Vanadium pentoxide poisoning has been described in men working in plants processing vanadium ore by Symanski (1939) and Sjoberg (1950), and twice (Wyers, 1946; Williams, 1952) in men exposed to the soot of fuel oil burned in boilers. It does not, however, appear to have been described before in men who work on gas turbines. Since these may become much more common in the future as sources of pow...

Biodiesel is a fatty acid alkyl ester which is renewable, biodegradable and non-toxic fuel which can be derived from any vegetable oil and animal fats. Vegetable oils and animal fats in their raw form have high viscosity that makes them unsuitable as fuels for diesel engines. Transesterification is one of the well-known process by which fats and oils are converted into biodiesel. The reaction o...

Biodiesel is an alternative to petroleum-based conventional diesel fuel and is defined as the mono-alkyl esters of vegetable oils and animal fats. Biodiesel has been prepared from numerous vegetable oils, such as canola (rapeseed), cottonseed, palm, peanut, soybean and sunflower oils as well as a variety of less common oils. In this work, Moringa oleifera oil is evaluated for the first time as ...

The work on the quality improvement of fuel oil using acid treatment was carried out. The improvement of the fuel oil was done using sulphuric acid to remove contaminants. Sulphuric acid at different concentrations were mixed with the oil and kept at 45°C for four hours in the agitator vessel to allow reaction to take place. Acidic sludge was then drained off from the agitator and the oil was n...

Soil and surface water contamination by organic compounds is a common occurrence in most developing countries. This caused harmful effects on the environment and human beings. Bioremediation can be an alternative green technology for remediation of such hydrocarbon-contaminated soil. Bioremediation of soil contaminated with 5% and 10% (w/w) diesel fuel amended with 10% soy cake (SC), potato ski...

Biodiesel is an alternative diesel fuel that can be produced from different kinds of vegetable oils. It is an oxygenated, non-toxic, sulphur-free, biodegradable, and renewable fuel and can be used in diesel engines without significant modification. However, the performance, emissions and combustion characteristics will be different for the same biodiesel used in different types of engine. In th...

Large quantities of petroleum products are released into the marine environment as result of tanker wrecks. Such catastrophic events have a dramatic impact on marine ecosystems, affecting a broad range of species. Seabirds are placed at the uppermost trophic level of the marine food chain. Therefore, important toxic effects are expected in these organisms. The recent Prestige oil spill gave the...

Biodiesel is a promising non-toxic and biodegradable alternative fuel used in the transport sector. Nevertheless, the higher viscosity and density of biodiesel poses some acute problems when it is used it in unmodified engine. Taking this into consideration, this study has been focused towards two objectives. The first objective is to identify the effect of temperature on density and viscosity ...

Since the early 1990s, it seems that the fuel cell might become the new key technology in the automotive sector leading to a change of paradigm in the next decades. Also in scientific discussion, fuel cells are researched on and described more intensively during the last ten years. The perspective to significantly reduce local emissions as well as to gain independence from crude oil has induced...

The soluble components of fuel oil are generally assumed to be the fraction that is toxic for organisms living in the water column. We have used a liquid phase bioassay with embryos of sea urchin to assess the toxicity of the water-soluble fraction (elutriate) of the fuel oil spilled when the tanker Prestige sank on 13 November 2002. Two methodologies to obtain elutriates were carried out in or...