Life-cycle assessment of hydrogen technologies with the focus on EU critical raw materials and end-of-life strategies

We present the results of a life-cycle assessment (LCA) for the manufacturing and end-of-life (EoL) phases of the following fuel-cell and hydrogen (FCH) technologies: alkaline water electrolyser (AWE), polymer-electrolyte-membrane water electrolyser (PEMWE), high-temperature (HT) and low-temperature (LT) polymer-electrolyte-membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs), together with the balance-of-plant components. New life-cycle inventories (LCIs), i.e., material inputs for the AWE, PEMWE and HT PEMFC are developed, whereas the existing LCI for the LT PEMFC is adopted from a previous EU-funded project. The LCA models for all four FCH technologies are created by modelling the manufacturing phase, followed by defining the EoL strategies and processes used and finally by assessing the effects of the EoL approach using environmental indicators. The effects are analysed with a stepwise approach, where the CML2001 assessment method is used to evaluate the environmental impacts. The results show that the environmental impacts of the manufacturing phase can be substantially reduced by using the proposed EoL strategies (i.e., recycled materials being used in the manufacturing phase and replacing some of the virgin materials). To point out the importance of critical materials (in this case, the platinum-group metals or PGMs) and their recycling strategies, further analyses were made. By comparing the EoL phase with and without the recycling of PGMs, an increase in the environmental impacts is observed, which is much greater in the case of both fuel-cell systems, because they contain a larger quantity of PGMs.     

Dynamic behavior of ozonation with pollutant in a countercurrent bubble column with oxygen mass transfer

The dynamic behavior of ozonation with pollutants in a countercurrent bubble column is studied for the model establishment. Bubble columns have been widely used for an ozonation system in the plants and laboratories. In addition, a countercurrent bubble column has been commonly recommended than a cocurrent one because it has a higher ozone transfer efficiency. Therefore, the investigation of this paper focuses on the countercurrent bubble column. As an ozonation process starts, the gas mixture of ozone and oxygen is introduced into the bottom of a column, and then transferred into the liquid. The pollutants in the wastewater are eliminated subsequently via oxidation by the dissolved ozone. There certainly exists a temporary and unsteady period before the ozonation system reaches steady state. However, available ozonation models employed to describe ozone and pollutant profiles have commonly been developed for steady state. The treating qualities of wastewater in the early stage of ozonation are usually not predicted, and the time required for the steady-state establishment remains to be determined. Moreover, oxygen mass transfer is usually neglected in previous ozonation models so that the increase of dissolved oxygen is uncertain. These information is desirable for the proper design and operation of ozonation system in a bubble column. Thus, the aim of this study is to model and investigate the dynamic processes of ozonation with pollutants including oxygen mass transfer. The dynamic axial dispersion model proposed is employed to predict the variation of the ozone, pollutant, and oxygen concentrations profiles. The validity of the model was demonstrated by comparing the predicted results with the experimental data. The o-cresol was chosen as the model pollutant. The temporal concentration variations of the residual o-cresol and dissolved oxygen in the effluent liquid, and the off-gas ozone in the free volume were measured accordingly. Furthermore, the variation of the enhancement factor of ozone and the amount of off-gas were predicted. Note that it usually needs 2-5 hydraulic retention times to approach steady state under the conditions of this study. Further, the effects of dimensionless system parameters on the performance of the ozonation processes are examined. As a result, the proposed dynamic model of ozonation with pollutants is useful for proper prediction of the variables of an ozonation system in a countercurrent bubble column.     

