Concentrating solar power (CSP) technologies continue to mature and are being deployed worldwide. Power towers will likely play an essential role in the future development of CSP due to their potential to provide dispatchable solar electricity at a low cost. This Power Tower Technology Roadmap has been developed by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to describe the current technology, the improvement opportunities that exist for the technology, and the specific activities needed to reach the DOE programmatic target of providing competitively-priced electricity in the intermediate and baseload power markets by 2020. As a first step in developing this roadmap, a Power Tower Roadmap Workshop that included the tower industry, national laboratories, and DOE was held in March 2010. A number of technology improvement opportunities (TIOs) were identified at this workshop and separated into four categories associated with power tower subsystems: solar collector field, solar receiver, thermal energy storage, and power block/balance of plant. In this roadmap, the TIOs associated with power tower technologies are identified along with their respective impacts on the cost of delivered electricity. In addition, development timelines and estimated budgets to achieve cost reduction goals are presented. The roadmap does not present a single path for achieving these goals, but rather provides a process for evaluating a set of options from which DOE and industry can select to accelerate power tower R&D, cost reductions, and commercial deployment.
The Moderate Resolution Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensor has provided near real-time estimates of gross primary production (GPP) since March 2000. We compare four years (2000 to 2003) of satellite-based calculations of GPP with tower eddy CO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> flux-based estimates across diverse land cover types and climate regimes. We examine the potential error contributions from meteorology, leaf area index (LAI)/fPAR, and land cover. The error between annual GPP computed from NASA's Data Assimilation Office's (DAO) and tower-based meteorology is 28%, indicating that NASA's DAO global meteorology plays an important role in the accuracy of the GPP algorithm. Approximately 62% of MOD15-based estimates of LAI were within the estimates based on field optical measurements, although remaining values overestimated site values. Land cover presented the fewest errors, with most errors within the forest classes, reducing potential error. Tower-based and MODIS estimates of annual GPP compare favorably for most biomes, although MODIS GPP overestimates tower-based calculations by 20%-30%. Seasonally, summer estimates of MODIS GPP are closest to tower data, and spring estimates are the worst, most likely the result of the relatively rapid onset of leaf-out. The results of this study indicate, however, that the current MODIS GPP algorithm shows reasonable spatial patterns and temporal variability across a diverse range of biomes and climate regimes. So, while continued efforts are needed to isolate particular problems in specific biomes, we are optimistic about the general quality of these data, and continuation of the MOD17 GPP product will likely provide a key component of global terrestrial ecosystem analysis, providing continuous weekly measurements of global vegetation production
Various errors and influences leading to differences between tower- and aircraft-measured fluxes are surveyed. This survey is motivated by reports in the literature that aircraft fluxes are sometimes smaller than tower-measured fluxes. Both tower and aircraft flux errors are larger with surface heterogeneity due to several independent effects. Surface heterogeneity may cause tower flux errors to increase with decreasing wind speed. Techniques to assess flux sampling errors are reviewed. Such error estimates suffer various degrees of inapplicability in real geophysical time series due to nonstationarity of tower time series (or inhomogeneity of aircraft data). A new measure for nonstationarity is developed that eliminates assumptions on the form of the nonstationarity inherent in previous methods. When this nonstationarity measure becomes large, the surface energy imbalance increases sharply. Finally, strategies for obtaining adequate flux sampling using repeated aircraft passes and grid patterns are outlined.
A solar updraft tower power plant—sometimes also called “solar chimney” or just “solar tower”—is a solar thermal power plant utilizing a combination of solar air collector and central updraft tube to generate a solar induced convective flow which drives pressure staged turbines to generate electricity. The paper presents theory, practical experience, and economy of solar updraft towers: First a simplified theory of the solar tower is described. Then results from designing, building and operating a small scale prototype in Spain are presented. Eventually technical issues and basic economic data for future commercial solar tower systems like the one being planned for Australia are discussed.
Large-scale arrayed ZnO crystals with a series of novel morphologies, including tower-like, flower-like, and tube-like samples, have been successfully fabricated by a simple aqueous solution route. The morphology and orientation of the obtained ZnO crystal arrays can be conveniently tailored by changing the reactants and experimental conditions. For example, the tower-like ZnO crystal arrays were obtained in a reaction solution system including zinc salt, ammonia, ammonium salt, and thiourea, and the orientation of these tower-like crystals could be controlled by the contents of these reactants. Flower-like ZnO arrays were obtained at lower temperatures, and tube-like ZnO arrays were obtained by ultrasonic pretreatment of the reaction system. The growth mechanism of the tower-like and tube-like ZnO crystals was investigated by FESEM. The results show that tower-like crystals grow layer by layer, while tube-like crystals grow from active nanowires. Ultrasonic pretreatment is proved to be effective in promoting the formation of active nuclei, which have important effects on the formation of the tube-like ZnO crystals. In addition, large-scale arrays of these ZnO crystals can be successfully synthesized onto various substrates such as amorphous glass, crystalline quartz, and PET. This implies this chemical method has a wide application in the fabrication of nano-/microscale devices.
