The physical properties and the hydrogen release of NaBH₄–Mg(BH₄)₂ and NaBH₄−Ca(BH₄)₂ composites are investigated using<i> in situ </i>synchrotron radiation powder X-ray diffraction, thermal analysis and temperature programmed photographic analysis. The composite, <i>x</i>NaBH₄–(1 − <i>x</i>)Mg(BH₄)₂, <i>x</i> =...

Organic Rankine cycles (ORCs) are an established technology to convert waste heat to electricity. Although several commercial implementations exist, there is still considerable potential for thermo-economic optimization. As such, a novel framework for designing optimized ORC systems is proposed...

We apply a modified proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) to large eddy simulation data of a wind turbine wake in a turbulent atmospheric boundary layer. The turbine is modeled as an actuator disk. Our analysis mainly focuses on the pragmatic identification of spatial modes, which yields a low...

Electric vehicles constitute a multidisciplinary subject that involves disciplines such as automotive, mechanical, electrical and control engineering. Due to this multidisciplinary technical nature, practical teaching methodologies are of special relevance. Paradoxically, in the past, the...

Accurate forecasting of fossil fuel energy consumption for power generation is important and fundamental for rational power energy planning in the electricity industry. The least squares support vector machine (LSSVM) is a powerful methodology for solving nonlinear forecasting issues with small...

In order to realize the non-contact measurement of ceramic insulator contamination severity, a method based on feature level fusion of infrared (IR) and ultraviolet (UV) image information is proposed in this paper. IR and UV images of artificially polluted insulators were obtained from high...

Currently, there are considerable discrepancies between China’s central government and some local governments in attitudes towards coal to liquids (CTL) technology. Energy return on investment (EROI) analysis of CTL could provide new insights that may help solve this dilemma. Unfortunately,...

During the last years, special attention has been paid to renewable polygeneration technologies, able of simultaneously producing thermal, cooling, electrical energy and desalinated water from seawater. This paper focuses on an innovative polygeneration system driven by renewable energy sources,...

This paper deals with the power conversion system architectures to interface a stationary electrochemical storage installation with the network. Theoretical justifications about the conversion system layouts and control, used for actual Italian installations, are given. This paper aims at giving...

The supercritical water gasification process is an alternative to both conventional gasification as well as anaerobic digestion as it does not require drying and the process takes place at much shorter residence times; a few minutes at most. The drastic changes in the thermo-physical properties...