Search results for: service sector

Authors: Mitansha, Suzanne Wilkinson, Regan Potangaroa

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The built environment is designed, maintained, operated, and decommissioned by construction organisations, which play a significant role in providing physical resources and rebuilding infrastructures during major crises and disasters. It is evident that enhancing the resilience of construction organisations allows better responding ability and speedy recovery from disasters and acts as a boon for the nation in the face of significant disruptions. As individuals are the integral component of any organisation, hence, individual resilience is considered a critical aspect, which may boost organisational resilience of construction sector. It has been observed that individual resilience is indirectly supported by organisation’s citizenship behaviour, job performance, and career success. Not only this, it also tends to hold a directly proportional relation with job satisfaction, physical and emotional well-being affected by organisation’s work culture, whereas the resilience of organisation increases as a result of positive adaption, growth and collective learning of the employees as an entity. Moreover, indicators like situation awareness in staff and crisis related issues, effective vulnerability management, organisational leadership and culture ensured by approachable, encouraging and people-oriented leaders, are prominent for achieving organisational resilience. It, thus, becomes perceptible that both, organisational and individual resiliencies, have the potential to influence each other. Consequently, it arises a major question that how these characteristics are associated and tend to behave with respect to each other. The study, thus, aims to explore the overlapping dimensions of organisational and individual resilience to determine the impact boundaries. The research methodology of the paper would be based on systematic literature review specifically focused on the resilience of construction industry. This would provide a direct comparison of characteristics influencing individual and organisational resilience and will present the most significant indicators of individual resilience that can eventually help to enhance the resilience of construction organisations amidst any disaster or crisis.

Keywords: Construction industry, individual resilience, organisational resilience, overlapping dimension.

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Authors: Sareh Rajabi, Taha Anjamrooz, Salwa Bheiry

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Sustainability of construction projects is an important issue to be addressed since the sector will continue to be developed in the coming years, especially in developing countries. Thus, it is significant to discover approaches and solutions for improving sustainability. Currently, the construction industry is the largest consumer of natural resources. This is the same in other countries in the Gulf region, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has limited natural resources such as water, electricity, etc. Recently, the UAE has taken several actions in order to implement sustainable initiatives within its construction industry. Within the industry, the contractors’ role is significant in promoting sustainable development by taking the responsibility to minimize their negative impacts on the environment and society, and maximize their economic distribution. In this research, sustainability will be studied as an important key to bring competitive advantages to contracting organizations. The contractors should understand the need to improve their sustainable performance in order to expand their business competitiveness. Competitiveness at the construction project level refers to a contractor’s ability to compete for a project. There is less focus on how to improve contractors’ competitiveness by implementing sustainable construction practices. Based on an inclusive literature review on the relationship between sustainability performance and business competitiveness, this research will conduct a study of sustainable practice in the construction industry and the relationship between sustainability performance and business competitiveness in order to develop a framework for evaluating how contractors can improve their competitiveness in terms of more efficient processes, enhancements in productivity, and lower costs of compliance in order to reduce the initial project cost and obtain market opportunities in the UAE. The research findings will provide a framework that can be a useful guideline for contractors to develop their sustainability policy, strategy and practice for meeting the increased requirements for sustainable development in construction.

Keywords: Sustainable construction practice, sustainability, competitiveness, construction industry, contractors.

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Authors: Akinola Ikudayisi, Josiah Adeyemo

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The correct estimation of reference evapotranspiration (ETₒ) is required for effective irrigation water resources planning and management. However, there are some variables that must be considered while estimating and modeling ETₒ. This study therefore determines the multivariate analysis of correlated variables involved in the estimation and modeling of ETₒ at Vaalharts irrigation scheme (VIS) in South Africa using Principal Component Analysis (PCA) technique. Weather and meteorological data between 1994 and 2014 were obtained both from South African Weather Service (SAWS) and Agricultural Research Council (ARC) in South Africa for this study. Average monthly data of minimum and maximum temperature (°C), rainfall (mm), relative humidity (%), and wind speed (m/s) were the inputs to the PCA-based model, while ETₒ is the output. PCA technique was adopted to extract the most important information from the dataset and also to analyze the relationship between the five variables and ETₒ. This is to determine the most significant variables affecting ETₒ estimation at VIS. From the model performances, two principal components with a variance of 82.7% were retained after the eigenvector extraction. The results of the two principal components were compared and the model output shows that minimum temperature, maximum temperature and windspeed are the most important variables in ETₒ estimation and modeling at VIS. In order words, ETₒ increases with temperature and windspeed. Other variables such as rainfall and relative humidity are less important and cannot be used to provide enough information about ETₒ estimation at VIS. The outcome of this study has helped to reduce input variable dimensionality from five to the three most significant variables in ETₒ modelling at VIS, South Africa.

Keywords: Irrigation, principal component analysis, reference evapotranspiration, Vaalharts.

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Authors: W. Munyoka, F. M. Manzira

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The purpose of this study is to analyze how varying alignment of e-Government policies in four countries in Sub-Saharan Africa Region, namely South Africa, Seychelles, Mauritius and Cape Verde lead to the success or failure of e-Government; and what should be done to ensure positive alignment that lead to e-Government project growth. In addition, the study aims to understand how various governments’ efforts in e-Government awareness campaign strategies, international cooperation, functional literacy and anticipated organizational change can influence implementation.

This study extensively explores contemporary research undertaken in the field of e-Government and explores the actual respective national ICT policies, strategies and implemented e-Government projects for in-depth comprehension of the status core. Data is analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively to reach a conclusion.

The study found that resounding successes in strategic e-Government alignment was achieved in Seychelles, Mauritius, South Africa and Cape Verde - (Ranked number 1 to 4 respectively).

