The thief process for mercury removal from flue gas

The Thief Process is a cost-effective variation to activated carbon injection (ACI) for removal of mercury from flue gas. In this scheme, partially combusted coal from the furnace of a pulverized coal power generation plant is extracted by a lance and then re-injected into the ductwork downstream of the air preheater. Recent results on a 500-lb/h pilot-scale combustion facility show similar removals of mercury for both the Thief Process and ACI. The tests conducted to date at laboratory, bench, and pilot-scales demonstrate that the Thief sorbents exhibit capacities for mercury from flue gas streams that are comparable to those exhibited by commercially available activated carbons. A patent for the process was issued in February 2003. The Thief sorbents are cheaper than commercially-available activated carbons; exhibit excellent capacities for mercury; and the overall process holds great potential for reducing the cost of mercury removal from flue gas. The Thief Process was licensed to Mobotec USA, Inc. in May of 2005.     

Report: Combustion Byproducts and Their Health Effects: Summary of the 10th International Congress

The 10th International Congress on Combustion Byproducts and their Health Effects was held in Ischia, Italy, from June 17-20, 2007. It is sponsored by the US NIEHS, NSF, Coalition for Responsible Waste Incineration (CRWI), and Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI). The congress focused on: the origin, characterization, and health impacts of combustion-generated fine and ultrafine particles; emissions of mercury and dioxins, and the development/application of novel analytical/diagnostic tools. The consensus of the discussion was that particle-associated organics, metals, and persistent free radicals (PFRs) produced by combustion sources are the likely source of the observed health impacts of airborne PM rather than simple physical irritation of the particles. Ultrafine particle-induced oxidative stress is a likely progenitor of the observed health impacts, but important biological and chemical details and possible catalytic cycles remain unresolved. Other key conclusions were: (1) In urban settings, 70% of airborne fine particles are a result of combustion emissions and 50% are due to primary emissions from combustion sources, (2) In addition to soot, combustion produces one, possibly two, classes of nanoparticles with mean diameters of?~10?nm and?~1?nm. (3) The most common metrics used to describe particle toxicity, viz. surface area, sulfate concentration, total carbon, and organic carbon, cannot fully explain observed health impacts, (4) Metals contained in combustion-generated ultrafine and fine particles mediate formation of toxic air pollutants such as PCDD/F and PFRs. (5) The combination of metal-containing nanoparticles, organic carbon compounds, and PFRs can lead to a cycle generating oxidative stress in exposed organisms.     

Response of Red-Backed Voles to Recent Patch Cutting in Subalpine Forest

We examined the response of southern red-backed voles ( Clethrionomys gapperi ) to patch cutting in a forested landscape in which 23% of the forest cover had been removed by timber harvest. We live trapped voles in and around 18 patchcuts in one watershed of southern Wyoming. Although we found a significant difference in capture rates between patchcut interior and forest habitats in 1 of 2 years, voles did not strongly avoid the interior of patchcuts. This result contrasts with results from most studies of voles in clearcut ecosystems, which report that red-backed voles are generally rare or absent from clearcuts. Capture rates were highest on both sides of the patchcut edge, which also contrasts with studies of voles at the edges of forest remnants. The use of patchcut interior and edge habitats could not be explained as a consequence of juvenile voles dispersing to those habitats or males moving through the habitat in search of mates. We suggest that, despite similar physiognomy in patchcut and clearcut sites, the differences in landscape structure in perforated versus fragmented landscapes lead to very different patterns of vole movement. Understanding the scales at which voles perceive landscapes as coarse- or fine-grained will be key to developing predictive models to aid managers in designing timber sales that maintain high vole populations. Our results emphasize the importance of the spatial pattern and scale of disturbance in determining the response of vertebrates to landscape change and the need for more refined investigations of the consequences of deforestation.     

Do horses with poor welfare show ‘pessimistic’ cognitive biases?

This field study tested the hypothesis that domestic horses living under putatively challenging-to-welfare conditions (for example involving social, spatial, feeding constraints) would present signs of poor welfare and co-occurring pessimistic judgement biases. Our subjects were 34 horses who had been housed for over 3 years in either restricted riding school situations (e.g. kept in single boxes, with limited roughage, ridden by inexperienced riders; N = 25) or under more naturalistic conditions (e.g. access to free-range, kept in stable social groups, leisure riding; N = 9). The horses’ welfare was assessed by recording health-related, behavioural and postural indicators. Additionally, after learning a location task to discriminate a bucket containing either edible food (‘positive’ location) or unpalatable food (‘negative’ location), the horses were presented with a bucket located near the positive position, near the negative position and halfway between the positive and negative positions to assess their judgement biases. The riding school horses displayed the highest levels of behavioural and health-related problems and a pessimistic judgment bias, whereas the horses living under more naturalistic conditions displayed indications of good welfare and an optimistic bias. Moreover, pessimistic bias data strongly correlated with poor welfare data. This suggests that a lowered mood impacts a non-human species’ perception of its environment and highlights cognitive biases as an appropriate tool to assess the impact of chronic living conditions on horse welfare.     

