Engineering Commons^™

Sustainable Water Management In The University Of Texas At El Paso, Cora Martinez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis showed how to improve water and financial savings for UTEP and El Paso by improving water conservation and sustainability of the UTEP campus. The goals of this research were successfully accomplished by focusing in three principal objectives.

1. Analyze historical data of water consumption of the UTEP campus for the past decade.

2. Evaluate water consumption to quantify water consumption by buildings and type of use, as well as provide recommendations for water and cost savings.

3. Synthesize a water management framework within the UTEP Facilities' Geographic Information System (GIS) for long-term monitoring and evaluation

High Pressure Synchrotron X-Ray Diffraction Studies Of Superprotonic Transitions In Phosphate Based Solid Acids, Juan Daniel Hermosillo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Certain phosphate based solid acids, such as CsH2PO4 and RbH2PO4, have been shown to exhibit an abrupt, several-order-of-magnitude increase in their proton conductivity when heated above a temperature threshold. This so called superprotonic behavior allows the above-mentioned materials to function as fuel cell electrolytes at temperatures between 150C and 300C, a remarkable application that attracted significant interest especially from the automobile industry. Yet, the microscopic structures and dynamic mechanisms responsible for this behavior are not fully understood. In fact, until very recently, the very nature of the superprotonic behavior has been debate, with some groups attributing the steep proton enhancement …

Water Mass Balances For The Rio Grande/Bravo From Fort Quitman, Texas To Foster Ranch Near Langtry, Texas: An Assessment Of Factors, Ramiro Lujan

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Water availability is declining in many regions of the planet, particularly in arid and semi-arid regions. Water bodies located in these regions, like the Rio Grande/Bravo at the U.S. - Mexico border, are subjected to high water demands. This research project makes an assessment of the spatial and temporal variability of elements intervening in the water mass balance for the section of the Rio Grande/Bravo between Fort Quitman and Langtry, Texas during the time period extending from January 1990 through December 2005. This document mentions the main Rio Grande/Bravo stakeholders from the U.S. and Mexico, and describes issues related …

Evaluation Of A Cash Award Program For Water Conservation, Robert Moss

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This document is the final report of a water conservation study funded by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and The University of Texas at El Paso with cooperation from El Paso Water Utilities. The study period was from September, 1997 through January, 2000.

Investigation Of Gas-Solid Fluidized Bed With Non-Spherical Particles, Mario Alberto Ruvalcaba

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The number of experimental and numerical studies of multiphase flows has remarkably increased over the last several years. This research has abundant applications in energy, chemical, and conversion processes. Common use of these technologies includes catalytic cracking for petroleum refineries, fluidized bed reactors (type of chemical reactor), interface modification, and has been an important technology breakthrough in coal gasification. The present work will concentrate on the investigation and validation of gas-solid flows utilizing numerical methods. The gas-solid flows study on this research assumes the solid and gas phases as continua with averaged properties.

The fluid flow computation was achieved using …

Measurement And Analysis Of Turbulent Syngas/Air And Methane Oxy-Combustion, Vishwanath Reddy Ardha

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Development of a next generation gas turbine combustors for power production by using fossil fuels is increasing substantially in order to maintain energy sustainability. National Energy Technology Laboratory has made efforts for developing hydrogen and oxy-fuel based gas turbine combustors which could enhance plant efficiency and ensure low or zero NOx production without sacrificing operational advantages. The current experimental work aims to characterize the turbulent flow-field of premixed syngas/air flames, methane/oxy flames and syngas/oxy flames in a laboratory scaled burner by varying the Reynolds numbers, blockage ratios, firing inputs and blockage ratios in the upstream of the burner. The effects …

Ozone Studies In The Paso Del Norte Region, Fernando Becerra-Davila

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The Paso del Norte region forms the largest contiguous bi-national conglomerate on the US-Mexico border. With a combined population of around 2 million inhabitants, the Paso del Norte region is isolated, more than 500 km away from the nearest urban area of comparable size, thus making it an ideal location for air quality studies of an isolated urban environment.

