed. Given the autoaggregation capacity (flocculation) of brewing yeast cells, a fast and off-cost yeast separation is achieved after the treatment of metal-laden effluent, which reduces the costs associated with the process. This is a critical issue when we are looking for an effective, eco-friendly, and low-cost technology. The possibility of the bioremediation of industrial effluents linked with the selective recovery of metals, in a strategy of simultaneous minimisation of environmental hazard of industrial wastes with financial benefits from reselling or recycling the metals, is discussed.

Horizontal and vertical distributions of zooplanckton numbers and biomass off the coast of Peru

Estudio de las distribuciones horizontales y verticales del zooplancton a lo largo de una línea desde cerca de la costa hasta el borde de la plataforma.

A spatial modelling framework for assessing climate change impacts on freshwater ecosystems: Response of brown trout (Salmo trutta L.) biomass to warming water temperature

Mountain regions worldwide are particularly sensitive to on-going climate change. Specifically in the Alps in Switzerland, the temperature has increased twice as fast than in the rest of the Northern hemisphere. Water temperature closely follows the annual air temperature cycle, severely impacting streams and freshwater ecosystems. In the last 20 years, brown trout (Salmo trutta L) catch has declined by approximately 40-50% in many rivers in Switzerland. Increasing water temperature has been suggested as one of the most likely cause of this decline. Temperature has a direct effect on trout population dynamics through developmental and disease control but can also indirectly impact dynamics via food-web interactions such as resource availability. We developed a spatially explicit modelling framework that allows spatial and temporal projections of trout biomass using the Aare river catchment as a model system, in order to assess the spatial and seasonal patterns of trout biomass variation. Given that biomass has a seasonal variation depending on trout life history stage, we developed seasonal biomass variation models for three periods of the year (Autumn-Winter, Spring and Summer). Because stream water temperature is a critical parameter for brown trout development, we first calibrated a model to predict water temperature as a function of air temperature to be able to further apply climate change scenarios. We then built a model of trout biomass variation by linking water temperature to trout biomass measurements collected by electro-fishing in 21 stations from 2009 to 2011. The different modelling components of our framework had overall a good predictive ability and we could show a seasonal effect of water temperature affecting trout biomass variation. Our statistical framework uses a minimum set of input variables that make it easily transferable to other study areas or fish species but could be improved by including effects of the biotic environment and the evolution of demographical parameters over time. However, our framework still remains informative to spatially highlight where potential changes of water temperature could affect trout biomass. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.-

Development of remote monitoring process tools for biomass fired bubbling fluidized bed boilers

Remote monitoring of a power boiler allows the supplying company to make sure that equipment is used as supposed to and gives a good chance for process optimization. This improves co-operation between the supplier and the customer and creates an aura of trust that helps securing future contracts. Remote monitoring is already in use with recovery boilers but the goal is to expand especially to biomass-fired BFB-boilers. To make remote monitoring possible, data has to be measured reliably on site and the link between the power plant and supplying company’s server has to work reliably. Data can be gathered either with the supplier’s sensors or with measurements originally installed in the power plant if the plant in question is not originally built by the supplying company. Main goal in remote monitoring is process optimization and avoiding unnecessary accidents. This can be achieved for instance by following the efficiency curves and fouling in different parts of the process and comparing them to past values. The final amount of calculations depends on the amount of data gathered. Sudden changes in efficiency or fouling require further notice and in such a case it’s important that dialogue toward the power plant in question also works.

Invertase immobilised on montmorillonite: reusability enhancement and reduction in leaching

Invertase was immobilised on microporous montmorillonite K-10 via adsorption and covalent binding. The immobilised enzymes were tested for sucrose hydrolysis activity in a batch reactor. Km for immobilised systems was greater than free enzyme. The immobilised forms could be reused for 15 continuous cycles without any loss in activity. After 25 cycles, 85% initial activity was retained. A study on leaching of enzymes showed that 100% enzyme was retained even after 15 cycles of reuse. Leaching increased with reaction temperature. Covalent binding resisted leaching even at temperatures of 70 °C.