Search Results (33)

To overcome the shortcomings of traditional polyurethane, such as poor weather resistance and susceptibility to hydrolysis, this study systematically explores the preparation techniques of organic silicon-modified polyurethane and its application in intelligent sports fields. By introducing siloxane into the polyurethane matrix through copolymerization, physical blending, and grafting techniques, the microphase separation structure and interfacial properties of the material are effectively optimized. In terms of synthesis processes, the one-step method achieves efficient preparation by controlling the isocyanate/hydroxyl molar ratio (1.05–1.15), while the prepolymer chain extension method optimizes the crosslinked network through dual reactions. The modified material exhibits significant performance improvements: tensile strength reaches 60 MPa, tear resistance reaches 80 kN/m, and the elastic recovery rate ranges from 85% to 92%, demonstrating outstanding weather resistance. In sports field applications, the 48% impact absorption rate meets the requirements for athletic tracks, wear resistance of <15 mg suits gym floors, and the impact resistance for skate parks reaches 55%–65%. Its environmental benefits are notable, with volatile organic compounds (VOC) <50 g/L and a recycling rate >85%, complying with green building material standards. However, its development is still constrained by multiple factors: insufficient material interface compatibility, a comprehensive cost of 435 RMB/m², and the lack of a quality evaluation system. Future research priorities include constructing dynamic covalent crosslinked networks (e.g., self-healing systems), adopting bio-based raw materials to reduce carbon footprint by 30%–50%, and integrating flexible sensing technologies for intelligent responsiveness. Through multidimensional innovation, this material is expected to evolve toward multifunctionality and environmental friendliness, providing core material support for the intelligent upgrading of sports fields. Full article

Multi-energy microgrids (MEMs) can achieve efficient and low-carbon energy utilization by relying on the coordination, complementarity, and coupling conversion of different energy sources, which is of great significance for new energy consumption and energy cascade utilization. In this paper, a low-carbon economic dispatch model of a multi-energy microgrid that uses a joint carbon capture–CHP-P2G operation is proposed. Firstly, the basic structure of the power–electrolysis–methanol energy (PEME) is established. Secondly, a flexible mechanism for the joint operation of CCPPs and CHP is analyzed, and a flexible joint operation model for carbon capture–CHP-P2G is proposed. Finally, considering the system’s low-carbon operation and economy, a low-carbon economic dispatch model for a multi-energy microgrid in a park is established, with the goal of minimizing the total operating cost of PEME in the park. The results illustrate that the introduction of a liquid storage tank reduces the total cost and carbon emissions of the MEM by 4.04% and 8.49%, respectively. The application of an electric boiler and ORC effectively alleviates the problem of peak–valley differences in the electric heating load. Our joint operation model realizes the dual optimization of the MEM’s flexibility and low-carbon requirement through the collaboration of multiple pieces of technology. Full article

The reintroduction of natural components into the urban environment has several benefits for the adaptation of urban environments. The urban green infrastructure (UGI) approach makes it possible to develop greening programs on a sound scientific basis and in connection with the ability to provide ecosystem services. However, in practice, UGI programs are almost exclusively based on the concept of a continuous green network, which requires large-scale interventions such as green corridors and parks. This severely limits the extension of UGI in dense urban areas such as historic centers. This article introduces the concept of green fragments and proposes an integrative approach to support greater spatial flexibility of the UGI. By setting appropriate limits on the number and proximity of green fragments, the resulting green system keeps functional connectivity despite being physically discontinuous. The proposed approach was tested in the case study of the historical center of Milan, leading to the proposal of integrations regarding the identification and mapping of the existing UGI and the planning of its future extension. Full article

Theme parks have been constantly updated and modified to maintain their attractiveness while managing seasonality and fluctuating visitors. Flexibility must be considered in spatial planning, design, and operations to meet the evolving daily and seasonal requirements and ensure long-term adjustability. Nonetheless, the flexibility remains unclear due to variations in its interpretation among different authors, thus hindering its adoption. Its application in spatial planning and design is still limited, primarily seen in the housing sector. This research aims to establish a framework for integrating and evaluating flexibility in the planning and design of a theme park based on the diverse interpretations of flexibility in residential and urban sectors. These interpretations were distilled into three primary dimensions: function, access, and transformation. Full article

This paper proposes a new approach to the design of smart charging systems. It aims to separate the role of the Smart Charging Service Provider (SCSP) from the role of the Charge Point Operator (CPO) to provide real flexibility and efficiency of mass deployment. As interoperability is required for this purpose, the challenge is to use standard equipment and protocols in the design of the smart charging Energy Management System (EMS). The use of an Open Charge Point Interface (OCPI) is crucial for an interface between the EMS and the Charge Point Operator. The smart charging EMS developed has been implemented and successfully tested with two CPOs, with different use cases: (1) EV charging infrastructure at office buildings, and (2) EV charging infrastructure installed at a public car park facility. Full article