The implications of the study is that policy makers in developing countries should put mechanisms in place for constant monitoring and evaluation of project implementation in line with ICT policies to ensure that e-Government projects reach maturity levels and do not die mid-way implementation as often noticed in many countries. The study recommends that countries within the region should make consented collaborative efforts and synergies with the private sector players and international donor agencies to achieve the implementation part of the set ICT policies.

Keywords: E-Government, ICT-Policy Alignment, Implementation, Sub-Saharan Africa.

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Authors: V. G. Cappellesso, D. M. G. da Silva, J. A. Arndt, N. dos Santos Petry, A. B. Masuero, D. C. C. Dal Molin

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Concrete elements are subject to cracking, which can be an access point for deleterious agents that can trigger pathological manifestations reducing the service life of these structures. Finding ways to minimize or eliminate the effects of this aggressive agents’ penetration, such as the sealing of these cracks, is a manner of contributing to the durability of these structures. The cementitious self-healing phenomenon can be classified in two different processes. The autogenous self-healing that can be defined as a natural process in which the sealing of this cracks occurs without the stimulation of external agents, meaning, without different materials being added to the mixture, while on the other hand, the autonomous seal-healing phenomenon depends on the insertion of a specific engineered material added to the cement matrix in order to promote its recovery. This work aims to evaluate the autogenous self-healing of concretes produced with different water/cement ratios and exposed to wet/dry cycles, considering two ages of crack openings, 3 days and 28 days. The self-healing phenomenon was evaluated using two techniques: crack healing measurement using ultrasonic waves and image analysis performed with an optical microscope. It is possible to observe that by both methods, it possible to observe the self-healing phenomenon of the cracks. For young ages of crack openings and lower water/cement ratios, the self-healing capacity is higher when compared to advanced ages of crack openings and higher water/cement ratios. Regardless of the crack opening age, these concretes were found to stabilize the self-healing processes after 80 days or 90 days.

Keywords: Self-healing, autogenous, water/cement ratio, curing cycles, test methods.

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Authors: Ashiquer Rahman

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The cutting edge knowledge mediation system called ‘ePLANETe’ provides a framework for building knowledge, tools, and methods for education, research, and sustainable practices, as well as the deliberative assessment support for Higher Education, Research Institutions, and elsewhere e.g., the collaborative learning and research on sustainability and biodiversity issues of territorial development sectors. The paper is to present the analytical perspective of the ‘ePLANETe’ concept and functionalities as an experimental platform for contributing to sustainability assessment. Now the ‘ePLANETe’ can be seen as experimentation of the challenges of “ICT for Green”. The digital technologies of ‘ePLANETe’ are exploited (i) to facilitate collaborative research, learning tools, and knowledge for sustainability challenges, and (ii) as deliberation support tools in pursuing of sustainability performance and practices in territorial governance, public policy, and business strategy, as well as in the higher education sectors itself. The paper investigates the dealing capacity of qualitative and quantitative assessment of agriculture sustainability through the stakeholder-based integrated assessment. Specifically, this paper focuses on integrating system methodologies with Deliberation Support Tools (DST) and INTEGRAAL method for collective assessment and decision-making in implementing regional plans. The report aims to identify the effective knowledge and tools to enable deliberations methodologies regarding practices on the sustainability of agriculture and biodiversity issues, societal responsibilities, and regional planning, concentrating on the question: “How to effectively mobilize resources (knowledge, tools, and methods) from different sources and at different scales regarding on agriculture and biodiversity issues to address sustainability challenges” that will create the scope for qualitative and quantitative assessments of sustainability as a new landmark of the agriculture sector.

Keywords: Biodiversity, Deliberation Support Tools, INTEGRAAL, stakeholder.

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Authors: Raif Parlakkaya, Mustafa Nihat Demirci, Mehmet Nuri Salur

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Environmental pollution has detrimental effects on the quality of our life and its scope has reached such an extent that measures are being taken both at the national and international levels to reduce, prevent and mitigate its impact on social, economic and political spheres. Therefore, awareness of environmental problems has been increasing among stakeholders and accordingly among companies. It is seen that corporate reporting is expanding beyond environmental performance. Primary purpose of publishing an environmental report is to provide specific audiences with useful, meaningful information. This paper is intended to analyze the extent and qualification of environmental disclosures of Turkish publicly quoted firms and see how it varies from one sector to another. The data for the study were collected from annual activity reports of companies, listed on the corporate governance index (BIST-XKURY) of Istanbul Stock Exchange. Content analysis was the research methodology used to measure the extent of environmental disclosure. Accordingly, 2015 annual activity reports of companies that carry out business in some particular fields were acquired from Capital Market Board, websites of Public Disclosure Platform and companies’ own websites. These reports were categorized into five main aspects: Environmental policies, environmental management systems, environmental protection and conservation activities, environmental awareness and information on environmental lawsuits. Subsequently, each component was divided into several variables related to what each firm is supposed to disclose about environmental information. In this context, the nature and scope of the information disclosed on each item were assessed according to five different ways (N.I: No Information; G.E.: General Explanations; Q.E.: Qualitative Detailed Explanations; N.E.: Quantitative (numerical) Detailed Explanations; Q.&N.E.: Both Qualitative and Quantitative Explanations).

Keywords: Environmental accounting, disclosure, corporate governance, content analysis.

