The Optimal Depletion of Exhaustible Resource under Different Commitment

There are few papers in the literature focusing on the issue of the optimal depletion of exhaustible resources in the framework of variable time preference. This paper attempts to analyze the pure consumption of exhaustible resource under hyperbolic time preference, and to discuss the optimal depletion rate and the effect of the protection of the exhaustible resource under different commitment abilities. The results of model show that the case of the hyperbolic discount with the full commitment of the government is equivalent to the case of constant discount of the social planner problem. In that case, the optimal depletion rate and the initial consumption of exhaustible resource are the slowest. On the contrary, they are the highest and the myopic behaviors lead to excessive consumption of exhaustible resources inevitably without commitment. Otherwise, in the case of partial commitment, the results are between the cases of full commitment and of no commitment. Therefore, with the hyperbolic time preference, the optimal depletion rate of resource depends on the commitment ability. Higher commitment ability leads to lower effective rate of time preference, and consequently, lower depletion rate and lower initial depletion value. The improvement of commitment ability can decrease the impatience and myopia behaviors, and contribute to the protection of the exhaustible resources.     

巢湖水向湖滨带生态修复工程实践

针对巢湖湖滨带水生植物消失的问题,提出浅水区自组织生态修复技术框架,并开展工程示范。该技术框架依据湖泊水生植被恢复的环境条件需求,针对不同区域湖滨带情况,提出合理的修复目标,进而集成系列工程措施,改善湖滨带环境并恢复水生植被。根据该技术框架实施中试工程,恢复湖滨带水生植被面积5万m2,使水生植物多样性增加70%,植被盖度由30%提高到60%。该技术为巢湖湖滨带生态修复提供技术支撑,有较强的实际应用价值     

自然灾害社会脆弱性评估研究——以上海市为例

基于投影寻踪聚类模型(PPC),结合基于实数编码的加速遗传算法(RAGA),对上海市进行了自然灾害社会脆弱性评估的尝试。结果表明:①灾害社会脆弱性最高的为崇明县,其次为宝山区和金山区;②灾害社会脆弱性最低的是黄埔区,其次是徐汇区和静安区;③总体而言,灾害脆弱性较低的地区集中于上海城市中心区,而城市边缘区的社会脆弱性一般较高。     

长江三角洲地区人类生命体多自然灾害综合风险度评估

自然灾害综合风险评估是当前灾害研究领域的主要难点之一。以经济发达、灾害频繁的长三角地区为研究区,选取县级行政区域为基本分析单元,以人类生命体作为受灾对象,尝试进行了区域多灾种综合风险度分析。致灾因子方面选取地震、台风、洪水;选择性别比例、年龄结构、交通状况、通信设施和医疗状况等构建脆弱性评价指标,以人口密度作为承灾体暴露性指标。以历史上各致灾因子造成的年均死亡人数为权重依据,将各致灾因子进行加和得到多致灾因子的危险度指数;使用熵值法对脆弱性的各相关指标进行分析计算,得出脆弱性指数。将得到的多致灾因子危险度指数、承灾体脆弱性指数和暴露性指数合并,得出各县的人类生命多灾种综合风险度指数。结果表明:高风险度地区主要分布在上海市中心区域、台州市的南部。所得风险度指数反映了长三角区域内各县区人口受到多灾种综合影响的相对强度。     

长三角地区台风灾害链特征分析

利用1951-2008年58年的历史台风资料分析了台风致灾因子,提取了影响长三角地区的187场台风并根据台风路径频率,将影响长三角地区的台风划分为西行、穿越和北上3类优势路径和一类特殊路径。然后,结合自然环境特征和DEM高程数据,将长三角地区台风孕灾环境划分为海岸带、北部平原和南部丘陵3个区域,并分析了每个区域发生的主要台风灾害链类型。针对"云娜"、"芸妮"和"爱娜斯"3个台风案例,分析了台风路径与不同孕灾环境组合形成的不同台风灾害链。结果表明:海岸带易引发台风-大风-巨浪或风暴潮灾害链;丘陵区域易引发台风-暴雨-山洪、泥石流和滑坡灾害链;平原地区易引发台风-暴雨-平原洪水和内涝灾害链。西行类台风影响海岸带和南部丘陵地区,易形成海岸带和南部丘陵区的台风灾害链;穿越类台风影响整个长三角地区,3种类型的台风灾害链都易发生;北上类台风一般只影响海岸带,易形成海岸带的台风灾害链。     

水性膨胀型防火涂料的现状和应用

钢结构是现代建筑工程中较普遍的结构形式之一,具备重量轻、机械性能好、可承受较大的荷载及制作和安装机械化程度高的特点。随着城市规模的发展,钢结构在我国建筑业具有非常广阔的应用前景。但由于其自身抗火能力差,在火灾高温作用下,其力学性能如屈服强度、弹性模量等会随温度升高而降低,一般在15min左右即丧失承重能力而垮塌,需采取保护措施使其温度不超过临界点才能在火灾中保持稳定性。涂敷钢结构防火涂料,施工简单、重量轻、耐火时间长且不受钢结构几何形状的制约,具有良好的经济性和实用性。随着环保意识的增强,国内外越来越多的建筑提倡绿色环保理念,参与三星或LEED认证体系的评级认证。水性膨胀型防火涂料凭借其优异的环保、施工安全和防火性能,开始逐渐受到众多业主和设计师的青睐。本文从防火原理、技术特点、防火领域的国内外认证、施工和质量管理的角度,浅谈水性膨胀型防火涂料的性能和发展现状,同时也讨论了目前防火涂料存在的一些问题。     

