There exits a great challenge to evaluate the flow properties of tight porous media even at the core scale. A pulse-decay experiment is routinely used to measure the petrophysical properties of tight cores including permeability and porosity. In this study, 5 sets of pulse-decay experiments are performed on a tight heterogeneous core by flowing nitrogen in the forward and backward directions under different pressures under pore pressures approximately from 100 psi to 300 psi. Permeability values from history matching are from about 300 nD to 600 nD which shows a good linear relationship with the inverse of pore pressure. A preferential flow path is found even when the microcrack is absent. The preferential path causes different porosity values using differential initial upstream and downstream pressure. In addition, the porosity values calculated based on the forward and backward flow directions are also different, and the values are about 1.0% and 2.3%, respectively, which is the primary novelty of this study. The core heterogeneity effect significantly affects the very early stage of pressure responses in both the upstream and downstream but the permeability values are very close in the late-stage experiment. We proposed that that there are two reasons for the preferential flow path: the Joule–Thomson effect for non-ideal gas and the core heterogeneity effect. Based on the finding of this study, we suggest that very early pressure response in a pulse-decay experiment should be closely examined to identify the preferential flow path, and failure to identify the preferential flow path leads to significant porosity and permeability underestimation. Full article

The process of transformation of the Polish economy, traditionally based on coal, into an economy that uses low-carbon technologies, faces a problem associated with the diversification of energy sources, especially in rural areas. The scale of the use of conventional energy carriers in households located in rural areas in Poland has a very negative impact on the natural environment. The aim of the paper is to indicate possibilities of reducing low-altitude emissions (with emitters not exceeding 40 m in height) in rural areas in Poland, through the development of renewable energy sources. This paper provides an overview of the specific character of rural areas in Poland and the development challenges faced in these areas in the investigated scope. In order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve energy efficiency, it is necessary to dynamize pro-ecological activities in agriculture and in rural areas, including the development of agricultural biogas plants, wind and photovoltaic farms. The use of renewable energy sources can be an important factor in the development and sustainable growth of rural areas in Poland. Full article

Strict emission regulations and demand for better fuel economy are driving forces for finding advanced engines that will be able to replace the conventional internal combustion engines in the near future. Homogeneous charge compression ignition (HCCI) engines use a different combustion technique; there are no spark plugs or injectors to assist the combustion. Instead, when the mixtures reach chemical activation energy, combustion auto-ignites in multiple spots. The main objective of this review paper is to study the engine performance and emission characteristics of HCCI engines operating in various conditions. Additionally, the impact of different fuels and additives on HCCI engine performance is also evaluated. The study also introduces a potential guideline to improve engine performance and emission characteristics. Compared to conventional compression ignition and spark ignition combustion methods, the HCCI combustion mode is noticeably faster and also provides better thermal efficiency. Although a wide range of fuels including alternative and renewable fuels can be used in the HCCI mode, there are some limitation/challenges, such as combustion limited operating range, phase control, high level of noise, cold start, preparation of homogeneous charge, etc. In conclusion, the HCCI combustion mode can be achieved in existing spark ignition (SI) engines with minor adjustments, and it results in lower oxides of nitrogen (NO_x) and soot emissions, with practically a similar performance as that of SI combustion. Further improvements are required to permit extensive use of the HCCI mode in future. Full article

With increasingly stringent emission regulations, the cold start emissions have become more important than ever. Using a low compression ratio is a feasible way to improve a heavy-duty engine’s efficiency and emissions. However, cold start performance restricts the development of this technology, especially at high altitudes. In response, we conducted a study of the emissions of a heavy-duty low-compression-ratio diesel engine during start-up process at different altitudes. A plateau simulation system controlled the inlet and exhaust pressure to create altitude environments of 0 m, 1000 m, 2000 m, 3000 m, 3750 m and 4500 m. The gas, particulate and volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions were analyzed with speed and cycle during the start-up process. The results indicated that cold start performance and combustion characteristics became worse as altitudes increased. The gas and particulate emissions of carbon monoxide (CO), carbon dioxide (CO2), total hydrocarbon (THC) and nitrous oxide (NO_X) almost all increased as the engine speed and altitude increased, and was much higher than in idle conditions. The PN and PM emissions in each particle diameter also increased as the altitude increased, which was the same as the nucleation mode and the accumulation mode particles. VOC emissions were also measured, which increased during the start-up process as altitudes increased. Full article