To meet the demand for constructing a market mechanism that adapts to the integrated energy system and promotes market-oriented reforms in the energy sector, in-depth research on integrated energy trading strategies is required. This study focused on the integrated energy trading problem and clarify the relationships among participants in the integrated energy market. A regional integrated energy system model was established that enables trading of electricity, gas, heat, and cold, and propose a integrated energy trading strategy based on the carbon emissions/green certificate equivalence interaction. Firstly, the trading process of carbon emissions and green certificates, the underlying representation of green attributes, and market transaction prices are analyzed. Combining with a tiered carbon trading system that includes rewards and penalties, a carbon emissions/green certificate equivalence interaction mechanism is constructed. Secondly, the paper utilized the flexible characteristics of loads within the industrial park to establish a integrated energy demand response model for electricity, heat, and cold. Finally, with the objective of minimizing regional operating costs, a integrated energy trading model considering the carbon emissions/green certificate equivalence interaction mechanism was developed. In the simulation, the operating cost of the system is reduced by 4%, and the carbon emission is reduced by 11.4%, which verifies the effectiveness of the model. Full article

The ever-increasing number of plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) requires appropriate electric vehicle grid integration (EVGI) for charging coordination to maintain grid stability and enhance PEV user convenience. As such, the widespread adoption of electric mobility can be successful. EVGI is facilitated through charging stations and empowers PEV users to manage their charging demand by using smart charging solutions. This makes PEV grids assets that provide flexibility to the power grid. The Internet of Things (IoT) feature can make smooth EVGI possible through a supporting communication infrastructure. In this regard, the selection of an appropriate communication protocol is essential for the successful implementation of EVGI. This study assesses the efficacy of the UK’s 4G network with TCP and 4G UDP protocols for potential EVGI operations. For this, an EVGI emulation test bed is developed, featuring three charging parking lots with the capacity to accommodate up to 64 PEVs. The network’s performance is assessed in terms of data packet loss (e.g., the data-exchange capability between EVGI entities) and latency metrics. The findings reveal that while 4G TCP often outperforms 4G UDP, both achieve latencies of less than 1 s with confidence intervals of 90% or greater for single PEV cases. However, it is observed that the high penetration of PEVs introduces a pronounced latency due to queuing delays in the network including routers and the base station servers, highlighting the challenges associated with maintaining efficient EVGI coordination, which in turn affects the efficient use of grid assets. Full article

Photovoltaic (PV) powered Electric Vehicle Charging Stations (PVCS) have received extensive attention recently due to the complementary relationship of PV energy and electric vehicles. This paper proposes a methodology aimed at assisting a Charging Point Operator (CPO) in determining the size of the main components of such PVCS. The modular structure of the method gives flexibility for possible use on a new sizing problem by modifying key parameters such as the EV charging demand (i.e., arrival/departure times and energy needed to fill the battery), the EV charging strategy or the business model, independently from each other. It is of particular interest for a CPO that sizes many PVCS operated in the same environment (for example, a car park at a workplace). In that case, the CPO first has to apply the method on a representative charging station. Next, he can re-use parts of the obtained results to drastically speed up (from weeks to hours) the sizing of the other charging stations. The proposed method has been applied to the EVCS of an industrial research complex in southern France. The input dataset used to apply the method consists of more than 32,000 charging transactions spanning over 6 years with 350 EV users and 80 charging points. Three charging strategies with different levels of complexity are investigated, including Mean Power, Plug and Charge, and Solar Smart Charging. The considered business model is based on the maximization of the self-production rate. The numerical findings reveal that employing a straightforward charging strategy, such as Mean Power, leads to a substantial reduction of nearly half in the required size of the PV plant compared to the basic Plug and Charge mode. In addition, our analysis demonstrates that Solar Smart Charging has the potential to decrease the PV plant size by nearly three times. Full article

