• Energy Research

To assess the sustainability of waste management scenario with energy recovery, it is necessary to carry out an adequate analysis of all influential criteria. The main problem in the analysis is to determine the indicators that clearly and fully sublimate the most important influential factors. The model for the assessment of the sustainability of waste treatment scenarios based on multi-criteria analysis AHP (analytic hierarchy process) method is developed. The model predicts an increase in the number of indicators, if it found that a selected number of indicators are not sufficient to distinguish between scenarios and new criterion for the selection of indicators: the relevance of the indicator for certain waste treatment. The model is verified in the case study the city of Nis. Four scenarios were selected and examined: business as usual scenario (landfilling of waste) and the other are created as scenarios with energy recovery and recourses preserving: composting organic waste with recycling inorganic waste, incineration of waste and anaerobic digestion of waste. The assessment of the sustainability of waste treatment scenarios was made in several steps. It is found that the best sustainable scenario is composting of organic and recycling of inorganic waste.

In the context of sustainability of document management technologies, this paper presents a new system for layout-based document retrieval specifically designed for commercial form retrieval. The system first uses a technique based on mathematical morphology to extract grid-based structural components from the document image. Successively, Radon Transform is used for document layout description. A document matching technique based on dynamic time warping is finally adopted. The experimental results carried out on real and simulated data set, demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach with respect to different classes of commercial forms.

Abstract European energy policy pursues the objective of a sustainable, competitive and reliable supply of energy. In 2007, the European Commission adopted a proper energy policy for Europe supported by several documents and included an action plan to meet the major energy challenges Europe has to face. A farsighted diversified yearly mix of energies was suggested to countries, aiming at increasing security of supply and efficiency, but a wide and systemic view of energy interchanges between states was missing. In this paper, a Small-World methodology of analysis of Interchange Energy-Networks (IENs) is presented, with the aim of providing a useful tool for planning sustainable energy policies. A proof case is presented to validate the methodology by considering the European IEN behaviour in the period of economical crisis. This network is approached as a Small World Net from a modelling point of view, by supposing that connections between States are characterised by a probability value depending on economic/political relations between countries.

Abstract The pollution caused by fuel combustion either for mechanical or electrical energy generation purposes is nowadays one of the most important environmental issues. It has been proven that combustion emissions, particularly those from cars and trucks, are linked with severe damages to the environment and human health. Along with the environmental problems, is necessary to consider that fossil resources are declining and their exploitation is getting more and more expensive. Bioenergy represent a sustainable solution for energy generation. Bioenergy is renewable energy made from plant-derived organic matter, collectively termed “biomass”. Biomass-based energy sources are potentially carbon dioxide neutral and recycle the same carbon atoms. Life cycle assessments are reported to evaluate the net environmental impacts of biofuels. The term biofuel refers to liquid or gaseous fuels for the internal combustion engines that are predominantly produced from biomass. Biofuel policy might capitalize on the production of biofuels supporting rural economic development and sustainable agriculture. Amongst biofuels pure plant oil (PPO) has been investigated. This paper sets out to review the state of the art for PPO use as fuel in diesel engines, based on a wide literature review.

Systemic view in Strategic Environmental Management is gaining even more attention. The paper proposes the case of a Territorial Environmental and Social Assessment (TESA), based on a Life-cycle approach, applied to set-up the Matera Provincial Plan for a strategic environmental management. Information for performing LCA is here integrated through an Energy-Social Planning model as a decisional support tool. The city-owned buildings are critical facilities for Territorial energy management: the focus here is mainly on energy efficiency. The results obtained of the study contribute to reach EU targets according to the new Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the energy performance of buildings.