High bandwidths and accurate current controls are essential in high-performance permanent magnet synchronous (PMSM) servo drives. Compared with conventional proportional–integral control, deadbeat current control can considerably enhance the current control loop bandwidth. However, because the deadbeat current control performance is strongly affected by the variations in the electrical parameters, tuning the controller gains to achieve a satisfactory current response is crucial. Because of the prompt current response provided by the deadbeat controller, the gains must be tuned within a few control periods. Therefore, a fast online current loop tuning scheme is proposed in this paper. This scheme can accurately identify the controller gain in one current control period because the scheme is directly derived from the discrete-time motor model. Subsequently, the current loop is tuned by updating the deadbeat controller with the identified gains within eight current control periods or a speed control period. The experimental results prove that in the proposed scheme, the motor current can simultaneously have a critical-damped response equal to its reference in two current control periods. Furthermore, satisfactory current response is persistently guaranteed because of an accurate and short time delay required for the current loop tuning. Full article

Rapid and uncontrolled urbanization is continuously increasing buildings’ energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere. In this scenario, solar energy integrated into the built environment can play an important role in optimizing the use of renewable energy sources on urban surfaces. Preliminary solar analyses to map the solar accessibility and solar potential of building surfaces (roofs and façades) should become a common practice among urban planners, architects, and public authorities. This paper presents an approach to support urban actors to assess solar energy potential at the neighborhood scale and to address the use of solar energy by considering overshadowing effects and solar inter-building reflections in accordance with urban morphology and building characteristics. The approach starts with urban analysis and solar irradiation analysis to elaborate solar mapping of façades and roofs. Data processing allows assessment of the solar potential of the whole case study neighborhood of Sluppen in Trondheim (Norway) by localizing the most radiated parts of buildings’ surfaces. Reduction factors defined by a new method are used to estimate the final solar potential considering shadowing caused by the presence of buildings’ architectural elements (e.g., glazed surfaces, balconies, external staircases, projections) and self-shading. Finally, rough estimation of solar energy generation is assessed by providing preliminary recommendations for solar photovoltaic (PV) systems suited to local conditions. Results show that depending on urban morphology and buildings’ shapes, PV systems can cover more than 40% of the total buildings’ energy needs in Trondheim. Full article

Supersonic ejectors are used extensively in all kind of applications: compression of refrigerants in cooling systems, pumping of volatile fluids or in vacuum generation. In vacuum generation, also known as zero-secondary flow, the ejector has a transient behaviour. In this paper, a numerical and experimental research of a supersonic compressible air nozzle is performed in order to investigate and to simulate its behaviour. The CFD toolbox OpenFOAM 6 was used, with two density-based solvers: explicit solver rhoCentralFoam, which implements Kurganov Central-upwind schemes, and implicit solver HiSA, which implements the AUSM+up upwind scheme. The behaviour of the transient evacuation ranges between adiabatic polytropic exponent at the beginning of the process and isothermal at the end. A model for the computation of the transient polytropic exponent is proposed. During the evacuation, two regimes are encountered in the second nozzle. In the supercritic regime, the secondary is choked and sonic flow is reached. In the subcritic regime, the secondary flow is subsonic. The final agreement is good with the two different solvers, although simulation tends to slightly overestimate flow rate for large values region. Full article

