Toward the decarbonization of hard-to-abate sectors: a case study of the soda ash production

Decarbonizing the so-called "hard-to-abate" sectors is considered more technically challenging than others such as energy or transportation because they entail emissions not only from heat and power generation but also from manufacturing and process industries. The opportunities for them are less obvious and the challenges are greater, so their shift or transition to zero emissions is still relatively unexplored. In this case study, we aim to analyze the environmental impact and the technoeconomic viability of the integration of a carbon capture and utilization (CCU) plant that produces CO2-based methanol (CO2-MeOH) by means of electrochemical reduction (ER) in the hard-to-abate sector of synthetic soda ash. With a rigorous emphasis on the goal of net zero CO2 emissions, life cycle assessment (LCA) and technoeconomic assessment (TEA) were used as tools in order to guide further research and development toward its potential final commercialization. LCA and TEA results have demonstrated that it is possible to reduce the carbon footprint (CF) of the synthetic soda ash production at a reasonable cost within proper medium/long-term developments. Several scenarios have been assessed considering the future innovation of the CCU-ER technology and the future evolution of the electricity and CO2 market prices because of the application of instruments such as Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) and the European Union Emissions Trading System. The scenarios analyzed suggest that the complete electrification of the integrated plants of soda ash through electric heat (EH) is positive from the environmental perspective. This EH represents the direct conversion of renewable electricity to industrial heat. The results displayed a reduction in the CF of soda ash up to 74% as long as the entire integrated plant was run on renewable electricity and considering the commercialization of the ER side products such as H2 and O2. Not considering the selling of these two products leads to more modest reduction around 41%. However, this complete electrification has major implications on the economic profile under the current combination of electricity and CO2 market prices. Low-cost electricity, for example, using surpluses of renewable electricity and/or PPAs, and a higher CO2 price, which can be expected in the short/mid-term, are required to ensure economic feasibility. A 50% reduction of the current average wholesale electricity price that was used as a reference in the present study (43 €·MW h-1) will ensure economic feasibility under the proper ER technology development. The insights gained in this study may be of assistance in the sustainable implementation of CCU in energy-intensive manufacturing processes.Authors thank to Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) for the financial support through the project CTQ2016-76231-C2-1-R. We would like also to thank MINECO for providing Marta Rumayor with a Juan de la Cierva postdoctoral contract (IJCI-2017-32621)

Metabolic Disturbance of High-Saturated Fatty Acid Diet in Cognitive Preservation

first_pagesettingsOrder Article Reprints Open AccessArticle Metabolic Disturbance of High-Saturated Fatty Acid Diet in Cognitive Preservation by Antonio Rivas-Domínguez 1ORCID,Himan Mohamed-Mohamed 2,Margarita Jimenez-Palomares 3ORCID,Victoria García-Morales 3ORCID,Laura Martinez-Lopez 1,Manuel Luis Orta 1,Juan José Ramos-Rodriguez 2,*,†ORCID andBeatriz Bermudez-Pulgarin 1,† 1 Department of Cellular Biology, University of Seville, 41009 Seville, Spain 2 Department of Physiology, Faculty of Health Sciences (Ceuta), University of Granada, 51001 Ceuta, Spain 3 Department of Biomedicine, Biotechnology and Public Health, University of Cádiz, 11003 Cádiz, Spain * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. † These authors contributed equally to this work. Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2023, 24(9), 8042; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms24098042 Received: 31 March 2023 / Revised: 16 April 2023 / Accepted: 26 April 2023 / Published: 28 April 2023 (This article belongs to the Special Issue Research on Neural and Cognitive Molecular Mechanisms of Memory and Executive Control) Download Browse Figures Review Reports Versions Notes Abstract Aging continues to be the main cause of the development of Alzheimer’s, although it has been described that certain chronic inflammatory pathologies can negatively influence the progress of dementia, including obesity and hyperlipidemia. In this sense, previous studies have shown a relationship between low-density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR) and the amyloid-beta (Aβ) binding activity, one of the main neuropathological features of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). LDLR is involved in several processes, including lipid transport, regulation of inflammatory response and lipid metabolism. From this perspective, LDLR−/− mice are a widely accepted animal model for the study of pathologies associated with alterations in lipid metabolism, such as familial hypercholesterolemia, cardiovascular diseases, metabolic syndrome, or early cognitive decline. In this context, we induced hyperlipidemia in LDLR−/− mice after feeding with a high-saturated fatty acid diet (HFD) for 44 weeks. LDLR−/−-HFD mice exhibited obesity, hypertriglyceridemia, higher glucose levels, and early hepatic steatosis. In addition, HFD increased plasmatic APOE and ubiquitin 60S levels. These proteins are related to neuronal integrity and health maintenance. In agreement, we detected mild cognitive dysfunctions in mice fed with HFD, whereas LDLR−/−-HFD mice showed a more severe and evident affectation. Our data suggest central nervous system dysfunction is associated with a well-established metabolic syndrome. As a late consequence, metabolic syndrome boots many behavioral and pathological alterations recognized in dementia, supporting that the control of metabolic parameters could improve cognitive preservation and prognosis.Junta de Andalucía, Spain, grant number P18-RT-3324P20-01061 from Junta de Andalucía, SpainPID2019- 110960GB-I00 from the Ministry of Science and Innovation, Spai

