Engineering Commons^™

Investigating The Impacts Of Conventional And Advanced Treatment Technologies On Energy Consumption At Satellite Water Reuse Plants, Jonathan Roy Bailey

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

With the ever increasing world population and the resulting increase in industrialization and agricultural practices, depletion of two of the world's most important natural resources, water and fossil fuels, is inevitable. Water reclamation and reuse is the key to protecting these natural resources. Water reclamation using smaller decentralized wastewater treatment plants, known as satellite water reuse plants (WRP), have become popular in the last decade. With stricter standards and regulations on effluent quality and requirements for a smaller land footprint (i.e. real estate area), additional treatment processes and advanced technologies are needed. This greatly increases the energy consumption of an …

Effects Of Moisture Augmentation Of Municipal Solid Waste Through Addition Of Food Waste Or Wastewater Treatment Biosolids On Bio-Gas Formation For Power Generation, Jared Michael Gore

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

An investigation into the effect of moisture augmentation by manipulation of food waste proportion or wastewater treatment plant biosolids proportion was undertaken to determine the effects on production of methane and other biogases from municipal solid waste (MSW). Laboratory microcosm experiments were performed to determine the effect of various proportions of influent waste streams on the production of biogas. Results indicated that moisture augmentation through the addition of food waste to MSW increases the overall bio-gas and hydrogen gas formed during fermentation. Moisture augmentation through addition of wastewater treatment bio-solids lead to inconclusive results. Addition of food waste to MSW …

Impact Of Secondary Treatment Types And Sludge Handling Processes On Estrogen Concentration In Wastewater Sludge, Erica J. Marti

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Endocrine-disrupting compounds (EDCs), such as estrogen, are known to be present in the aquatic environment at concentrations that negatively affect fish and other wildlife. Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are major contributors of EDCs into the environment. EDCs are released via effluent discharge and land application of biosolids. Estrogen removal in WWTPs has been studied in the aqueous phase; however, few researchers have determined estrogen concentration in sludge. This study focuses on estrogen concentration in wastewater sludge as a result of secondary treatment types and sludge handling processes. Grab samples were collected before and after multiple treatment steps at two WWTPs …

Estimating Annual Precipitation For The Colorado River Basin Using Oceanic-Atmospheric Oscillations, Ajay Kalra, Sajjad Ahmad

Civil and Environmental Engineering and Construction Faculty Research

Estimating long-lead time precipitation under the stress of increased climatic variability is a challenging task in the field of hydrology. A modified Support Vector Machine (SVM) based framework is proposed to estimate annual precipitation using oceanic-atmospheric oscillations. Oceanic-atmospheric oscillations, consisting of Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO), and El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) for a period of 1900–2008, are used to generate annual precipitation estimates with a 1 year lead time. The SVM model is applied to 17 climate divisions encompassing the Colorado River Basin in the western United States. The overall results revealed that …

College Of Engineering Senior Design Competition Spring 2018, University Of Nevada, Las Vegas

Fred and Harriet Cox Senior Design Competition Projects

Part of every UNLV engineering student’s academic experience, the senior design project stimulates engineering innovation and entrepreneurship. Each student in their senior year chooses, plans, designs, and prototypes a product in this required element of the curriculum. A capstone to the student’s educational career, the senior design project encourages the student to use everything learned in the engineering program to create a practical, real world solution to an engineering challenge. The senior design competition helps focus the senior students in increasing the quality and potential for commercial application for their design projects. Judges from local industry evaluate the projects on …

Estimation Of Performance Indices For The Planning Of Sustainable Transportation Systems, Pankaj Maheshwari, Alexander Paz, Pushkin Kachroo

College of Engineering: Graduate Celebration Programs

In simple words, the objective of this research is the estimation of performance indices for the planning of sustainable transportation systems Sustainability is achieved when the Transportation system, Activity system and Environmental system have all reached minimum and stable levels of quality so that they can continue operating in perpetuity at less than these levels

Modeling Passive Solar Distillation In Las Vegas, Nv, Noe I. Santos

College of Engineering: Graduate Celebration Programs

Project Background

• Many rural areas on the planet do not have easy access to clean water!

• Water distillation basins are capable of distilling water by using incident solar radiation to evaporate polluted water.

• Current thermodynamic models used to predict behavior require instantaneous data; requires the use of expensive equipment.

• Distillation basins are dependent on multiple meteorological variables: insolation, temperature, wind speed, cloud cover.

• Non‐linear behavior is difficult to predict for long term operations.

Nano-Silica For Enhanced Greener Concrete, Mohamed S. Zeidan

College of Engineering: Graduate Celebration Programs

Colloidal nano-silica was added to normal and fly ash concretes with different rates to examine the its effect on different concrete performance aspects. The main objectives of the study is to determine the effect of adding nano-silica on:

• The rate hydration and the reactivity of cement and pozzolans.

• The mechanical properties and strength gain rate (especially for fly ash concrete).

• Durability.

• Microstructure and Porosity.

Impact Of Sludge Treatment Processes On Estrogen Concentration In Wastewater Sludge, Erica Marti

College of Engineering: Graduate Celebration Programs

Endocrine-disrupting compounds (EDCs), such as estrogen, are known to be present in the aquatic environment at concentrations that affect fish and other wildlife. For example, juvenile male fish exposed to estrogen will synthesize vitellogenin, which is a female-specific protein. Estrogen exposure is also linked to sex reversal, intersexuality, and inhibition of gonadal growth (Jobling et al., 1996).

Wastewater treatment plants are major contributors of EDCs into the environment. EDCs end up in wastewater as a result of natural excretion from the body or being washed off the skin. WWTPs are not designed to remove these substances. As a result, EDCs …

Losing The Lake: Development And Deployment Of An Educational Game, Joseph M. Vesco, Katie Gilgen, Anne Paine, Marissa Owens, Michael Nussbaum, Gale M. Sinatra, Sajjad Ahmad, Kent J. Crippen, Sergiu Dascalu, Frederick C. Harris

Civil and Environmental Engineering and Construction Faculty Research

When asked what the top three issues of the Las Vegas region were, the reply was “water, water, water!" This was the result of a survey done a few years ago of Las Vegas Valley TV anchors. The reason for this response is that sustainability of the urban environments requires sufficient water resources as does population growth. With the advent of global climate change, this resource is in danger. Water flow and mountainous ice packs are impacted by this change in climate there by impacting the amount of water the the region. This is compounded over time as the population …

Las Vegas Strip Odor Remediation, Francell R. Rodriguez, Daniel Hoskins, Guadalupe Gutierrez

Calvert Undergraduate Research Awards

The project described in our report looks at four alternatives to eliminate odor from the intersection of Las Vegas Blvd and Flamingo Rd: biofiltration, Granulated Activated Carbon (GAC) filtration, nitrate addition and the alternative of doing nothing. The odor is caused mainly by hydrogen sulfide, which escapes from the sewer system in this area. Each alternative was evaluated based on effectiveness, land usage, energy consumption, water and material usage, and cost. Cost was further broken down into initial costs and annual costs, and then a cash flow analysis was performed to evaluate the cost over a 30 year timeframe.

Nitrate …