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Optimizing the design of water distribution systems often faces difficulties due to continuous variations in water demands, pressure requirements, and disinfectant concentrations. The complexity of this optimization even increases when trying to optimize both the hydraulic and the water quality design models. Most of the previous works in the literature did not investigate the linkage between both models, either by combining them into one general model or by selecting any representative solution to proceed from one model to another. This work introduces an integrated two-step framework to optimize both designs while investigating the reasonable network configuration selection from the hydraulic design view before proceeding to the water quality design. The framework is mainly based on a modified version of the multi-objective particle swarm optimization algorithm. The algorithm’s first step is optimizing the hydraulic design of the network by minimizing the system’s capital cost while maximizing the system’s reliability. The second step targets optimizing the water quality design by minimizing both the total consumed chlorine mass and the accumulated differences between actual and maximum chlorine concentrations for all the network junctions. The framework is applied to Safi Network in Yemen. Three scenarios of the water quality design are proposed based on the selected decision variables. The results show a superior performance of the first scenario, based on optimized 24-h multipliers of a chlorine pattern for a flow-paced booster station, compared to the other scenarios in terms of the diversity of final solutions.

Nowadays, the increasing demand for concrete is causing serious environmental impact including pollution and waste generation, rapid depletion of natural resources, and increased CO2 emission. Incorporating natural fibers in concrete can contribute toward environmental sustainability. This paper is concerned with the use of natural fibers obtained from the plant species Phragmites australis (PA). The plant is invasive, and rapidly grows abundantly along rivers and waterways, causing major ecological problems. This research is part of a wide range investigation on the use of natural fibers produced from the stem of PA plants in concrete. Using a machine, plant stems were crushed into fibers measuring 40 mm in length and 2 mm in width, and treated with 4% NaOH solution for 24 h. A total of four concrete mixes were prepared with varying additions of treated fibers, ranging from 0% to 1.5% (by volume) with water to cement ratio of 0.5% (by volume). Concrete specimens were tested at 3, 7, and 28 days. Testing included compressive strength, density, total water absorption, and capillary water absorption. The results show that incorporating PA natural fibers reduces the water absorption by total immersion and capillary action by up to 45%. Moreover, there is a negligible decrease in concrete density and strength when fibers were added. It is concluded that adding up to 1.5% natural PA fibers to concrete is a feasible strategy to produce an eco-friendly material which can be used in the production of sustainable building material with adequate mechanical and durability performance.

Phenolic compounds are highly toxic, along with being one of the most persistent substances in petroleum refinery effluents. The most potent solution is through phenol bioremediation to produce demi-water and bioenergy, which are two effective outcomes for a single process. Fifteen genetically identified native bacterial strains were isolated from the effluents of the petrochemical industry plant (AMOC, Egypt) and were investigated for potential phenol biodegradation activity and energy bioproduction individually and as a consortium in a batch culture. Successful and safe phenol biodegradation was achieved (99.63%) using a native bacterial consortium after statistical optimization (multifactorial central composite design) with bioelectricity generation that reached 3.13 × 10−6 mW/cm3. In conclusion, the native consortium was highly potent in the bioremediation process of petroleum refinery wastewater, protecting the environment from potential phenol pollution with the ability to generate an electrical current through the bioremediation process.

Scaling up the algal cultivation systems to commercial production is an essential step towards the biorefinery and circular bioeconomy concepts, meeting sustainable development goals (SDGs). The performance of the algal systems, regarding the biomass productivity and the associated biochemical composition, is improved by adapting the nitrogen-to-phosphorus (N/P) ratio of the culture medium. In this study, secondary-treated wastewater was used to cultivate microalgae Scenedesmus obliquus in pilot-scale circular ponds (3000 L) with N/P ratios of 4:1, 10:1, and 68:1, representing nutrient variability under natural (outdoor) environmental conditions. Based on the growth performance and macromolecule accumulation in the algal cells, the N/P ratio of 10:1 was selected to operate a raceway pond (300,000 L) for ensuring the scalability approach. Under this condition, the biomass concentration reached 0.98 ± 0.03 g/L, and the pollutant removal efficiencies (%) were ≈100 for NH4+, 89.44 ± 3.98 for NO3-, and 79.01 ± 3.21 for PO43-. Moreover, the metabolite contents (% of dry cell weight) of microalgae were 21.40 ± 1.86 for lipids, 33.40 ± 2.07 for proteins, and 18.66 ± 1.20 for carbohydrates. Microalgae production via outdoor open raceway ponds would meet multiple environmental (water, land, biodiversity, and greenhouse gases)-, economic (energy, investment, and industrialization)-, and social (awareness, and educational)-related SDGs. Hence, the study outcomes would contribute to the biomass conversion and biorefinery strategy, especially in developing countries.

