A domestic rooftop PV system: a step towards retrofitting the built environment to combat climate change in Bahrain

This article assesses the technological, economic, and environmental aspects of installing the first 7.8 kW PV installation on a rooftop of a domestic house in Bahrain for a period of 2 years (20th March 2018 to 31st March 2020). The maximum solar electricity generated was 1,228.9 kWh (August 2018), and the least was 728.16 kWh (December 2019). The maximum daily specific yield (SY) was 6.12 kWh/kWp (on 14 April 2019). The annual average daily specific yield for this domestic building was 4.13 kWh/kWp. The average performance ratio (PR) of the PV system was 73.0% in 2019. The self-sufficiency (SS) of this installation was found to vary from 15.3% to 50.7%. The average SS value in 2018 was 22.8%, while in 2019 it was 28.6%. Furthermore, a cubic relation correlation was established, relating the month number (X) and the monthly average of the daily specific yield (Y). It was found that installing a solar PV system will cut about 39.0% of CO2 annually, which is equal to 4.637 tons and hence saves 38,567 ft3 of natural gas. The initiative of encouraging the use of rooftops in Bahrain to produce zero-carbon electricity is a step towards retrofitting the built environment to combat climate change

Worrying about climate change

The paper discusses the impact of climate change on ten sectors: water, water desalination, energy, renewable energy supply, health, society, agriculture, economy, industry, and built environment. Each of the sectors has unique characteristics that require special consideration. Planning for climate change adaptation is among the most complex challenges cities are facing today. Climatic alterations put a strain on 1) energy needs for cooling/heating and release of anthropogenic heat, 2) mortality and morbidity due to air pollution and air turbidity, 3) productivity and wellbeing, and 4) accessibility to public spaces and social prosperity. There are many innovate ideas and proposals suggested in order to minimize the impact of climate change, but no simple solution exists because of the interdependence and fast-moving technological solutions, and the role of the policy makers in setting targets and providing finance for solutions

The performance of four domestic rooftop 7.8 kW − PV in the Kingdom of Bahrain: toward low building emission

This paper reports the performance of four domestic houses at different locations in Bahrain, each have 7.8 kW of PV on the roof, and all panels are tilted at 12°, but the azimuth of the panels (orientation) in these houses varies slightly from south (±10°); depending on roof space availability and building surroundings. The data of year 2019 have been used because all these domestic houses were monitored, maintained, and cleaned by an assigned company from the government. The annual solar electricity generated was 11,329 kWh, 11,448 kWh, 10,978 kWh, and 9995 kWh for houses # 4, # 2, #1, and # 3, respectively. The annual Specific Yield (SY) obtained was 1468 kWh/kW, 1452 kWh/kW, 1407 kWh/kW and 1254 kWh/kW for houses # 2, #4, # 1, and # 3, respectively; this makes the daily average SY equals to 4.02 kWh/kW, 3.98 kWh/kW, 3.85 kWh/kW, and 3.43 kWh/kW, respectively. The average performance ratio (PR) of each PV system were found to range from 75.1% to 65.6%. The PV system performs better in house #4 due to its azimuth PV panels' angle (orientation) which is closest to the south direction. A polynomial equation is established, relating the month number (X) and the monthly average of monthly solar electricity generated as well as the monthly specific yield (Y). This work shows that installing a 7.8 kWp of PV on the roof of all residential building in Bahrain will reduce the total CO2 emission in Bahrain by 39.0% (4.637 tons) per year, saving 38,567 ft3 of natural gas. This is a step towards low-carbon building; in an attempt to make Bahrain a zero carbon by 2060

Accelerating the transformation to a green university: University of Bahrain experience

Many universities are striving to have an environmental impact on the society as they are considered as small communities aiming to be eco-friendly and having low CO2 emission. This concept has been emerging after the worldwide concern on the ozone depletion issue and global warming. As a result, many titles have appeared like “Green Universities”, “eco- friendly Universities,” “Environmental sustainable Universities” and “Environmentally responsible universities,” etc. This paper proposes a mechanism that allows universities to go green or become environmentally sustainable higher education bodies in a short span of time. It simply advises the universities to best practice the Environmental Sustainable Development Goals (ESDG’s) Components incorporated in the seventeen United Nation Sustainable Developments Goals (SDG’s) that were announced on the 25 th September 2015 by all leaders of the countries which were aimed to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all as part of a new sustainable development agenda where each goal has specific targets to be achieved over the next 15 years. These ESDG’s listed within the SDG’s are the following: 1) Good Health and Well-being. 2) Quality Education. 3) Clean Water and Sanitation. 4) Affordable and Clean Energy. 5) Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure. 6) Sustainable Cities and Communities. 7) Climate Action. 8) Life below Water. 9) Life on Land. Therefore, incorporating such 9 Goals in the strategic planning of each worldwide university that has aligned its goals with the Country National Strategy - which by default includes these SDG’s - will accelerate and boost each university to transform to Green and Environmentally Sustainable campus. The paper also sheds light on the experience of University of Bahrain in this respect