Spatial patterns reveal negative density dependence and habitat associations in tropical trees

Understanding how plant species coexist in tropical rainforests is one of the biggest challenges in community ecology. One prominent hypothesis suggests that rare species are at an advantage because trees have lower survival in areas of high conspecific density due to increased attack by natural enemies, a process known as negative density dependence (NDD). A consensus is emerging that NDD is important for plant-species coexistence in tropical forests. Most evidence comes from short-term studies, but testing the prediction that NDD decreases the spatial aggregation of tree populations provides a long-term perspective. While spatial distributions have provided only weak evidence for NDD so far, the opposing effects of environmental heterogeneity might have confounded previous analyses. Here we use a novel statistical technique to control for environmental heterogeneity while testing whether spatial aggregation decreases with tree size in four tropical forests. We provide evidence for NDD in 22% of the 139 tree species analyzed and show that environmental heterogeneity can obscure the spatial signal of NDD. Environmental heterogeneity contributed to aggregation in 84% of species. We conclude that both biotic interactions and environmental heterogeneity play crucial roles in shaping tree dynamics in tropical forests.     

Large-eddy simulation of starting buoyant jets

A series of Large Eddy Simulations (LES) are performed to investigate the penetration of starting buoyant jets. The LES code is first validated by comparing simulation results with existing experimental data for both steady and starting pure jets and lazy plumes. The centerline decay and the growth rate of the velocity and concentration fields for steady jets and plumes, as well as the simulated transient penetration rate of a starting pure jet and a starting lazy plume, are found to compare well with the experiments. After validation, the LES code is used to study the penetration of starting buoyant jets with three different Reynolds numbers from 2000 to 3000, and with a wide range of buoyancy fluxes from pure jets to lazy plumes. The penetration rate is found to increase with an increasing buoyancy flux. It is also observed that, in the initial Period of Flow Development, the two penetrative mechanisms driven by the initial buoyancy and momentum fluxes are uncoupled; therefore the total penetration rate can be resolved as the linear addition of these two effects. A fitting equation is proposed to predict the penetration rate by combining the two independent mechanisms.     

Homeostatic maintenance of ponderosa pine gas exchange in response to stand density changes.

Homeostatic maintenance of gas exchange optimizes carbon gain per water loss. Homeostasis is regulated by short-term physiological and long-term structural mechanisms, both of which may respond to changes in resource availability associated with competition. Therefore, stand density regulation via silvicultural manipulations may facilitate growth and survival through mechanisms operating at both short and long timescales. We investigated the responses of ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) to stand basal area manipulations in Arizona, USA. Stand basal area was manipulated to seven replicated levels in 1962 and was maintained for four decades by decadal thinning. We measured basal area increment (BAI) to assess the response and sustainability of wood growth, carbon isotope discrimination (A) inferred from annual rings to assess the response of crown gas exchange, and ratios of leaf area to sapwood area (A(l):A(s)) to assess longer term structural acclimation. Basal area treatments increased soil water potential (r2 = 0.99) but did not affect photosynthetic capacity. BAI increased within two years of thinning, and the 40-year mean BAI was negatively correlated with stand basal area (r2 = 0.98). delta was negatively correlated with stand basal area for years 5 through 12 after thinning (r2 = 0.90). However, delta was relatively invariant with basal area for the period 13-40 years after initial thinning despite maintenance of treatment basal areas via repeated decadal thinnings. Independent gas exchange measurements verified that the ratio of photosynthesis to stomatal conductance was invariant with basal area, but absolute values of both were elevated at lower basal areas. A(l):A(s) was negatively correlated with basal area (r2 = 0.93). We hypothesize that increased A(l):A(s) is a homeostatic response to increased water availability that maximizes water-use efficiency and whole-tree carbon uptake. Elevated A(l):A(s) of trees at low basal areas was associated with greater resilience to climate, i.e., greater absolute BAI during drought; however, trees with high A(l):A(s) in low basal area stands also exhibited the greatest sensitivity to drought, i.e., greater relative decline in BAI.     

Privatization and Europeanization: The Changing Context of Water Supply in Britain and France

This paper examines changes in the provision of water services, and in particular drinking water supply, in two Member States of the European Union, Britain England and Wales and France, by considering the impact of the twin processes of water service privatization and the Europeanization of environmental regulatory regimes. The paper demonstrates that in two nations with very different water service traditions, the articulation of these processes has led to profound shifts not only in management style but also in the perception of drinking water supply as a service to consumers. The British and French models are compared as are their responses to these twin processes. It is argued that while the British model has proved more responsive to the exigencies of European Union environmentalstandards,this has been at the expense of public confidence. In France, the existence of a well established traditional management style is, potentially, under greater long term threat from the growth of private water companies and the increasing importance of European legislation.