With the continuous expansion of renewable energy construction, the power system requires a larger-scale flexible dispatchable and controllable resource for power balance. Fully tapping into the power regulation capability of multi-type loads in industrial parks, making them a low-cost flexible dispatchable and controllable resource, is an effective approach to establish power regulation capability at scale in the new power system. However, the control characteristics of multi-type loads in industrial parks vary greatly, and their control delay characteristics, response speed, and sustainable response time are all different. Traditional dispatch and control methods cannot achieve precise control of the massive and multi-type loads in industrial parks. Therefore, this paper establishes unified models for the control characteristics of multi-type loads in industrial parks, quantitatively characterizes their control delay characteristics, start–stop characteristics, and control response speed. Based on this, the aggregated dispatch and control model and dispatch and control strategy for multi-type loads in industrial parks are developed, which provide a predictive control rate for individual loads considering the delay and segmented response characteristics to achieve precise aggregation control of multi-type loads in industrial parks. Simulation results show that the aggregated dispatch and control model and its aggregated dispatch and control strategy achieve precise control of multi-type loads in industrial parks. Flexible dispatchable and controllable loads can provide low-cost power regulation capability for the new power system. Full article

With the deepening of power market reform, further study on power trading mechanisms has become the core issue of power market study. The development stage of the industrial electricity market requires efficient and flexible pricing mechanisms. Currently available pricing strategies are inadequate for demand response management. Therefore, this paper provides an in-depth study of the pricing mechanism in the industrial electricity market in the context of electricity market reform. It proposes a demand–response-based dynamic pricing strategy for industrial parks. The method proposes a dynamic pricing strategy for demand-side response in industrial parks based on master–slave game by establishing an exogenous model of demand-side response and incentives. Compared with the existing strategies, the strategy is more efficient and flexible, and effectively improves the economic efficiency of power trading and load regulation. Firstly, an exogenous model of demand-side response and incentive is built to characterize the demand-side response cost. The method focuses more on describing the exogenous characteristics of user incentives and response quantities. It only needs to analyze the exogenous indicators and random errors in various typical scenarios. The description of user demand-side response is more efficient. Secondly, a master–slave-game-based dynamic pricing strategy for industrial parks with demand-side response is proposed. The strategy is composed of a two-stage optimization. The primary regulation of customers is achieved by day-ahead time-of-use tariffs. The secondary regulation of customers is achieved by means of the same-day regulation of demand and purchase regarding clean electricity. The proposed two-stage price formation mechanism is more economical, more effective in load regulation, and improves the flexibility of industrial pricing. Finally, a case study is conducted on an industrial power user in a park in Liaoning Province. The results show that the proposed method is significantly better than existing methods in terms of improving the economic efficiency and load control effectiveness of the pricing strategy. Full article

Balanced fear supports human rational decision-making and useful behavioral responses. In contrast, overwhelming, persistent, and unbalanced fear can paralyze the individual and result in heightened anxiety, lack of cognitive flexibility, fear-based public compliance and serious mental health issues. Psychobiotics research has established that a healthy microbiome is required for balanced fear and mental health protection via control of fear extinction. The recent COVID-19 pandemic featured daily, persistent, fear-of-a-single-contagion conditioning on a global scale paired with various behavioral mandates (e.g., lockdowns of the healthy, required wearing of face masks in many locations including schools, isolation from environmental microbes and each other through the closure of beaches and parks, and restrictions on social gatherings including access to family members in hospitals and senior-assisted facilities). Such mandates degraded the human microbiome and isolated us from each other and useful environmental microbes. It also ignored the historic role of secondary bacterial pathogens in pandemic deaths. This narrative review examines how the institutional promotion of fear-of-a-single-contagion, lack of balanced risk communication, and appalling disregard of our fundamental nature (as majority-microbial human superorganisms) resulted in problems rather than solutions. This review illustrates that government-public health-media promotion of pervasive fear and microbiome-degrading behaviors: (1) increased public compliance, (2) reduced cognitive flexibility, and (3) increased risk of mental health conditions. However, a portion of the general public chose a healthier path through their increased consumption of microbiome- and immune-supportive supplements and fermented foods during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. For a healthier future, public health must follow the lead of this population to ensure that human freedom, rather than paralyzing fear, dominates our future. Full article

Road authorities worldwide can leverage the advances in vehicle technology by continuously monitoring their roads’ conditions to minimize road maintenance costs. The existing methods for carrying out road condition surveys involve manual observations using standard survey forms, performed by qualified personnel. These methods are expensive, time-consuming, infrequent, and can hardly provide real-time information. Some automated approaches also exist but are very expensive since they require special vehicles equipped with computing devices and sensors for data collection and processing. This research aims to leverage the advances in vehicle technology in providing a cheap and real-time approach to carry out road condition monitoring (RCM). This study developed a deep learning model using the You Only Look Once, Version 5 (YOLOv5) algorithm that was trained to capture and categorize flexible pavement distresses (FPD) and reached 95% precision, 93.4% recall, and 97.2% mean Average Precision. Using vehicle built-in cameras and GPS sensors, these distresses were detected, images were captured, and locations were recorded. This was validated on campus roads and parking lots using a car featured with a built-in camera and GPS. The vehicles’ built-in technologies provided a more cost-effective and efficient road condition monitoring approach that could also provide real-time road conditions. Full article

