Engineering Commons^™

Small Scale Water Filtration Project, Elaine Yang, Lang Ming, Alex Tees, Lauren Galle, Tristan Coffey, Andria Tattersfield, Colin Brock

PSU High School Innovation Challenge

Access to clean drinking water is a large problem that our world is facing today. Consuming contaminated water can lead to the spread of water-borne illnesses. Populations without the security of water struggle to develop, as seen predominately in Africa. As Oregonians prepare for life after a major earthquake which could devastate the infrastructure that delivers clean water to our homes, a water filtration system should be part of a family’s emergency preparedness plan.

There are a large variety of processes for achieving fresh water. Combining all of the necessary components to lead to clean water is a complex process, …

Estimating The Probability Of Vegetation To Be Groundwater Dependent Based On The Evaluation Of Tree Models, Isabel C. Pérez Hoyos, Nir Y. Krakauer, Reza Khanbilvardi

Publications and Research

Groundwater Dependent Ecosystems (GDEs) are increasingly threatened by humans’ rising demand for water resources. Consequently, it is imperative to identify the location of GDEs to protect them. This paper develops a methodology to identify the probability of an ecosystem to be groundwater dependent. Probabilities are obtained by modeling the relationship between the known locations of GDEs and factors influencing groundwater dependence, namely water table depth and climatic aridity index. Probabilities are derived for the state of Nevada, USA, using modeled water table depth and aridity index values obtained from the Global Aridity database. The model selected results from the performance …

Planning For Climate Change: The Need For Mechanistic Systems-Based Approaches To Study Climate Change Impacts On Diarrheal Diseases, Jonathan E. Mellor, Karen Levy, Julie Zimmerman, Mark Elliott, Jamie Bartram, Elizabeth Carlton, Thomas Clasen, Rebecca Dilingham, Joseph Eisenberg, Richard Guerrant, Daniele Lantagne, James Mihelcic, Kara Nelson

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Increased precipitation and temperature variability as well as extreme events related to climate change are predicted to affect the availability and quality of water globally. Already heavily burdened with diarrheal diseases due to poor access to water, sanitation and hygiene facilities, communities throughout the developing world lack the adaptive capacity to sufficiently respond to the additional adversity caused by climate change. Studies suggest that diarrhea rates are positively correlated with increased temperature, and show a complex relationship with precipitation. Although climate change will likely increase rates of diarrheal diseases on average, there is a poor mechanistic understanding of the underlying …

Characterization Of A Continuous-Flow Reactor For Solar Uv Water Disinfection, Margaret M. Busse

Open Access Theses

Lack of access to safe water is a common problem in many developing countries (UNICEF/WHO, 2011). Fortunately, solar ultraviolet (UV) radiation is abundantly available in many of these same areas, and it has been used to accomplish disinfection of drinking water by processes that involve no electrical power, such as solar water disinfection (SODIS). However, conventional SODIS systems are limited by batch processing and exclusion of UVB radiation, which is the most germicidally-active portion of the UV spectrum (Coohill and Sagripanti, 2008). To address these limitations, a continuous-flow solar UV disinfection system was developed to amplify ambient solar UV radiation, …

A Review Of Advances In The Identification And Characterization Of Groundwater Dependent Ecosystems Using Geospatial Technologies, Isabel C. Pérez Hoyos, Nir Y. Krakauer, Reza Khanbilvardi, Roy A. Armstrong

Publications and Research

Groundwater Dependent Ecosystem (GDE) protection is increasingly being recognized as essential for the sustainable management and allocation of water resources. GDE services are crucial for human well-being and for a variety of flora and fauna. However, the conservation of GDEs is only possible if knowledge about their location and extent is available. Several studies have focused on the identification of GDEs at specific locations using ground-based measurements. However, recent progress in remote sensing technologies and their integration with Geographic Information Systems (GIS) has provided alternative ways to map GDEs at a much larger spatial extent. This paper presents a review …

Sizing An Anaerobic Digester In A Rural Developing World Community: Does Household Fuel Demand Match Greenhouse Gas Production?, Ronald Keelan Greenwade

