Search results for: marketing industry

Authors: Nader Zirak, Mohammadali Shirinbayan, Abbas Tcharkhtchi

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Additive manufacturing is referred to as a method for fabrication of parts with a mechanism of layer by layer. Suitable economic efficiency and the ability to fabrication complex parts have made this method the focus of studies and industry. In recent years many studies focused on the fabrication of impellers, which is referred to as a key component of turbomachinery, through this technique. This study considers the important effect of the final surface quality of the impeller on the performance of the system, investigates the fabricated printed rotors through the fused deposition modeling with different process parameters. In this regard, the surface of each impeller was analyzed through the 3D scanner. The results show the vital role of surface quality on the final performance of the centrifugal compressor.

Keywords: additive manufacturing, impeller, centrifugal compressor, performance

Procedia PDF Downloads 133

Authors: Z. Karahaliloğlu, C. Hacker, M. Demirbilek, G. Seide, E. B. Denkbaş, T. Gries

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Currently, textile industry has played an important role in world’s economy, especially in developing countries. Dyes and pigments used in textile industry are significant pollutants. Most of theirs are azo dyes that have chromophore (-N=N-) in their structure. There are many methods for removal of the dyes from wastewater such as chemical coagulation, flocculation, precipitation and ozonation. But these methods have numerous disadvantages and alternative methods are needed for wastewater decolorization. Titanium-mediated photodegradation has been used generally due to non-toxic, insoluble, inexpensive, and highly reactive properties of titanium dioxide semiconductor (TiO2). Melt electrospinning is an attractive manufacturing process for thin fiber production through electrospinning from PP (Polyprophylene). PP fibers have been widely used in the filtration due to theirs unique properties such as hydrophobicity, good mechanical strength, chemical resistance and low-cost production. In this study, we aimed to investigate the effect of titanium nanoparticle localization and amine modification on the dye degradation. The applicability of the prepared chemical activated composite and pristine fabrics for a novel treatment of dyeing wastewater were evaluated.In this study, a photocatalyzer material was prepared from nTi (titanium dioxide nanoparticles) and PP by a melt-electrospinning technique. The electrospinning parameters of pristine PP and PP/nTi nanocomposite fabrics were optimized. Before functionalization with nTi, the surface of fabrics was activated by a technique using glutaraldehyde (GA) and polyethyleneimine to promote the dye degredation. Pristine PP and PP/nTi nanocomposite melt-electrospun fabrics were characterized using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-Ray Photon Spectroscopy (XPS). Methyl orange (MO) was used as a model compound for the decolorization experiments. Photocatalytic performance of nTi-loaded pristine and nanocomposite melt-electrospun filters was investigated by varying initial dye concentration 10, 20, 40 mg/L). nTi-PP composite fabrics were successfully processed into a uniform, fibrous network of beadless fibers with diameters of 800±0.4 nm. The process parameters were determined as a voltage of 30 kV, a working distance of 5 cm, a temperature of the thermocouple and hotcoil of 260–300 ºC and a flow rate of 0.07 mL/h. SEM results indicated that TiO2 nanoparticles were deposited uniformly on the nanofibers and XPS results confirmed the presence of titanium nanoparticles and generation of amine groups after modification. According to photocatalytic decolarization test results, nTi-loaded GA-treated pristine or nTi-PP nanocomposite fabric filtern have superior properties, especially over 90% decolorization efficiency at GA-treated pristine and nTi-PP composite PP fabrics. In this work, as a photocatalyzer for wastewater treatment, surface functionalized with nTi melt-electrospun fabrics from PP were prepared. Results showed melt-electrospun nTi-loaded GA-tretaed composite or pristine PP fabrics have a great potential for use as a photocatalytic filter to decolorization of wastewater and thus, requires further investigation.

Keywords: titanium oxide nanoparticles, polyprophylene, melt-electrospinning

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Authors: Pawan Hinge, Priya Gupta

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Due to cutting edge competitions between organizations and war for talent, the workforce as an asset is gaining significance. The employees are considered as the brand ambassadors of an organization, and their interactions with the clients and customers might impact directly or indirectly on the overall value of the organization. Especially, organizations in the healthcare industry the value of an organization in the perception of their employees can be one of the revenue generating and talent retention strategy. In such context, it is essential to understand that the brand awareness among employees can effect on employer brand image and brand value since the brand ambassadors are the interface between organization and customers and clients. In this exploratory study, we have adopted both quantitative and qualitative approaches for data analysis. Our study shows existing variation among nurses working in different business units of the same organization in terms of their customer interface or interactions and brand awareness.