The geological heritage of Australia’s landscapes and World Heritage areas has generally been underpromoted to the public by the tourism industry. However, in 2008, the fledgling world of geotourism in Australia received a significant boost with two events: the Inaugural Global Geotourism Conference ‘Discover the Earth beneath our Feet’ held in Fremantle, Western Australia, and the declaration of the UNESCO Kanawinka Global Geopark, which linked volcanic regions in South Australia and Victoria. Simultaneously the Australian Federal Government launched the ‘Australian National Landscapes’ (ANL) program. However, this impetus was not sustained when the Kanawinka Global Geopark was deregistered as a UNESCO-branded geopark in 2012, and the ANL program faded within a decade. Despite these setbacks, as an outcome of the 2008 Fremantle conference, several productive lines of geotourism have developed across Australia. This paper reviews the history of Australian geotourism since 2008. It examines the impacts of the experiences, lessons learned, problems for geology as perceived by National Parks and the Environment movement, geological communication problems, and the subsequent evolution of Australian geotourism. From these issues, new non-government bodies and initiatives have arisen, including the Australian Geoparks Network, the Australian Geoscience Council, and the recent development of a National Geotourism Strategy. Strong elements emerging from these initiatives are the increasing development of geotrails (which suit the large Australian continent) and the new Australian concept of ‘GeoRegions’. These are in response to an awareness that geotourism requires a flexible outlook to widen the appreciation and appeal of geological heritage and landscapes to the broader public. A further new direction is suggested: for Australian geotourism to combine with some elements of ICOMOS Cultural Routes. An outstanding example, the ICOMOS Overland Telegraph Line (OTL) Cultural Route that crosses Australia from south to north, is considered. For 2000 km, the construction of this line in the 1870s followed the regional geology and hydrology, relying upon the available biota but bringing about a clash of human cultures. The six colonies of Australia were finally linked to the world by wire, but the arrival of the OTL had a significant impact on the country’s Indigenous inhabitants. In Australia and globally, geotourism is incorporating the A–B–Cs (abiotic, biotic and cultural elements) to more effectively encourage the public to value their landscapes and the associated stories. The OTL provides an example of a newly introduced fourth dimension for geotourism, which gives consideration to the socio-political context of landscape adaptation. Full article

Prototyping and validating hardware–software components, sub-systems and systems within the intelligent transportation system-of-systems framework requires a modular yet flexible and open-access ecosystem. This work presents our attempt to develop such a comprehensive research and education ecosystem, called AutoDRIVE, for synergistically prototyping, simulating and deploying cyber-physical solutions pertaining to autonomous driving as well as smart city management. AutoDRIVE features both software as well as hardware-in-the-loop testing interfaces with openly accessible scaled vehicle and infrastructure components. The ecosystem is compatible with a variety of development frameworks, and supports both single- and multi-agent paradigms through local as well as distributed computing. Most critically, AutoDRIVE is intended to be modularly expandable to explore emergent technologies, and this work highlights various complementary features and capabilities of the proposed ecosystem by demonstrating four such deployment use-cases: (i) autonomous parking using probabilistic robotics approach for mapping, localization, path-planning and control; (ii) behavioral cloning using computer vision and deep imitation learning; (iii) intersection traversal using vehicle-to-vehicle communication and deep reinforcement learning; and (iv) smart city management using vehicle-to-infrastructure communication and internet-of-things. Full article

In the post-pandemic era, cities are facing new demands and challenges. Both telecommuting and dense development require communities to provide more public space to meet people’s psychological and physical needs. The insufficient space currently left in the city calls for stock development. The Japanese public libraries affected by COVID-19 are part of this stock. We aimed to determine and propose strategies for using the external space of libraries to enhance the sustainability of cities. Ultimately, we expect to achieve a synergy between public libraries and cities in terms of sustainability. We found that the most dominant element in the exterior space of Japanese public libraries is parking lots, which have the potential to be flexibly utilized in the post-pandemic era. We also summarized the current patterns of external space for public libraries in Japan. Finally, we proposed six strategies to enhance the sustainability of libraries and cities. These strategies can simultaneously enhance the sustainability of cities and public libraries from multiple perspectives, especially in the post-pandemic era. Our proposal will not only help to build or renew public libraries in the future, but also fills a gap in the urban perspective of Japanese public libraries and their external spaces. Full article