Industrial and wildfire aerosol pollution over world heritage Lake Baikal

Lake Baikal is the biggest reservoir of fresh water with unique flora and fauna; presently it is negatively affected by climate change, water warming, industrial emissions, shipping, touristic activities, and Siberian forest fires. The assessment of air pollution - related Baikal's ecosystem damage is an unsolved problem. Ship, based expedition exploring the Baikal atmospheric aerosol loading, was performed over the lake area in July 2018. We combine the aerosol near - water and vertical distributions over the Lake Baikal basin with meteorological observations and air mass transportation simulations. Lidar sounding of aerosol fields in the troposphere assesses the atmospheric background in the pristine areas and the pollution during fire-affected periods. Aerosol optical properties (scattering and spectral absorption) converted to the particle number size, black carbon (BC) mass, and Absorption Angstrom Exponent (AAE) provide the inside into aerosol characterization. Transport of industrial emissions from Krasnoyarsk and Irkutsk regions, and wildfire plumes from Republic of Yakutia relates the pollution sources to the increased concentrations of fine particle numbers, PM₁₀ and BC mass over Southern and Northern/Central Baikal, respectively. The highest PM₁₀ and BC are associated to the harbor and touristic areas of intensive shipping and residential biomass burning. Deposition estimates applied to aerosol data exhibit the pollution fluxes to water surface over the whole Baikal area. AAE marks the impact of coal combustion, residential biomass burning, and wildfires indicating the high pollution level of the Lake Baikal ecological system .     

Modeling the emissions of a dual fuel engine coupled with a biomass gasifier—supplementing the Wiebe function

There is a growing market demand for small-scale biomass gasifiers that is driven by the economic incentives and the legislative framework. Small-scale gasifiers produce a gaseous fuel, commonly referred to as producer gas, with relatively low heating value. Thus, the most common energy conversion systems that are coupled with small-scale gasifiers are internal combustion engines. In order to increase the electrical efficiency, the operators choose dual fuel engines and mix the producer gas with diesel. The Wiebe function has been a valuable tool for assessing the efficiency of dual fuel internal combustion engines. This study introduces a thermodynamic model that works in parallel with the Wiebe function and calculates the emissions of the engines. This “vis-à-vis” approach takes into consideration the actual conditions inside the cylinders—as they are returned by the Wiebe function—and calculates the final thermodynamic equilibrium of the flue gases mixture. This approach aims to enhance the operation of the dual fuel internal combustion engines by identifying the optimal operating conditions and—at the same time—advance pollution control and minimize the environmental impact.