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A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Energy Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (29 February 2024) | Viewed by 8408

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Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Yi-Ren Wang

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Guest Editor

Department of Aerospace Engineering, Tamkang University, Tamsui, NewTaipei City 25137, Taiwan
Interests: vibration energy harvester; wind turbine; nonlinear vibration; fluid–structure interaction

Prof. Dr. Yu-Hsi Huang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei City 10617, Taiwan
Interests: smart materials and structures; sensors and actuators; signal analysis and processing; solid mechanics; acoustics

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The main purpose of this Special Issue is to hope to solve current environmental problems from the perspective of green energy technologies. With the increasingly serious problem of global warming, the issue of sustainable development has become the current mainstream. The United Nations has set a goal of carbon neutrality by 2050. However, with the increasingly serious effect of global warming, we must speed up the improvement of the environment. Human beings deserve to use the power of science and technology to improve the environment and make life better.

There are still many environmental problems that need to be solved by applying engineering technology. For example, the material technology of aerospace engineering, the fuel used in aircraft or rockets, etc. In addition, the VEH system that converts general mechanical vibration into electrical energy, the vibration reduction of bridge structure, or the reuse of vibration energy, the utilization of wind energy or solar energy, etc. These are all great ways to use engineering to come up with a way to make the environment sustainable.

Colleagues are welcome to submit relevant research for this Special Issue. Contributions are welcome as long as they contribute to the planet and our environment from the perspective of green energy technologies.

Topics of interest include:

Aircraft green material technology,
Research on low-emission fuel for aircraft,
Manufacture of low-polluting rocket fuel,
Vibration energy harvesting system,
Application of wind energy,
Research on high-efficiency conversion of solar energy into electrical energy,
Hydro electric energy.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but not limited to) the following:

Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Civil Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Materials Engineering and Environmental Engineering.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Prof. Dr. Yi-Ren Wang
Prof. Dr. Yu-Hsi Huang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

vibration energy harvester
solar energy
wind turbine
hydro power energy
aerospace green materials
aerospace fuel
rocket propellant

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

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31 pages, 28446 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Optimization Based on Computational Fluid Dynamics and Machine Learning for the Performance of Diffuser-Augmented Wind Turbines with Inlet Shrouds

by Po-Wen Hwang, Jia-Heng Wu and Yuan-Jen Chang

Sustainability 2024, 16(9), 3648; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/su16093648 - 26 Apr 2024

Viewed by 448

Abstract

A methodology that could reduce computational cost and time, combining computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations, neural networks, and genetic algorithms to determine a diffuser-augmented wind turbine (DAWT) design is proposed. The specific approach used implements a CFD simulation validated with experimental data, and key parameters are analyzed to generate datasets for the relevant mathematical model established with the backpropagation neural network algorithm. Then, the mathematical model is used with the non-dominant sorting genetic algorithm II to optimize the design and improve the DAWT design to overcome negative constraints such as noise and low energy density. The key parameters adopted are the diffuser’s flange height/angle, the diffuser’s length, and the rotor’s axial position. It was found that the impact of the rotor’s axial position on the power output of the DAWT is the most significant parameter, and a well-designed diffuser requires accelerating the airflow while maintaining high-pressure recovery. Introducing a diffuser can suppress the wind turbine’s noise, but if the induced tip vortex is too strong, it will have the opposite effect on the noise reduction. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Application of Green Energy Technology in Sustainable Environment)

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19 pages, 6377 KiB

Open AccessArticle

SLM Additive Manufacturing of Oscillating Heat Pipe

by Kuan-Lin Chen, Kuan-Yu Luo, Pratik Prakash Gupta and Shung-Wen Kang

Sustainability 2023, 15(9), 7538; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/su15097538 - 4 May 2023

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1874

Abstract

This study employed metal additive manufacturing technology to fabricate oscillating heat pipes using SUS316L as the material and conducted related printing parameter experiments and thermal performance tests. The initial experimentation involved testing the relative density and size error of the metal additive manufacturing process. Density measurement was performed using the Archimedes method, and further X-ray CT scanning was utilized to observe the internal structure and compactness. The outcomes indicate that suitable laser parameters yield favorable results in producing oscillating heat pipes, achieving good compactness and minimal dimensional error with proper parameter adjustments. Following relevant pre-processing and post-processing on the oscillating heat pipe, leakage experiments were conducted to ensure experimental accuracy. The oscillating heat pipe had dimensions of 120 mm in length and 51 mm in width, with five turns of 2 mm × 2 mm cross-sectional channels inside. Interval design was employed to address inter-channel thermal interaction commonly encountered in flat heat pipes for comparison. Methanol was selected as the working fluid to investigate the oscillating characteristics and thermal performance under different input powers (20 W, 30 W, 40 W, 60 W, 80 W). The results indicated that the inter-channel spacing can significantly decrease the lateral thermal interaction and enhance the oscillation effect during the operation of the oscillating heat pipe, resulting in improved thermal performance. The experiments demonstrated that at 20 W, the equivalent thermal conductivity of the heat pipes with and without inter-channel spacing was 2428 and 1743 (W/mK), respectively, and at 80 W, it was 2663 and 2511 (W/mK), respectively. These results indicate that reducing thermal interaction can significantly improve the oscillation effect, leading to higher equivalent thermal conductivity at low power. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Application of Green Energy Technology in Sustainable Environment)