Keywords: brand awareness, brand image, brand value, customer interface

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Authors: Shawn P. Daly

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Communities heavily engaged in the tourism industry discover their values intersect, meld, and conflict with those of visitors. Maintaining cultural integrity in the face of powerful external pressures causes stress among society members. This effect represents a less studied aspect of sustainable tourism. The present paper brings a perspective unique to the tourism literature: biculturalism. The grounded theories, coherent hypotheses, and validated constructs and indicators of biculturalism represent a sound base from which to consider sociocultural issues in sustainable tourism. Five models describe the psychological state of individuals operating at cultural crossroads: assimilation (joining the new culture), acculturation (grasping the new culture but remaining of the original culture), alternation (varying behavior to cultural context), multicultural (maintaining distinct cultures), and fusion (blending cultures). These five processes divide into two units of analysis (individual and society), permitting research questions at levels important for considering sociocultural sustainability. Acculturation modelling has morphed into dual processes of acculturation (new culture adaptation) and enculturation (original culture adaptation). This dichotomy divides sustainability research questions into human impacts from assimilation (acquiring new culture, throwing away original), separation (rejecting new culture, keeping original), integration (acquiring new culture, keeping original), and marginalization (rejecting new culture, throwing away original). Biculturalism is often cast in terms of its emotional, behavioral, and cognitive dimensions. Required cultural adjustments and varying levels of cultural competence lead to physical, psychological, and emotional outcomes, including depression, lowered life satisfaction and self-esteem, headaches, and back pain—or enhanced career success, social skills, and life styles. Numerous studies provide empirical scales and research hypotheses for sustainability research into tourism’s causality and effect on local well-being. One key issue in applying biculturalism to sustainability scholarship concerns identification and specification of the alternative new culture contacting local culture. Evidence exists for tourism industry, universal tourist, and location/event-specific tourist culture. The biculturalism paradigm holds promise for researchers examining evolving cultural identity and integrity in response to mass tourism. In particular, confirmed constructs and scales simplify operationalization of tourism sustainability studies in terms of human impact and adjustment.

Keywords: biculturalism, cultural integrity, psychological and sociocultural adjustment, tourist culture

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Authors: G. Çelik Gül, F. Kurtuluş

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Colemanite is the most common borate mineral, and the main source of the boron required by plants, human, and earth. Transition metals exhibit optical and physical properties such as; non-linear optical character, structural diversity, thermal stability, long cycle life and luminescent radiation. The doping of colemanite with a transition metal, bring it very interesting and attractive properties which make them applicable in industry. Iron doped calcium borate was synthesized by conventional solid state method at 1200 °C for 12 h with a systematic pathway. X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy/energy dispersive analyze (SEM/EDS) were used to characterize structural and morphological properties. Also, thermal properties were recorded by thermogravimetric-differential thermal analysis (TG/DTA). 

Keywords: colemanite, conventional synthesis, powder x-ray diffraction, borates

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Authors: A. S. Cheliyan, S. K. Bhattacharyya

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Dynamic Positioning System (DPS) is employed in marine vessels of the offshore oil and gas industry. It is a computer controlled system to automatically maintain a ship’s position and heading by using its own thrusters. Reliability assessment of the same can be analyzed through conventional fault tree. However, the complex behaviour like sequence failure, redundancy management and priority of failing of events cannot be analyzed by the conventional fault trees. The Dynamic Fault Tree (DFT) addresses these shortcomings of conventional Fault Tree by defining additional gates called dynamic gates. Monte Carlo based simulation approach has been adopted for the dynamic gates. This method of realistic modeling of DPS gives meaningful insight into the system reliability and the ability to improve the same.

Keywords: dynamic positioning system, dynamic fault tree, Monte Carlo simulation, reliability assessment

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Authors: Tayeb Aissaoui, Inas M. AlNashef

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In recent years, green solvents named deep eutectic solvents (DESs) have been found to possess significant properties and to be applicable in several technologies. Choline chloride (ChCl) mixed with urea at a ratio of 1:2 and 80 °C was the first discovered DES. In this article, chemical structure and combination mechanism of ChCl: urea based DES were investigated. Moreover, the implementation of this DES in water removal from natural gas was reported. Dehydration of natural gas by ChCl:urea shows significant absorption efficiency compared to triethylene glycol. All above operations were retrieved from COSMOthermX software. This article confirms the potential application of DESs in gas industry.