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Anaerobic digestion is the process by which organic carbon is converted into biogas in the form of carbon dioxide (CO₂) and methane (CH₄). Both of these products are greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. Therefore if anaerobic reactors are improperly maintained and biogas is leaked or intentionally released into the atmosphere because biogas production exceeds household demand, these reactors may become generators of greenhouse gas emissions instead of sustainable energy producers. The objective of this research was to develop a framework to assess if the demand for biogas by a rural adopter of an anaerobic …

Evaluating Storm Sewer Pipe Condition Using Autonomous Drone Technology, Maria T. Meeks

Theses and Dissertations

The United States Air Force (USAF) owns a total of 30.9 million linear feet (LF) of storm sewer pipes valued at approximately $2.3B in its vast portfolio of built infrastructure. Current inventory records reveal that 78% of the inventory (24.1 million LF) is over 50 years old and will soon exceed its estimated service life. Additionally, the USAF depends on contract support while its business processes undervalue in-service evaluations from long-term funding plans. Ultimately, this disconnect negatively impacts infrastructure performance and overall strategic success, and the USAF risks making uninformed decisions in a fiscally constrained environment.

This research presents a …

Sefo: A Package For Generating Probabilistic Forecasts From Nmme Predictive Ensembles, Nir Krakauer

Publications and Research

Long-range weather forecasts based on output from ensembles of computer simulations are attracting increasing interest. A variety of methods have been proposed to convert the ensemble outputs to calibrated probabilistic forecasts. The package presented here (SeFo, for Seasonal Forecasting) implements a number of methods for producing forecasts of monthly surface air temperature anomalies up to 9 months in advance using output from the North American Multi-Model Ensemble (NMME). The package contains modules for downloading and reading past observations and ensemble output; producing forecast probability distributions; and verifying and calibrating a user-determined subset of methods using arbitrary past periods. By changing …

Alkali Silica Reaction (Asr) Mitigation For Arkansas Region, Lois Farouk Kamel

Theses and Dissertations

The objective of this research is to mitigate and prevent the alkali silica reactivity (ASR) in highway construction projects. ASR is a deleterious reaction initiated when the silica content of the aggregate reacts with alkali hydroxides in the mix in the presence of relatively high moisture content. The ASR results in the formation of an expansive white colored gel-like material which forms the destructive tensile stresses inside hardened concrete. Different types of local aggregates available in the State of Arkansas were mixed, mortar bars and concrete specimens were poured according to the ASTM specifications. Specimens' expansion was measured versus time, …

Four Billion People Facing Severe Water Scarcity, Mesfin Mekonnen, Arjen Y. Hoekstra

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Freshwater scarcity is increasingly perceived as a global systemic risk. Previous global water scarcity assessments, measuring water scarcity annually, have underestimated experienced water scarcity by failing to capture the sea- sonal fluctuations in water consumption and availability. We assess blue water scarcity globally at a high spatial resolution on a monthly basis. We find that two-thirds of the global population (4.0 billion people) live under conditions of severe water scarcity at least 1 month of the year. Nearly half of those people live in India and China. Half a billion people in the world face severe water scarcity all year …

Modeling Food Security, Energy, And Climate And Cultural Impacts Of A Process: The Case Study Of Shea Butter In Sub-Saharan Africa, Colleen Claire Naughton

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Millions of people in the world, particularly women and people in sub-Saharan Africa, suffer from hunger and poverty. Three of the major 2015-2030 United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aim to eliminate hunger through food security and sustainable agriculture, eradicate poverty, and achieve gender equality through women’s empowerment. Shea trees and their associated fruit and butter can play a major role in each of these three SDGs for women and their families throughout sub-Saharan Africa. Shea trees are located over a wide expanse stretching more than 5,000 kilometers across over eighteen countries in sub-Saharan Africa. These trees produce fruit that …

The Bridge Newsletter Spring 2016, Missouri University Of Science And Technology

The Bridge Newsletter

-Steel Bridge Team qualifies for nationals
-Concrete, reimagined
-Going with the flow
-Remembering Vernon T. Jones

Significance Of U-Wrap Frp Shear Strengthening On Flexural Behavior Of Rc Beams Strengthened Using Near Surface Mounted Frp Bars, Rahulreddy Chennareddy