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Authors: Andrej Golowin, Viktor Denk, Axel Riepe

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Solid fan blades and discs in aero engines are subjected to high combined low and high cycle fatigue loads especially around the contact areas between blade and disc. Therefore, special coatings (e.g. dry film lubricant) and surface treatments (e.g. shot peening or laser shock peening) are applied to increase the strength with respect to combined cyclic fatigue and fretting fatigue, but also to improve damage tolerance capability. The traditional deterministic damage tolerance assessment based on fracture mechanics analysis, which treats service damage as an initial crack, often gives overly conservative results especially in the presence of vibratory stresses. A probabilistic damage tolerance methodology using crack initiation data has been developed for fan discs exposed to relatively high vibratory stresses in cross- and tail-wind conditions at certain resonance speeds for limited time periods. This Monte-Carlo based method uses a damage databank from similar designs, measured vibration levels at typical aircraft operations and wind conditions and experimental crack initiation data derived from testing of artificially damaged specimens with representative surface treatment under combined fatigue conditions. The proposed methodology leads to a more realistic prediction of the minimum damage tolerance life for the most critical locations applicable to modern fan disc designs.

Keywords: Damage tolerance, Monte-Carlo method, fan blade and disc, laser shock peening.

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Authors: C. W. Hsu, C. N. Liang, L. Y. Ke, F. Y. Huang

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Many accidents were happened because of fast driving, habitual working overtime or tired spirit. This paper presents a solution of remote warning for vehicles collision avoidance using vehicular communication. The development system integrates dedicated short range communication (DSRC) and global position system (GPS) with embedded system into a powerful remote warning system. To transmit the vehicular information and broadcast vehicle position; DSRC communication technology is adopt as the bridge. The proposed system is divided into two parts of the positioning andvehicular units in a vehicle. The positioning unit is used to provide the position and heading information from GPS module, and furthermore the vehicular unit is used to receive the break, throttle, and othersignals via controller area network (CAN) interface connected to each mechanism. The mobile hardware are built with an embedded system using X86 processor in Linux system. A vehicle is communicated with other vehicles via DSRC in non-addressed protocol with wireless access in vehicular environments (WAVE) short message protocol. From the position data and vehicular information, this paper provided a conflict detection algorithm to do time separation and remote warning with error bubble consideration. And the warning information is on-line displayed in the screen. This system is able to enhance driver assistance service and realize critical safety by using vehicular information from the neighbor vehicles.KeywordsDedicated short range communication, GPS, Control area network, Collision avoidance warning system.

Keywords: Dedicated short range communication, GPS, Control area network, Collision avoidance warning system.

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Authors: E. M. Vieira, C. S. Vieira, L. P. Bonifácio, L. M. de Oliveira Ciabati, A. C. A. Franzon, F. S. Zaratini, J. A. C. Sanchez, M. S. Andrade, J. P. Dias de Souza

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The quality of prenatal care is key to reduce maternal morbidity and mortality. Communication between the health service and users can stimulate prevention and care. M-health has been an important and low cost strategy to health education. The PRENACEL programme (prenatal in the cell phone) was developed. It consists of a programme of information via SMS from the 20^th week of pregnancy up to 12^th week after delivery. Messages were about prenatal care, birth, contraception and breastfeeding. Communication of the pregnant woman asking questions about their health was possible. The objective of this study was to evaluate the implementation of PRENACEL as a useful complement to the standard prenatal care. Twenty health clinics were selected and randomized by cluster, 10 as the intervention group and 10 as the control group. In the intervention group, women and their partner were invited to participate. The control group received the standard prenatal care. All women were interviewed in the immediate post-partum and in the 12^th and 24^th week post-partum. Most women were married, had more than 8 years of schooling and visit the clinic more than 6 times during prenatal care. The intervention group presented lowest percentage of higher economic participants (5.6%), less single mothers and no drug user. It also presented more prenatal care visits than the control group and it was less likely to present Severe Acute Maternal Mortality when compared to control group as well as higher percentage of partners (75.4%) was present at the birth compared to control group. Although the study is still being carried out, preliminary data are showing positive results of the compliance of women to prenatal care.

Keywords: Cellphone, health technology, prenatal care, prevention.

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Authors: John Lamb, Robert Epstein, Vasundhara L. Bhupathi, Sanjeev Kumar Marimekala

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As we enter the new era of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and cloud computing, we mostly rely on the machine and natural language processing capabilities of AI, and energy efficient hardware and software devices in almost every industry sector. In these industry sectors, much emphasis is on developing new and innovative methods for producing and conserving energy and to sustain the depletion of natural resources. The core pillars of sustainability are Economic, Environmental, and Social, which are also informally referred to as 3 P's (People, Planet and Profits). The 3 P's play a vital role in creating a core sustainability model in the enterprise. Natural resources are continually being depleted, so there is more focus and growing demand for renewable energy. With this growing demand there is also a growing concern in many industries on how to reduce carbon emission and conserve natural resources while adopting sustainability in the corporate business models and policies. In our paper, we would like to discuss the driving forces such as climate changes, natural disasters, pandemic, disruptive technologies, corporate policies, scaled business models and emerging social media and AI platforms that influence the 3 main pillars of sustainability (3P’s). Through this paper, we would like to bring an overall perspective on enterprise strategies and the primary focus on bringing cultural shifts in adapting energy efficient operational models. Overall, many industries across the globe are incorporating core sustainability principles such as reducing energy costs, reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, reducing waste and increase recycling, adopting advanced monitoring and metering infrastructure, reducing server footprint and compute resources (shared IT services, cloud computing and application modernization) with the vision for a sustainable environment.

Keywords: AI, cloud computing, machine learning, social media platform.