Keywords: COSMO-RS, deep eutectic solvents, dehydration, natural gas, structure, organic salt

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Authors: Nakarin Prempri

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Single-phase induction motors are widely used in industry. Most manufacturing processes use capacitor-run single-phase induction motors to drive mechanical loads. The selection of a suitable motor for driving is important. The optimum operating range of the motor can help the motor operate efficiently. Thus, this paper presents an operating range analysis of capacitor-run single-phase induction motors and a determination of suitability between motor and mechanical loads. an observational study found that the optimum operating range of the motor can be used to determine the suitability between the motor and the mechanical load. Such considerations ensure that the motor uses no more current than necessary and operates efficiently.

Keywords: single phase induction motor, operating range, torque curve, efficiency curve

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Authors: Patrícia Branco, Catarina Prista, Helena Albergaria

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Industrial fuel-ethanol fermentations are carried out under non-sterile conditions, which favors the development of microbial contaminants, leading to huge economic losses. Wild yeasts such as Brettanomyces bruxellensis and lactic acid bacteria are the main contaminants of industrial bioethanol fermentation, affecting Saccharomyces cerevisiae performance and decreasing ethanol yields and productivity. In order to control microbial contaminations, the fuel-ethanol industry uses different treatments, including acid washing and antibiotics. However, these control measures carry environmental risks such as acid toxicity and the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Therefore, it is crucial to develop and apply less toxic and more environmentally friendly biocontrol methods. In the present study, an industrial fuel-ethanol starter, S. cerevisiae Ethanol-Red, was genetically modified to over-express AMPs with activity against fuel-ethanol microbial contaminants and evaluated regarding its biocontrol effect during mixed-culture alcoholic fermentations artificially contaminated with B. bruxellensis. To achieve this goal, S. cerevisiae Ethanol-Red strain was transformed with a plasmid containing the AMPs-codifying genes, i.e., partial sequences of TDH1 (925-963 bp) and TDH2/3 (925-963 bp) and a geneticin resistance marker. The biocontrol effect of those genetically modified strains was evaluated against B. bruxellensis and compared with the antagonistic effect exerted by the modified strain with an empty plasmid (without the AMPs-codifying genes) and the non-modified strain S. cerevisiae Ethanol-Red. For that purpose, mixed-culture alcoholic fermentations were performed in a synthetic must use the modified S. cerevisiae Ethanol-Red strains together with B. bruxellensis. Single-culture fermentations of B. bruxellensis strains were also performed as a negative control of the antagonistic effect exerted by S. cerevisiae strains. Results clearly showed an improved biocontrol effect of the genetically-modified strains against B. bruxellensis when compared with the modified Ethanol-Red strain with the empty plasmid (without the AMPs-codifying genes) and with the non-modified Ethanol-Red strain. In mixed-culture fermentation with the modified S. cerevisiae strain, B. bruxellensis culturability decreased from 5×104 CFU/mL on day-0 to less than 1 CFU/mL on day-10, while in single-culture B. bruxellensis increased its culturability from 6×104 to 1×106 CFU/mL in the first 6 days and kept this value until day-10. Besides, the modified Ethanol-Red strain exhibited an enhanced antagonistic effect against B. bruxellensis when compared with that induced by the non-modified Ethanol-Red strain. Indeed, culturability loss of B. bruxellensis after 10 days of fermentation with the modified Ethanol-Red strain was 98.7 and 100% higher than that occurred in fermentations performed with the non-modified Ethanol-Red and the empty-plasmid modified strain, respectively. Therefore, one can conclude that the S. cerevisiae genetically modified strain obtained in the present work may be a valuable solution for the mitigation of microbial contamination in fuel-ethanol fermentations, representing a much safer and environmentally friendly preservation strategy than the antimicrobial treatments (acid washing and antibiotics) currently applied in fuel-ethanol industry.

Keywords: antimicrobial peptides, fuel-ethanol microbial contaminations, fuel-ethanol fermentation, biocontrol agents, genetically-modified yeasts

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Authors: Glessiane de O. Almeida, Sérgio Murilo C. Messias, Iracema Machado de Aragão Gomes

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This article discusses issues related to the System of Innovation: Comparing economies of Brazil and South Africa. Having as this study aimed at comparing the Innovation System of the countries mentioned. Then briefly describe the process of Venture Capital/Risk Capital and present the industry innovation in Brazil and South Africa. The methodological approach described in this article is descriptive and the approach is qualitative, taking as a basis secondary data relating to research articles. The main results are related to the different forms of financing of Venture Capital used by countries compared, in addition to the training and economic policy. And finally, it was highlighted the importance of implementation of policy reforms for the Brazil and Africa in the innovation process.