基于非线性屈服准则及主应力判据的圆形巷道围岩岩爆过程的数值模拟

鉴于考虑拉伸截断的线性莫尔-库仑屈服准则不能考虑岩石在高应力条件下的非线性屈服特征,根据虎克-布朗本构模型,将上述屈服准则在受压区的线性屈服函数修改为非线性形式。采用3种岩爆的主应力判据,判别圆形巷道开挖之后围岩中各种级别岩爆的分布及演变规律。计算采用"先加载,后挖洞"的方式,岩石服从弹—脆—塑性本构模型。研究发现,发生高级别岩爆的单元数少于发生低级别岩爆的单元数;轻微岩爆区的形态更接近于塑性区及剪切应变增量的高值区。根据巴顿判据,发生重岩爆的单元数较多,而且主要发生的是拉伸岩爆;根据陶振宇判据,发生轻微及中等岩爆的单元数均多于根据谷明成-陶振宇判据判别的结果。上述两种判据判别的结果均表明,在不考虑拉伸岩爆的条件下,只有位于围岩内部的单元才有可能发生高级别的岩爆,而位于巷道表面的单元一般仅发生轻微岩爆。     

An Intelligent Emissions Controller for Fuel Lean Gas Reburn in Coal-Fired Power Plants

ABSTRACT

The application of artificial intelligence techniques for performance optimization of the fuel lean gas reburn (FLGR) system is investigated. A multilayer, feedforward artificial neural network is applied to model static nonlinear relationships between the distribution of injected natural gas into the upper region of the furnace of a coal-fired boiler and the corresponding oxides of nitrogen (NO_x) emissions exiting the furnace. Based on this model, optimal distributions of injected gas are determined such that the largest NO_x reduction is achieved for each value of total injected gas. This optimization is accomplished through the development of a new optimization method based on neural networks. This new optimal control algorithm, which can be used as an alternative generic tool for solving multidimensional nonlinear constrained optimization problems, is described and its results are successfully validated against an off-the-shelf tool for solving mathematical programming problems. Encouraging results obtained using plant data from one of Commonwealth Edison's coal-fired electric power plants demonstrate the feasibility of the overall approach.

Preliminary results show that the use of this intelligent controller will also enable the determination of the most cost-effective operating conditions of the FLGR system by considering, along with the optimal distribution of the injected gas, the cost differential between natural gas and coal and the open-market price of NO_x emission credits. Further study, however, is necessary, including the construction of a more comprehensive database, needed to develop high-fidelity process models and to add carbon monoxide (CO) emissions to the model of the gas reburn system.     

Anthropogenic impacts on suspended sediment load in the Upper Yangtze river

Climate change and human disturbance drive catchment erosion and increase riverine sediment load sensitively in small and medium-sized watersheds. This is not always true in large basins, where aggregation and buffering effects have dampen the ability to determine the driving forces of sedimentation. Even though there are significant responses to sedimentation in large river basins, it is difficult to get a precise quantitative assessment of specific drivers. This paper develops a methodology to identify driving forces that change suspended sediment load in the Upper Yangtze river. Annual runoff and sediment load data from 1954 to 2005 at the Yichang gauging station in the Upper Yangtze basin, daily precipitation data from 60 meteorological stations, and survey data on reservoir sediment were collected for the study. Sediment load/rainfall erosivity (S/R), is a new proxy indicator introduced to reflect human activities. Since the mid-1980s, S/R in the Upper Yangtze has dramatically declined from 0.21 to 0.03 (×10¹⁰ t ha h MJ⁻¹ mm⁻¹), indicating that human activity has played a key role in the decline of the suspended sediment load. Before the mid-1980s, a higher average S/R is attributed to large-scale deforestation and land reclamation. A significant sediment decrease occurred from 1959 to 1961 during an extreme drought condition, and an increase in sedimentation in 1998 coincided with an extreme flood event, which was well recorded in the S/R curve. This indicates that the S/R proxy is able to distinguish anthropogenic from climate impacts on suspended sediment load, but is not necessarily indicatory in extreme climate events. In addition, typical drivers of riverine sediment load variation including soil conservation projects, reservoirs construction, and land use/cover change are discussed.     

Dechlorination of PCBs in the simulative transformer oil by microwave-hydrothermal reaction with zero-valent iron involved

The conventional hydrothermal reaction with iron powder, NaOH and H₂O as reactants was reported to occur at temperature above 423 K, and iron oxides (Fe₃O₄ and NaFeO₂) and hydrogen were produced. In this study, microwave heating was adopted to take the place of conventional heating to induce the hydrothermal reaction. Under microwave irradiation, NaOH and H₂O absorbed microwave energy by space charge polarization and dipolar polarization and instantly converted it into thermal energy, which initiated the hydrothermal reaction that involved with zero-valent iron. X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis found Fe₃O₄/NaFeO₂ and confirmed the occurrence of microwave-induced hydrothermal reaction. The developed microwave-hydrothermal reaction was employed for the dechlorination of PCBs. Hexadecane containing 100 mg L⁻¹ of Aroclor1254 was used as simulative transformer oil, and the dechlorination of PCBs was evaluated by GC/ECD, GC/MS and ion chromatography. For PCBs in 10 mL simulative transformer oil, almost complete dechlorination was achieved by 750 W microwave irradiation for 10 min, with 0.3 g iron powder, 0.3 g NaOH and 0.6 mL H₂O added. The effects of important factors including microwave power and the amounts of reactants added, on the dechlorination degree were investigated, moreover, the dechlorination mechanism was suggested. Microwave irradiation combined with the common and cheap materials, iron powder, NaOH and H₂O, might provide a fast and cost-effective method for the treatment of PCBs-containing wastes.