Oil, Gas, and Energy Commons^™

Great Economic Growth Versus Sustainability, Maria Brandao

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Great Economic Growth versus Sustainability

It Is Always Possible, Ivan Makino

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

It Is Always Possible

Say No To Natural Gas, Alex Bruening

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Say No to Natural Gas

Iowa Does It Better: Necessary Role Model Needed To Up Nebraska’S Poor Recycling Diversion Rates, Brian Burris

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Iowa Does It Better: Necessary Role Model needed to Up Nebraska’s Poor Recycling Diversion Rates

What The Frack?, Carson Schwalbach

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

What The Frack?

Why Keystone Pipeline Xl Construction Doesn’T Matter Either Way, Melissa Allen

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Why Keystone Pipeline XL Construction Doesn’t Matter Either Way

Biofuels: Good And Bad, Megan Neve

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Biofuels: Good and Bad

A Call For Congressional Climate Action, Calvin Harman

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

A Call for Congressional Climate Action

Potential Biogas Production On Livestock Operations, Mariana Baia

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Potential Biogas Production on Livestock Operations

The Clean Power Plan – Has The Epa Got It Right…, Brooke Welsh

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The Clean Power Plan – Has the EPA Got It Right…

The Cost Of Change, Thomas Mcguire

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The Cost of Change

Nuclear Power Gateway To A Sustainable Energy Sector, Tyler Glewwe

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Nuclear Power Gateway to a Sustainable Energy Sector

Energy Race To Save The Planet, Ty Rempe

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Energy Race to Save the Planet

Corn Ethanol, A Bad Idea, Taylor Hackbart

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Corn Ethanol, A Bad Idea

Does Thorium Have A Place In The Future U.S. Electricity Mix?, Danny West

Master's Projects and Capstones

Thorium is an alternative fuel source for nuclear energy. Coupled with its use in a new reactor design, called a Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor, the two have the ability to disrupt the nuclear industry and power sector. Nuclear energy is a clean and reliable source of energy; however, it generates hazardous waste that must be stored away for hundreds of thousands of years and power plants are at risk of a catastrophic incident that can lead to a wide scale release of radiation. These drawbacks to nuclear energy can be mitigated using thorium in a Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor. These …

First Proof Of Concept Of Sustainable Metabolite Production From High Solids Fermentation Of Lignocellulosic Biomass Using A Bacterial Co-Culture And Cycling Flush System, Wanying Yao, Sue E. Nokes

Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering Faculty Publications

To improve the lignocellulose conversion for ABE in high solids fermentation, this study explored the feasibility of cycling the process through the cellulolytic or/and solventogenic phases via intermittent flushing of the fermentation media. Five different flushing strategies (varying medium ingredients, inoculum supplement and cycling through phases) were investigated. Flushing regularly throughout the cellulolytic phase is necessary because re-incubation at 65 °C significantly improved glucose availability by at least 6-fold. The solvents accumulation was increased by 4-fold using corn stover (3-fold using miscanthus) over that produced by flushing only through the solventogenic phase. In addition, cycling process was simplified by re-incubating …

Managing The Risks Of Shale Gas Development Using Innovative Legal And Regulatory Approaches, Sheila Olmstead, Nathan Richardson

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

Booming production of oil and gas from shale enabled by hydraulic fracturing technology has led to tension between hoped-for economic benefits and feared environmental and other costs, with great associated controversy. Studies of how policy can best react to these challenges and how it can balance risk and reward have focused on prescriptive regulatory responses and, to a somewhat lesser extent, voluntary industry best practices. While there is undoubtedly room for improved regulation, innovative tools are relatively understudied. The liability system predates environmental regulation yet still plays an important—and in some senses predominant—role. Changes to that system, including burden-shifting rules …

Predicted Performance Of A Skytherm North, A Highly Insulated Building Envelope System And A Frost Protected Shallow Foundation, Kitrina Ann Stratton

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

How do you design a durable, sustainable, and financeable Net Zero Energy house for a cold weather climate using little or no external energy that is also affordable? Reviewing all of the factors that would influence the design and materials selection of an appropriate response to the issues, the perfect system for housing people, whether it is in response to affordability, durability, comfort, cultural sensitivity, appearance or being locally appropriate, is using some kind of straw bale construction system with an integrated frost protected shallow foundation and a SkyTherm North design.

The focus and intention of this research is to …

Spectroscopic Investigation Of The Chemical And Electronic Properties Of Chalcogenide Materials For Thin-Film Optoelectronic Devices, Kimberly Horsley

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Chalcogen-based materials are at the forefront of technologies for sustainable energy production. This progress has come only from decades of research, and further investigation is needed to continue improvement of these materials.

For this dissertation, a number of chalcogenide systems were studied, which have applications in optoelectronic devices, such as LEDs and Photovoltaics. The systems studied include Cu(In,Ga)Se2 (CIGSe) and CuInSe2 (CISe) thin-film absorbers, CdTe-based photovoltaic structures, and CdTe-ZnO nanocomposite materials. For each project, a sample set was prepared through collaboration with outside institutions, and a suite of spectroscopy techniques was employed to answer specific questions about the system. These …

Spectral Decomposition Of The Scattered Light Due To Deposits On The Solar Panel Surface, And Cross Correlated To Power Loss, Suzanna Ho

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The electric energy generated by solar panels declines due to dust particulates, bird deposits, water spots, and other contaminants that inhibit sunlight absorption and promote light scattering. As part of our research, we use cameras to capture images of solar panels, and analyze the images to detect the amount of scattered light. The more scattered light there is, the less light there is to penetrate the solar panel glass and reach the part of the panel that converts incident light to electric energy; therefore, less energy is generated. In this paper, we discuss the classification algorithm we developed to classify …