Wind turbines mounted on floating platforms is subjected to completely different and soft foundation properties, than seen for onshore wind turbines. This leads to much lower natural frequencies, related to the rigid body motion of the structure which again leads to an unfavorable coupling between tower motion and the pitch control of the turbine. The tower motion in combination with the aerodynamics and the pitch control will be poor or even negative damped which causes large transient loads if not accounted for. The reason for this low damping is shown to be caused by a too fast pitch regulation compared to the motion of the tower or in other words the lowest control-structure natural frequency must be lower than the lowest critical tower frequency. A control algorithm is presented including the tuning method (pole-placement) to ensure the desired control frequency which provides stable tower vibration modes.
An analysis of electric and magnetic fields radiated by lightning first and subsequent return strokes to tall towers is presented. The contributions of the various components of the fields, namely, static, induction, and radiation for the electric field, and induction and radiation for the magnetic field are illustrated and discussed. It is shown in particular that the presence of a tower tends, in general, to increase substantially the electric and magnetic field peaks and their derivatives. This increase is mainly caused by the presence of two oppositely propagating current wavefronts originating from the tower top and by the very high propagation velocity of current pulses within the tower, and depends essentially on the wavefront steepness of the channel-base current. Because of the last factor, the increase of the field magnitudes is found to be significantly higher for subsequent return strokes, which are characterized by much faster risetimes compared to first return strokes. The presented results are consistent with experimental observations of current in lightning strokes to the Toronto CN Tower and of the associated electric and magnetic fields measured 2 km away. These findings partially explain the fact that subsequent return strokes characterized by lower current peaks but higher front steepnesses and return stroke speeds may result in higher field peaks. The results obtained have important implications in electromagnetic (EM) compatibility. It is found that lightning strokes to tall metallic objects lead to increased EM field disturbances. Also, subsequent return strokes are to be considered an even more important source of EM interference than first return strokes. Indeed, EM fields from subsequent strokes are characterized by faster fronts and additionally, they may reach greater peaks than first strokes. Lastly, findings of this study emphasize the difficulty of extracting reliable lightning return stroke current information from remote EM field measurements using oversimplified formulae.
A multistory transmission tower model to be used in multiconductor analysis by EMTP (Electromagnetic Transients Program) is proposed. The circuit parameters of the model are determined based on the measurement of voltages across the insulator strings on an actual 500 kV transmission tower. The multiconductor lightning surge analysis considered enables one to predict the waveform of each insulator voltage, which is useful in determining the phase and the instant of a back flashover. The new tower model is recommended in Japan to be used in the new multiconductor analysis of EHV and UHV class double circuit transmission lines. The new tower model and conventional tower models are compared in the analysis of minimum back flashover lightning currents at a UHV transmission line. The new model gives about 20% smaller current.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>
Abstract A nonhydrostatic cloud model is used to examine the thermomechanics of tropical cyclogenesis under realistic meteorological conditions. Observations motivate the focus on the problem of how a midtropospheric cyclonic vortex, a frequent by-product of mesoscale convective systems during summertime conditions over tropical oceans, may be transformed into a surface-concentrated (warm core) tropical depression. As a first step, the vortex transformation is studied in the absence of vertical wind shear or zonal flow. Within the cyclonic vorticity-rich environment of the mesoscale convective vortex (MCV) embryo, the simulations demonstrate that small-scale cumulonimbus towers possessing intense cyclonic vorticity in their cores [vortical hot towers (VHTs)] emerge as the preferred coherent structures. The VHTs acquire their vertical vorticity through a combination of tilting of MCV horizontal vorticity and stretching of MCV and VHT-generated vertical vorticity. Horizontally localized and exhibiting convective lifetimes on the order of 1 h, VHTs overcome the generally adverse effects of downdrafts by consuming convective available potential energy in their local environment, humidifying the middle and upper troposphere, and undergoing diabatic vortex merger with neighboring towers. During metamorphosis, the VHTs vortically prime the mesoscale environment and collectively mimic a quasi-steady diabatic heating rate within the MCV embryo. A quasi-balanced toroidal (transverse) circulation develops on the system scale that converges cyclonic vorticity of the initial MCV and small-scale vorticity anomalies generated by subsequent tower activity. The VHTs are found to accelerate the spinup of near-surface mean tangential winds relative to an approximate axisymmetric model that excises the VHTs. This upscale growth mechanism appears capable of generating a tropical depression vortex on time scales on the order of 1–2 days, for reasonable parameter choices. Further tests of the VHT paradigm are advocated through diagnoses of operational weather prediction models, higher resolution simulations of the current configuration, examination of disruption scenarios for incipient vortices, and a meteorological field experiment.