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Authors: Sindhu Govardhan, Kenneth G. Crowther

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Modernisation of the water sector is leading to increased connectivity and integration of emerging technologies with traditional ones, leading to new security risks. The convergence of Information Technology (IT) with Operation Technology (OT) results in solutions that are spread across larger geographic areas, increasingly consist of interconnected Industrial Internet of Things (IIOT) devices and software, rely on the integration of legacy with modern technologies, use of complex supply chain components leading to complex architectures and communication paths. The result is that multiple parties collectively own and operate these emergent technologies, threat actors find new paths to exploit, and traditional cybersecurity controls are inadequate. Our approach is to explicitly identify and draw data flows that cross trust boundaries between owners and operators of various aspects of these emerging and interconnected technologies. On these data flows, we layer potential attack vectors to create a frame of reference for evaluating possible risks against connected technologies. Finally, we identify where existing controls, mitigations, and other remediations exist across industry partners (e.g., suppliers, product vendors, integrators, water utilities, and regulators). From these, we are able to understand potential gaps in security, the roles in the supply chain that are most likely to effectively remediate those security gaps, and test cases to evaluate and strengthen security across these partners. This informs a “shared responsibility” solution that recognises that security is multi-layered and requires collaboration to be successful. This shared responsibility security framework improves visibility, understanding, and control across the entire supply chain, and particularly for those water utilities that are accountable for safe and continuous operations.

Keywords: Cyber security, shared responsibility, IIOT, threat modelling.

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Authors: S. Pushkar, O. Verbitsky

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Currently, green rating systems are mainly utilized for correctly sizing mechanical and electrical systems, which have short lifetime expectancies. In these systems, passive solar and bio-climatic architecture, which have long lifetime expectancies, are neglected. Urban rating systems consider buildings and services in addition to neighborhoods and public transportation as integral parts of the built environment. The main goal of this study was to develop a more consistent point allocation system for urban building standards by using six different lifetime shearing layers: Site, Structure, Skin, Services, Space, and Stuff, each reflecting distinct environmental damages. This shearing-layer concept was applied to internationally well-known rating systems: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) for Neighborhood Development, BRE Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM) for Communities and Comprehensive Assessment System for Building Environmental Efficiency (CASBEE) for Urban Development. The results showed that LEED for Neighborhood Development and BREEAM for Communities focused on long-lifetime-expectancy building designs, whereas CASBEE for Urban Development gave equal importance to the Building and Service Layers. Moreover, although this rating system was applied using a building-scale assessment, “Urban Area + Buildings” focuses on a short-lifetime-expectancy system design, neglecting to improve the architectural design by considering bioclimatic and passive solar aspects.

Keywords: Green rating system, passive solar architecture, shearing-layer concept, urban community.

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Authors: Saad Alkhaldi, Fadi Ghammas, Tariq Alghamdi, Stefano Alexandirs

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The operating conditions and corrosive nature of the process fluid in the Haradh and Hawiyah areas are subjecting facility piping to undesirable corrosion phenomena. Therefore, production headers inside remote headers have been internally cladded with high alloy material to mitigate the corrosion damage mechanism. Corrosion mitigation in the jump-over lines, constructed between the existing flowlines and the newly constructed facilities to provide operational flexibility, is proposed. This corrosion mitigation system includes the application of fusion bond epoxy (FBE) coating on the internal surface of the pipe and depositing corrosion-resistant alloy (CRA) weld layers at pipe and fittings ends to protect the carbon steel material. In addition, high alloy CRA weld material is used to deposit the girth weld between the 90-degree elbows and mating internally coated segments. A rigorous testing and qualification protocol was established prior to actual adoption at the Haradh and Hawiyah Field Gas Compression Program, currently being executed by Saudi Aramco. The proposed mitigation system, aimed at applying the cladding at the ends of the internally FBE coated pipes/elbows, will resolve field joint coating challenges, eliminate the use of approximately 1700 breakout flanges, and prevent the potential hydrocarbon leaks.

Keywords: Corrosion, FBE coated sour service, cost savings.

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Authors: Chaiwat Kongsom, Vitoon Panyakul

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The objective of this study was to assess the production and market of certified organic products in Thailand. A purposive sampling technique was used to identify a sample group of 154 organic entrepreneurs for the study. A survey and in-depth interview were employed for data collection. Also, secondary data from organic agriculture certification body and publications was collected. Then descriptive statistics and content analysis technique were used to describe about production and market of certified organic products in Thailand. Results showed that there were 9,218 farmers on 213,183.68 Rai (83,309.2 acre) of certified organic agriculture land (0.29% of national agriculture land). A total of 57.8% of certified organic agricultural lands were certified by the international certification body. Organic farmers produced around 71,847 tons/year and worth around THB 1,914 million (Euro 47.92 million). Excluding primary producers, 471 operators involved in the Thai organic supply chains, including processors, exporters, distributors, green shops, modern trade shops (supermarket shop), farmer’s markets and food establishments were included. Export market was the major market channel and most of organic products were exported to Europe and North America. The total Thai organic market in 2014 was estimated to be worth around THB 2,331.55 million (Euro 58.22 million), of which, 77.9% was for export and 22.06% was for the domestic market. The largest exports of certified organic products were processed foods (66.1% of total export value), followed by organic rice (30.4%). In the domestic market, modern trade was the largest sale channel, accounting for 59.48% of total domestic sales, followed by green shop (29.47%) and food establishment (5.85%). To become a center of organic farming and trading within ASEAN, the Thai organic sector needs to have more policy support in regard to agricultural chemicals, GMO, and community land title. In addition, appropriate strategies need to be developed.

Keywords: Certified organic products, production, market, Thailand.

