Waste to power

ABSTRACT: There has been a growing trend towards the use of biomass as a primary energy source, which now contributes over 54% of the European pulp and paper industry energy needs [1]. The remaining part comes from natural gas, which to a large extent serves as the major source of energy for numerous recovered fiber paper mills located in regions with limited available forest resources. The cost of producing electricity to drive paper machinery and generate heat for steam is increasing as world demand for fossil fuels increases. Additionally, recovered fiber paper mills are also significant producers of fibrous sludge and reject waste material that can contain high amounts of useful energy. Currently, a majority of these waste fractions is disposed of by landspreading, incineration, or landfill. Paper mills must also pay a gate fee to process their waste streams in this way and the result of this is a further increase in operating costs. This work has developed methods to utilize the waste fractions produced at recovered fiber paper mills for the onsite production of combined heat and power (CHP) using advanced thermal conversion methods (pyrolysis and gasification) that are well suited to relatively small scales of throughput. The electrical power created would either be used onsite to power the paper making process or alternatively exported to the national grid, and the surplus heat created could also be used onsite or exported to a local customer. The focus of this paper is to give a general overview of the project progress so far and will present the experimental results of the most successful thermal conversion trials carried out by this work to date. Application: The research provides both paper mills and energy providers with methodologies to condition their waste materials for conversion into useful energy. The research also opens up new markets for gasifier and pyrolysis equipment manufacturers and suppliers.

Trago Mills (South Devon) Ltd v Information Commissioner 2012

Case law report - online

Influence of Increased Human Presence in the Mills River Basin on Water Availability and Drought

Periods of drought and low streamflow can have profound impacts on both human and natural systems. People depend on a reliable source of water for numerous reasons including potable water supply and to produce economic value through agriculture or energy production. Aquatic ecosystems depend on water in addition to the economic benefits they provide to society through ecosystem services. Given that periods of low streamflow may become more extreme and frequent in the future, it is important to study the factors that control water availability during these times. In the absence of precipitation the slower hydrological response of groundwater systems will play an amplified role in water supply. Understanding the variability of the fraction of streamflow contribution from baseflow or groundwater during periods of drought provides insight into what future water availability may look like and how it can best be managed. The Mills River Basin in North Carolina is chosen as a case-study to test this understanding. First, obtaining a physically meaningful estimation of baseflow from USGS streamflow data via computerized hydrograph analysis techniques is carried out. Then applying a method of time series analysis including wavelet analysis can highlight signals of non-stationarity and evaluate the changes in variance required to better understand the natural variability of baseflow and low flows. In addition to natural variability, human influence must be taken into account in order to accurately assess how the combined system reacts to periods of low flow. Defining a combined demand that consists of both natural and human demand allows us to be more rigorous in assessing the level of sustainable use of a shared resource, in this case water. The analysis of baseflow variability can differ based on regional location and local hydrogeology, but it was found that baseflow varies from multiyear scales such as those associated with ENSO (3.5, 7 years) up to multi decadal time scales, but with most of the contributing variance coming from decadal or multiyear scales. It was also found that the behavior of baseflow and subsequently water availability depends a great deal on overall precipitation, the tracks of hurricanes or tropical storms and associated climate indices, as well as physiography and hydrogeology. Evaluating and utilizing the Duke Combined Hydrology Model (DCHM), reasonably accurate estimates of streamflow during periods of low flow were obtained in part due to the model’s ability to capture subsurface processes. Being able to accurately simulate streamflow levels and subsurface interactions during periods of drought can be very valuable to water suppliers, decision makers, and ultimately impact citizens. Knowledge of future droughts and periods of low flow in addition to tracking customer demand will allow for better management practices on the part of water suppliers such as knowing when they should withdraw more water during a surplus so that the level of stress on the system is minimized when there is not ample water supply.

Active Energy: Three Mills - open workshop

On 14th May, as part of National Mills Weekend, an open workshop was held outside the 18th century House Mill in Bromley by Bow, the world's largest tidal mill. Members of the Geezers Club in Bow worked in the open air with an engineer to construct the stream wheel, which is being developed in ‘flat pack’ format to maximize transferability. The wheel will be installed in the River Lea later this year.

Entre ética e ironía: aspectos retóricos en los “pies de foto” de Juan José Millás.

