Most of the onshore water-flooding oilfield reservoirs have dominant seepage channels dominated by large pores and fractures, resulting in the oilfield being in a period of high water cut. The treatment of this problem needs to be solved by plugging. In the research process, the particle size and suspension of the water-swellable rubber particles were measured, and the effective time of the particles was evaluated; matching relationship. The results show that adding 2000 mg/L polymer to the water-swellable rubber particles can better improve the suspension performance; the performance of the polymer solution will not be affected during mixing and injection. In addition to strong swelling performance, it also has a certain strength and deformability, up to 10 MPa high via pressure and good thermal stability. Compared with the water and oil environment, the chemical degradation phenomenon is significant after soaking in alkaline conditions. Compared with the alkaline environment and the... [more]

Air pollution is accountable for various long-term and short-term respiratory diseases and even deaths. Air pollution is normally associated with a decreasing life expectancy. Governments have been implementing strategies to improve air quality. However, natural events have always played an important role in the concentration of air pollutants. In Australia, the lockdown period followed the Black Summer of 2019−2020 and coincided with the season of prescribed burns. This paper investigates the changes in the concentration of criteria pollutants such as particulate matter, nitrogen dioxide, ozone, and sulphur dioxide. The air quality data for the lockdown period in 2020 was compared with the pre-lockdown period in 2020 and with corresponding periods of previous years from 2016 to 2019. The results were also compared with the post-lockdown scenario of 2020 and 2021 to understand how the concentration levels changed due to behavioural changes and a lack of background events. The results r... [more]

The Earth’s magnetic field is one of the basic abiotic factors in all environments, and organisms had to adapt to it during evolution. On some occasions, organisms can be confronted with a significant reduction in a magnetic field, termed a “hypomagnetic field—HMF”, for example, in buildings with steel reinforcement or during interplanetary flight. However, the effects of HMFs on living organisms are still largely unclear. Experimental studies have mostly focused on the human and rodent models. Due to the small number of publications, the effects of HMFs are mostly random, although we detected some similarities. Likely, HMFs can modify cell signalling by affecting the contents of ions (e.g., calcium) or the ROS level, which participate in cell signal transduction. Additionally, HMFs have different effects on the growth or functions of organ systems in different organisms, but negative effects on embryonal development have been shown. Embryonal development is strictly regulated to avoid... [more]

This study was conducted in a fluidized-bed incineration plant, evaluating the formation, emission and flux of polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and dibenzofurans (PCDD/Fs) from industrial-organic-solid-waste (IW) incineration. The results revealed that both the total (or I-TEQ) concentrations of toxic and 136 total PCDD/Fs in flue gas (FG), fly ash (FA) and bottom ash (BA)were ramped up to a higher level than those during municipal-solid-waste (MSW) incineration. A possible explanation was the chlorine (Cl) content of IW. However, the emitted PCDD/Fs in FG (FA/BA) still fulfilled the criteria. Subsequently, similar distribution patterns of PCDD/F isomers were observed in subsystems, indicating a unified formation-pathway. De novo synthesis was detected as the dominant formation-pathway of PCDD/Fs, while high-temperature and precursor syntheses were excluded. DD/DF chlorination formed PCDD/Fs to some extent. Furthermore, the mass flow chart indicated that PCDD/Fs output in primary FG w... [more]

Several chemicals, such as pesticides and heavy metals, are frequently encountered together in environment matrices, becoming a priority concerning the prevention of their emissions, as well as their removal from the environment. In this sense, this work aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of a permeable biosorbent bio-barrier reactor (PBR) on the removal of atrazine and heavy metals (copper and zinc) from aqueous solutions. The permeable bio-barrier was built with a bacterial biofilm of R. viscosum supported on 13X zeolite. One of the aims of this work is the investigation of the toxic effects of atrazine, copper and zinc on the bacterial growth, as well as the assessment of their ability to adapt to repeated exposure to contaminants and to degrade atrazine. The growth of R. viscosum was not affected by concentrations of atrazine bellow 7 mg/L. However, copper and zinc in binary solutions were able to inhibit the growth of bacteria for all the concentrations tested (5 to 40 mg/L). The... [more]