Civil Engineering ETDs

The aim of this study is to investigate the significance of U-wrap shear strengthening on the flexural behavior of Near Surface Mounted (NSM) Fiber Reinforced Polymers (FRP) strengthened Reinforced Concrete (RC) beams. It is well-known that the performance of NSM-FRP technique is strongly dependent on bond performance between adhesive-concrete and adhesive-FRP interface. Although a full development length is provided for the NSM FRP bar, rupture of the FRP bar is highly unlikely. This is attributed to the fact that the NSM FRP bar typically observes a stress level lower than 60% of its ultimate capacity at RC beam failure by …

Methane Emissions As Energy Reservoir: Context, Scope, Causes And Mitigation Strategies, Xiaoli Chai, David J. Tonjes, Devinder Mahajan

Technology & Society Faculty Publications

Methane (CH4) is now considered a bridge fuel between present fossil (carbon) economy and desired renewables and this energy molecule is projected to play an important role in the global energy mix well beyond 2035. The atmospheric warming potential of CH4 is 28-36 times, when averaged over a 100-year period, that of carbon dioxide (CO2) and this necessitates a close scrutiny of global CH4 emissions inventory. As the second most abundant greenhouse gas (GHG), the annual global CH4 emissions were 645 million metric tons (MMT), accounting for 14.3% of the global anthropogenic GHG emissions. Of this, five key anthropogenic sources: …

A Compact To Revitalise Large-Scale Irrigation Systems Using A Leadership-Partnership-Ownership 'Theory Of Change', Bruce Lankford, Ian Makin, Nathanial Matthews, Peter G. Mccornick, Andrew Noble, Tushaar Shah

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

In countries with transitional economies such as those found in South Asia, large-scale irrigation systems (LSIS) with a history of public ownership account for about 115 million ha (Mha) or approximately 45% of their total area under irrigation. In terms of the global area of irrigation (320 Mha) for all countries, LSIS are estimated at 130 Mha or 40% of irrigated land. These systems can potentially deliver significant local, regional, and global benefits in terms of food, water and energy security, employment, economic growth, and ecosystem services. For example, primary crop production is conservatively valued at about US$355 billion. However, …

Demonstration And Evaluation Of Dual Purpose Chicken “Potchefstroom Koekoek” Packages At Areka Areas, Snnpr, Ethiopia, Aman Getiso, Melese Yilma, Mesfin Mekonnen, Addisu Jimma, Mebratu Asrat, Asrat Tera, Endrias Dako

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

The demonstration was conducted in Wolaita zone, Boloso Sore district at Areka and around Areka areas. Participants (farmers) were selected purposively on the basis of willingness to construct poultry house; to cover all the associated package costs and record the required was selected. Survival of chicks during the first 8 weeks of brooding using hay-box at the farmers management condition was 79.8% (359 were survived out 450). On average about 93.1% of the chicken were survived to the laying age while mortality reduced from 20.2% to 6.9%. The average age at first egg-laying recorded at each farmers was 142 days …

Anthropogenic Nitrogen And Phosphorus Emissions And Related Grey Water Footprints Caused By Eu-271s Crop Production And Consumption, Mesfin Mekonnen, Stephan Lutter, Aldo Martinez

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Water is a prerequisite for life on our planet. Due to climate change and pollution, water availability for agricultural production, industry and households is increasingly put at risk. With agriculture being the largest water user as well as polluter worldwide, we estimate anthropogenic nitrogen and phosphorus emissions to fresh water related to global crop production at a spatial resolution level of 5 by 5 arc min and calculate the grey water footprints (GWF) related to EU-271s crop production. A multiregional input-output model is used to trace the the GWF embodied in the final consumption of crop products by the EU-27. …

Using Casual Loop Diagramming To Explore The Drivers Of The Sustained Functionality Of Rural Water Services In Timor-Leste, Kate Neely, Jeffrey P. Walters

Faculty Publications - Biomedical, Mechanical, and Civil Engineering

It is recognized that international water sector development work has issues with a lack of sustained positive outcomes. A large driver of this outcome is how NGOs work with communities to implement and then manage water services. Many NGOs tend to focus their efforts on improving their reach and organisational growth by continually engaging in new projects. This behaviour is largely driven by short-term donor funding models that reward extended coverage, leaving little focus on sustained outcomes. Similarly, community-based management (CBM) schemes often impede sustained services as a result of the community’s limited capacity to operate and maintain the technology. …

2016 Scholarly Productivity Report, Missouri University Of Science And Technology

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Scholarly Productivity Reports

No abstract provided.

