Search results for " Monitoring"
showing 10 items of 3129 documents
Energetic Sustainability Using Renewable Energies in the Mediterranean Sea
2016
The paper is focused on the analysis of the electrical energy sector in the Maltese islands, focusing on the employment of Renewable Energies in order to increase its energy independence. The main renewable source here proposed is wave energy: thanks to its strategic position, Malta will be able to generate electrical energy through the use of an innovative type of Wave Energy Converter (WEC) based on the prototype of linear generator designed and developed by the University of Palermo. This new technology will be able to cut down the electrical energy production from traditional power plants and, consequently, the greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). Wave energy source and off-shore photovoltai…
Energy Saving in Public Transport Using Renewable Energy
2017
Hydrogen produced by renewable sources represents an interesting way to reduce the energetic dependence on fossil fuels in the transportation sector. This paper shows a feasibility study for the production, storage and distribution of hydrogen in the western Sicilian context, using three different renewable sources: wind, biomass and sea wave. The objective of this study is the evaluation of the hydrogen demand, needed to replace all diesel supplied buses with electrical buses equipped with fuel cells. An economic analysis is presented with the evaluation of the avoidable greenhouse gas emissions. Four different scenarios correlate the hydrogen demand for urban transport to the renewable en…
Mechanical Tests on Innovative BIPV Façade Components for Energy, Seismic, and Aesthetic Renovation of High-Rise Buildings
2018
The paper shows the results of mechanical tests carried out on prototypes of a new Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) component developed by the author and SBskin Smart Building Skin s.r.l. This patented innovative component is able to merge structural function, insulation proprieties, and production of clean energy for retrofit actions and/or the construction of translucent faç
PCM thermal storage design in buildings: Experimental studies and applications to solaria in cold climates
2017
Abstract As energy availability and demand often do not match, thermal energy storage plays a crucial role to take advantage of solar radiation in buildings: in particular, latent heat storage via phase-change material is particularly attractive due to its ability to provide high energy storage density. This paper analyzes the performance of a building-integrated thermal storage system to increase the energy performances of solaria in a cold climate. A wall opposing a highly glazed facade (south oriented) is used as thermal storage with phase change materials embedded in the wall. The study is based on both experimental and simulation studies. The concept considered is particularly suited t…
Quality Assurance and Support Measures for Solar Cooling on System Level
2016
Abstract Within the IEA SHC Task 48 “Quality assurance and support measures for Solar Cooling” the analysis and evaluation of the systems has been one of the four main focuses. Here the activities are including the lab- and field-based characterization of the systems, the definition and application of performance figures, a guideline for a reliable monitoring procedure including methods for automated error detection and an updated overview on worldwide installed DEC systems including hints and good practice examples. They are furthermore leading to three different easy-to-use tools for solar cooling systems: The LCA tool considers environmental and energetic values for the evaluation, the P…
From Silk to Digital Technologies: A Gateway to New Opportunities for Creative Industries, Traditional Crafts and Designers. The SILKNOW Case
2020
Nowadays, cultural heritage is more than ever linked to the present. It links us to our cultural past through the conscious act of preserving and bequeathing to future generations, turning society into its custodian. The appreciation of cultural heritage happens not only because of its communicative power, but also because of its economic power, through sustainable development and the promotion of creative industries. This paper presents SILKNOW, an EU-H2002 funded project and its application to cultural heritage, as well as to creative industries and design innovation. To this end, it presents the use of image recognition tools applied to cultural heritage, through the interoperability of …
Structural Health Monitoring Procedure for Composite Structures through the use of Artificial Neural Networks
2015
In this paper different architectures of Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) for structural damage detection are studied. The main objective is to investigate an ANN able to detect and localize damage without any prior knowledge on its characteristics so as to serve as a real-time data processor for Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) systems. Two different architectures are studied: the standard feed-forward Multi Layer Perceptron (MLP) and the Radial Basis Function (RBF) ANNs. The training data are given, in terms of a Damage Index ℑD, properly defined using a piezoelectric sensor signal output to obtain suitable information on the damage position and dimensions. The electromechanical respon…
A simplified approach for load flow analysis in MV smart grids based on LV power measurements
2017
This paper presents a simplified approach for load flow analysis in medium voltage (MV) distribution networks. It is a power summation Backward/Forward (B/F) algorithm, based on measurements of active and reactive powers at low voltage (LV) side of MV/LV distribution substations. The proposed solution allows achieving good accuracy, computational efficiency and fast convergence. In order to verify the algorithm performances, simulation studies are carried out in the case of a real test system, i.e. the distribution grid of Favignana Island (Mediterranean Sea, Italy). The compatibility between simulations results and power measurements at the MV bus bars of the generating substation shows th…
History and Environmental Impact of Mining Activity in Celtic Aeduan Territory Recorded in a Peat Bog (Morvan, France)
2003
The present study aims to document historical mining and smelting activities by means of geochemical and pollen analyses performed in a peat bog core collected around the Bibracte oppidum (Morvan, France), the largest settlement of the great Aeduan Celtic tribe (ca. 180 B.C. to 25 A.D.). The anthropogenic Pb profile indicates local mining operations starting from the Late Bronze Age, ca. cal. 1300 B.C. Lead inputs peaked at the height of Aeduan civilization and then decreased after the Roman conquest of Gaul, when the site was abandoned. Other phases of mining are recognized from the 11th century to modern times. They have all led to modifications in plant cover, probably related in part to…
Sustainability evaluation of Sicily's lemon and orange production: An energy, economic and environmental analysis
2013
The island of Sicily has a long standing tradition in citrus growing. We evaluated the sustainability of orange and lemon orchards, under organic and conventional farming, using an energy, environmental and economic analysis of the whole production cycle by using a life cycle assessment approach. These orchard systems differ only in terms of a few of the inputs used and the duration of the various agricultural operations. The quantity of energy consumption in the production cycle was calculated by multiplying the quantity of inputs used by the energy conversion factors drawn from the literature. The production costs were calculated considering all internal costs, including equipment, materi…