Keywords: innovation, Venture Capital, Economy, National Innovation System (NIS), BRICS

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Authors: Samira Abbaspour

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Soil contamination by oil industry is unavoidable issue; irrespective of environmental impact, which occurs during the process of soil contaminating and remediating. Effect of this phenomenon on the geotechnical properties of the soil has not been investigated thoroughly. Some researchers studied the environmental aspects of these phenomena more than geotechnical point of view. In this research, compaction and unconfined compression tests were conducted on samples of natural, contaminated and treated soil after 50 days of bio-treatment. The results manifest that increasing the amount of crude oil, leads to decreased values of maximum dry density and optimum water content and increased values of unconfined compression strength (UCS). However, almost 65% of this contamination terminated by using a Bioremer as a bioremediation agent. Foremost, as bioremediation takes place, values of maximum dry density, unconfined compression strength and failure strain increase.

Keywords: contamination, shear strength, compaction, oil contamination

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Authors: Hanbhin Ryu, Ilkwon Yun

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Automotive industry targets to provide an improvement in safety and convenience through realizing fully autonomous vehicle. For partially realizing fully automated driving, Current vehicles already feature varieties of advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) for safety and infotainment systems for the driver’s convenience. This paper presents Cloud Connected Vehicle (CCV) which connected vehicles with cloud data center via the access network to control the vehicle for achieving next autonomous driving form and describes its features. This paper also describes the shortcoming of the existing In-Vehicle Network (IVN) to be a next generation IVN of CCV and organize the 802.3 Ethernet, the next generation of IVN, related research issue to verify the feasibility of using Ethernet. At last, this paper refers to additional considerations to adopting Ethernet-based IVN for CCV.

Keywords: autonomous vehicle, cloud connected vehicle, ethernet, in-vehicle network

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Authors: Pennuel P. Togonave, Bartholomew S. Apis, Emma Kiup, Gure Tumae, Johannes Pakatul, Michael Webb

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Interplanting food crops in coffee gardens has increased in recent years. The purpose of this study was to quantify the nutrient management implications of growing food crops within the coffee garden and to investigate the sustainability of this practice through field surveys in two accessible sites (Asaro and Bena) and two remote sites (Marawaka and Baira), in Eastern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea. Coffee gardens were selected at each site and surveys were conducted to assess the status of intercropping in each of the smallholder coffee gardens. Food crops in the coffee gardens were sampled for nutrient analysis Survey results indicate intercropping as a common practice in coffee gardens and entailed mixed cropping of food crops in an irregular pattern and spacing. More than 40% of the farmers used 40-60% of their total coffee garden area for intercropping. In remote sites, more than 50% of the coffee garden areas closest to the house were intercropped with food crops compared to 40% of inaccessible sites. In both remote and accessible sites, the most common intercropped food crops were 90% banana (Musa spp) varieties and 50% sugarcane (Saccharum spp). Nutrient analysis of the by-products and residuals of some common intercrops shows the potential to replenish the coffee plant's deficient nutrients like Potassium, Magnesium, Phosphorus, Boron and Zinc. Intercropping of coffee gardens is increasing due to land pressure, marketing opportunities, food security and labor supply

Keywords: by-products, coffee, crops, intercropping, nutrients, soil

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Authors: Rui Xing, Baolin Ye, Nan Zhou, Guohong Wang

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Drawing upon a perspective of cognitive interaction, this study explores the relationship between team cognitive heterogeneity and team strategic decision-making flexibility, treating the transactive memory system as a mediator and task complexity as a moderator. The hypotheses were tested in linear regression models by using data gathered from 67 strategic decision-making teams in the new-energy vehicle industry. It is found that team cognitive heterogeneity has a positive impact on strategic decision-making flexibility through the mediation of specialization and coordination of the transactive memory system, which is positively moderated by task complexity.

Keywords: strategic decision-making flexibility, team cognitive heterogeneity, transactive memory system, task complexity

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Authors: Liliana Crăc, Nicolae Giorgi, Gheorghe Fometescu, Mihai Cruceru

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Power plants represent the main source of air pollution, through combustion processes, both by releasing large amounts of dust, greenhouse gases and acidifying, and large quantities of waste, slag and ash disposed in landfills covering significant areas. SC Turceni S.A. is one of the largest power generating unit from Romania. Their policy is focused on the production and delivery of electricity in order to increase energy efficiency and to reduce the environmental impact. The paper presents environmental impact produced by slag and ash storage, while pointing out that the recovery of this waste significant improves the air quality in the area. An important aspect is the proprieties of the ash and slag evacuated by Turceni power plant in order to use them for building materials manufacturing.

