Search results for "Renewable energy sources"
showing 10 items of 432 documents
State of art and economic evaluation of wave energy converters. A case study
2022
The even increasing energy demand in the world is a relevant problem for the modern society. The energy supply from fossil fuels has become a critical aspect due to the progressive reduction of reserves and political instability among the Countries. For these reasons, the exploitation of renewable energy sources is looked with a great interest. In this context, solar, wind, geothermal, hydropower, and biomass can be successfully used through commercial technologies. Other potential renewable energy sources could have potential applications in the next future. Among these, sea wave is considered a very promising energy source, especially for small islands. In this context, the paper propones…
CO2 reduction exploiting RES for EV charging
2017
The world is facing an urgent need to reduce emissions, limiting pollution for a better quality of life. This objective has to be reached by all cities and governments worldwide. This paper focuses on the field of transportation, which is greatly responsible for air pollution, mainly in cities and urban areas such as towns, airports and seaports. The diffusion of electric vehicles (EVs) enables a significant reduction of air pollutants emitted by combustion engines; however, their recharge can affect the total pollution by their increasing energy demand. A solution is the use of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) to charge EVs. This paper analyzes the feasibility of integrating EVs and RES, foc…
2015-2020. Sicily and Italy as Electricity Hub in the Mediterranean Area for the Development of the European Power Grids Interconnections
2015
Falling demand and explosion of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) are redesigning the criteria for planning the power grids interconnections by ENTSO-E. In particular, the interconnections between networks of different countries have been acquiring importance more and more, in view of an unique European market for electricity and an increase of RES. Italy and Sicily, placed in the centre of the Mediterranean Sea, play a fundamental role as a bridge between Central Europe, North Africa area and Mediterranean islands (electricity hub). This paper aims to show how power system exchanges tend to follow the direction from South to North, and how the impact of North-African power – mainly generated …
A Reinforcement Learning Approach for User Preference-aware Energy Sharing Systems
2021
Energy Sharing Systems (ESS) are envisioned to be the future of power systems. In these systems, consumers equipped with renewable energy generation capabilities are able to participate in an energy market to sell their energy. This paper proposes an ESS that, differently from previous works, takes into account the consumers’ preference, engagement, and bounded rationality. The problem of maximizing the energy exchange while considering such user modeling is formulated and shown to be NP-Hard. To learn the user behavior, two heuristics are proposed: 1) a Reinforcement Learning-based algorithm, which provides a bounded regret and 2) a more computationally efficient heuristic, named BPT- ${K}…
Physical Activity and Sports Practice in Children and Adolescents at the Time of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Hypothetical Future Scenarios and Preventive …
2021
As a logical and direct consequence of the closure of schools and sports facilities, an expected reduction in the practice of physical activity (PA) and sports has been detected in both children and adolescents all over the world. Hence, we analysed the short-term and long-term consequences of the lack/low level of PA and sports activity in this population, which we referred to as primary and secondary risks, respectively, the latter of which have to be considered in hypothetical future scenarios.
Educational Impact Evaluation of Professional Development of In-Service Teachers: The Case of the Dialogic Pedagogical Gatherings at Valencia “On Gia…
2021
There is a broad consensus on the impact of teacher quality on students’ outcomes. However, the debate on how to evaluate the impact of teacher training on student improvement remains open. The evaluation of the impact of in-service teacher training, organized in a network for different schools, has been analyzed very little to date. Our research displays an innovative approach in this regard, through an In-Service Professional Development Program based upon scientific evidence and dialogic principles: The Pedagogical Gatherings “On Giant’s Shoulders”. We conducted a multilevel communicative study to analyze its impact upon students’ achievement and schools’ outcomes whose teachers taking p…
Silk Road Museums: Design of Inclusive Heritage and Cross-Cultural Education
2021
This work is the result of a study on the characteristics that define some of the museums created on the Silk Road. The approach to these museums has focused especially on the observation of the educational and heritage aspects that define these institutions. Since 1988, numerous actions related to the Silk Road have been promoted by UNESCO. This old trade route has now become a route of dialogue between cultures. Each museum studied is characterized by promoting local and national issues that define it. Educational issues stand out, since the tradition of silk production is very important in each place. Another aspect observed is that heritage issues manage to strengthen the characteristic…
Citizen science for scientific literacy and the attainment of sustainable development goals in normal education
2020
Curricular integration of the formal teaching of citizen science can bring to the classroom aspects of scientific literacy that encourage the involvement of citizens. In particular, these include non-epistemic aspects related to the sociology of science (which are often not transferred to the classroom). Furthermore, this practice raises awareness among students, and encourages them to become participants in the attainment of the United Nations&rsquo
Exploring the contribution of grassroots innovations to justice: using the capability approach to normatively address bottom-up sustainable transitio…
2020
There is growing interest in the potential of grassroots innovations for the transition towards more just and sustainable societies. Nevertheless, there is lack of clear normative discussion regarding these processes. The paper strives to propose and test a framework that enables an analysis of how and in which sense specific grassroots innovation processes may be contributing to the construction of more just societies. To this end, we connect elements of the multi-level perspective on sociotechnical transitions (frequently used in the analysis of grassroots innovations) with elements of the capability approach, which offers a multi-dimensional perspective to justice. The framework is used …
Cover Crop Impact on Soil Organic Carbon, Nitrogen Dynamics and Microbial Diversity in a Mediterranean Semiarid Vineyard
2020
Cover crop (CC) management in vineyards increases sustainability by improving soil chemical and biological fertility, but knowledge on its effects in semiarid soils is lacking. This study evaluated the effect of leguminous CC management on soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration, soil nitrate content and microbial diversity in a semiarid vineyard, in comparison to conventional tillage (CT). SOC and nitrate were monitored during vine-growing season