Drivers Of Food Wastage And Their Implications For Sustainable Policy Development, Krista L. Thyberg, David J. Tonjes

Technology & Society Faculty Publications

There has been growing interest in establishing food waste prevention and recovery programs throughout the world. The drive to target food waste stems from increasing concerns about resource conservation, food security, food waste’s environmental and economic costs, and a general trend in the waste management industry to transition to more sustainable practices. Here the drivers of residential, institutional, and commercial food waste generation in developed countries, particularly in the U.S., are explored. The impacts of food system modernization on food waste generation are examined, particularly impacts related to food system industrialization, urbanization, globalization, and economic growth. Socio-demographic, cultural, political, and …

A Framework To Utilize Shear Strength Properties For Evaluating Rutting Potentials Of Unbound Aggregate Materials, Issam Qamhia, Erol Tutumluer, Liang Chern Chow, Debakanta Mishra

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper presents shear strength and permanent deformation trends of four unbound aggregate materials, commonly used for base and subbase layers in the state of North Carolina, USA, studied through repeated load triaxial testing, using the University of Illinois FastCell equipment. A testing and modeling framework has been established to develop a proper permanent deformation prediction model, referred to herein as the UIUC rutting model, with number of load applications. According to the framework, the unbound aggregate shear strength properties are incorporated into the model using the ratio of the applied wheel load shear stress to the mobilized shear strength, …

Analyses, Calibration And Validation Of Evapotranspirationmodels To Predict Grass-Reference Evapotranspiration In Thesenegal River Delta, Koffi Djaman, Hossein Tabari, Alpha B. Balde, Lamine Diop, Koichi Futakuchi, Suat Irmak

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

Study region: Grass-reference evapotranspiration estimation by the Penman-Monteithmethod (PM-ETo) requires a number of climate variables which are not always availableat all weather stations. Different alternative ETo equations have been developed and theirutilization for various local climate conditions requires analyses of their accuracy as com-pared to the standardized Penman-Monteith method. There is a significant lack of data andinformation on this topic in the Senegal River Delta (SRD). Study focus: The objective of this study was to evaluate, calibrate and validate six EToequations ((Trabert, Mahringer, Penman1948, Albrecht, Valiantzas1 and Valiantzas2) forthe SRD. Although all six equations showed good agreement with the PM-ETo …

Long-Term Patterns Of Air Temperatures, Daily Temperature Range, Precipitation, Grass-Reference Evapotranspiration And Aridity Index In The Usa Great Plains: Part Ii. Temporal Trends, Meetpal S. Kukal, Suat Irmak

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

Detection of long-term changes in climate variables over large spatial scales is a very important prerequisite to the development of effective mitigation and adaption measures for the future potential climate change and for developing strategies for future hydrologic balance analyses under changing climate. Moreover, there is a need for effective approaches of providing information about these changes to decision makers, water managers and stakeholders to aid in efficient implementation of the developed strategies. This study involves computation, mapping and analyses of long-term (1968-2013) county-specific trends in annual, growing-season (1st May- 30th Sept.) and monthly air temperatures [(maximum (T_max), …

Long-Term Patterns Of Air Temperatures, Daily Temperature Range, Precipitation, Grass-Reference Evapotranspiration And Aridity Index In The Usa Great Plains: Part I. Spatial Trends, Meetpal S. Kukal, Suat Irmak

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

Due to their substantial spatio-temporal behavior, long-term quantification and analyses of important hydrological variables are essential for practical applications in water resources planning, evaluating the water use of agricultural crop production and quantifying crop evapotranspiration patterns and irrigation management vs. hydrologic balance relationships. Observed data at over 800 sites across the Great Plains of USA, comprising of 9 states and 2,307,410 km² of surface area, which is about 30% of the terrestrial area of the USA, were used to quantify and map large-scale and long-term (1968-2013) spatial trends of air temperatures, daily temperature range (DTR), precipitation, grass-reference evapotranspiration (ET …