This paper assessed the effect of dark fermentation, the fermentative phase in a two-stage anaerobic digestion system, in terms of digestate biostabilization efficiency. The digestates analyzed in this study were obtained from a pilot-scale system in which two different substrates were used in order to simulate both the digestion and co-digestion process. Biostabilization performances were evaluated by measuring the specific oxygen uptake rate (SOUR) of the outgoing digestates. This index allowed us to define the degree of effectiveness in terms of stabilization of organic matter, between the traditional anaerobic digestion process and the two-stage configuration. Considering the traditional process as a reference scenario, the results highlighted an increase in biological stability for the two-stage co-digestion process, consisting of a dark fermentation stage, followed by an anaerobic digestion one. Digestates biostabilization efficiency increased up from 6.5% to 40.6% from the traditional one-stage configuration to the two-stage one by improving the anaerobic digestion process through a preliminary fermentative stage. The advantages of the two-stage process were due to the role of dark fermentation as a biological pre-treatment. Considering the partial stability results related to the second stage, biological stability was improved in comparison to a single-stage process, reaching an efficiency of 42.2% and 55.8% for the digestion and co-digestion scenario respectively. The dark fermentation phase allowed for a higher hydrolysis of the substrate, making it more easily degradable in the second phase. Results demonstrated better biostabilization performances of the outgoing digestates with the introduction of dark fermentation, resulting in more stable digestates for both the digestion and co-digestion process. Full article

Accurate wind power and wind speed forecasting remains a critical challenge in wind power systems management. This paper proposes an ultra short-time forecasting method based on the Takagi–Sugeno (T–S) fuzzy model for wind power and wind speed. The model does not rely on a large amount of historical data and can obtain accurate forecasting results though efficient linearization. The proposed method employs meteorological measurements as input. Next, the antecedent and the consequent parameters of the forecasting model are identified by the fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm and the recursive least squares method. From these components, the T–S fuzzy model is obtained. Wind farms located in China (Shanxi Province) and in Ireland (County Kerry) are considered as cases with which to validate the proposed forecasting method. The forecasting results are compared with results from the contemporary machine learning-based models including support vector machine (SVM), the combined model of SVM and empirical mode decomposition, and back propagation neural network methods. The results show that the proposed T–S fuzzy model can effectively improve the precision of the short-term wind power forecasting. Full article

In this article, a technique for the reduction of total harmonic distortion (THD) in distributed renewables energy access (DREA) composed of wind turbines is introduced and tested under the wind speed conditions presented in Tamaulipas, Mexico. The analysis and simulation are delimited by a study case based on wind speeds measured and recorded for one year at two highs in the municipality of Soto La Marina, Tamaulipas, Mexico. From this information, the most probable wind speed and the corresponding turbulence intensity is calculated and applied to a wind energy conversion system (WECS). The WECS is composed of an active front-end (AFE) converter topology using four voltage source converters (VSCs) connected in parallel with a different phase shift angle at the digital sinusoidal pulse width modulation (DSPWM) signals of each VSC. The WECS is formed by the connection of five type-4 wind turbines (WTs). The effectiveness and robustness of the DREA integration are reviewed in the light of a complete mathematical model and corroborated by the simulation results in Matlab-Simulink^®. The results evidence a reduction of the THD in grid currents up to four times and which enables the delivery of a power capacity of 10 MVA in the Tamaulipas AC distribution grid that complies with grid code of harmonic distortion production. Full article

The purpose of this paper is to characterize the arrangement of raindrops and natural condensation and its effect on the direct current voltage’s flashover of a hydrophobic silicone insulating surface under variable inclination. Two devices have been realized, one for on-site exposure of insulation samples under rain and condensation, and the other for laboratory use in order to allow the variation of the angle of their inclination. The temporal evolution of the constellation of raindrops and natural condensation as well as the electrical discharge produced in the laboratory was visualized. The results emanated from the on-site investigation allowed the identification of the most reproducible type of arrangement of rainwater and natural condensation drops as well as the estimation of their respective volume. The results from the laboratory clearly show the existence of an interval of the insulation’s inclination angle, which allows the best approximation of its electrical performance to what was obtained in the absence of these drops. Moreover, these same results also inform us about some very critical situations to avoid regarding the insulation by a judicious choice of its inclination angle. Full article