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Authors: P. Mukhopadhyay, N. C. Dey

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Occupational health hazard is a very common term in every emerging country. Along with the unorganized sector, most organized sectors including government industries are suffering from this affliction. In addition to workload, the seasonal changes also have some impacts on working environment. With this focus in mind, one hundred male industrial workers, who are directly involved to the task of Periodic Overhauling (POH) in a fabricating workshop in the public domain are selected for this research work. They have been studied during work periods throughout different seasons in a year. For each and every season, the participants working heart rate (WHR) is measured and compared with the standards given by different national and internationally recognized agencies i.e., World Health Organization (WHO) and American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) etc. The different environmental parameters i.e. dry bulb temperature (DBT), wet bulb temperature (WBT), globe temperature (GT), natural wet bulb temperature (NWB), relative humidity (RH), wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT), air velocity (AV), effective temperature (ET) are recorded throughout the seasons to critically observe the effect of seasonal changes on the WHR of the workers. The effect of changes in environment to the WHR of the workers is very much surprising. It is found that the percentages of workers who belong to the ‘very heavy’ workload category are 83.33%, 66.66% and 16.66% in the summer, rainy and winter seasons, respectively. Ongoing undertaking of this type of job profile forces the worker towards occupational disorders causing absenteeism. This occurrence results in lower production rates, and on the other hand, costs due to medical claims also weaken the industry’s economic condition. In this circumstance, the authors are trying to focus on some remedial measures from the ergonomic angle by proposing a new work/ rest regimen and introducing engineering controls along with management controls which may help the worker, and consequently, the management also.

Keywords: Environmental changes, industrial worker, working heart rate, workload, occupational health hazard.

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Authors: Buse A. Ataç, Doğan K. Cenan, Arda Çetinkaya, Naz D. Şahin, Köksal Sanlı, Zeynep Koç, Akın Kısa

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With its spatial data reliability, interpretation and questioning capabilities, Geographical Information Systems make significant contributions to scientists, planners and practitioners. Geographic information systems have received great attention in today's digital world, growing rapidly, and increasing the efficiency of use. Access to and use of current and accurate geographical data, which are the most important components of the Geographical Information System, has become a necessity rather than a need for sustainable and economic development. This project aims to enable sharing of data collected by public institutions and organizations on a web-based platform. Within the scope of the project, INSPIRE (Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community) data specifications are considered as a road-map. In this context, Turkey's National Geographic Information System (TUCBS) Integration Project supports sharing spatial data within 61 pilot public institutions as complied with defined national standards. In this paper, which is prepared by the project team members in the TUCBS Integration Project, the technical process with a detailed methodology is explained. In this context, the main technical processes of the Project consist of Geographic Data Analysis, Geographic Data Harmonization (Standardization), Web Service Creation (WMS, WFS) and Metadata Creation-Publication. In this paper, the integration process carried out to provide the data produced by 61 institutions to be shared from the National Geographic Data Portal (GEOPORTAL), have been trying to be conveyed with a detailed methodology.

Keywords: Data specification, geoportal, GIS, INSPIRE, TUCBS, Turkey’s National Geographic Information System.

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Authors: Helen L. Hein, Joachim Schwarte

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As a pillar of sustainable development, ecology has become an important milestone in research community, especially due to global challenges like climate change. The ecological performance of products can be scientifically conducted with life cycle assessments. In the construction sector, significant amounts of CO₂ emissions are assigned to the energy used for building heating purposes. Therefore, sustainable construction materials for insulating purposes are substantial, whereby aerogels have been explored intensively in the last years due to their low thermal conductivity. Therefore, the WALL-ACE project aims to develop an aerogel-based thermal insulating plaster that would achieve minor thermal conductivities. But as in the early stage of development phases, a lot of information is still missing or not yet accessible, the ecological performance of innovative products bases increasingly on uncertain data that can lead to significant deviations in the results. To be able to predict realistically how meaningful the results are and how viable the developed products may be with regard to their corresponding respective market, these deviations however have to be considered. Therefore, a classification method is presented in this study, which may allow comparing the ecological performance of modern products with already established and competitive materials. In order to achieve this, an alternative calculation method was used that allows computing with lower and upper bounds to consider all possible values without precise data. The life cycle analysis of the considered products was conducted with an interval arithmetic based calculation method. The results lead to the conclusion that the interval solutions describing the possible environmental impacts are so wide that the result usability is limited. Nevertheless, a further optimization in reducing environmental impacts of aerogels seems to be needed to become more competitive in the future.

Keywords: Aerogel-based, insulating material, early develop¬ment phase, interval arithmetic.

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Authors: János Levendovszky, András Oláh

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In this paper, novel statistical sampling based equalization techniques and CNN based detection are proposed to increase the spectral efficiency of multiuser communication systems over fading channels. Multiuser communication combined with selective fading can result in interferences which severely deteriorate the quality of service in wireless data transmission (e.g. CDMA in mobile communication). The paper introduces new equalization methods to combat interferences by minimizing the Bit Error Rate (BER) as a function of the equalizer coefficients. This provides higher performance than the traditional Minimum Mean Square Error equalization. Since the calculation of BER as a function of the equalizer coefficients is of exponential complexity, statistical sampling methods are proposed to approximate the gradient which yields fast equalization and superior performance to the traditional algorithms. Efficient estimation of the gradient is achieved by using stratified sampling and the Li-Silvester bounds. A simple mechanism is derived to identify the dominant samples in real-time, for the sake of efficient estimation. The equalizer weights are adapted recursively by minimizing the estimated BER. The near-optimal performance of the new algorithms is also demonstrated by extensive simulations. The paper has also developed a (Cellular Neural Network) CNN based approach to detection. In this case fast quadratic optimization has been carried out by t, whereas the task of equalizer is to ensure the required template structure (sparseness) for the CNN. The performance of the method has also been analyzed by simulations.

Keywords: Cellular Neural Network, channel equalization, communication over fading channels, multiuser communication, spectral efficiency, statistical sampling.

