Oil spill modeling of diesel and gasoline with GNOME around Rajaee Port of Bandar Abbas, Iran.

Rajaee port in Bandar Abbas is one of the important-oil transport hubs in Persian Gulf and any oil spill incidents can result in pollution, which impact on human habitats and the marine environment. Oil spill trajectory modeling is a tool which applied to increase the knowledge about oil spill fate. The GNOME model is a physical model which indicates the oil spill movements on sea water and potential risk areas. The model inputs include GIS data, time of spill release, release duration, spill chemistry and physical characteristics of wind and current data. Two scenarios for 10 and 200 bbl of diesel and gasoline spills are run on the model. Both the general Persian Gulf circulation which is from the south west and the local wind direction cause to move the oil spills toward the Bandar Abbas coast and Qeshm Island that pollutant these areas. Both regions are very valuable economic and environmental zones. They have known as risk places due to the oil spills that release from Rajaee Port in this study. The model results can assist organizations in preparing their emergency management systems for responses in the potential risk areas

Water mass characteristics in the Strait of Malacca using ocean data view.

The main purpose of this project was to identify the pattern of water masses in Malacca Strait. The physical properties of seawater investigated were water temperature, salinity and dissolved oxygen over the Monsoon season. Ocean data view software was used to process the data and to create contour visualizations. Data from world ocean database were taken from 1900 to 2005. The results show the significant low salinity input from West coast Peninsular Malaysia in Northeast Monsoon season. During Southwest Monsoon period, there was an intrusion of high saline water from Andaman Sea to the Strait. The blowing of Southwesterly wind may push seawater from Indian Ocean and Andaman Sea intruding the Strait from the Northern sector. The Strait also were found to be more stratified in warmer condition. However, Southern sections are more homogeneous in every season indicating better mixing. This further study can improve the better understanding of seasonal water mass variation in the Strait of Malacca

Utilizing self-organization systems for modeling and managing risk based on maintenance and repair in petrochemical industries

Maintenance is essential to ensure safe operation of equipment in normal conditions. Therefore, managers must identify the relative priorities and equipment maintenance requirements. Moreover, based on the results of equipment vulnerability assessments, maintenance programs can be developed and managed properly. There are different methods and techniques in the process of risk assessment and management and vulnerability of equipment. Seventy-six samples with different properties have been used in this study. Networks used in this study are self-organizing networks with constant weight, which include Kohonen networks. For this purpose, operation impact, operation flexibility, maintenance cost, impact of safety and environment and frequency parameters had been considered as input; and using this model, the risk level is calculated. Utilizing genetic algorithms, the structures of all self-organizing systems are optimized. In order to evaluate the accuracy of the model, we compare it with the fuzzy model, and the results indicate that self-organizing systems optimized with the genetic algorithm have higher ability, flexibility and accuracy than the fuzzy model in predicting risk

Determination of Mn and Pb uptake by vetiver grass (Vetiveria zizanioides) with different shoot length in artificial running water system

Vetiveria zizanioides has been known as a phytoremediation agent and widely uses in water conservation works. However, there is a need to improve performance of this plant in removing pollutant in water system. Therefore, this study was conducted to measure Water Quality Index (WQI) improvement in the system installed by vetiver grass (VG) with trimmed and untrimmed shoot, identify rate of metal uptake and visual changes of VGs exposed in high concentration of lead (Pb) and Manganese (Mn). Artificial water system was setup by installing Class III water samples taken from pond within Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM). Plants were exposed to 15 mg/L of Pb and Mn (192 h) and harvested at different time intervals. The WQI of water samples has improved to class II after treated with VGs. Independent sample T-test found that no significant different of Pb and Mn concentration between trimmed and untrimmed plants, but there were significant different of those metal concentration between root and shoot of VGs (p<0.05). Higher concentration of Pb detected in root while in shoot, higher Mn concentration. Chlorosis of the plant leaves was seen on day 6 for trimmed and day 7 for untrimmed. No chlorosis observed on VGs in control experiment. This study found that VG have great potential in improving WQI for running water and have good tolerance ability to high level of Pb and Mn despite no differences in metal uptake between plants with trimmed and untrimmed shoot. Metal accumulation in different organ varied significantly depending upon the role of the metal