Accelerating the transformation to a green university: University of Bahrain experience

Many universities are striving to have an environmental impact on the society as they are considered as small communities aiming to be eco-friendly and having low CO2 emission. This concept has been emerging after the worldwide concern on the ozone depletion issue and global warming. As a result, many titles have appeared like “Green Universities”, “eco- friendly Universities,” “Environmental sustainable Universities” and “Environmentally responsible universities,” etc. This paper proposes a mechanism that allows universities to go green or become environmentally sustainable higher education bodies in a short span of time. It simply advises the universities to best practice the Environmental Sustainable Development Goals (ESDG’s) Components incorporated in the seventeen United Nation Sustainable Developments Goals (SDG’s) that were announced on the 25 th September 2015 by all leaders of the countries which were aimed to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all as part of a new sustainable development agenda where each goal has specific targets to be achieved over the next 15 years. These ESDG’s listed within the SDG’s are the following: 1) Good Health and Well-being. 2) Quality Education. 3) Clean Water and Sanitation. 4) Affordable and Clean Energy. 5) Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure. 6) Sustainable Cities and Communities. 7) Climate Action. 8) Life below Water. 9) Life on Land. Therefore, incorporating such 9 Goals in the strategic planning of each worldwide university that has aligned its goals with the Country National Strategy - which by default includes these SDG’s - will accelerate and boost each university to transform to Green and Environmentally Sustainable campus. The paper also sheds light on the experience of University of Bahrain in this respect

Advanced Coordination Method for Overcurrent Protection Relays Using New Hybrid and Dynamic Tripping Characteristics for Microgrid

Nowadays, the Overcurrent (OC) and Earth Fault (EF) relays coordination problem is one of the most complex and challenging concerns of power protection and network operators due to the high and volatile generation capacity of renewable energy sources in the grid. In this article, a new and dynamic optimal coordination scheme based on a novel hybrid tripping characteristic has been designed and developed for Over Current Relays (OCRs). Considering the impact of renewable energy sources such as the photovoltaic (PV) system on fault characteristic, this work presents and verifies a novel dynamic and hybrid tripping to achieve minimum tripping time and improve the OCR and EF relays coordination performance in terms of security, sensitivity, and selectivity. The proposed dynamic and hybrid scheme will help the OCRs to cover the EF events, and it has been tested under different fault scenarios compared to the literature. The IEEE-9 and IEEE-33 bus systems are implemented in the ETAP package to validate the effectiveness of the proposed hybrid characteristics against traditionally well-established IEC characteristics. Furthermore, the performance of the proposed advance and dynamic protection approach which doesn’t require a communication infrastructure is investigated for a power network with PV plants under different grid operation modes and topology to provide more robustness protection system. The results, as presented using Industrial software (ETAP), showed that the novel dynamic and hybrid tripping scheme improved the speed of the total time tripping different fault scenarios and location by more than 50% and covers all EF events compared to traditional OCR schemes from the literature. The proposed novel dynamic approach has superior performance in detecting high-impedance faults and significantly reducing the tripping time on the IEEE 33 bus network by 47%

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on patients with paediatric cancer in low-income, middle-income and high-income countries: a multicentre, international, observational cohort study

OBJECTIVES: Paediatric cancer is a leading cause of death for children. Children in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) were four times more likely to die than children in high-income countries (HICs). This study aimed to test the hypothesis that the COVID-19 pandemic had affected the delivery of healthcare services worldwide, and exacerbated the disparity in paediatric cancer outcomes between LMICs and HICs. DESIGN: A multicentre, international, collaborative cohort study. SETTING: 91 hospitals and cancer centres in 39 countries providing cancer treatment to paediatric patients between March and December 2020. PARTICIPANTS: Patients were included if they were under the age of 18 years, and newly diagnosed with or undergoing active cancer treatment for Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, Hodgkin lymphoma, Wilms' tumour, sarcoma, retinoblastoma, gliomas, medulloblastomas or neuroblastomas, in keeping with the WHO Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: All-cause mortality at 30 days and 90 days. RESULTS: 1660 patients were recruited. 219 children had changes to their treatment due to the pandemic. Patients in LMICs were primarily affected (n=182/219, 83.1%). Relative to patients with paediatric cancer in HICs, patients with paediatric cancer in LMICs had 12.1 (95% CI 2.93 to 50.3) and 7.9 (95% CI 3.2 to 19.7) times the odds of death at 30 days and 90 days, respectively, after presentation during the COVID-19 pandemic (p<0.001). After adjusting for confounders, patients with paediatric cancer in LMICs had 15.6 (95% CI 3.7 to 65.8) times the odds of death at 30 days (p<0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The COVID-19 pandemic has affected paediatric oncology service provision. It has disproportionately affected patients in LMICs, highlighting and compounding existing disparities in healthcare systems globally that need addressing urgently. However, many patients with paediatric cancer continued to receive their normal standard of care. This speaks to the adaptability and resilience of healthcare systems and healthcare workers globally