Trade-offs between nutrient circularity and environmental impacts in the management of organic waste

Measuring the circularity of resources is essential to assessing the performance of a circular economy. This work aims at proposing an indicator that quantifies how effective a system is at extending the lifetime of its waste components after they have been discarded. The developed indicator was applied to study the circularity of nutrients within a system that handles the organic waste (OW) generated in the Spanish region of Cantabria. A superstructure was developed to determine the optimal configuration of the system. It is composed of alternative unit processes for (1) the management of OW and (2) the application of the recovered products as soil amendment to grow corn. A multiobjective mixed integer linear programming problem was formulated under two policy scenarios with different source separation rates. The problem was optimized according to six objective functions: the circularity indicators of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus, which are maximized, and their associated environmental impacts to be minimized (global warming, marine eutrophication, and freshwater eutrophication). The model was fed with the life cycle assessment results obtained with the Environmental Assessment System for Environmental TECHnologies (EASETECH) version 2.3.6 and the nutrient flows in the agriculture subsystem, which were calculated with Denitrification–Decomposition (DNDC) version 9.5. It was concluded that improving nutrient circularity paradoxically leads to eutrophication impacts and that increasing the SSR of OW has a positive effect on the carbon footprint of the system.The authors acknowledge the financial support from the Spanish MECD (grant no. FPU15/01771) and MINECO (grant no. CTQ2016-76231-C2-1R

Innovative alternatives to methanol manufacture: carbon footprint assessment

Finding and implementing more sustainable alternatives to the fossil-dependence routes for methanol (MeOH) manufacturing is undoubtedly one of the challenges of our model of society. Some approaches can be used to convert CO2 into MeOH as direct hydrogenation or electrochemical reduction (ER). These alternatives lead to lower natural resources consumption respect the conventional routes, but they are still found at different technological readiness levels (TRLs). Therefore some remaining challenges need to be overtaken to achieve a carbon neutral cycle respect the conventional route, especially in the case of ER, which is currently found at its infancy. This would indicate their final industrial competitiveness in a sustainable mode. This study uses Life Cycle Assessment as the main tool in order to compare these two CO2-based manufacture alternatives (found at different TRLs) with the fossil-route. The results allow for evaluating the potential challenges inherited to the alternative based on ER. Utilization of renewable energy is one of the most important key issues to achieve a carbon neutral product using these options. However, its benefit could be neglected due to the high requirement of steam in the purification step, particularly in ER. It was demonstrated that a future scenario using ER leads to a lower natural resources consumption (mainly natural gas) compared to the conventional fabrication, which represents an important step towards more green and efficient MeOH synthesis.Authors thank to Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) for the financial support through the project CTQ2013-48280-C3-1-R. We would like also to thank MINECO for providing Marta Rumayor with a Juan de la Cierva postdoctoral contract (FJCI-2015-23658)

From linear to circular integrated waste management systems: A review of methodological approaches

The continuous depletion of natural resources related to our lifestyle cannot be sustained indefinitely. Two major lines of action can be taken to overcome this challenge: the application of waste prevention policies and the shift from the classical linear Integrated Waste Management Systems (IWMSs) that focus solely on the treatment of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) to circular IWMSs (CIWMSs) that combine waste and materials management, incentivizing the circularity of resources. The system analysis tools applied to design and assess the performance of linear IWMSs were reviewed in order to identify the weak spots of these methodologies, the difficulties of applying them to CIWMSs, and the topics that could benefit from further research and standardization. The findings of the literature review provided the basis to develop a methodological framework for the analysis of CIWMSs that relies on the expansion of the typical IWMS boundaries to include the upstream subsystems that reflect the transformation of resources and its interconnections with the waste management subsystems

Architecture, design and source code comparison of ns-2 and ns-3 network simulators

Ns-2 and its successor ns-3 are discrete-event simulators. Ns- 3 is still under development, but offers some interesting characteristics for developers while ns-2 still has a big user base. This paper remarks current differences between both tools from developers point of view. Leaving performance and resources consumption aside, technical issues described in the present paper might help to choose one or another alternative depending of simulation and project management requirements.Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia TIN2006-15617-C03-03Junta de Andalucía P06-TIC-229

Noncooperative game theory to ensure the marketability of organic fertilizers within a sustainable circular economy