This paper studies the potential of carbon-abatement cost-sharing contracts in optimizing the joint economic−environmental benefit of a green supply chain. One-way and two-way cost-sharing contracts were investigated, respectively, in scenarios in which a capital-constrained manufacturer has a dominant downstream retailer or a dominant upstream supplier. The manufacturer obtains financing from a competitively priced bank to fulfill its production, carbon-abatement investment, and even insufficient emission permit purchase given the fact that the cap-and-trade regulation exists. Results show that in both one-way and two-way cost-sharing cases, cost sharing of carbon abatement has no effect on the manufacturer’s output or its counterparty’s wholesale price decisions; however, it improves the carbon abatement level of the supply chain. As a result, such cost-sharing of carbon abatement is proven to hamper the profit of the overall supply chain, but it improves the joint “economic-environm... [more]

The hormetic effect is a toxicological phenomenon in the soil ecosystem. The influence of low-molecular-weight organic acids (LMWOAs) on the release and activation of soil phosphorus (P) has become the focus of toxicological research. To what extent LMWOAs can regulate the hormetic effect of P release and then influence soil P nutrients is worth attention. This study aimed to investigate the effects of different types and concentrations of exogenous LMWOAs on P extraction, establish the relationship between the concentration of LMWOAs and P extraction efficiency, and calculate the hormetic parameters to understand the mechanism of types and concentrations of LMWOAs in P extraction efficiency. Four organic acids, i.e., citric, oxalic, tartaric, and malic acids, induced hormetic effects on P extraction that were concentration dependent. The relationship between LMWOAs and P extraction efficiency was explained by a quadratic polynomial equation. The critical threshold of citric acid conce... [more]

This paper provides a brief review on wastewater treatment system and the application of life cycle assessment (LCA) for assessing its environmental performance. An extensive review regarding the geographical relevance of LCA for WWTPs, and the evaluation of sustainable wastewater treatment by LCA in both developed and developing countries are also discussed. The objective of the review is to identify knowledge gap, for the improvement of the LCA application and methodology to WWTPs. A total of 35 published articles related to wastewater treatment (WWT) and LCA from international scientific journals were studied thoroughly and summarised from 2006 to 2022. This review found that there is lack of studies concerning LCA of WWTPs that consider specific local criteria especially in the developing countries. Thus, it is important to: (1) assess the influence of seasonality (i.e., dry and wet seasons) on the environmental impact of WWT, (2) investigate environmental impacts from WWTPs in dev... [more]

Due to the adverse effects of hexavalent chromium (Cr6+) on human health and the quality of the environment, the scientific community has invested a lot of effort to solve this pollution problem. Thus, implementing sustainable alternatives for Cr6+ elimination by exploiting the capacity of microbial biomass to retain heavy metals by biosorption is considered an economic and eco-friendly solution, compared to the conventional physico-chemical processes. However, the ability of microorganisms to remove Cr6+ from liquid effluents can strongly be affected by biotic and abiotic factors. With these issues in mind, the main purpose of this paper was to investigate Cr6+ biosorption on Bacillus megaterium and Rhodotorula sp. biomass inactivated by thermal treatments, exploring the effects of some factors such as: pH, biosorbent dose, initial concentration of the metal in solution, temperature and contact time between the biosorbent and the metal ions on process effectiveness. The results showed... [more]

In order to solve the corrosion problem of production string in the process of acidizing for the purpose of production, a new water-based annular protective fluid suitable for HTHP acid gas, including H2S-CO2 wells, was developed. Firstly, an appropriate deoxidizer, bactericide, and corrosion inhibitor shall be selected according to the production string of acid gas. In addition, the synergism between additives is evaluated. Then, by designing the additive ratio, the optimal formulation of the water-based annular protective fluid is determined. Finally, a high-temperature autoclave was used to evaluate the protective performance of the water-based annular protective liquid. The results showed that it is recommended to use water-based annular protective liquids prepared with clear water that comes easily from nature (rivers, etc.), which consist of a corrosion inhibitor, CT2-19C (30,000 ppm), BN-45 bactericide (2 g/L), and anhydrous sodium sulfite (3 g/L). The density of the water-based... [more]