Keywords: ash and slag properties, air pollution, building materials industry, power plants

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Authors: Malek Miladi, Miguel Vegara, Maria Perez-Infantes, Khaled Mohamed Ramadan, Antonio Ruiz-Canales, Damaris Nunez-Gomez

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Coffee is the second consumed commodity worldwide, yet it also generates colossal waste. Proper management of coffee waste is proposed by converting them into products with higher added value to achieve sustainability of the economic and ecological footprint and protect the environment. Based on this, a study looking at the recovery of coffee waste is becoming more relevant in recent decades. Spent coffee grounds (SCG's) resulted from brewing coffee represents the major waste produced among all coffee industry. The fact that SCGs has no economic value be abundant in nature and industry, do not compete with agriculture and especially its high oil content (between 7-15% from its total dry matter weight depending on the coffee varieties, Arabica or Robusta), encourages its use as a sustainable feedstock for bio-oil production. The bio-oil extraction is a crucial step towards biodiesel production by the transesterification process. However, conventional methods used for oil extraction are not recommended due to their high consumption of energy, time, and generation of toxic volatile organic solvents. Thus, finding a sustainable, economical, and efficient extraction technique is crucial to scale up the process and to ensure more environment-friendly production. Under this perspective, the aim of this work was the statistical study to know an efficient strategy for oil extraction by n-hexane using indirect sonication. The coffee waste mixed Arabica and Robusta, which was used in this work. The temperature effect, sonication time, and solvent-to-solid ratio on the oil yield were statistically investigated as dependent variables by Central Composite Rotatable Design (CCRD) 23. The results were analyzed using STATISTICA 7 StatSoft software. The CCRD showed the significance of all the variables tested (P < 0.05) on the process output. The validation of the model by analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed good adjustment for the results obtained for a 95% confidence interval, and also, the predicted values graph vs. experimental values confirmed the satisfactory correlation between the model results. Besides, the identification of the optimum experimental conditions was based on the study of the surface response graphs (2-D and 3-D) and the critical statistical values. Based on the CCDR results, 29 ºC, 56.6 min, and solvent-to-solid ratio 16 were the better experimental conditions defined statistically for coffee waste oil extraction using n-hexane as solvent. In these conditions, the oil yield was >9% in all cases. The results confirmed the efficiency of using an ultrasound bath in extracting oil as a more economical, green, and efficient way when compared to the Soxhlet method.

Keywords: coffee waste, optimization, oil yield, statistical planning

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Authors: Jolanta Tamošaitienė

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The article focuses on a developed comprehensive model to be used in an agile environment for the risk assessment and selection based on multi-attribute methods. The model is based on a multi-attribute evaluation of risk in construction, and the determination of their optimality criterion values are calculated using complex Multiple Criteria Decision-Making methods. The model may be further applied to risk assessment in an agile construction environment. The attributes of risk in a construction project are selected by applying the risk assessment condition to the construction sector, and the construction process efficiency in the construction industry accounts for the agile environment. The paper presents the comprehensive risk assessment model in an agile construction environment. It provides a background and a description of the proposed model and the developed analysis of the comprehensive risk assessment model in an agile construction environment with the criteria.

Keywords: assessment, environment, agile, model, risk

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Authors: G. Erkomaishvili, M. Kobalava, T. Lazariashvili, N. Damenia

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Current state of foreign direct investment (FDI) in Georgia is analyzed and evaluated in the paper, the existing legislative background for regulating investments and stimulating policies to attract investments are shown. It is noted that in developing countries encouragement of investment activity, support and implementation are of the most important tasks, implying a consistent investment policy, investor-friendly tax regime and the legal system, reducing administrative barriers and restrictions, fare competitive conditions and business development infrastructure. The work deals with the determining factor of FDIs and the main directions of stimulation, as well as prospective industries where new investments are needed. Contributing and hindering factors and stimulating measures are analyzed. As a result of the research, the direct and indirect factors attracting FDI have been identified. Facilitating factors to FDI inflow are as follows: simplicity of starting business, geopolitical location, low taxes, access to credit, ease of ownership registration, natural resources, low burden of regulations, low level of corruption and low crime rates. Hindering factors to FDI inflow are as follows: small market, lack of policy for attracting investments, low qualification of the workforce (despite the large number of unemployed people it is difficult to find workers with necessary special skills and qualifications), high interest rates, instability of national currency exchange rate, presence of conflict zones within the country and so forth.

