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PP/EPDM (TPV) is a common thermoplastic elastomer with excellent performance and a wide range of uses. Polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS) with its own functional organic group (OV-POSS) was used to improve the combustion performance of TPV systems. 1 wt%, 3 wt% and 5wt% OV-POSS were added to TPV respectively, and their mechanical properties and thermal stability were tested. The results showed that the TPV mechanics performance of OV-POSS was slightly reduced, but the thermal stability was improved. Cone test results showed a 53% reduction in the heat release rate of TPV containing 5wt% OV-POSS compared with TPV without adding OV-POSS. The release of CO and CO2 also decreased significantly, and the amount of carbon formation increased from 1.1% to 14.8%. As can be seen from TG-IR analysis, the addition of OV-POSS slows down the thermal decomposition process of hydrocarbons. OV-POSS was added to improve flame-retardant properties and reduces fire risk of TPV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cyanobacterial collected from eutrophic freshwater lakes constituted intractable waste with a rich algae biomass content. Supercritical water gasification (SCWG) was proposed to treat the cyanobacterial and to produce hydrogen for energy. The H2yield reached 2.92 mol/kg at reaction conditions of 500 °C, 30 min and 22 MPa; this yield accounted for 26% of the total gaseous products. Abundant ammonia and dissolved reactive phosphorous were concentrated in the liquid product, which could be recovered and used as a liquid fertilizer. Solid residue, which accounted only for about 1% of the wet weight, was mainly composed of coke and ash. The efficiency of H2production was better than that from other biomass, because of the abundant organic matter in cyanobacterial. Thus, cyanobacterial are an ideal biomass feedstock for H2production from SCWG. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Secondary dewatering of dewatered sludge is imperative to make conventional drying and incineration of sludge more economically feasible. In this study, a secondary dewatering of dewatered sludge with selected solvents (i.e. acetone and ethanol) followed by vacuum filtration and nature drying was investigated to achieve in-depth dewatering. After the entire secondary dewatering process, the sludge was shown to be odourless and the organic matter content was greatly retained. Increased mean particle size of sludge after solvent contact improved solid–liquid separation. With an acetone/sludge ratio of 3:1 (mL:g) in solvent contact and subsequent nature drying at ambient temperature after 24 h, the moisture content of sludge can be reduced to a level less than 20%. It is found that the polysaccharides were mainly precipitated by acetone, whereas the release ratios of protein and DNA were increased significantly as the added acetone volumes were elevated. During nature drying, accumulated evaporation rates of the sludge after solvent contact were 5–6 times higher than original dewatered sludge. Furthermore, sludge after acetone contact had better nature drying performance than ethanol. The two-stage dewatering involves solvent contact dewatering and solvent enhanced evaporation dewatering. Through selecting an appropriate solvent/sludge ratio as well as economical solvents and minimizing the solvent loss in a closed-pilot system, this dewatering process can be competitive in industrial applications. Therefore, this solvent-aided secondary dewatering is an energy-saving technology for effective in-depth dewatering of dewatered sludge and subsequent sludge utilization. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]