Search results for "Reuse"
showing 10 items of 240 documents
Using and Extending the SPEM Specifications to Represent Agent Oriented Methodologies
2009
Situational Method Engineering used for constructing ad-hoc agent oriented design processes is grounded on a well defined set of phases that are principally based on reuse of components coming from existing agent design processes; these components have to be stored in a repository. The identification and extraction of these components could take large advantages from the existence of a standardized representation of the design processes they come from. In this paper we illustrate our solution based on SPEM 2.0 specifications for modelling agent design processes and extending them when necessary to meet the specific needs we faced in our experiments.
Cost Modelling In Waste Water Treatment Processes: An Empirical Analysis For Spain
2007
The reuse of resources obtained from regenerating wastewater is an absolute must both from a social and also environmental and health viewpoint. For any water reuse project to be viable, water treatment processes must be optimised. In this sense, extensive knowledge of the structure of costs associated to each of the treatment technologies available is necessary. This research applies cost modelling methodology by adjusting a series of representative functions and an empirical analysis is undertaken for a sample of wastewater treatment plants in Spain.
Cost modelling for wastewater treatment processes
2011
Abstract The aim of this paper is to provide a methodology for a better understanding of the cost structure of wastewater treatment processes. This methodology may be useful in the planning of new facilities. The existing models in the literature are focused on the influence of the capacity of plant, expressed as inhabitants or flow rate, on the cost of treatment. We propose a new approach for the operating cost function that includes the most representative variables in the process. The idea is that the modelling of treatment costs enables us to understand the key role of the economies of scale in this context; and also the influence of other variables such as contaminants removed, or the …
Technical efficiency and cost analysis in wastewater treatment processes: A DEA approach
2009
In light of the growing importance of water reuse as an alternative source of water resources in many regional areas, the objective of this paper is to analyse the efficiency of wastewater treatment plants as a basic requisite to improve the potential of the water reuse. The analytical benchmarking methodology Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is used to calculate efficiency measurements. An efficiency index is obtained for each plant by means of mathematical programming techniques, aiming to minimise the inputs used in the water treatment process. This indicator is used as a reference to analyse plants' activity through a series of variables including the size of the plant or its cost struct…
Agile Deep Learning UAVs Operating in Smart Spaces: Collective Intelligence Versus “Mission-Impossible”
2017
The environments, in which we all live, are known to be complex and unpredictable. The complete discovery of these environments aiming to take full control over them is a “mission-impossible”, however, still in our common agenda. People intend to make their living spaces smarter utilizing innovations from the Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) as very dynamic, autonomous and intelligent things capable to discover and control large areas are becoming important “inhabitants” within existing and future smart cities. Our concern in this paper is to challenge the potential of UAVs in situations, which are evolving fast in a way unseen before, e.g., em…
TREATMENT AND DISPOSAL OF TYRES: TWO EU APPROACHES. A REVIEW
2015
The treatment and disposal of tyres from vehicles has long been of considerable environmental importance. The main problem lies in the mixed composition of the tyres. Studies have been undertaken to modify the structure of the tyres, especially with reference to the percentage of granulated rubber incorporated, in order to improve their performance, and also to reduce their environmental impact during normal functioning (noise, particulates, etc.) and facilitate recycling and final disposal. The aim of the present study is to review and compare how used tyres are treated and disposed of in two different EU countries. The first is Italy, which has been part of the European Union since its in…
An expert system hybrid architecture to support experiment management
2014
Specific expert systems are used for supporting, speeding-up and adding precision to in silico experimentation in many domains. In particular, many experimentalists exhibit a growing interest in workflow management systems for making a pipeline of experiments. Unfortunately, these type of systems does not integrate a systematic approach or a support component for the workflow composition/reuse. For this reason, in this paper we propose a knowledge-based hybrid architecture for designing expert systems that are able to support experiment management. This architecture defines a reference cognitive space and a proper ontology that describe the state of a problem by means of three different per…
A New HLA-Based Distributed Control Architecture for Agricultural Teams of Robots in Hybrid Applications with Real and Simulated Devices or Environme…
2011
The control architecture is one of the most important part of agricultural robotics and other robotic systems. Furthermore its importance increases when the system involves a group of heterogeneous robots that should cooperate to achieve a global goal. A new control architecture is introduced in this paper for groups of robots in charge of doing maintenance tasks in agricultural environments. Some important features such as scalability, code reuse, hardware abstraction and data distribution have been considered in the design of the new architecture. Furthermore, coordination and cooperation among the different elements in the system is allowed in the proposed control system. By integrating …
Water reuse from wastewater treatment: The transition towards circular economy in the water sector
2022
Water is crucial for economic development since it interacts with the agricultural, production, and energy sec-tors. However, the increasing demand and climate change put pressure on water sources. This paper argued the necessity of using reclaimed water for irrigation within the scope of a circular economy. The barriers (i.e., technological and economic, institutional/regulatory, and social) to water reuse practices were revealed. Lessons on how to overcome the barriers were learned from good practices. The roadmaps adopted in the European Union for the transition towards the circular economy were reviewed. It has been observed that these roadmaps are generally on the circularity of solid …
Greening MSW management systems by saving footprint: The contribution of the waste transportation.
2018
Abstract Municipal solid waste (MSW) management constitutes a highly challenging issue to cope with in order of moving towards more sustainable urban policies. Despite new Standards call for recycling and reusing materials contained in the urban waste, several municipalities still use landfilling as a waste disposal method. Other than the environmental pressure exerted by these plants, waste transportation from the collection points to the landfill needs a specific attention to correctly assess the whole burden of the waste management systems. In this paper, the Ecological Footprint (EF) indicator is applied to the actual MSW of the city of Palermo (Sicily). Results show that the effects pr…