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Authors: Michael Moeti, Khuliso Sigama, Thapelo Samuel Matlala

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One of the principal challenges that the world is confronted with is insecurity. The crime rate is increasing exponentially, and protecting our physical assets, especially in the motorist sector, is becoming impossible when applying our own strength. The need to develop technological solutions that detect and report theft without any human interference is inevitable. This is critical, especially for vehicle owners, to ensure theft detection and speedy identification towards recovery efforts in cases where a vehicle is missing or attempted theft is taking place. The vehicle theft detection system uses Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to recognize the driver's face captured using an installed mobile phone device. The location identification function uses a Global Positioning System (GPS) to determine the real-time location of the vehicle. Upon identification of the location, Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) technology is used to report or notify the vehicle owner about the whereabouts of the vehicle. The installed mobile app was implemented by making use of Python as it is undoubtedly the best choice in machine learning. It allows easy access to machine learning algorithms through its widely developed library ecosystem. The graphical user interface was developed by making use of JAVA as it is better suited for mobile development. Google's online database (Firebase) was used as a means of storage for the application. The system integration test was performed using a simple percentage analysis. 60 vehicle owners participated in this study as a sample, and questionnaires were used in order to establish the acceptability of the system developed. The result indicates the efficiency of the proposed system, and consequently, the paper proposes that the use of the system can effectively monitor the vehicle at any given place, even if it is driven outside its normal jurisdiction. More so, the system can be used as a database to detect, locate and report missing vehicles to different security agencies.

Keywords: Convolutional Neural Network, CNN, location identification, tracking, GPS, GSM.

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Authors: Nooshin La'l Mohamadi

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Due to the fact that in the new century customers tend to express globally increasing demands, networks of interconnected businesses have been established in societies and the management of such networks seems to be a major key through gaining competitive advantages. Supply chain management encompasses such managerial activities. Within a supply chain, a critical role is played by quality. QFD is a widely-utilized tool which serves the purpose of not only bringing quality to the ultimate provision of products or service packages required by the end customer or the retailer, but it can also initiate us into a satisfactory relationship with our initial customer; that is the wholesaler. However, the wholesalers- cooperation is considerably based on the capabilities that are heavily dependent on their locations and existing circumstances. Therefore, it is undeniable that for all companies each wholesaler possesses a specific importance ratio which can heavily influence the figures calculated in the House of Quality in QFD. Moreover, due to the competitiveness of the marketplace today, it-s been widely recognized that consumers- expression of demands has been highly volatile in periods of production. Apparently, such instability and proneness to change has been very tangibly noticed and taking it into account during the analysis of HOQ is widely influential and doubtlessly required. For a more reliable outcome in such matters, this article demonstrates the application viability of Analytic Network Process for considering the wholesalers- reputation and simultaneously introduces a mortality coefficient for the reliability and stability of the consumers- expressed demands in course of time. Following to this, the paper provides further elaboration on the relevant contributory factors and approaches through the calculation of such coefficients. In the end, the article concludes that an empirical application is needed to achieve broader validity.

Keywords: Analytic Network Process, Quality Function Deployment, QFD flaws, Supply Chain Management

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Authors: Akram Mahdaviparsa, Tamera McCuen, Vahideh Karimimansoob

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Fire service is responsible for protecting life, assets, and natural resources from fire and other hazardous incidents. Search and rescue in unfamiliar buildings is a vital part of firefighters’ responsibilities. Providing firefighters with precise building information in an easy-to-understand format is a potential solution for mitigating the negative consequences of fire hazards. The negative effect of insufficient knowledge about a building’s indoor environment impedes firefighters’ capabilities and leads to lost property. A data rich building information modeling (BIM) is a potentially useful source in three-dimensional (3D) visualization and data/information storage for fire emergency response. Therefore, this research’s purpose is prioritizing the required information for firefighters from the most important information to the least important. A survey was carried out with firefighters working in the Norman Fire Department to obtain the importance of each building information item. The results show that “the location of exit doors, windows, corridors, elevators, and stairs”, “material of building elements”, and “building data” are the three most important information specified by firefighters. The results also implied that the 2D model of architectural, structural and way finding is more understandable in comparison with the 3D model, while the 3D model of MEP system could convey more information than the 2D model. Furthermore, color in visualization can help firefighters to understand the building information easier and quicker. Sufficient internal consistency of all responses was proven through developing the Pearson Correlation Matrix and obtaining Cronbach’s alpha of 0.916. Therefore, the results of this study are reliable and could be applied to the population.

Keywords: BIM, building fire response, ranking, visualization.

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Authors: F. Ahwide, Y. Bouker, K. Hatem

Abstract:

This paper presents long term wind data analysis in terms of annual and diurnal variations at different areas of Libya. The data of the wind speed and direction are taken each ten minutes for a period, at least two years, are used in the analysis. ‘WindPRO’ software and Excel workbook were used for the wind statistics and energy calculations. As for Darnah, average speeds are 10m, 20m and 40m and 6.57 m/s, 7.18 m/s, and 8.09 m/s, respectively. Highest wind speeds are observed at SSW, followed by S, WNW and NW sectors. Lowest wind speeds are observed between N and E sectors. Most frequent wind directions are NW and NNW. Hence, wind turbines can be installed against these directions. The most powerful sector is NW (31.3% of total expected wind energy), followed by 17.9% SSW, 11.5% NNW and 8.2% WNW

In Excel workbook, an estimation of annual energy yield at position of Derna, Al-Maqrun, Tarhuna and Al-Asaaba meteorological mast has been done, considering a generic wind turbine of 1.65 MW. (mtORRES, TWT 82-1.65MW) in position of meteorological mast. Three other turbines have been tested and a reduction of 18% over the net AEP. At 80m, the estimation of energy yield for Derna, Al- Maqrun, Tarhuna and Asaaba is 6.78 GWh or 3390 equivalent hours, 5.80 GWh or 2900 equivalent hours, 4.91 GWh or 2454 equivalent hours and 5.08 GWh or 2541 equivalent hours respectively. It seems a fair value in the context of a possible development of a wind energy project in the areas, considering a value of 2400 equivalent hours as an approximate limit to consider a wind warm economically profitable. Furthermore, an estimation of annual energy yield at positions of Misalatha, Azizyah and Goterria meteorological mast has been done, considering a generic wind turbine of 2 MW. We found that, at 80 m the estimation of energy yield is 3.12 GWh or 1557 equivalent hours, 4.47 GWh or 2235 equivalent hours and 4.07GWh or 2033 respectively.