Water scarcity has become one of the most significant problems globally. Membrane technology has gained considerable attention in water treatment technologies. Polymeric nanocomposite membranes are based on several properties, with enhanced water flux, high hydrophilicity and anti-biofouling behavior, improving the membrane performance, flexibility, cost-effectiveness and excellent separation properties. In this study, aminated graphene oxide (NH2-GO)-based PVDF membranes were fabricated using a phase-inversion method for textile dye removal. These fabricated membranes showed the highest water flux at about 170.2 (J/L.h−1.m−2) and 98.2% BSA rejection. Moreover, these membranes removed about 96.6% and 88.5% of methylene blue and methyl orange, respectively. Aminated graphene oxide-based polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) membranes emerge as a good membrane material that enhances the membrane performance.

In this work, a new design of a Multi Stage Flash-M echanical Vapor Compression (MSF-MVC) desalination process is investigated. The analysis of the proposed MSFMVC system is performed based on the energy, exergy and thermoeconomic methodologies. The considered system is investigate d under different operating conditions using a developed Visual Design and Simulation (VDS) software. To examine the performance of the proposed process, a comparison with the conventional MSF desalination process is performed. Thermoeconomic results show that, the best operatin g suction pressure is 8 kPa and the best top brine temperature is 110 °C. The effect of the stages number of the heat recovery section is investigated and the results sh ow that the low unit product cost is obtained at 20 stages. The effect of the temperatur e difference across the vent chamber is conducted and the results show that the lower un it product cost is 6 °C. Thermoeconomic analysis shows that the last stage ( vent chamber) has the highest value of the sum of capital and operation & mainten ance cost in addition to the exergy destruction cost. Also the last stage has higher re lative cost difference and lower exergetic efficiency. This in turn shows that a red uction in the exergy destruction within the vent chamber will reduce the unit produc t cost. The performance ratio of the proposed MSF-MVC system is 2.4 times the performance ratio of the conventional MSF process. The heat transfer area of the MSF-MVC system is 57 % higher than that of the conventional MSF. The exergetic efficiency o f the MSF-MVC system is 67 % higher than that of the MSF. The thermoeconomic results show that the unit product cost of MSF-MVC, under the specified conditions, is calculated by 2.0 $/m 3 and this value is 25 % less than that of the conventional MS F process.

This paper presents a methodology of exergy and thermoeconomic analysis for performance of the Multi-Stage Flash (MSF) process using the developed package. This methodology gets insight on details not available by the first law analysis. The main target of these analyses is to improve the MSF process as well as to determine the unit product cost of the distilled water. Using the developed VDS package, the energy analysis of the considered MSF plant in the rating mode (performance), the gain ratio (GR) is calculated as 7.91. The exergy input, ĖF, to the MSF plant is calculated as 10.7 MW which represents the exergy of the heating steam, exergy associated to the sea water feed, and electrical pumping power minus the exergy of the brine heater condensate. Only 0.2 MW of an elevated exergy in the distilled stream is produced. The exergy associated with blow down and rejection of cooling streams is 4.04 MW which nominated as an exergy loss. The remainder part of ĖD = 6.46 MW is destroyed internally in the plant components as a result the exergetic efficiency of the considered MSF plant, ηII 1.87%. The unit product cost of the MSF desalination plant is calculated as 2.63 $/m3 by two different ways. The first one by calculating the capital and running costs which invested at the boundary of the MSF plant (input streams); the second way is based on mathematical model (thermoeconomics) by which the outlet streams cost is calculated and charged their value to the desalted water. Thermoeconomic analysis shows that the overall cost of the desalination plant will be obtained if the exergy destruction rate of the desuperheater, the distiller train is reduced. The monetary cost of the streams indicated that any modifications in the first stages will cause more effect other than the last stages. Different partial load conditions for the real data of Eoun Mousa MSF plant are depicted and recorded by Data Control System (DCS). These data are fed to the developed VDS software to investigate the performance of the MSF plant. The distillate product varies from 104 (50%) m3/h to 208 (100%) m3/h as well as the top brine temperature varies from 86 to 110°C. The heating steam consumption varies from 12 to 26 m3/h. Thermoeconomic analysis of MSF plant under different partial load conditions showed that the unit product cost increases to 21% when the load decreases to 50% of its design value.

Chromium is one of the most significant metals used in the industry. There are many techniques for treating different types of industrial waste water that include chromium ion. In this study, the authors successfully adsorbed the chromium ion from alkaline aqueous solutions using different prepared types of chitosan as adsorbent materials. For the simultaneous sorption behaviour, the adsorption potential of the produced adsorbent was investigated for Cr+6 in a batch system. Natural chitosan was extracted from shrimp shell as it contains about 8–10% chitin which is used in the production of chitosan. The removal percentage of Cr+6 reached 99% after grafting natural and commercial chitosan at specific conditions. Several isotherm models have been used for mechanistic studies. The results indicated that the adsorption data for commercial chitosan is well-fitted by the Freundlich isotherm, Langmuir for commercial grafted, natural and natural grafted chitosan. Kinetic and equilibrium studies showed that the experimental data of Cr+6 were better described by the pseudo-first-order model for commercial chitosan and fitted the pseudo-second-order model for different types of chitosan used. Significantly, in order to scale this effective strategy on an industrial scale, response surface methodology (RSM) was used as a modelling tool to optimise process parameters such as ion concentrations, utilising Statistica Software.