Effect of Pt/TiO2 characteristics on temporal behavior of o-cresol decomposition by visible light-induced photocatalysis

Platinum deposited TiO(2) films were prepared on quartz substrates by dip-coating process for the photodecomposition of o-cresol. The characteristics of Pt/TiO(2) and the temporal behavior of o-cresol decomposition by Pt/TiO(2) photocatalysis under visible light irradiation were investigated. Platinum deposited on TiO(2) photocatalysts was characterized by Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area measurement, X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), diffuse reflectance UV-Vis spectra (DRS) and photoluminescence (PL) emission spectra. The results indicated that the deposition of platinum on TiO(2) promoted the optical absorption in the visible region and made it possible to be excited by visible light. The decomposition rate of o-cresol under visible light irradiation from a fluorescent lamp was enhanced to noticeably extents for experiments conducted with Pt/TiO(2) containing platinum up to 0.50wt% platinum because of the presence of Ti(3+) resulted from the platinum deposited on the TiO(2) surface; and the formation of Schottky Barrier between platinum and TiO(2) preventing the recombination of electric holes and electrons. Specifically, the reaction rate of o-cresol photodegradation at pH 9 using the 0.50wt% Pt/TiO(2) was 4.8 times than that of using pure TiO(2). The intermediates identified by GC/MS spectroscopy during the photocatalytic oxidation of o-cresol. The proposed kinetic model could be adequately applied to describe the temporal behavior of the o-cresol decomposition with and without the dosage of Pt on TiO(2) in aqueous solution by UV/TiO(2) process.     

柔性防护网系统护坡施工技术

结合具体工程,针对地形复杂、边坡岩石破碎的线路试用柔性防护网做防护措施,阐述了该系统方案的原理,详细介绍了该方案的施工顺序及工法,总结了坡面锚杆的施工要点,指出了该系统对边坡防护技术的优势,同时对行车安全具有积极的保障作用。     

Strong adsorption of phosphate by amorphous zirconium oxide nanoparticles

Phosphate removal is important in the control of eutrophication of water bodies. Adsorption is one of the promising approaches for the removal of phosphate, which could serve as a supplement for the biological phosphate removal process commonly used in the wastewater treatment industry to meet the discharge requirement when the biological performance is deteriorated from changes of operation conditions. Amorphous zirconium oxide nanoparticles were synthesized by a simple and low-cost hydrothermal process, and their phosphate removal performance was explored in aqueous environment under various conditions. A fast adsorption of phosphate was observed in the kinetics study, and their adsorption capacity was determined at about 99.01 mg/g at pH 6.2 in the equilibrium adsorption isotherm study. Commonly coexisting anions showed no or minimum effect on their phosphate adsorption performance. The phosphate adsorption showed little pH dependence in the range from pH 2 to 6, while it decreased sharply with the pH increase above pH 7. After adsorption, phosphate on these am-ZrO₂ nanoparticles could be easily desorbed by NaOH solution washing. Both the macroscopic and microscopic techniques demonstrated that the phosphate adsorption mechanism of am-ZrO₂ nanoparticles followed the inner-sphere complexing mechanism, and the surface hydroxyl groups played a key role in the phosphate adsorption.     

Using Genetic Algorithms to Optimize Stopping Patterns for Passenger Rail Transportation

In a passenger railroad system, the stopping pattern optimization problem determines the train stopping strategy, taking into consideration multiple train classes, station types, and customer origin‐destination (OD) demand, to maximize the profit made by a rail company. The stopping pattern is traditionally decided by rule of thumb, an approach that leaves much room for improvement. In this article, we propose an integer program for this problem and provide a systematic approach to determining the optimal train stopping pattern for a rail company. Commonly used commercial optimization packages cannot solve this complex problem efficiently, especially when problems of realistic size need to be solved. Therefore, we develop two genetic algorithms, namely binary‐coded genetic algorithm (BGA) and integer‐coded genetic algorithm (IGA). In many of the past evolutionary programming studies, the chromosome was coded using the binary alphabet as BGA. The encoding and genetic operators of BGA are straightforward and relatively easy to implement. However, we show that it is difficult for the BGA to converge to feasible solutions for the stopping pattern optimization problem due to the complex solution space. Therefore, we propose an IGA with new encoding mechanism and genetic operators. Numerical results show that the proposed IGA can solve real‐world problems that are beyond the reach of commonly used optimization packages.