Solar Photovoltaic (PV) systems have become prominent and have attained the attention of energy engineers, governments and researchers. To achieve the maximum benefit from the PV system in spite of its nonlinear characteristic and environmental conditions, finding a robust maximum power point tracking method is essential. Over two decades, various researchers proposed numerous MPPT methods, but they failed to evaluate their methods on consistency, reliability, and robustness over several numbers of runs. Most of the researchers examined one configuration and they did not to consider the dynamic change in the irradiation conditions. Therefore, in this manuscript, the authors introduced a novel optimization technique Fractional chaotic Flower Pollination Algorithm (FC-FPA), by merging fractional chaos maps with flower pollination algorithm (FPA). The proposed technique, help FPA in extracting the Global Maximum Power Point (GMPP) under different partial shading patterns including with different PV array configurations. The proposed FC-FPA technique is tested and evaluated over 5 different patterns of partial shading conditions. The first three patterns are tested over 4S configuration made with Shell S36 PV module. The other two patterns are applied to the 4S2P configuration of Shell SM55 PV panels. The performance of the proposed variant is investigated by tracking the GMPP for abruptly changing shade pattern. Exclusive statistical analysis is performed over several numbers of runs. Comparison with perturb and observe MPPT technique is established. These results confirm that, the proposed method shows fast convergence, zero oscillation and rapid response for the dynamic change in irradiation with consistent behavior. Full article

Recently a number of changes were introduced in amendment to standard EN 50160 related to power quality (PQ) including 1 min aggregation intervals and the obligation to consider 100% of measured data taken for the assessment of voltage variation in a low voltage (LV) supply terminal. Classical power quality assessment can be extended using a correlation analysis so that relations between power quality parameters and external indices such as weather conditions or power demand can be revealed. This paper presents the results of a comparative investigation of the application of 1 and 10 min aggregation times in power quality assessment as well as in the correlation analysis of power quality parameters and weather conditions and the energy production of a 100 kW photovoltaic (PV) power plant connected to a LV network. The influence of the 1 min aggregation time on the result of the PQ assessment as well as the correlation matrix in comparison with the 10 min aggregation algorithm is presented and discussed. Full article

Recently, the need of improved resource trading has arisen due to resource limitations and energy optimization problems. Various platforms supporting resource exchange and waste reuse in industrial symbiotic networks are being developed. However, the actors participating in these networks still mainly act based on predefined patterns, without taking the possible alternatives into account, usually due to the difficulty of properly evaluating them. Therefore, incorporating intelligence into the platforms that these networks use, supporting the involved actors to automatically find resources able to cover their needs, is still of high importance both for the companies and the whole ecosystem. In this work, we present a hybrid recommender system to support users in properly identifying the symbiotic relationships that might provide them an improved performance. This recommender combines a graph-based model for resource similarities, while it follows the basic case-based reasoning processes to generate resource recommendations. Several criteria, apart from resource similarity, are taken into account to generate, each time, the list of the most suitable solutions. As highlighted through a use case scenario, the proposed system could play a key role in the emerging industrial symbiotic platforms, as the majority of them still do not incorporate automatic decision support mechanisms. Full article

This article presents a comparison of wind speed forecasting techniques, starting with the Auto-regressive Integrated Moving Average, followed by Artificial Intelligence-based techniques. The objective of this article is to compare these methods and provide readers with an idea of what method(s) to apply to solve their forecasting needs. The Artificial Intelligence-based techniques included in the comparison are Nearest Neighbors (the original method, and a version tuned by Differential Evolution), Fuzzy Forecasting, Artificial Neural Networks (designed and tuned by Genetic Algorithms), and Genetic Programming. These techniques were tested against twenty wind speed time series, obtained from Russian and Mexican weather stations, predicting the wind speed for 10 days, one day at a time. The results show that Nearest Neighbors using Differential Evolution outperforms the other methods. An idea this article delivers to the reader is: what part of the history of the time series to use as input to a forecaster? This question is answered by the reconstruction of phase space. Reconstruction methods approximate the phase space from the available data, yielding m (the system’s dimension) and τ (the sub-sampling constant), which can be used to determine the input for the different forecasting methods. Full article