• Energy Research
• Closed Access close
• DE close
• IT close
• FR close
• Fraunhofer Society close

Abstract Alternative fuel vehicles (AFV) may help to reduce global CO2 emissions from the transport sector. One obstacle for AFV market diffusion is the lack of refueling infrastructure which prevents potential users from buying AFVs. Meanwhile infrastructure suppliers await market developments before investing in an extensive infrastructure roll-out. This mutual interaction has been a field of research for several years and a variety of modeling approaches have been applied. This paper aims at reviewing models of combined AFV and refueling infrastructure market diffusion and pointing out research gaps. We retrieve stylized facts which models should account for from empirical studies on natural gas vehicles, user acceptance analyses on AFVs and technical restraints of plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) and fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs). Ten interaction models are evaluated with respect to the identified aspects. We find that simulation is the most common approach for an interaction model. Besides, the majority of the examined stylized facts is covered by the models. However, models for FCEVs could be improved by reflecting the transport of fuel to refueling infrastructure while new models on PEVs should include charging duration, frequency and charging station ownership.

SummaryThe German government has adopted a law that requires sewage plants to go beyond the recovery of phosphorus from wastewater and to promote recycling. We argue that there is no physical global short‐ or mid‐term phosphorus scarcity. However, we also argue that there are legitimate reasons for policies such as those of Germany, including: precaution as a way to ensure future generations’ long‐term supply security, promotion of technologies for closed‐loop economics in a promising stage of technology development, and decrease in the current supply risk with a new resource pool.

Six corrosion protection systems for offshore wind power constructions have been subjected to offshore conditions on a test site in the North Sea in three different exposure zones, namely splash zone, intermediate zone, and underwater zone. The systems included single- and multiple-layered organic coatings, metal-spray coatings, and duplex coatings. Special testing specimens were designed and manufactured and exposed to an offshore environment for three years in order to characterize particular constructive details for different corrosivity zones. The following target parameters were investigated: intensity of fouling, anti-corrosive effect, coating adhesion, coating integrity, flange corrosion, coating performance over welds, and condition of screw connections. Fouling was an issue in the underwater zone and in the intermediate zone, but it did not affect the coating corrosion protection capacity. It was found that duplex systems, consisting of Zn/Al spray metallization, intermediate particle-reinforced epoxy coating, and polyurethane top layer, provided the highest anti-corrosive effect. Mechanical damage to the coatings initiated coating delamination and substrate corrosion. Effective coating systems should be either very resistant to impact or able to compensate for corrosion of the steel. Flange connections were found to be critical structural parts in the splash zone in terms of corrosion. Notable crevice corrosion was observed at places. Except for one coating system, welds have been protected well. Welds, however, affected the corrosion of the steel inside the uncoated internal sections in the underwater samples. Coating integrity on difficult-to-coat structural parts was satisfactory for all systems.

Abstract Waste disposal is a core issue worldwide. Different researches are being carried out in order to handle waste materials, generated in industrial production and application processes, e.g. paint residue from metal coating in the automobile industry. Often waste is disposed in landfills at substantial economic and environmental cost. Combustion is another way to get rid of possibly hazardous waste. Pulverized fuel combustion is one of the latest combustion technologies. However, pulverized fuel combustion faces severe problems if the waste (fuel) contains components with low melting point. Having a low melting point, it gets difficult to manage and convey the pulverized material to the hot combustion chamber. The melting of fuel causes clogging in the fuel transport nozzle used to convey the material into the combustion chamber. In this work, a new technology for combustion of materials with low melting points is proposed, focusing on apparatus and nozzle design to prevent clogging. For this purpose, different nozzle designs were evaluated by multi-phase CFD simulations. Two sets of nozzle air flow rates were used in four nozzles. Effect of different flow rates and fuel particle size on combustion temperatures are also discussed. It was noted that nozzle air flow rate has a strong influence on the temperature distributions. Small fuel particle sizes result in wider combustion zones while larger particles give longer combustion zones. The results come up with optimized nozzle design and nozzle air flow for transportation of pulverized material with low melting point.

Technical and economic developments in battery and fast-charging technologies could soon make fuel cell electric vehicles, which run on hydrogen, superfluous in road transport

Abstract Despite the comparatively limited stock of vehicles, heavy-duty road transport is responsible for a major share of CO2 emissions from the European transport sector. Electric trucks powered by overhead lines, so-called trolley trucks or catenary hybrid trucks, have been proposed as a potential GHG mitigation option. However, from the perspective of the energy system, trolley trucks constitute an additional and inflexible electricity demand. Here, we analyse scenarios with an ambitious European market diffusion of trolley trucks and their impact on the electricity system and CO2 emissions. Our results show that trolley trucks can noteworthily reduce the CO2 emissions from heavy road transport even when the additional CO2 emissions from electricity generation are taken into account. Furthermore, the actual impact of the additional load from trolley trucks on the total energy system is limited. Compared to the anticipated electricity demand from passenger cars in 2030, trolley trucks require less energy and the load is more equally distributed over daytime. Our findings thus show that electric trucks are an interesting option for CO2 mitigation in heavy road transport.

Abstract The performance of n-type Si back-contact back-junction (BC-BJ) solar cells under illumination with high energy ultraviolet (UV) photons was investigated. The impact of the phosphorus doped front surface field (FSF) layer on the stability of the front surface passivation under UV illumination was investigated. Lifetime samples and solar cells without the front surface field showed a significant performance reduction when exposed to ultraviolet light. The surface saturation current density ( J 0e ) increased from 48 to 446 fA/cm 2 after the UV exposure. At the same time the efficiency of the BC-BJ solar cells without the FSF diffusion reduced from 19.8% to 14.3%. In contrast to the lifetime samples and solar cells without the FSF diffusion, the tested n + nn + structures and the BC-BJ solar cells with applied FSF diffusion profiles were significantly more stable under UV exposure, i.e. J 0e increased only by a factor of 25% and the efficiency of these cells decreased only 0.3% abs by the UV illumination. Finally it was shown that the performance of the UV-degraded solar cells without FSF could be improved during a forming gas anneal (FGA). Due to application of FGA the efficiency almost fully recovered from 14.3% to 19.6%.