Compared with conventional reactors that are designed by traditional micromachining technology, the use of 3D-printing technology to manufacture multichannel large-volume microchannel reactors as reaction equipment to remove low-concentration NOX by the wet method is simple and convenient, and the processing cost is low. The results showed that when the concentration of NO was 400 ppm, the mixed solution of (NH2)2CO mass fraction of 3% and H2O2 concentration of 0.5 mol/L was used, and the flow rates of gas and liquid were 100 mL/min, respectively, under the experimental conditions of pH = 11, solution temperature of 20 °C and 500 mL solution recycling for 20 min, the best removal effect of NOX was achieved, and the removal efficiency was 100%. When the O2 content in the flue gas was increased and the number and length of microchannels were increased, the NOX removal efficiency increased accordingly, which was conducive to the rapid and efficient reaction. The application of the microch... [more]

With the development of the social economy, the population has increased sharply, and the land area involved in people’s production and life is also gradually increasing [...]

The occurrence state of groundwater in a karst area has a significant impact on the tunnel lining structure. The impact on the groundwater is more significant during construction. This paper used numerical simulation to study the grouting reinforcement range of the Liaoshan Tunnel. This was based on the critical water rich height. Under Grade IV and Grade V surrounding rock, the critical points of grouting reinforcement were 230 m and 240 m deep, respectively. The vertical and horizontal stress and seepage flow of the tunnel arch crown and invert decreased as the circumferential grouting reinforcement range increased. In the case of no grouting reinforcement, 1/4 circumferential grouting reinforcement, 1/2 circumferential grouting reinforcement, and all circumferential grouting reinforcement, the seepage flow was 7 m3/dm, 4 m3/dm, 3 m3/dm, and 0 m3/dm, respectively. With Grade V surrounding rock, when the groundwater level was 260−270 m away from the tunnel arch crown, two schemes coul... [more]

Servitization is becoming an essential strategy for manufacturers to gain competitive advantage, and several successful cases have already been reported. However, these success stories are mainly studied for large enterprises such as GE, IBM, Xerox, and Rolls-Royce. Therefore, it is difficult to apply the cases to the servitization of SMEs, thus in this study, the status of SMEs’ servitization was examined and the applicability was studied. Among those SMEs, manufacturing of electrical equipment and basic metal parts were selected because they are related to all manufacturing industries. As a research method, companies in the relevant industry were randomly selected and CEOs, managers, and employees were interviewed. Through in-depth interviews, the company’s current servitization status in the perception of different employment levels and new servitization opportunities are analyzed. As a result of the interview, the level of servitization in the industry seems to be very low, and it... [more]

Recently, a growing number of studies have confirmed that biological nitrogen fixation is also an important reactive nitrogen source in coastal regions. However, how benthic nitrogen fixation and diazotrophic community in coastal regions respond to seasonal hypoxia remains largely unknown. In this study, we investigated the spatiotemporal pattern of potential nitrogen fixation rate and diazotrophic abundance and community in sediments of a eutrophic marine ranch experiencing summer hypoxia using 15N tracing and high throughput sequencing techniques. The results showed that potential nitrogen fixation rates ranged from 0.013 to 10.199 μmol kg−1 h−1, and were significantly enhanced by summer hypoxia (ANOVA, p < 0.05). However, nifH gene abundance peaked in June. The diazotrophic community was dominated by Geobacteraceae (>60%), followed by Desulfobulbaceae (13.61%). Bottom water oxygen, pH, Chl-a concentration, and sediment NH4+ significantly regulated benthic nitrogen fixation, while th... [more]