Keywords: foreign direct investment, investor, investment attracting marketing policies, reinvestment

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Authors: Markus Heck, Hans Vettiger

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Small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) are the backbone of central Europe’s economies and have a significant contribution to the gross domestic product. Production planning and scheduling (PPS) is still a crucial element in manufacturing industries of the 21st century even though this area of research is more than a century old. The topic of PPS is well researched especially in the context of large enterprises in the manufacturing industry. However, the implementation of PPS methodologies within SME is mostly unobserved. This work analyzes how PPS is implemented in SME with the geographical focus on Switzerland and its vicinity. Based on restricted resources compared to large enterprises, SME have to face different challenges. The real problem areas of selected enterprises in regards of PPS are identified and evaluated. For the identified real-life problem areas of SME clear and detailed recommendations are created, covering concepts and best practices and the efficient usage of PPS. Furthermore, the economic and entrepreneurial value for companies is lined out and why the implementation of the introduced recommendations is advised.

Keywords: central Europe, PPS, production planning, SME

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Authors: Nagmani Lnu

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Often, Quality Engineering refers to testing the applications that either have a User Interface (UI) or an Application Programming Interface (API). We often find mature test practices, standards, and automation regarding UI or API testing. However, another kind is present in almost all types of industries that deal with data in bulk and often get handled through something called a Batch Application. This is primarily an offline application companies develop to process large data sets that often deal with multiple business rules. The challenge gets more prominent when we try to automate batch testing. This paper describes the approaches taken to test a Batch application from a Financial Industry to test the payment settlement process (a critical use case in all kinds of FinTech companies), resulting in 100% test automation in Test Creation and Test execution. One can follow this approach for any other batch use cases to achieve a higher efficiency in their testing process.

Keywords: batch testing, batch test automation, batch test strategy, payments testing, payments settlement testing

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Authors: Damiaa Saad Khudor

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The paper describes an investigation for the thermal design of a fluidized bed cooler and prediction of heat transfer rate among the media categories. It is devoted to the thermal design of such equipment and their application in the industrial fields. It outlines the strategy for the fluidization heat transfer mode and its implementation in industry. The thermal design for fluidized bed cooler is used to furnish a complete design for a fluidized bed cooler of Sodium Bicarbonate. The total thermal load distribution between the air-solid and water-solid along the cooler is calculated according to the thermal equilibrium. The step by step technique was used to accomplish the thermal design of the fluidized bed cooler. It predicts the load, air, solid and water temperature along the trough. The thermal design for fluidized bed cooler revealed to the installation of a heat exchanger consists of (65) horizontal tubes with (33.4) mm diameter and (4) m length inside the bed trough.

Keywords: fluidization, powder technology, thermal design, heat exchangers

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Authors: W. Schellong

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Industry accounts for one-third of global final energy demand. Crossover technologies (e.g. motors, pumps, process heat, and air conditioning) play an important role in improving energy efficiency. These technologies are used in many applications independent of the production branch. Especially electrical power is used by drives, pumps, compressors, and lightning. The paper demonstrates the algorithm of the energy analysis by some selected case studies for typical industrial processes. The energy analysis represents an essential part of energy management systems (EMS). Generally, process control system (PCS) can support EMS. They provide information about the production process, and they organize the maintenance actions. Combining these tools into an integrated process allows the development of an energy critical equipment strategy. Thus, asset and energy management can use the same common data to improve the energy efficiency.

Keywords: crossover technologies, data management, energy analysis, energy efficiency, process control

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Authors: Azadeh Askarinejad, Parham Hayati, Reza Parchami, Parisa Hayati

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One of the most important industries and building operations causing carbon dioxide emission is the cement and concrete related industries so that cement production (including direct fuel for mining and transporting raw material) consumes approximately 6 million Btus per metric-ton, and releases about 1 metric-ton of CO2. Reducing the consumption of cement with simultaneous utilizing waste materials as cement replacement is preferred for reasons of environmental protection. Blended cements consist of different supplementary cementitious materials (SCM), such as fly ash, silica fume, Ground Granulated Blast Furnace Slag (GGBFS), limestone, natural pozzolans, etc. these materials should be chemically activated to show effective cementitious properties. The present review article reports three different methods of nanofabrication that were used for activation of two types of SCMs.

Keywords: nanofabrication, cement replacement materials, activation, concrete

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Authors: Mncedisi Trinity Dewa, Andre Francois Van Der Merwe, Stephen Matope

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Tool, Die and Mould-making (TDM) firms have been known to play a pivotal role in the growth and development of the manufacturing sectors in most economies. Their output contributes significantly to the quality, cost and delivery speed of final manufactured parts. Unfortunately, the South African Tool, Die and Mould-making manufacturers have not been competing on the local or global market in a significant way. This reality has hampered the productivity and growth of the sector thus attracting intervention. The paper explores the shortcomings South African toolmakers have to overcome to restore their competitive position globally. Results from a global benchmarking survey on the tooling sector are used to establish a roadmap of what South African toolmakers can do to become a productive, World Class force on the global market.