The Effect Of Glycerol On Readily Biodegradable Chemical Oxygen Demand (Rbcod) In A Wastewater Stream, Rojina Rawut

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study evaluated the short-term effects of glycerol addition on readily biodegradable (RB) chemical oxygen demand (COD) in a carbon limited wastewater influent. The presence of an RB fraction provides with a suitable substrate for microorganisms to produce volatile fatty acids (VFA). The oxygen utilization rate (OUR) has been used to evaluate the oxygen consumption for RB substrate in wastewater. Wastewater with low organic content contains limited RB substrate, and thus, additional carbon source is required to improve biological treatment capability. Acetate, propionate, methanol, and glycerol are the commonly available carbon sources for biological treatment process. However, the cost of …

Behavior Of Rc Beams Strengthened In Flexure With Spliced Cfrp Rod Panels, Akram Rasheed Jawdhari

Theses and Dissertations--Civil Engineering

FRP laminates and fabrics, used as an externally bonded reinforcement (EBR) to strengthen or repair concrete members, have proven to be an economical retrofitting method. However, when used to strengthen long-span members or members with limited access, the labor and equipment demands may negate the benefits of using continuous EBR FRP. Recently, CFRP rod panels (CRPs) have been developed and deployed to overcome the aforementioned limitations. Each CRP is made of several small diameter CFRP rods placed at discrete spacing. To fulfill the strengthening length, CRP’s are spliced together and made continuous by means of overlaps (or finger joints).

In …

Using Zeolite For Soil Moisture Retention And Salinity Control, Mark Torres

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

There is a great need in the desert southwest United States for exploring ways to save water in agriculture as it accounts for up to 90 percent of water consumption in many western states (USDA 2016). As surface water reaches critical lows the dependence on ground water has increased leading to the need for deeper wells with higher salt concentrations. The studies conducted for this research included using zeolites from the St Cloud Mining Company in Winston, New Mexico to determine the feasibility of using these zeolites to help and retain moisture in zeolite treated soils. The Volumetric Water Content …

Foundation Design Of Low Volume Roads: Evaluation And Performance, Alyssa Clemen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A majority of roads in the state of SD are low volume roads (LVRs). The SDDOT has developed simplified methods for LVR pavement thickness selection. These guides allow users to obtain recommended asphalt surfacing and base course layer thickness based on the subgrade support and the average daily traffic (ADT) of the road. The main objective of this study is to relate the surface condition of LVRs to their ADT, layer thicknesses, foundation material properties, and maintenance. A secondary objective was to evaluate if the Dynamic Cone Penetrometer (DCP) is an acceptable tool in determining the subgrade support by using …

A Literature Review Of The Evolution Of British Prefabricated Low-Rise Housing, Daniel O'Neill, Samantha Organ

Articles

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore academic papers and reports and present a chronology of the evolution of British low-rise prefabricated housing. The paper provides chronological information for construction and surveying researchers undertaking research in associated areas.

Design/methodology/approach – This is a qualitative literature review, providing an exploration and analysis of academic papers and reports on low-rise prefabricated housing.

Findings – A substantial literature was discovered. However, there are gaps in the available literature. The history of British construction technology is a rich research area but is under-researched. Prefabricated housing has a long history dating back …

Object Detection For Agricultural And Construction Environments Using An Ultrasonic Sensor, Joseph S. Dvorak, Marvin L. Stone, Kelvin P. Self

Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering Faculty Publications

This study tested an ultrasonic sensor‘s ability to detect several objects commonly encountered in outdoor agricultural or construction environments: a water jug, a sheet of oriented strand board (OSB), a metal fence post, a human model, a wooden fence post, a Dracaena plant, a juniper plant, and a dog model. Tests were performed with each target object at distances from 0.01 to 3 m. Five tests were performed with each object at each location, and the sensor‘s ability to detect the object during each test was categorized as "undetected," "intermittent," "incorrect distance," "good." Rigid objects that presented a larger surface …