Monte Carlo Simulation and Scenario Analysis Based Limestone Quarry Production Planning

The key factor behind raw mix design in the cement factory is the appropriate production planning, resulting in high-quality raw material. Quarry managers usually come up with uncertainty-related raw materials due to variations in chemical composition. These uncertainties required efficient planning in terms of useful insight into this problem. This research provides a detailed explanation of scenario analysis of raw materials used in cement manufacturing using Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) and indices. Scenario analysis is used to predict the possibility of best, worst and most likely cases of raw material’s quality. Whereas, Monte Carlo simulation is used to evaluate the inherent uncertainty associated with chemical composition values in order to analyze the impact of truly unpredictable scenarios. The predictive results help in decisions related to production planning, raw mix design optimization and increasing the probability of designing the best plan

Sustainability Analysis of Marble Sector in Buner

Marble is an ornamental stone, extremely popular for use as architectural and sculptural purposes. Nonrenewable marble resources in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), Pakistan are mostly mined by conventional mining methods(producing irregular shaped blocks) instead of using mechanized mining producing regular shaped blocks.Conventional mining methods are more economical but are less environment friendly due to more quantity of wasteproduced. While, mechanized marble mining has a better recovery, reduces mining cost (processing and transportation)and is less environmentally hazardous. In this study a situation and sustainability analysis of marble mining operationsat Buner, the most productive marble mining cluster in KP, Pakistan, is carried out. Buner has about 1.4 billion tons ofmarble resources and contributes around 51 percent of total country’s marble production. Analytical Hierarchy Process(AHP) is used on the basis of key sustainability factors (economic, technical, social, environmental and safety) forselection of most sustainable mining methods. The analysis revealed that conventional mining is least sustainable andproduces maximum waste, cracks, irregular shaped blocks, high working faces, back break, rock falls and accidents. Itwas concluded and recommended that these conventional mining methods should be replaced with the more sustainablemining methods i.e. semi-mechanized (controlled blasting / expansion material) at sunny grey and get black marbledeposits and mechanized mining (rope cutting) at Bampokha No.1 and Chagharzai white marble deposits

Effect of Viscosity Parameter on Numerical Simulation of Fire Damaged Concrete Columns

The assessment of the residual strength of post-heated concrete structural members in a professional way is a prime factor to take a decision about the restoration or destruction of fire-damaged structure. This Paper explores the numerical modelling of RC square columns damaged by exposure to heat at 5000C, unjacketed. Software ABAQUS was used for numerical modelling of fire damaged compression member i-e column. The main objective of this study is prediction of axial load and axial deformation of fire damaged concrete using finite element studies. Moreover, a parametric nonlinear finite element (FE) research is carried out to check the effect of viscosity parameters on numerical simulation of fire damaged concrete columns. For the said objectives, numerical simulation of existing experimental study of fire damaged RC columns is conducted with varied values of viscosity parameters. The numerical analysis (Finite Element Modeling) indicated that axial load capacity decreases and axial deformation increases after exposure to fire. The experimental and numerical studies are compared in terms of load displacement analysis. The use of optimum viscosity parameter and its definition to FEM improves significantly the performance of convergence and reduces analysis time of numerical simulations of RC square columns.  Moreover, a good agreement was found between the experimental and the finite model results

Impact of Climate Change on Land use/Land cover of Chakwal District

Alterations in land use and land cover, either natural or anthropogenic can disturb the balance of fragile ecosystems. Climate change plays a unique role in governing the structure and state of land features and alters the structure of ecosystem as well as its services required by earth. Human health and environment are matter of concern due to changes induced by human in its natural environment (Jat et al., 2008). Human has an urge to remain near nature, for that they shift from dense urban areas to less dense areas (Western, 2001). So is the case of new housing societies where the land mafias intimate the people about new settlements (Zaman and Baloch, 2011), which are made by cutting the forests, removing trees and disturbing the ecosystem. For proper planning and management of natural resources, it is necessary to study the land cover and its associated changes (Asselman and Middelkoop, 1995). Modelling of changes within land cover to identify environmental trends on the local, national or regional level, have been realized in the scientific community (Nath et al., 2020). GIS/RS provides continuous change dynamics (Berlanga-Robles and Ruiz-Luna, 2011) of land cover/land use, i.e. by satellite monitoring (Ruiz-Ruano et al., 2016). The understanding of land cover changes is necessary for decision making (Lu et al., 2004) in the natural resource management (Seif et al., 2012). This study was carried out to identify the impact of changes in climate upon land use and land cover of Chakwal district from 1995 to 2020. Geospatial techniques were applied to estimate the differences in land features, using different time interval satellite datasets (Table 1). Six major classes of land features including, agriculture, bare land, built-up, forest, shrubs/grass and water were selected for this study, with respect to time

