Experimental study on leak detection and location for gas pipeline based on acoustic method

The leak of gas pipelines can be detected and located by the acoustic method. The technologies of recognizing and extracting wave characteristics are summarized in details in this paper, which is to distinguish leaking and disturbing signals from time and frequency domain. A high-pressure and long distance leak test loop is designed and established by similarity analysis with field transmission pipelines. The acoustic signals collected by sensors are de-noised by wavelet transform to eliminate the background noises, and time-frequency analysis is used to analyze the characteristics of frequency domain. The conclusion can be drawn that most acoustic signals are concentrated on the ranges of 0-100 Hz. The acoustic signal recognition and extraction methods are verified and compared with others and it proves that the disturbing signals can be efficiently removed by the analysis of time and frequency domain, while the new characteristics of the accumulative value difference, mean value difference and peak value difference of signals in adjacent intervals can detect the leak effectively and decrease the false alarm rate significantly. The formula for leak location is modified with consideration of the influences of temperature and pressure. The positioning accuracy can be significantly improved with relative error between 0.01% and 1.37%.     

Use Impairments and Ecosystem Impacts of the New York Bight

The New York Bight is perhaps one of the most used and abused coastal areas in the world as a consequence of urbanization and the disposal of the waste of some 20 million people who reside by its shores and surrounding bays and estuaries. A variety of sources, including those associated with sewage wastes, industrial wastes, contaminated dredged material, urban runoff, and atmospheric fallout contaminate these coastal waters. Many of the stresses of excess population and industrialization as measured by pollutant loadings and ecosystem impacts can be crudely quantified in terms of use impairments-use impairments that have measurable social and economic relevance. Five broad categories of impairment attributed to pollution in the Bight that are causing significant losses of ecological, economic, or social values are: beach closures, unsafe seafoods, hazards to commercial and recreational navigation, loss of commercial and recreational fisheries, and declines in birds, mammals and turtles. These impairments are generally caused by floatable wastes, nutrients, toxicants, pathogens and habitat loss. Measures of such impairments are not standard, nor in many cases totally quantifiable. We have examined specific subsets of these impairments in terms of their spatial and temporal changes and as a first approximation determined the economic and social significance of these changes. the cost of these impaired uses of the Bight are measured in terms of billions of dollars annually for New York and New Jersey.     

The endowment effect,discounting and the environment

There is a considerable body of evidence showing that our preferences exhibit both reference dependence and loss aversion, a.k.a. the endowment effect. In this paper, we consider the implications of the endowment effect for discounting, with a special focus on discounting future improvements in the environment. We show that the endowment effect modifies the discount rate via (i) an instantaneous endowment effect and (ii) a reference-updating effect. Moreover we show that these two effects often combine to dampen the preference to smooth consumption over time. What this implies for discounting future environmental benefits may then depend critically on whether environmental quality is merely a factor of production of material consumption, or whether it is an amenity. On an increasing path of material consumption, dampened consumption smoothing implies a lower discount rate. But on a declining path of environmental quality and where we derive utility directly from environmental quality, it implies a higher discount rate. On non-monotonic paths, loss aversion specifically can give rise to substantial discontinuities in the discount rate.     

Use Impairments and Ecosystem Impacts of the New York Bight

The New York Bight is perhaps one of the most used and abused coastal areas in the world as a consequence of urbanization and the disposal of the waste of some 20 million people who reside by its shores and surrounding bays and estuaries. A variety of sources, including those associated with sewage wastes, industrial wastes, contaminated dredged material, urban runoff, and atmospheric fallout contaminate these coastal waters. Many of the stresses of excess population and industrialization as measured by pollutant loadings and ecosystem impacts can be crudely quantified in terms of use impairments-use impairments that have measurable social and economic relevance. Five broad categories of impairment attributed to pollution in the Bight that are causing significant losses of ecological, economic, or social values are: beach closures, unsafe seafoods, hazards to commercial and recreational navigation, loss of commercial and recreational fisheries, and declines in birds, mammals and turtles. These impairments are generally caused by floatable wastes, nutrients, toxicants, pathogens and habitat loss. Measures of such impairments are not standard, nor in many cases totally quantifiable. We have examined specific subsets of these impairments in terms of their spatial and temporal changes and as a first approximation determined the economic and social significance of these changes. the cost of these impaired uses of the Bight are measured in terms of billions of dollars annually for New York and New Jersey.     

中国的地震灾害损失预测

估计某个地区未来将会遭到多大的地震灾害损失.对于减轻地震灾害是十分重要的科学问题.因力地震预防和救灾的基础是对未来地震灾害的定量估计.地震灾害主要由两方面因素决定.一方面是未来地震动强烈程度的估计(地震危险性分析).另一方面是各个地震动等级对社会、经济、人口等所造成的损害程度估计(地震易损性分析). 本文介绍了以上两方面研究工作的进展,以及国家地震局“未来地震灾害损失预测研究组”试编的中国未来50年地震灾害损失预测图及其应用.讨论了在灾害预测方面所遇到的科学问题.     

Integration of process safety engineering and fire protection engineering for better safety performance

Since the inception of the process industries, there have been a great number of process incidents causing significant loss of life and property damage. Even the establishment and implementation of a series of rigorous regulations has not prevented the occurrence of process incidents. In order to protect people, property and the environment a more robust safety program is needed and the safety performance of process industries must continue to improve. In this work, the common ground and the unique characteristics of process safety engineering (PSE) and fire protection engineering (FPE) is reviewed to demonstrate the potential benefits of unifying the two fields or improving the coordination between them to create a more robust safety program, thereby enhancing the safety performance of process industries. Recommendations are made to facilitate and encourage continued discussion and efforts toward the integration of process safety engineering and fire protection engineering.     

脱硫塔滤料遗失原因分析及防治措施

脱硫塔是天然气处理的关键设备之一,设备完好性、适用性直接影响天然气脱硫效果和产品质量.南堡作业区在用脱硫塔13 台,2013 年投用以来,底排污腔存在积液,弱化脱硫效果,影响脱硫塔正常运行,脱硫塔内部构件腐蚀损坏后导致塔内滤料漏失,影响下游天然气处理设备和管道平稳运行,本文以NP3-2 转油站内脱硫塔滤料遗失成功治理为...     

Reconsidering autoignition in the context of modern process safety: Literature review and experimental analysis

Autoignition is regarded as the spontaneous combustion of a fuel without an apparent ignition source. With respect to fires and explosions in the process industries, the autoignition hazard is one that requires management and consideration. Despite the importance of understanding the autoignition hazard, the literature on the topic is often disappointingly sparse and inconsistent. Experimental methods don't adequately represent real-world conditions and are complicated by experimental error, invoking the need for a reconsideration of autoignition as it pertains to process safety. This work utilized the ASTM E659 method to study potential experimental error for the purpose of improving the process safety community's understanding of autoignition phenomena. Of interest to this study were effects of humidity and suspected occurrences of cool flames, two sources of error which have not been fully explained in the literature. For the fuels tested, results show that humidity has only a slight effect on overall autoignition behavior. However, this study's examination of cool flames suggests that they could be a common occurrence in this testing method. Analysis of these experiments show that cool flames can feature significant exothermic effects and are thus of concern from a perspective of risk management. In addition, this work proposes a novel criterion for a more conservative assessment of autoignition experiments, which results in less subjectivity of analysis.