Energy and Water Systems Integration and Management

Funder

Organizational Unit

Publications

Water-Energy Nexus: Review of Literature in Management of Integrated Systems, Challenges and Opportunities. Case Study in Urban Context

Publication . Silva, Ana Rita Carriço; Santos, Fernando Charrua; Espírito Santo, António; Páscoa, J. C.; Fael, Cristina Maria Sena

In a society where Energy and Water walk side by side in practically all sectors of activity, it becomes necessary to analyze them from a productive, economic and sustainable point of view. From the extraction of mines and wells, to its treatment and transportation, and to the cooling systems of energy production, and despite being independently developed, managed and regulated, it is known that water needs energy and energy needs water. All these concerns, decision-making and the relationship between water and energy by itself create an opportunity to improve management in both sectors. There is an urgent need to consider all the assumptions and alternatives to improve the system and reduce energy consumption, which includes technological modifications and optimized resources management, leading to a more sustainable future. The increasing demand for energy and its exponential trend will have repercussions at all levels and will consequently increase the strain on freshwater resources with the most affected agricultural and industrial sectors. By improving the efficiency of water and energy use, there are positive repercussions that allow for substantial savings, especially where there is a lack of such resources. This article aims to address all these crucial issues related to energy and water in order to increase knowledge on the subject and to help promote alternatives for managing and developing integrated management systems and, consequently, for a rational use of both resources and a more sustainable future.

2017-12Conference object

Open access

Summary of in-stream energy production devices

Publication . Canilho, Hugo Daniel Leitão; Fael, Cristina Maria Sena

Renewable energy is more important as the time advances. The need to replace fossil fuels such as coal and oil is a big concern in the European union which has established goals of 20% of share of energy from renewable sources in whole European union. The importance of small energy production devices increases when we think of this goal, so energy can reach every citizen, even in a remote village which is kilometers away from the main power source. In-stream devices are optimal for remote sources, which almost always have a water source in the proximities. In-stream turbines can generate enough power to a common house and because it does not require any sort of head nor dam it is easy to mount. Its efficiency is around 40% for most recent in-stream turbines. The most recent technology in this area, the vortex induced vibration devices are still in development reaching 20-30% efficiency when a single device is working, reaching up to 40% when arrayed in some exact positions.

2017-12Conference object

Open access

Study of a Water-Energy Integrated System: Challenges of Prototyping

Publication . Silva, Ana Rita; Santos, Fernando Charrua; Espírito Santo, António; Páscoa, J. C.; Fael, Cristina Maria Sena

In a society where Energy and Water walk side by side in practically all sectors of activity, it becomes necessary to analyze them from a productive, economic and sustainable point of view. Although independently developed and regulated, it is known that water needs energy and energy needs water. The increasing demand for energy and its exponential trend will have repercussions at all levels in the short term. and consequently, will increase the strain on freshwater resources. All these concerns and associated decision-making policies create an opportunity to improve the management of both sectors. There is an urgent need to improve the water-energy system and reduce energy consumption, using advanced technological changes and an optimized management strategy, leading to a more sustainable future. By improving the efficiency of water and energy use through integrated smart strategies, there are very positive repercussions on savings and impact on the local economy, especially in decentralized cases. The present paper aims to address the theme of the nexus of water-energy in the scope of promoting alternatives of management and development of integrated systems and study the dynamics of the development of the theoretical concept vs. prototyping in case of urban context and real environment.

2018-10Conference object

Open access

Velocity Field Analysis of a Channel Narrowed by Spur-dikes to Maximize Power Output of In-stream Turbines

Publication . Canilho, Hugo Daniel Leitão; Fael, Cristina Maria Sena

Decentralized energy is growing in importance with time. The electricity being needed even in the most remote places, far from power stations, increases the importance of small power production devices such as micro-hydro devices like turbines. In this research, the velocity field in a meandering channel is studied in its natural conditions and with the introduction of spur-dikes, structures that prevent bank erosion, a natural phenomenon observed in meandering channels, with the use of computational fluid dynamics software. With the objective of improving the power production by investigating the changes of the flume velocities with the introduction of spur-dikes, one test without any spur-dike and three tests with it were conducted. Good results were reached, with velocities increasing between 10 to 20% with the introduction of these structures. In certain cases, the increase in power production can reach up to 85% than in a normal situation without spur-dikes in the river.

2018Journal article

Open access

Developing Energy Harvest Efficient Strategies with Microbial Fuel Cells

Publication . Serra, Pedro Miguel Domingos; Espírito Santo, António Eduardo Vitória do

Nowadays, thinking of energetic efficiency is to determine how to decrease consumption and to reuse resources. This is a major concern when addressing hydric resources. The consumption of drinking water is seeing an unaffordable growth and, although most of it is replenished to the environment, the water quality is affected by pollutants and impurities. As such, using wastewater, a by-product of our routine and way of life, as resource is an asset. Even more when thinking about the heightened energy costs of a wastewater treatment station. The hypotheses of this work show how to achieve this goal by using microbial fuel cells. The organic composition of this water increases its energy production potential, where the bacterial metabolism can be used to, simultaneously, produce energy and help to clean the water. This document is divided in 5 chapters. The strategic positioning of the theme happens in chapter 1. Chapter 2 explains how the main elements of microbial fuel cell technology can work and determine its operation. In chapter 3, the power management systems used with microbial fuel cells are presented and discussed, with the identification of optimization strategies. The second-to-last chapter corresponds to the experimental results discussion and validation, while focusing improved energy production efficiencies. The outputs of this chapter pilot the future work analysis on chapter 5, together with the main conclusions and research trends. The validity and usefulness of this work is cleared with an application example.

2021-10-26Doctoral thesis

Open access