In August and September 1978, an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease occurred in Memphis, Tennessee. Of the 44 ill, 39 had been either patients, employees, visitors, or passers-by at one Memphis hospital (Hospital A) during the 10 days before. Assuming an incubation period of between two and 10 days, the onset of cases correlated precisely with the use of Hospital A's auxiliary air-conditioning cooling tower. L. pneumophila was recovered from two samples of water from the tower. Infection appeared to have occurred both outside and within the hospital. A significant association was demonstrated between acquisition of Legionnaires' disease and prior hospitalization in those areas of Hospital A that received ventilating air from air intakes near the auxiliary cooling tower. Tracer-smoke studies indicated that contaminated aerosols from the tower could easily reach these air intakes, as well as the street below, where four passers-by had been before they contracted Legionnaires' disease. This represents a common-source outbreak in which the source of L. pneumophila infection and airborne transmission were identified.
A bstract It has been conjectured that in theories consistent with quantum gravity infinite distances in field space coincide with an infinite tower of states becoming massless exponentially fast in the proper field distance. The complex-structure moduli space of Calabi-Yau manifolds is a good testing ground for this conjecture since it is known to encode quantum gravity physics. We study infinite distances in this setting and present new evidence for the above conjecture. Points in moduli space which are at infinite proper distance along any path are characterised by an infinite order monodromy matrix. We utilise the nilpotent orbit theorem to show that for a large class of such points the monodromy matrix generates an infinite orbit within the spectrum of BPS states. We identify an infinite tower of states with this orbit. Further, the theorem gives the local metric on the moduli space which can be used to show that the mass of the states decreases exponentially fast upon approaching the point. We also propose a reason for why infinite distances are related to infinite towers of states. Specifically, we present evidence that the infinite distance itself is an emergent quantum phenomenon induced by integrating out at one-loop the states that become massless. Concretely, we show that the behaviour of the field space metric upon approaching infinite distance can be recovered from integrating out the BPS states. Similarly, at infinite distance the gauge couplings of closed-string Abelian gauge symmetries vanish in a way which can be matched onto integrating out the infinite tower of charged BPS states. This presents evidence towards the idea that also the gauge theory weak-coupling limit can be thought of as emergent.
In the early morning hours of May 16, 1968, the occupant of apartment 90 on the 18th floor of the 22-story Ronan Point apartment tower, in London, lit a match to brew her morning cup of tea. The resulting gas explosion initiated a partial collapse of the structure that killed four people and injured 17 (one of whom subsequently died). On investigation, the apartment tower was found to be deeply flawed in both design and construction. The existing building codes were found to be inadequate for ensuring the safety and integrity of high-rise precast concrete apartment buildings. The Larsen–Nielson building system, intended for buildings with only six stories, had been extended past the point of safety. The tower consisted of precast panels joined together without a structural frame. The connections relied, in large part, on friction. The apartment tower lacked alternate load paths to redistribute forces in the event of a partial collapse. When the structure was dismantled, investigators found appallingly poor workmanship at the critical connections between the panels. Subsequently, building codes in many countries have adopted structural integrity or “robustness” provisions that may be directly traced to the Ronan Point collapse.
Abstract The effects of interaction with surrounding water on the dynamic response behaviour of cantilever tower structures are studied. Expressions for response to harmonic ground motion in individual modes of vibration, including hydrodynamic interaction, are presented, the accuracy of responses obtained by ignoring surface waves and compressibility of water in the hydrodynamic solutions is evaluated, the effects of hydrodynamic interaction on the fundamental period of vibration are studied and the commonly used ‘added mass’ approach to account for effects of surrounding water is examined. The conclusions deduced from the results of this investigation include the following. Interaction with surrounding water increases the fundamental period of vibration of the tower and decreases the modal damping ratio. Compressibility of water has essentially no influence in the hydrodynamic effects on slender towers. The traditional definition of added mass is conceptually deficient, but is simple to employ; the errors in this simple added mass representation are negligible for the first mode of vibration of towers.