Criticality analysis of petrochemical assets using risk based maintenance and the fuzzy inference system

Assets failure is widely considered as one of the main causes of major accidents in chemical industries such as fires, explosions, and toxic gas releases. Assets criticality analysis is vital to prevent such accidents. Risk-based maintenance (RBM) is among the most advanced comprehensive risk assessment methodologies for the criticality analysis of assets. The present study applies both traditional RBM and Fuzzy RBM (FRBM) methods for the risk analysis of petrochemical assets failure. Four consequence factors comprising operational impact, operational flexibility, maintenance cost, and impact on safety and environment are considered for the risk evaluation of assets failure. Moreover, frequency and risk factor scales are localized for both traditional RBM and Fuzzy RBM methods using an expert panel. The results of the case study show suitability of the FRBM model. Fuzzy numbers show that out of 107 assets, 10 are at the semi-critical level, and the remaining 97 are at the non-critical level. The highest fuzzy risk numbers were obtained for two blowers, where the assets failure value was 99.145. The criticality evaluation results show that the plant in the case study is at the semi-critical level. Given this, it is recommended that risk managers of the plant should customize and prioritise their maintenance planning according to the FRBM value for each asset failure. To this end, maintenance-related recommendations are offered to facilitate and assist decision-makers

Characterization of beach sedimentary environments in the Batinah Region, Oman.

In this study, 252 surface sediment samples were collected for sand properties from three sites on the North Batinah coast: Harmul, North of Sohar industrial area, Majees South of Sohar industrial area and Zafaran 9 km South of Majees. Sampling was conducted in four occasions: November 2005, February 2006, June 2006 and November 2006. Almost, 52% of all samples were unimodal, 32% were bimodal and 16% were polymodal. June 2006 samples had a higher particle density than November 2006 samples. This is most probably due to rework and suspension, which lead to removal of light particles from the upper layer of the beach and high density particles to be concentrated in the bottom layer in June 2006 and deposition of light fraction of lower density in November 2006. Only Harmul samples had a significant difference between June 2006 samples and November 2006 samples in bulk density. The difference between the two sets in percentage water by volume was significant in Harmul and Zafaran but not in Majees. All sites showed significant difference between the two sets in percentage of air filled porosity and percentage of saturation. However, the sand pattern was the same in the three sites

Phytoremediation of heavy metals (Pb, Zn, Fe, Cu, Mn) in controlled running water system by using vetiver grass (Vetiveria zizanioides)

This study was conducted to identify phytoremediation potential of vetiver grass (Vetiveria zizanioides) for removal of five heavy metals (Lead (Pb), Zinc (Zn), Iron (Fe), Copper (Cu) and Manganese (Mn)) in controlled running water system. Plants with different root length (10 cm, 20 cm and 30 cm) were exposed to a concentration of Pb, Zn, Fe, Cu and Mn (10 mg/L) in flowing water system (0.0012 m3/s) and harvested at different time intervals (24, 48, 72, 96, 120 144 and 168 h). The initial concentration (10 mg/L) depicted a decreasing trend from 24 h up to 168 h of the experiment. The highest amount of heavy metal uptake by the plant was Fe (95.8% removal) with the concentration left was 0.42 ± 0.004 mg/L by 168 h. This was followed by Zn with 75% removal (2.55 ± 0.03 mg/L left in the water), Pb; 50% removal with 4.97 ± 0.007 mg/L remain, Mn (33% removal and 6.70 ± 0.006 mg/L remain) and the least uptake is Cu (25% removal with remaining 7.46 ± 0.005 mg/L in the water). In general, removal of the heavy metals from water follow the order of Fe > Zn > Pb > Mn > Cu. Heavy metals were detected in the roots after 24-hours of exposure with level in roots were higher compare to level in the shoots. Based on the ANOVA, no significant different in uptake of Zn, Pb, Fe and Cu by different root length in the running water except for Mn. The morphological changes particularly the change in leaf colour of the plants (chlorosis effect) was observed specifically after 6 days of the experiment for plants with 10 cm root length and the chlorosis effect was seen at day 7 for plants with root length of 20 cm and 30 cm. This study shows Vetiver grass has great potential for phytoremediation of wastewater polluted with Pb, Zn, Fe, Cu and Mn in running water