It seems a very poor value in the context of possible development of a wind energy project in the areas, considering a value of 2400 equivalent hours as an approximate limit to consider a wind warm economically profitable. Anyway, more data and a detailed wind farm study would be necessary to draw conclusions.

Keywords: Wind turbines, wind data, energy yield, micrositting.

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Authors: Kutubuddin Ansari, Malay Mukul, Sridevi Jade

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We used high-precision Global Positioning System (GPS) to geodetically constrain the motion of stations in the Darjiling-Sikkim Himalayan (DSH) wedge and examine the deformation at the Indian-Tibetan plate boundary using IGS (International GPS Service) fiducial stations. High-precision GPS based displacement and velocity field was measured in the DSH between 1997 and 2009. To obtain additional insight north of the Indo-Tibetan border and in the Darjiling-Sikkim-Tibet (DaSiT) wedge, published velocities from four stations J037, XIGA, J029 and YADO were also included in the analysis. India-fixed velocities or the back-slip was computed relative to the pole of rotation of the Indian Plate (Latitude 52.97 ± 0.22º, Longitude - 0.30 ± 3.76º, and Angular Velocity 0.500 ± 0.008º/ Myr) in the DaSiT wedge. Dislocation modelling was carried out with the back-slip to model the best possible solution of a finite rectangular dislocation or the causative fault based on dislocation theory that produced the observed back-slip using a forward modelling approach. To find the best possible solution, three different models were attempted. First, slip along a single thrust fault, then two thrust faults and in finally, three thrust faults were modelled to simulate the back-slip in the DaSiT wedge. The three-fault case bests the measured displacements and is taken as the best possible solution.

Keywords: Global Positioning System, Darjiling-Sikkim Himalaya, Dislocation modelling.

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Authors: Bipul Krishna Saha, Basab Chakraborty, Ashish Alex Sam, Parthasarathi Ghosh

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The demand for energy is cumulatively increasing with time.  Since the availability of conventional energy resources is dying out gradually, significant interest is being laid on searching for alternate energy resources and minimizing the wastage of energy in various fields.  In such perspective, low-grade waste heat from several industrial sources can be reused to generate electricity. The present work is to further the adoption of the Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) technology in Indian industrial sector.  The present paper focuses on extending the previously reported idea to the next level through a comparative review with three different working fluids using practical data from an Indian industrial plant. For comprehensive study in the simulation platform of Aspen Hysys^®, v8.6, the waste heat data has been collected from a current coke oven gas plant in India.  A parametric analysis of non-regenerative ORC and regenerative ORC is executed using the working fluids R-123, R-11 and R-21 for subcritical ORC system.  The primary goal is to determine the optimal working fluid considering various system parameters like turbine work output, obtained system efficiency, irreversibility rate and second law efficiency under applied multiple heat source temperature (160 °C- 180 °C).  Selection of the turbo-expanders is one of the most crucial tasks for low-temperature applications in ORC system. The present work is an attempt to make suitable recommendation for the appropriate configuration of the turbine. In a nutshell, this study justifies the proficiency of integrating the ORC technology in Indian perspective and also finds the appropriate parameter of all components integrated in ORC system for building up an ORC prototype.

Keywords: Organic rankine cycle, regenerative organic rankine cycle, waste heat recovery, Indian industry.

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Authors: Alemayehu Agizew Woldeamanuel, Mekonnen Maschal Tarekegn, Raj Mohan Balakrishina

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Composting is one of the conventional techniques adopted for organic waste management but the practice is very limited in emerging cities despite that most of the waste generated is organic. This paper aims to examine the viability of composting for organic waste management in the emerging city of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia by addressing the composting practice, quality of compost and application of compost in urban agriculture. The study collects data using compost laboratory testing and urban farm households’ survey and uses descriptive analysis on the state of compost production and application, physicochemical analysis of the compost samples, and regression analysis on the urban farmer’s willingness to pay for compost. The findings of the study indicated that there is composting practice at a small scale, most of the producers use unsorted feedstock materials, aerobic composting is dominantly used and the maturation period ranged from four to 10 weeks. The carbon content of the compost ranges from 30.8 to 277.1 due to the type of feedstock applied and this surpasses the ideal proportions for C:N ratio. The total nitrogen, pH, organic matter and moisture content are relatively optimal. The levels of heavy metals measured for Mn, Cu, Pb, Cd and Cr6+ in the compost samples are also insignificant. In the urban agriculture sector, chemical fertilizer is the dominant type of soil input in crop productions but vegetable producers use a combination of both fertilizer and other organic inputs including compost. The willingness to pay for compost depends on income, household size, gender, type of soil inputs, monitoring soil fertility, the main product of the farm, farming method and farm ownership. Finally, this study recommends the need for collaboration among stakeholders along the value chain of waste, awareness creation on the benefits of composting and addressing challenges faced by both compost producers and users.

Keywords: Composting, emerging city, organic waste management, urban agriculture.