To optimize the environmental performance and the conflicting economic interests of the main stakeholders that interact within circular integrated waste management systems (CIWMSs), life cycle analysis and a game-theoretical model-based on the Stackelberg equilibrium-were integrated into a multiobjective optimization framework. The framework was used to determine the operational decisions and the configuration of a CIWMS that simultaneously minimize the total global warming impacts (GWIs) and maximize the profits of (i) the waste managers that valorize the municipal organic waste generated in the Spanish region of Cantabria and (ii) the regional farmers that purchase the resulting organic fertilizers. A bilevel optimization problem was formulated and solved by replacing the lower-level problem with its equivalent Karush-Kuhn-Tucker conditions. The balance between the stakeholders' objectives is reflected in the low prices set for the organic fertilizers (0-2 €·metric ton-1 of compost and 0-1 €·metric ton-1 of digestate). Although the minimal GWIs are constrained by the waste managers' profits, it is possible to improve the values of the objective functions by increasing the waste management tax. The proposed framework proved to be useful to plan for a sustainable circular economy, warranting the profitability of organic fertilizers for both ends of the supply chain.The authors acknowledge the financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Education 567 (EST18/00007 and FPU15/01771

Analysis of source code metrics from ns-2 and ns-3 network simulators

Ns-2 and its successor ns-3 are discrete-event simulators which are closely related to each other as they share common background, concepts and similar aims. Ns-3 is still under development, but it offers some interesting characteristics for developers while ns-2 still has a large user base. While other studies have compared different network simulators, focusing on performance measurements, in this paper we adopted a different approach by focusing on technical characteristics and using software metrics to obtain useful conclusions. We chose ns-2 and ns-3 for our case study because of the popularity of the former in research and the increasing use of the latter. This reflects the current situation where ns-3 has emerged as a viable alternative to ns-2 due to its features and design. The paper assesses the current state of both projects and their respective evolution supported by the measurements obtained from a broad set of software metrics. By considering other qualitative characteristics we obtained a summary of technical features of both simulators including, architectural design, software dependencies or documentation policies.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación TEC2009-10639-C04-0

Fiabilización de la carta de propiedad de un vehículo y su aplicación a la red de postventa mediante la tecnología blockchain

La tecnología blockchain inició su recorrido en 2008 de la mano de Bitcoin, una moneda virtual a la que esta tecnología le proporciona unas características únicas: descentralización, transparencia, seguridad y fiabilidad.Con el paso de los años, el concepto de blockchain ha ido evolucionando, dando lugar a cadenas de bloques más complejas, como Ethereum, las cuales permiten la incorporación de programas automatizados y el aseguramiento de mayor diversidad de datos gracias a los Smart contracts.Aprovechando estas características únicas, este trabajo pretende demostrar la aplicabilidad de la tecnología blockchain para ofrecer servicios y gestionar la propiedad de los usuarios, centrándose en el desarrollo de una serie de servicios de postventa para vehículos.Para ello se creará un certificado de propiedad utilizando tokens NTF, los cuales servirán de base para ofrecer un servicio de compraventa de vehículos, un servicio de alquiler y la recopilación de información durante la vida del vehículo en un pasaporte digital. También se estudiará la forma de introducir estas ideas en el mercado de automóviles planteando un modelo de negocio.La tecnología demuestra ser prometedora y ofrece la posibilidad de extender su uso a una gran multitud de ámbitos, sin embargo, se debe seguir trabajando en la escalabilidad de las cadenas de bloques para que pueda generalizarse su aplicación.<br /

A techno-economic evaluation approach to the electrochemical reduction of CO2 for formic acid manufacture

Efforts to mitigate climate change require technological innovations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions together with the reduction of the consumption of natural resources in an economic way compared to conventional processes. This paper presents a prospective assessment of an alternative for carbon dioxide (CO2) utilization based on its electrochemical reduction (ER) to produce formic acid (FA). The methodology applied in the present study integrates a techno-economic assessment considering both the use of resources and a set of economic key process indicators versus the fossil-fuel based thermochemical conventional route. The results have demonstrated that the electricity consumption together with the consumables of the process (determined by the cathode lifetime) are the main contributors to the costs of production and therefore, to the profitability of the utilization plant. A sensitivity analysis was carried to evaluate the influence of the specific energy consumption in the profitability under a realistic ER approach. The results will assess the competitiveness of the production of FA by CO2 ER against the conventional manufacture in terms of economics. The study has demonstrated that the electrification of this kind of commodity production plants through inexpensive surpluses of renewable energy is needed for their future competitiveness.Authors thank to Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) for the financial support through the project CTQ2016-76231-C2-1-R. We would like also to thank MINECO for providing Marta Rumayor with a Juan de la Cierva postdoctoral contract (FJCI-2015-23658)