Durability of Mortars Modified with Calcined Montmorillonite Clay

This study aims to evaluate the performance of mortars containing locally available Pakistani montmorillonite (Mmt) clay mineral as partial replacement of cement in various curing environments. The local montmorillonite clay in “As is” (20°C) and “heated” (100°C, 200°C, 300°C, 400°C, 500°C, 600°C, 700°C, 800°C, 900°C & 1000°C) conditions was incorporated in mortar cubes as partial replacement of cement. Montmorillonite clay of all the temperatures was replaced by 15%, 20%, 25%, 30% and 35% of cement mass in mortar cubes. The Strength Activity Index (SAI) was calculated to determine the optimum activation temperature for the clay. Compressive strengths of the controlled mix and montmorillonite modified mortars were evaluated under the Sodium Sulfate (SS) (5% solution) and mixed (Sodium Sulfate + Sodium Chloride (SCS)) (5% +3.5% solution) curing environments to study its durability performance. Upon thermal treatment montmorillonite clay showed maximum activation at 800°C temperature. Mortar containing (800°C) calcined montmorillonite clay with 25% cement replacement exhibit competent compression results. Moreover, up on exposure to aggressive environments, montmorillonite clay mortars performed better than the control samples. The mortar cubes exposed to Sulfate environment (SS) were more damaged in compression than that exposed to mixed environment (SCS), for all replacement levels and time exposures

PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF RED COTTON BUG SPECIES (HEMIPTERA: PYRRHOCORIDAE) IN PUNJAB, PAKISTAN

Traditional techniques for identifying the red cotton bugs Dysdercus koenigii and Dysdercus cingulatus (Pyrrhocoridae: Hemiptera) depend on phenotypic and morphological data. These methods are suitable when species have well-defined structures and when huge taxonomic knowledge is at hand. In this study, the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase I (COI) gene was selected for the molecular identification of D. koenigii and D. cingulatus. The sequence data showed that one species of the red cotton bug sample was identified as Dysdercus koenigii with 35-100% similarity to other Dysdercus species present in the NCBI database, while the other species was identified as Dysdercus cingulatus with 88-94% similarity to other red cotton bugs species present in the NCBI database. The phylogenetic analysis revealed that our     D. koenigii Seq (>180319003-A02-102-DK-.ab1) shares the same cluster with four D. koenigii isolates (ZSI/SRC_I.28B, ZSI/SRC_I.28, GQ306227.1, KJ459924.1). While the D. cingulatus Seq (>180319003-A02-103-DC-.abl) shares a cluster with D. cingulatus voucher (RO_DC2015). This is the first molecular identification of red cotton bugs (D. koenigii and     D. cingulatus) reported in Pakistan. Thus, in the current study, molecular identification has been accepted as a reliable method for the identification of these agriculturally important insect pests

Comparison of nutrients uptake in different varieties of rice in Pakistan

The objective of this research was to determine the uptake of different elements (K, Mg, Ca, Na, Fe, Co, Mn, Pb, Cu, Zn and Ni) which are used as nutrients by the rice crop. Different types of rice seeds KSK-282, KSK-134, BAS-515, IR6, BAS-2000, KSK-133 and super-BAS were collected from National Agricultural Research Centre (NARC) Islamabad Pakistan and grown in different plastic pots containing soil under the same condition. Ten days old immature plants of different varieties of rice were dried and their roots were separated from the whole plants. The dried roots were ground into fine powder followed by acid digestion (HNO , H SO and 3 2 4 HClO ) solution in a ratio of (5:1:0.1) individually. After digestion the solutions were filtered and the filtrates 4 were diluted by adding distilled water. The diluted solutions of all the above mentioned varieties of rice were analyzed by Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometer (AAS) for nutrients (K, Mg, Ca, Na, Fe, Co, Mn, Pb, Cu, Zn and Ni) concentration. The different values obtained from AAS had shown that some rice varieties had taken up nutrients (elements) in large amount (e.g., KSK-134 had taken up maximum Fe while KSK-133 had taken up minimum) as compared to other varieties. Similarly, several verities absorbed comparatively minimum concentration of elements. The results obtained in this research work clearly indicated that the absorption of these elements from the soil was dependent on the rice variety (e.g., BAS-2000 absorbed maximum Mg while minimum Super-BAS). Interestingly most of the rice vaities had absorbed the beneficial elements in large quantity as compared to other toxic elements