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In marine vessel operations, fuel costs are major operating costs which affect the overall profitability of the maritime transport industry. The effective enhancement of using ship fuel will increase ship operation efficiency. Since ship fuel consumption depends on different factors, such as weather, cruising condition, cargo load, and engine condition, it is difficult to assess the fuel consumption pattern for various types of ships. Most traditional statistical methods do not consider these factors when predicting marine vessel fuel consumption. With technological development, different statistical models have been developed for estimating fuel consumption patterns based on ship data. Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) are some of the most effective artificial methods for modelling and validating marine vessel fuel consumption. The application of ANN in maritime transport improves the accuracy of the regression models developed for analysing interactive relationships between various factors. The present review sheds light on consolidating the works carried out in predicting ship fuel consumption using ANN, with an emphasis on topics such as ANN structure, application and prediction algorithms. Future research directions are also proposed and the present review can be a benchmark for mathematical modelling of ship fuel consumption using ANN.

Titanium dioxide (Titania) nanoparticle-coated biochar derived through co-pyrolysis of COVID-19 waste face mask (WFM) and Moringa oleifera seed cake (MO) provides an effective way to alleviate toxic metal in wastewater. This study investigates the effects of Biochar/titania photocatalyst preparation, characterization, and its photoreduction of Cr(VI). The morphological and functional modifications in the catalyst were identified using X-Ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, ultraviolet spectrophotometer, surface area analysis, and Raman spectrophotometer, respectively. The influencing parameters, namely, pH, photocatalyst dosage, initial pollutant concentration, and visible light irradiation time, have been investigated. The findings reveal that the Cr(VI) reduction by the photocatalyst was highly facilitated by photocatalytic process. The prepared photocatalyst shows higher and faster reduction rate of Cr(VI) and also improves the catalyst stability. The photoreduction of Cr(VI) ensembles well with pseudo-first order kinetics. At 180 min of reaction time, maximum Cr(VI) reduction of 98.65% was achieved at pH 2, 0.3 g/L catalyst dosage, and 10 ppm initial concentration, respectively. The synthesized photocatalyst shows excellent recycling performance up to 7 times, and these studies proved that the prepared catalyst is cost-effective and efficiently employed for removing pollutants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The shells of Tamarindus indica could serve as a primary source of energy generation from biomass. This paper deals with non-isothermal thermogravimetric experiments conducted at heating rates of 5, 10, 15, and 20°C/min with temperatures ranging between 25°C and 700°C to evaluate the kinetic behavior and the thermodynamic properties of Tamarindus indica shell pyrolysis. Three iso-conversational models, Kissinger–Akahira–Sunose (KAS), Starink, and Flynn-Wall-Ozawa (FWO), were used to identify the activation energy (Ea), Enthalpy (ΔH), Entropy (ΔS), and Gibbs free energy (ΔG) of the Tamarindus indica shell biomass. The average activation energy when estimated using KAS, Starink, and FWO models was found to be 209.1, 209.3, and 207.5 kJ/mol with R2 values of 0.91, 0.91, and 0.92, respectively. The average ΔH, ΔS, and ΔG values using the KAS method were found to be 204.4 kJ/mol, 82.2 J/mol K, and 155.2 kJ/mol, respectively. The values of kinetic and thermodynamic triplets indicate that the reaction is non-spontaneous. The findings of this present study reveal that there is an opportunity for Tamarindus indica shells to be used as an alternative biomass fuel due to their eco-friendly nature and ideal properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alcohol is used as an additive for a long time with the petroleum-based fuels. In this study, the higher alcohol, n-pentanol, was used as an additive to Calophyllum inophyllum (CI) biodiesel/diesel blends at 10, 15, and 20% by volume. In all blends, the ratio of CI was maintained at 20% by volume. The engine characteristics of the pentanol fuel blends were compared with the diesel and CI20 (Calophyllum inophyllum 20% and diesel 80%) biodiesel blend. The nitrogen oxide (NO) emission of the pentanol fuel blends showed an increased value than CI20 and neat diesel fuel. The carbon dioxide (CO2) also increased with increase in pentanol addition with the fuel blends than CI20 fuel blend and diesel. The carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrocarbon (HC) emissions were decreased with increase in pentanol proportion in the blend than the CI20 fuel and diesel. The smoke emission was reduced and the combustion characteristics of the engine were also improved by using pentanol blended fuels. From this investigation, it is suggested that 20% pentanol addition with the biodiesel/diesel fuel is suitable for improved performance and combustion characteristics of a diesel engine without any engine modifications, whereas CO2 and NO emissions increased with addition of pentanol due to effective combustion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to analyse the characteristics and properties of the fractions obtained from slow pyrolysis of non-edible seed cake of Calophyllum inophyllum (CI). The gas, bio-oil and biochar obtained from the pyrolysis carried out at 500 °C in a fixed bed batch type reactor at a heating rate of 30 °C/min were characterized by various analytical techniques. Owing to the high volatile content of CI biomass (72.61%), it was selected as the raw material in this present investigation. GC-MS and FT-IR analysis of bio-oil showed the presence of higher amount of oxygenated compounds, phenol derivatives, esters, acid and furans. The physicochemical properties of the bio-oil were tested as per ASTM norms which imply that bio-oil is a highly viscous liquid with lower heating value as compared to that of diesel fuel. The chemical composition of evolved gas was analysed by using GC testing which revealed the presence of combustible components. The FT-IR characterization of biochar showed the presence of aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons whereas the elevated amount of carbon in biochar indicates its potential to be used as solid fuel. The performance and emission characteristics of CI engine were assessed with different CI bio-oil blends and compared with baseline diesel fuel. The results showed that addition of bio-oil leads to decreased brake thermal efficiency and increased brake specific energy consumption. Meanwhile, increase in blend ratio reduces harmful pollutants such as oxides of nitrogen and smoke in the exhaust. From the engine testing, it is suggested to employ 20% of CI bio-oil blends in CI engine to obtain better operation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]