Soil microbial community plays a major role in removal of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) from soil, and bioremediation potentially offers an attractive and economic approach to the clean-up of polluted areas. To evaluate the contribution of different microbial groups in soil PAH degradation, enzymatic activity and phospholipid fatty acids (PLFAs) were analysed in a mesocosm trial in three different soils (two natural and one industrial) artificially contaminated with 3- and 5-rings PAHs. The Metabolic Activity Index (MAI) was applied to investigate the microbial community stability, in terms of resistance and resilience. Gram+ and Gram- bacteria were the predominant microbial groups in all soil types. In the first stage of incubation, fungi were predominant in the industrial soil, followed by mycorrhizae and actinomycetes, indicating their stimulation after PAH addition. In the two natural soils, several groups were predominant: actinomycetes in one, fungi and mycorrhizae in t... [more]

Nitrates and phosphates, found in fertilizers, are the most common eutrophication-causing agents. Douglas fir biochar (BC), a syngas byproduct, was treated with different Al/Mg ratios of sulfate (5% w/w metal loading) followed by an NaOH treatment. The greatest phosphate uptake at 25 °C and pH 7 was attributed to the composite with a Mg/Al 2:1 ratio prepared at pH 13 (AMBC). Batch AMBC phosphate uptake was optimized for initial pH, equilibrium time, temperature, and initial phosphate concentration. Phosphate removal following pseudo-2nd-order kinetics and increases gradually before reaching a max at pH 11, with 95% phosphate uptake in 15 mins. The Sips isotherm model provided the best sorption data fit resulting in a 42.1 mg/g capacity at 25 °C and pH 11. Endothermic and spontaneous adsorption were determined using van ’t Hoff’s plots. BET, XRD, XPS, SEM, TEM, and EDS were used to characterize the biochar before and after phosphate sorption. Used AMBC has the potential to be exploited... [more]

Since the 21st century, in several public health emergencies that have occurred across the world, the humid enclosed environment of the toilet has become one of the places where bacteria, viruses, and microorganisms breed and spread. Mobile public toilets, as a supplement of urban fixed public toilets, are also widely used in densely populated areas. According to statistics, since the outbreak of COVID-19 in 2019, multiple incidents of people being infected by the COVID-19 virus due to aerosol proliferation in public toilets have been confirmed. It is an urgent issue to resolve the internal environmental pollution of mobile public health and reduce the risk of virus transmission in public spaces under the global epidemic prevention. This paper utilized a typical combined mobile public toilet as the research object and measured and evaluated the indoor thermal environment in real time over a short period of time. The diffusion mode and concentration change law of pollutants in mobile pu... [more]

Wastes generated during the cultivation of marine microalga Crypthecodinium cohnii and after the lipid extraction process, were energetically valorized into biogas production through anaerobic digestion (AD). The tested wastes were extracted microalgae (Ae) with hexane (AeH) using supercritical extraction methods (AeS) and the supernatant obtained after culture medium centrifugation (M). The digestion of the algae biomass in the admixture with the supernatant medium (AeH+M+I and AeS+M+I) provided a higher methane content and a higher methane yield (582 and 440 L CH4/kg VS) than the substrates Ae and M, individually digested (155 and 96 L CH4/kg VS, respectively). Flow cytometry monitoring processes during AD indicated that the yield of the accumulated biogas was influenced by the operating conditions. The mixture of AeH+M+I was the only assay with a proportion of cells with less damaged membranes after AD, providing the highest methane yield and productivity (582 L CH4/kg VS and 31 L C... [more]

As a theory in ancient China, Feng Shui is used in terrain exploring to find ideal living environments. In this study, 62 traditional villages documented on China’s and Jiangxi’s protection lists in Jinxi County, Jiangxi Province were divided into four categories according to their landscape patterns and were simulated by CFD (computational fluid dynamics) with PHOENICS and quantitatively analyzed based on their wind and thermal environments. The results showed that hills greatly improve the wind environment of villages when they are in the windward direction. Concerning thermal environments, water and vegetation effectively reduced the summer temperatures in villages, while hills kept villages warm in winter. This paper verified the positive effect of elements such as mountains, water and forests on the improvement of wind and thermal environments of villages and the rationality of the site election principle of Bei Shan Mian Shui, also known as back mountain facing water, which is up... [more]