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14 pages, 1106 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Biogeography-Based Optimization with a Greedy Randomized Adaptive Search Procedure and the 2-Opt Algorithm for the Traveling Salesman Problem

by Cheng-Hsiung Tsai, Yu-Da Lin, Cheng-Hong Yang, Chien-Kun Wang, Li-Chun Chiang and Po-Jui Chiang

Sustainability 2023, 15(6), 5111; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/su15065111 - 14 Mar 2023

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 1758

Abstract

We develop a novel method to improve biogeography-based optimization (BBO) for solving the traveling salesman problem (TSP). The improved method is comprised of a greedy randomized adaptive search procedure, the 2-opt algorithm, and G2BBO. The G2BBO formulation is derived and the process flowchart is shown in this article. For solving TSP, G2BBO effectively avoids the local minimum problem and accelerates convergence by optimizing the initial values. To demonstrate, we adopt three public datasets (eil51, eil76, and kroa100) from TSPLIB and compare them with various well-known algorithms. The results of G2BBO as well as the other algorithms perform close enough to the optimal solutions in eil51 and eil76 where simple TSP coordinates are considered. In the case of kroa100, with more complicated coordinates, G2BBO shows greater performance over other methods. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Application of Green Energy Technology in Sustainable Environment)

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Review

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16 pages, 3655 KiB

Open AccessReview

An Analysis of Global Trends from 1990 to 2022 of Microbial Fuel Cells: A Bibliometric Analysis

by Segundo Rojas-Flores, Edwin Ramirez-Asis, Jorge Delgado-Caramutti, Renny Nazario-Naveda, Moisés Gallozzo-Cardenas, Félix Diaz and Daniel Delfin-Narcizo

Sustainability 2023, 15(4), 3651; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/su15043651 - 16 Feb 2023

Cited by 8 | Viewed by 1879

Abstract

Microbial fuel cells have undergone several modifications since their creation, mainly due to the different substrates that can be used as fuel for the generation of electrical energy. In this research, a deep and updated analysis of the characteristics of the literature published in the Scopus database from 1990 to 30 December 2022 has been carried out, finding 7055 documents indexed. The most used keywords are microbial fuel cells, performance, and electricity generation. From 2011 to the present, 5289 article-type documents were published; the article entitled “Microbial Fuel Cells: Methodology and Technology” by Logan B. E. et al., 2006 from Pennsylvania State University, USA in the Environmental Science and Technology journal of the ACS publisher was the most cited (4496 citations). On the other hand, in recent years, Chinese universities have begun to produce and highlight a number of documents positioning in the top ten, with six universities having the greatest presence in publications and as the country with the highest number of published and indexed documents (2773) in Scopus. Research on microbial fuel cells tends to grow, with China as a leading country on the subject, written by the author Wang X. It is observed that the new cell research trends deal with the modification and fabrication of electrodes with nanomaterials in order to improve their power and reduce costs to show their viability on a larger scale. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Application of Green Energy Technology in Sustainable Environment)

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Other

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20 pages, 11772 KiB

Open AccessTechnical Note

Analysis of Double Inverted Flag Energy Harvesting System in Pipe Flow

by Yi-Ren Wang, Pin-Tung Chen and Yen-Te Hsieh

Sustainability 2023, 15(1), 704; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/su15010704 - 30 Dec 2022

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1437

Abstract

This technical note numerically and experimentally studies a vibration energy harvester (VEH) consisting of a set of two parallel elastic steel sheets (ESSs) and piezoelectric patches (PZTs) in pipe flow. The roots of the elastic steel sheets are fixed on the base with the PZTs to form a double inverted flag vibration energy harvesting system (DIF-VEHS). In this note, a semi-circular receiving device (receiver) was added to the free end of the elastic steel, and a cylinder was installed upstream to generate a periodic oscillating flow field in the pipeline to obtain better electric energy generation efficiency. This study reveals the effect of different factors on the energy harvesting system, such as the distance between the ESSs, the diameter of the cylinder, etc. This study uses ANSYS software to simulate the fluid–structure interaction vibration of ESSs to determine the feasibility of this design. An experimental setup is then implemented to find the most effective combination of factors for the system. The results of this study show that with all parameters configured properly, the electric energy generation reaches a maximum average value of 1.6657 V per minute. In the future, such devices could be installed in sewers, pipes or rivers, allowing the flow energy of the fluid to be recycled to generate more energy. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Application of Green Energy Technology in Sustainable Environment)

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