Keywords: competitive performance objectives, toolmakers, world-class manufacturing, lead times

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Authors: Azar Mahmoudi

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Despite the rise of global anti-corruption movements and the strong emergence of international and national anti-corruption laws, corrupt practices are still prevalent in most places, and countries still struggle to translate these laws into practice. On the other hand, in most countries, political and economic elites oppose anti-corruption reforms. In such a situation, the role of external actors, like the other States, international organizations, and transnational actors, becomes essential. Among them, Transnational Corporations [TNCs] can develop their own regime-like framework to govern their internal activities, and through this, they can contribute to the regimes established by State actors to solve transnational issues. Among various regimes, TNCs may choose to comply with the transnational anti-corruption legal regime to avoid the cost of non-compliance with anti-corruption laws. As a result, they decide to strenghen their anti-corruption compliance as they expand into new overseas markets. Such a decision extends anti-corruption standards among their employees and third-party agents and within their projects across countries. To better address the challenges posed by corruption, TNCs have adopted a comprehensive anti-corruption toolkit. Among the various instruments, anti-corruption clauses have become one of the most anti-corruption means in international commercial agreements. Anti-corruption clauses, acting as a due diligence tool, can protect TNCs against the engagement of third-party agents in corrupt practices and further promote anti-corruption standards among businesses operating across countries. An anti-corruption clause allows parties to create a contractual commitment to exclude corrupt practices during the term of their agreement, including all levels of negotiation and implementation. Such a clause offers companies a mechanism to reduce the risk of potential corruption in their dealings with third parties while avoiding civil and administrative penalties. There have been few attempts to examine the role of anti-corruption clauses in the fight against corruption; therefore, this paper aims to fill this gap and examine anti-corruption clauses in a specific sector where corrupt practices are widespread and endemic, i.e., the petroleum industry. This paper argues that anti-corruption clauses are a positive step in ensuring that the petroleum industry operates in an ethical and transparent manner, helping to reducing the risk of corruption and promote integrity in this sector. Contractual anti-corruption clauses vary in terms of the types commitment, so parties have a wide range of options to choose from for their preferred clauses incorporated within their contracts. This paper intends to propose a categorization of anti-corruption clauses in the petroleum sector. It examines particularly the anti-corruption clauses incorporated in transnational hydrocarbon contracts published by the Resource Contract Portal, an online repository of extractive contracts. Then, this paper offers a quantitative assessment of anti-corruption clauses according to the types of contract, the date of conclusion, and the geographical distribution.

Keywords: anti-corruption, oil and gas, transnational corporations, due diligence, contractual clauses, hydrocarbon, petroleum sector

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Authors: Idris Adamu Idris

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The Nigerian construction industry is faced with problems of failure of structures/buildings. These failures are attributed to the use of low quality construction materials of which sand crate bock is inclusive. The research was conducted to determine the compressive strength of hollow sand crate block (6”) using locally made cement (Sokoto cement). Samples were tested for 7, 14, 21 and 28 days for mix ratio of 1:3 to 1:12. From the laboratory results obtained, a mix ratio of 1:10 corresponding to a minimum compressive strength of 1.9N/mm2 at 7 days should be adopted. This satisfies the BS 2028, 1364 1986 which specified a minimum compressive strength of 1.8N/mm2 at 7 days. At 28 days of curing, the same mix ratio meets the minimum BS standard of 2.5N/mm2 .

Keywords: buildings, cement, construction, hollow sand crate block, Nigeria

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Authors: Raymond Chi Fai Si Tou, Jacey Ja Young Choe, Amy Siu Ian So

Abstract:

Smart hotels can be defined as the hotel which has an intelligent system, through digitalization and networking which achieve hotel management and service information. In addition, smart hotels include high-end designs that integrate information and communication technology with hotel management fulfilling the guests’ needs and improving the quality, efficiency and satisfaction of hotel management. The purpose of this study is to identify appropriate factors that may influence guests’ satisfaction and intention to revisit Smart Hotels based on service quality measurement of lodging quality index and extended UTAUT theory. Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) is adopted as a framework to explain technology acceptance and use. Since smart hotels are technology-based infrastructure hotels, UTATU theory could be as the theoretical background to examine the guests’ acceptance and use after staying in smart hotels. The UTAUT identifies four key drivers of the adoption of information systems: performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, and facilitating conditions. The extended UTAUT modifies the definitions of the seven constructs for consideration; the four previously cited constructs of the UTAUT model together with three new additional constructs, which including hedonic motivation, price value and habit. Thus, the seven constructs from the extended UTAUT theory could be adopted to understand their intention to revisit smart hotels. The service quality model will also be adopted and integrated into the framework to understand the guests’ intention of smart hotels. There are rare studies to examine the service quality on guests’ satisfaction and intention to revisit in smart hotels. In this study, Lodging Quality Index (LQI) will be adopted to measure the service quality in smart hotels. Using integrated UTAUT theory and service quality model because technological applications and services require using more than one model to understand the complicated situation for customers’ acceptance of new technology. Moreover, an integrated model could provide more perspective insights to explain the relationships of the constructs that could not be obtained from only one model. For this research, ten in-depth interviews are planned to recruit this study. In order to confirm the applicability of the proposed framework and gain an overview of the guest experience of smart hotels from the hospitality industry, in-depth interviews with the hotel guests and industry practitioners will be accomplished. In terms of the theoretical contribution, it predicts that the integrated models from the UTAUT theory and the service quality will provide new insights to understand factors that influence the guests’ satisfaction and intention to revisit smart hotels. After this study identifies influential factors, smart hotel practitioners could understand which factors may significantly influence smart hotel guests’ satisfaction and intention to revisit. In addition, smart hotel practitioners could also provide outstanding guests experience by improving their service quality based on the identified dimensions from the service quality measurement. Thus, it will be beneficial to the sustainability of the smart hotels business.

Keywords: intention to revisit, guest satisfaction, qualitative interviews, smart hotels

Procedia PDF Downloads 189

Authors: Leonardo Ko

Abstract:

In an era marked by rapid technological innovation, the classical instrument industry nonetheless has not seen significant change. Is this a matter of stubborn traditionalism, or do old, conventional instruments really sound better? Because of the widespread use of 3-D printing, it seems feasible to produce modern, 3-D printed instruments that adhere to the basic conventions of standard construction. This study aimed to design and create a practical, effective 3-D printed acoustic violin. A cost-benefit analysis of materials and design is presented in addition to a report on sound tests in which a pool of professional musicians compared the traditional violin to its synthetic counterpart with regard to acoustic properties. With a low-cost yet functional instrument, musicians of all levels would be able to afford instruments with much greater ease; the present study thus hopes to contribute to efforts to increase the accessibility of classical music education.

Keywords: acoustic musical instrument, classical musical education, low-cost, 3-D printing

Procedia PDF Downloads 215

Authors: Caroline E. Mendes, Alberto C. Badino

Abstract:

Pneumatic reactors have been widely employed in various sectors of the chemical industry, especially where are required high heat and mass transfer rates. This study aimed to obtain correlations that allow the prediction of gas hold-up (Ԑ) and volumetric oxygen transfer coefficient (kLa), and compare these values, for three models of pneumatic reactors on two scales utilizing Newtonian fluids. Values of kLa were obtained using the dynamic pressure-step method, while  was used for a new proposed measure. Comparing the three models of reactors studied, it was observed that the mass transfer was superior to draft-tube airlift, reaching  of 0.173 and kLa of 0.00904s-1. All correlations showed good fit to the experimental data (R2≥94%), and comparisons with correlations from the literature demonstrate the need for further similar studies due to shortage of data available, mainly for airlift reactors and high viscosity fluids.

Keywords: bubble column, internal loop airlift, gas hold-up, kLa

Procedia PDF Downloads 260

Authors: Saurabh Ahluwalia, Sul Kassicieh

Abstract:

The conventional wisdom has maintained that being in proximity to entrepreneurial ecosystems helps startups to raise financing, develop and grow. In this paper, we examine the effect of a major component of an entrepreneurial ecosystem- financial or venture capital clusters on the exit of a startup through mergers and acquisitions (M&A). We find that the presence of a venture capitalist in a venture capital (VC) cluster is a major success factor for M&A exits. The location of startups in the top VC clusters did not turn out to be significant for success. Our results are robust to different specifications of the model that use different time periods, types of success, the reputation of VC, industry and the quality of the startup company. Our results provide evidence for VCs, startups and policymakers who want to better understand the components of entrepreneurial ecosystems and their relation to the M&A exits of startups.

Keywords: financial institution, mergers and acquisitions, startup financing, venture capital

Procedia PDF Downloads 181