The meteorological conditions leading to a high ozone episode in this region, such as the historical ozone episode of June 2006, are analyzed. It is well known that stagnation and minimal winds, high temperatures, and pressure ridges over the region are …

Investigation Of A Water Desalination Method Via A Humidification-Dehumidification Process Using Hvac Technology, Juan Antonio Cornejo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Potable water is becoming a scarce resource in many arid regions of the world. An experimental unit was designed and constructed to examine and characterize the production capabilities of a humidification-dehumidification (HDH) desalination process. An HDH cycle offers a viable, technologically light, alternative for producing fresh water from brackish water because the low relative humidity air is infused with water vapor through evaporation by means of conventional heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) components. The evaporation process effectively separates salts and suspended solids from the brackish feed-water. Desalinated water is subsequently recovered by extracting the water vapor from the moist …

Optimal Placement Of Wind Turbines On Non-Flat Terrain Using Cluster Identification And Multi-Objective Genetic Algorithm, Carlos Alejandro Garcia Rosales

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

To date, wind power has become very popular to produce electricity due to climate change, greenhouse gases and the fossil fuels crisis. Although using wind turbine technology to produce electricity is very mature, industries are looking to achieve the best utilization of the wind energy in order to fulfill the electrical needs for cities at a very affordable cost. In this thesis, a method entitled Cluster Identification Algorithm (CIA) and an optimization approach called a Multi-Objective Genetic Algorithm (MOGA) are integrated and implemented to maximize wind power efficiency and wind power in wind farms and minimize cost caused by the …

Hafnia-Based Nanostructured Thermal Barrier Coatings For Next Generation Gas Turbine Technology, Mohammed Noor-A-Alam

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Extensive efforts have been directed in the last several decades towards improving thermodynamic efficiency of industrial gas turbines for power generation plants. The central theme of the efforts is to increase the turbine operating temperature and, thus, allowing higher efficiency. Thermal barrier coatings (TBC) constitute an advanced technology to protect the metallic surface from high temperature exposure for long time operation. The TBCs protect the gas turbine components from high temperature and allows further increase in engine operating temperature which subsequently increases the efficiency of the gas turbine power plant. However, the current TBC materials are capable of allowing the …

Microscopic And Spectroscopic Analysis Of Wo3 And Ti-Doped Wo3 Thin Films, Young Taek Yun

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Tungsten oxide (WO3) has been a subject of high interest for its unique properties, and recently for its importance in different types of industrial applications which ranges from non-emissive displays, optical, microelectronic, catalytic/photocatalytic, humidity, temperature, gas, and biosensor devices. In this study, WO3 and Ti doped thin films were prepared using radio frequency magnetron reactive sputtering at different substrate temperatures ranging from room temperature to 500 ºC in increments of 100 ºC. After forming a hypothesis based on knowledge of established WO3 properties, we attempt in this work to investigate how the doping influences the roughness and the mean grain …

Low Energy Disruption Of Lipid Containing Biomass, Joaquin Rodriguez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Lipid containing biomass from microalgae has received recent research interest as a renewable and sustainable feedstock for biofuel production. Algae is known to offer as much as 30 times the energy density than corn based ethanol, the current world standard for biomass based liquid transportation fuels. The development of large scale systems and methods of extracting lipids from microalgae is still in the early stages of development and significant increases in efficiency and reduction in costs are necessary to substantiate algae as a feasible alternative source of fuel. Traditional conversion of algae feedstock into a refineable feedstock for biofuel can …

Sustainable Riparian Restoration - The Utilization Of Sewage Effluent To Construct Wetlands Along The Rio Grande: A String Of Pearls Approach To Replenishment, Michael Earl Landis

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The Rio Grande, from Elephant Butte Dam to El Paso, has been transformed from a free-flowing wild river into a highly engineered irrigation system. The Rio Grande Project, authorized by Congress in 1905, mandated the Bureau of Reclamation to store and deliver water exclusively to farmers. The river, maintained by the International Boundary and Water Commission, has been straightened and channelized between levees. The laws and policies governing the use of the waters of the Rio Grande are prohibitive to ecological restoration. Prior Appropriation doctrine allows for the exclusive use of these waters.

One sustainable tactic for replenishing the denuded …

Development Of The Control And Ignition Systems On A High Pressure Gas Turbine Combustor, Carlos Alejandro Valdez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The ignition and control systems of a laboratory scale high-pressure gas turbine combustor were developed in the present work. This work provides a detailed description of the design, development and testing of the remote control system developed for a High Pressure Gas Turbine Combustor (HPTC).

The combustor has the capability to operate at pressures up to 1.5 MPa and temperatures up to 2400 K. It is also designed for a maximum air and fuel flow rates of 81.93 g/s and 35.77 g/s respectively. The fuel used will be CH4 for the early experiments but it is designed to operate using …