Coffee is an extremely popular beverage worldwide. To obtain it, the berry must be depulped, fermented, washed, dried, and roasted, producing residues: pulp and husk, mucilage, and parchment. Recently there has been an interest in generating high-value products. In this article, advances in the valorization process are critically reviewed, including an overview of the composition of residues derived from primary processing, uses in food, biocomposite, and biofuel production (thermochemical conversion). With an increasing production of coffee projected in the coming years, there is an urgent need to balance it with the appropriate use and industrial application of coffee wastes and by-products, which are renewable resources rich in carbohydrates, proteins, pectin, and bioactive compounds (polyphenols). The applications described above, together with those that will undoubtedly be developed in the future, represent promising opportunities to take advantage of agro-industrial residues der... [more]

Phenolic compounds are toxic and ominously present in industrial effluents, which can end up in water bodies, causing potential damage to living organisms. This study employed the dried biomass of freshwater green microalgae Chlorella vulgaris to remove phenol and 2-chlorophenol from an aqueous environment. C. vulgaris was grown under different phosphorus- (P) starved conditions, and biomass was treated with sulfuric acid. It was observed that reducing the P level enhanced the lipid content by 7.8 times while decreasing protein by 7.2 times. P-starved C. vulgaris dried biomass removed phenol and 2-chlorophenol by 69 and 57%, respectively, after 180 min from the contaminated water. Acid-treated P-starved C. vulgaris dried biomass removed phenol and 2-chlorophenol by 77 and 75%, respectively, after 180 min. Thus, an economical and eco-friendly P-starved and acid treated C. vulgaris biomass has better potential to remove phenol and 2-chlorophenol from contaminated ground water and industr... [more]

Discrete element simulation is an effective method to reveal the interaction between tillage components and work objects. However, due to the lack of discrete element modelling parameters of maize root and its mixture with soil, existing tillage models cannot accurately simulate the farmland environment under a no-tillage system. This study developed single maize root (SMR) with different diameters and maize root-soil mixture (MRSM) DEM models based on calibrated parameters through the angle of repose (AOR) tests. First, the Plackett−Burman and the steepest climb tests were performed to identify the range of essential parameters for the AOR of the SMR. Then, the optimal parameters for the SMR and MRSR models were obtained by Box−Behnken design (BBD) testing. The results showed that the static friction coefficient of SMR-SMR and the rolling friction coefficient of SMR-SMR and SMR-steel significantly affected the AOR. In addition, the AOR of MRSM was extremely sensitive to the restitutio... [more]

The combustion of solid biomass in industrial boilers involves a sequence of processes that include heating, drying, devolatilization, and char conversion. To maintain a repeatable and fully controlled environment, and to monitor all the dynamics involved in the phenomena at a real scale, field-scale experiments become necessary to perform investigations. In this way, to evaluate different thermochemical conversion conditions of biomass particles under an oxidative atmosphere, and to quantify the emission of the main gas compounds continuously, a small-scale reactor was developed and presented in this paper. Hence, in this work, larger particles of eucalyptus are burned at 400 and 800 °C under different stoichiometric conditions to understand the differences between different biomass conversion regimes (gasification and combustion). The analysis of the mass loss at the different temperatures was characterized by only two different and consecutive stages for both thermochemical conditio... [more]

The negative environmental impact of the construction sector has garnered global attention, and as the “primary force” in achieving the “double carbon” target, green development is urgent, and social responsibility practices cannot be postponed. An evolutionary game model was constructed by combining the rank-dependent expected utility (RDEU) theory and the evolutionary game theory to understand the interaction mechanism between participants’ emotions and decisions, taking into account the characteristics of construction enterprises and the public regarding irrational decisions under heterogeneous emotional combinations. The study demonstrates that: (1) there is probability in the choice of rational strategies, and emotion is an irrational factor that can affect strategy choice. (2) The evolutionary trend of the strategy choice of the game subjects is altered by emotional intensity and emotional propensity. The optimism of construction enterprises inhibits their socially responsible pr... [more]