This paper develops the effectiveness-NTU design method for cooling towers. The definitions for effectiveness and NTU are totally consistent with the fundamental definitions used in heat exchanger design. Sample calculations are presented for counter and crossflow cooling towers. Using the proper definitions, a person competent in heat exchanger design can easily use the same basic method to design a cooling tower of counter, cross, or parallel flow configuration. The problems associated with the curvature of the saturated air enthalpy line are also treated. A “one-increment” design ignores the effect of this curvature. Increased precision can be obtained by dividing the cooling range into two or more increments. The standard effectiveness-NTU method is then used for each of the increments. Calculations are presented to define the error associated with different numbers of increments. This defines the number of increments required to attain a desired degree of precision. The authors also summarize the LMED method introduced by Berman, and show that this is totally consistent with the effectiveness-NTU method. Hence, using proper and consistent terms, heat exchanger designers are shown how to use either the standard LMED or effectiveness-NTU design methods to design cooling towers.
Abstract. The Amazon Basin plays key roles in the carbon and water cycles, climate change, atmospheric chemistry, and biodiversity. It has already been changed significantly by human activities, and more pervasive change is expected to occur in the coming decades. It is therefore essential to establish long-term measurement sites that provide a baseline record of present-day climatic, biogeochemical, and atmospheric conditions and that will be operated over coming decades to monitor change in the Amazon region, as human perturbations increase in the future. The Amazon Tall Tower Observatory (ATTO) has been set up in a pristine rain forest region in the central Amazon Basin, about 150 km northeast of the city of Manaus. Two 80 m towers have been operated at the site since 2012, and a 325 m tower is nearing completion in mid-2015. An ecological survey including a biodiversity assessment has been conducted in the forest region surrounding the site. Measurements of micrometeorological and atmospheric chemical variables were initiated in 2012, and their range has continued to broaden over the last few years. The meteorological and micrometeorological measurements include temperature and wind profiles, precipitation, water and energy fluxes, turbulence components, soil temperature profiles and soil heat fluxes, radiation fluxes, and visibility. A tree has been instrumented to measure stem profiles of temperature, light intensity, and water content in cryptogamic covers. The trace gas measurements comprise continuous monitoring of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane, and ozone at five to eight different heights, complemented by a variety of additional species measured during intensive campaigns (e.g., VOC, NO, NO2, and OH reactivity). Aerosol optical, microphysical, and chemical measurements are being made above the canopy as well as in the canopy space. They include aerosol light scattering and absorption, fluorescence, number and volume size distributions, chemical composition, cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) concentrations, and hygroscopicity. In this paper, we discuss the scientific context of the ATTO observatory and present an overview of results from ecological, meteorological, and chemical pilot studies at the ATTO site.
A series of automated tests is developed for tower and aircraft time series to identify instrumentation problems, flux sampling problems, and physically plausible but unusual situations. The automated procedures serve as a safety net for quality controlling data. A number of special flags are developed representing a variety of potential problems such as inconsistencies between different tower levels and the flux error due to fluctuations of aircraft height.
Mountains are important sources of freshwater for the adjacent lowlands. In view of increasingly scarce freshwater resources, this contribution should be clarified. While earlier studies focused on selected river systems in different climate zones, we attempt here a first spatially explicit, global typology of the so‐called “water towers” at the 0.5° × 0.5° resolution in order to identify critical regions where disproportionality of mountain runoff as compared to lowlands is maximum. Then, an Earth systems perspective is considered with incorporation of lowland climates, distinguishing four different types of water towers. We show that more than 50% of mountain areas have an essential or supportive role for downstream regions. Finally, the potential significance of water resources in mountains is illustrated by including the actual population in the adjacent lowlands and its water needs: 7% of global mountain area provides essential water resources, while another 37% delivers important supportive supply, especially in arid and semiarid regions where vulnerability for seasonal and regional water shortage is high.
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Experimental and theoretical methods for determining the surge impedance of towers are presented. It is demonstrated that the values so obtained adequately describe the response of the tower when a transmission line is struck by lightning. A right cone representation for conventional double-circuit steel towers is proposed, and a theoretical analysis using field theory yields the surge impedance as Z= 60 ln (2/S) where S is the sine of the half-angle of the cone.
A large amount of water is stored in the world's highest and largest plateau, the Tibetan Plateau, in the forms of glaciers, snowpacks, lakes, and rivers. It is vital to understand where these waters come from and whether the supply to these water resources has been experiencing any changes during recent global warming. Here we show the maintenance of water content in the atmosphere over the Tibetan Plateau, the atmospheric circulations and transports of water vapor to this part of the world, and the trend of the water vapor supply. The Tibetan Plateau serves as a role of “the world water tower”, and its land‐ocean‐atmosphere interaction provides a profound impact on the global natural and climate environment. The analyses of a half‐century time series of atmospheric water vapor, precipitation, and surface temperature indicate that the atmospheric supply to this water tower presents an increasing trend under recent global warming condition.