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Authors: Mohammed W. Abdulrahman

Abstract:

In the thermochemical water splitting process by Cu-Cl cycle, oxygen gas is produced by an endothermic thermolysis process at a temperature of 530^oC. Oxygen production reactor is a three-phase reactor involving cuprous chloride molten salt, copper oxychloride solid reactant and oxygen gas. To perform optimal performance, the oxygen reactor requires accurate control of heat transfer to the molten salt and decomposing solid particles within the thermolysis reactor. In this paper, the scale up analysis of the oxygen reactor that is heated by an internal helical tube is performed from the perspective of heat transfer. A heat balance of the oxygen reactor is investigated to analyze the size of the reactor that provides the required heat input for different rates of hydrogen production. It is found that the helical tube wall and the service side constitute the largest thermal resistances of the oxygen reactor system. In the analysis of this paper, the Cu-Cl cycle is assumed to be heated by two types of nuclear reactor, which are HTGR and CANDU SCWR. It is concluded that using CANDU SCWR requires more heat transfer rate by 3-4 times than that when using HTGR. The effect of the reactor aspect ratio is also studied and it is found that increasing the aspect ratio decreases the number of reactors and the rate of decrease in the number of reactors decreases by increasing the aspect ratio. Comparisons between the results of this study and pervious results of material balances in the oxygen reactor show that the size of the oxygen reactor is dominated by the heat balance rather than the material balance.

Keywords: Heat transfer, Cu-Cl cycle, hydrogen production, oxygen, clean energy.

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Authors: Cholpassorn Sitthiwarongchai, Chutikarn Sriviboon

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The two primary objectives of this research were (1)  to examine the current knowledge and actual circumstance of  agricultural workers about mangosteen product processing; and (2) to  analyze and evaluate ways to develop capacity of mangosteen  product processing. The population of this study was 15,125 people  who work in the agricultural sector, in this context, mangosteen  production, in the eastern part of Thailand that included Chantaburi  Province, Rayong Province, Trad Province and Pracheenburi  Province. The sample size based on Yamane’s calculation with 95%  reliability was therefore 392 samples. Mixed method was employed  included questionnaire and focus group discussion with  Connoisseurship Model used in order to collect quantitative and  qualitative data. Key informants were used in the focus group  including agricultural business owners, academic people in agro food  processing, local academics, local community development staff,  OTOP subcommittee, and representatives of agro processing  industry professional organizations. The study found that the  majority of the respondents agreed with a high level (in five- rating  scale) towards most of variables of knowledge management in agro  food processing. The result of the current knowledge and actual  circumstance of agricultural human resource in an arena of  mangosteen product processing revealed that mostly, the respondents  agreed at a high level to establish 7 variables. The guideline to  developing the body of knowledge in order to enhance the capacity  of the agricultural workers in mangosteen product processing was  delivered in the focus group discussion. The discussion finally  contributed to an idea to produce manuals for mangosteen product  processing methods, with 4 products chosen: (1) mangosteen soap;  (2) mangosteen juice; (3) mangosteen toffee; and (4) mangosteen  preserves or jam.

Keywords: Capacity Enhancement, Agricultural Workers, Mangosteen Product Processing.

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Authors: P. Abachi, T. W. Coyle, P. S. Musavi Gharavi

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By applying coating onto a structural component, the corrosion and/or wear resistance requirements of the surface can be fulfilled. Since the layer adhesion of the coating influences the mechanical integrity of the coat/substrate interface during the service time, it should be examined accurately. At the present work, the tensile bonding strength of the 316 stainless steel plasma sprayed coating on aluminum substrate was determined by using tensile adhesion test, TAT, specimen. The interfacial fracture toughness was specified using four-point bend specimen containing a saw notch and modified chevron-notched short-bar (SB) specimen. The coating microstructure and fractured specimen surface were examined by using scanning electron- and optical-microscopy. The investigation of coated surface after tensile adhesion test indicates that the failure mechanism is mostly cohesive and rarely adhesive type. The calculated value of critical strain energy release rate proposes relatively good interface status. It seems that four-point bending test offers a potentially more sensitive means for evaluation of mechanical integrity of coating/substrate interfaces than is possible with the tensile test. The fracture toughness value reported for the modified chevron-notched short-bar specimen testing cannot be taken as absolute value because its calculation is based on the minimum stress intensity coefficient value which has been suggested for the fracture toughness determination of homogeneous parts in the ASTM E1304-97 standard. 

Keywords: Bonding strength, four-point bend test, interfacial fracture toughness, modified chevron-notched short-bar specimen, plasma sprayed coating.

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Authors: Y. Harold Robinson, M. Rajaram

Abstract:

Wireless mesh networking is rapidly gaining in popularity with a variety of users: from municipalities to enterprises, from telecom service providers to public safety and military organizations. This increasing popularity is based on two basic facts: ease of deployment and increase in network capacity expressed in bandwidth per footage; WMNs do not rely on any fixed infrastructure. Many efforts have been used to maximizing throughput of the network in a multi-channel multi-radio wireless mesh network. Current approaches are purely based on either static or dynamic channel allocation approaches. In this paper, we use a hybrid multichannel multi radio wireless mesh networking architecture, where static and dynamic interfaces are built in the nodes. Dynamic Adaptive Channel Allocation protocol (DACA), it considers optimization for both throughput and delay in the channel allocation. The assignment of the channel has been allocated to be codependent with the routing problem in the wireless mesh network and that should be based on passage flow on every link. Temporal and spatial relationship rises to re compute the channel assignment every time when the pattern changes in mesh network, channel assignment algorithms assign channels in network. In this paper a computing path which captures the available path bandwidth is the proposed information and the proficient routing protocol based on the new path which provides both static and dynamic links. The consistency property guarantees that each node makes an appropriate packet forwarding decision and balancing the control usage of the network, so that a data packet will traverse through the right path.

Keywords: Wireless mesh network, spatial time division multiple access, hybrid topology, timeslot allocation.

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