The aim of this short essay is to analyze the techniques of argumentation developed by the writer and journalist Juan José Millás in his articles named Pie de Foto. Millás is known for his peculiar way of writing, in which language is highly unstable and is thereby apt to the creation of new perspectives and points of view. In the Pie de Foto, this ambivalence of language is enriched by the presence of a picture, of which his textual article is a comment. Using the definition given by Genette, Millás rhetoric is not a ‘restricted’ one but it is a complex system, in which also the apparently superficial figures can provide semantic effects and enrich information. Within this frame, irony plays a fundamental role because it helps questioning the standard discourse of politics. By means of techniques such as the mechanical reproduction and the ridiculing of the fallacies hidden in common sense, Millas raises ethical problems and develops a critique to the postmodern way of life in western countries.

Lo que sé de los hombrecillos de Juan José Millás: la ficción psicótica de la sociedad perfecta.

This short essay deals with literary representations of identity and of social reality, especially in relation to the novelistic works published by the Spanish writer Juan José Millás. The article is divided into three parts. The first section is dedicated to a general overview of the new perspectives brought by the contemporary ‘linguistic turn’ in culture, which is currently considered as the product of different discourses and not as an ontological datum. The postmodern condition, on the other hand, is described as the age in which it has become radically difficult to rely on such ideas as “nation” and “people” for the construction of personal identity. The second part of the article identifies Millás’ poetics as an excellent example of describing the neurotic symptoms produced by the urban way of life in Western communities. Millás recognizes the separateness between language and material reality as the origin of the subject's isolation, especially in contemporary life. Finally, the third part handles with Lo que sé de los hombrecillos, the last novel by Millás, in which we witness a significant switch from neurosis to psychosis in the mind of the protagonist who offers us a distorted realisation of his idea of community and plenitude.

Enzymatic upgrading of eucalypt paper-grade kraft pulp within dissolving pulp production

Dissolving-grade pulps are commonly used for the production of cellulose derivatives and regenerated cellulose. High cellulose content, low content of non-cellulosic material, high brightness, a uniform molecular weight distribution and high cellulose reactivity are the key features that determine the quality of a dissolving pulp. The first part of this work was an optimization study regarding the application of selected enzymes in different stages of a new purification process recently developed in Novozymes for purifying an eucalypt Kraft pulp into dissolving pulp, as an alternative to the pre-hydrolysis kraft (PHK) process. In addition, a viscosity reduction was achieved by cellulase (endoglucanase) treatment in the beginning of the sequence, while the GH11 and GH10 xylanases contributed to boost the brightness of the final pulp. The second part of the work aimed at exploring different auxiliary enzyme activities together with a key xylanase towards further removal of recalcitrant hemicelluloses from a partially bleached Eucalypt Kraft pulp. The resistant fraction (ca. 6% xylan in pulp) was not hydrolysable by the different combinations of enzymes tested. Production of a dissolving pulp was successful when using a cold caustic extraction (CCE) stage in the end of the sequence O-X-DHCE-X-HCE-D-CCE. The application of enzymes improved process efficiency. The main requirements for the production of a dissolving pulp (suitable for viscose making) were fulfilled: 2,7% residual xylan, 92,4% of brightness, a viscosity within the values of a commercial dissolving pulp and increased reactivity.

Dust recovery practice at blast furnaces; an evaluation of settleable solids formation and recovery at mills in the Ohio Valley and a suggested proceedure [sic] for defining performance of wastewater clarifiers.

"Reference data publication."

Sacrum w drodze. Moskwa-Pietuszki Wieniedikta Jerofiejewa i Pulp Fiction Quentina Taranino w kluczu montażowego czytania

The aim of this monograph is the attempt of reading the poem Moscow-Petushki by Venedikt Erofeev and the film Pulp Fiction by Quentin Tarantino using the comparative approach, in which we go beyond the range of factual relationships, historical influences or similarities functioning in the structure of the presented world. The purpose of the book is to see both works of art from the angle of the montage theory of Sergei Eisenstein – the outstanding and highly regarded Russian director and film philosopher – which means studying cultural phenomena in their mutual intertextual relationships. The book focuses on the interpretation of the selected Tarantino’s and Erofeev’s texts of culture, in which the subject of the city, the search for the concept of the body at the end of 20th century and the problem of addictions constitute the dominant thematic issues. The monograph also offers the insight into the nature of the phenomenon of postmodernism and treats Eisenstein’s philosophy as the specific type of anticipation of postmodern tendencies in cinematography.