• Clean Technology
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.53-58
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• 2023

This study shows the summary of the economic performance of excess electricity conversion to hydrogen as well as methane and returned conversion to electricity using a fuel cell. The methane production process has been examined in a previous study. Here, this study focuses on the conversion of methane to electricity. As a part of this study, capital expenditure (CAPEX) is estimated under various sized plants (0.3, 3, 9, and 30 MW). The study shows a method for economic optimization of electricity generation using a fuel cell. The CAPEX and operating expenditure (OPEX) as well as the feed cost are used to calculate the discounted cash flow. Then the levelized cost of returned electricity (LCORE) is estimated from the discounted cash flow. This study found the LCORE value was ¢10.2/kWh electricity when a 9 MW electricity generating fuel cell was used. A methane production plant size of 1,500 Nm³/hr, a methane production cost of $11.47/mcf, a storage cost of $1/mcf, and a fuel cell efficiency of 54% were used as a baseline. A sensitivity analysis was performed by varying the storage cost, fuel cell efficiency, and excess electricity cost by ±20%, and fuel cell efficiency was found as the most dominating parameter in terms of the LCORE sensitivity. Therefore, for the best cost-performance, fuel cell manufacturing and efficiency need to be carefully evaluated. This study provides a general guideline for cost performance comparison with LCORE.

• Animal Bioscience
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• v.36 no.9
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• pp.1384-1392
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• 2023

Objective: Replacing soybean meal (SBM) with cricket (Gryllus bimaculatus) meal pellets (CMP) in concentrate diets was investigated for feed efficiency, ruminal fermentation and microbial protein synthesis in Thai native beef cattle. Methods: Four male beef cattle were randomly assigned to treatments using a 4×4 Latin square design with four levels of SBM replaced by CMP at 0%, 33%, 67%, and 100% in concentrate diets. Results: Results revealed that replacement of SBM with CMP did not affect dry matter (DM) consumption, while digestibilities of crude protein, acid detergent fiber and neutral detergent fiber were significantly enhanced (p<0.05) but did not alter digestibility of DM and organic matter. Increasing levels of CMP up to 100% in concentrate diets increased ruminal ammoniacal nitrogen (NH₃-N) concentrations, blood urea nitrogen, total volatile fatty acids and propionate concentration (p<0.05), whereas production of methane and protozoal populations decreased (p<0.05). Efficiency of microbial nitrogen protein synthesis increased when SBM was replaced with CMP. Conclusion: Substitution of SBM with CMP in the feed concentrate mixture at up to 100% resulted in enhanced nutrient digestibility and rumen fermentation efficiency, with increased volatile fatty acids production, especially propionate and microbial protein synthesis, while decreasing protozoal populations and mitigating rumen methane production in Thai native beef cattle fed a rice straw-based diet.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.265-271
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• 2016

DEA is a typical method that allows measurements and evaluations of the efficiency. This study examined the management efficiency of bean farm households to suggest factors that influence the management efficiency. The results showed that a larger cultivation area has more positive effects on the scale efficiency of beans farm households. When summing up farmer's family labor, lease fee, hired labor cost, which are strongly related to the workforce, it reached up to 54.6%. This means that they all occupy more than half of the production cost and they show an increasing trend. Moreover, although the hired labor rate is higher, it has more positive influences on the gross efficiency, technical efficiency and scale efficiency. In addition, the results showed that environmentally-friendly agriculture decreases the efficiency.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.1 no.3
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• pp.173-178
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• 1988

To study the effects of utilizing extruded full fat soybean (FFS) in layer diets, 300 White Leghorn pullets were put in trial divided into 5 treatments; control (commercial soybean meal as protein source), FFS 50% (replacing 50% of soybean meal with FFS), FFS 100% (replacing all amount of soybean meal with FFS), soybean oil and tallow added treatment. Each treatment consisted of 5 replicates of 12 birds. Egg production and feed efficiency from hens fed control diet were significantly lower than from hens fed the other diets. Significant differences in egg production and feed efficiency were found between the control and the other treatments. Cholesterol concentration of serum and egg yolk were not affected by any dietary treatment. Feeding extruded full fat soybean did not cause pancreatic hypertrophy nor change in mortality. There was an indication that linoleic acid (C18:2), linolenic acid (C18:3) and iodine contents increased in the thigh and egg yolk lipid of the groups fed FFS or soybean soybean can serve as effective protein source for layer diets if economically justified.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.810-815
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• 2010

Ultrasonic sludge pre-treatment has been studied to enhance the performance of anaerobic digestion by increasing sludge hydrolysis which is regarded as the rate-limiting-step of anaerobic digestion. In this study, the effect of ultrasonic pre-treatment on sludge hydrolysis (solubilization) and methane production was investigated. Sludge solubilization efficiency increased with ultrasonic energy input. However, it is uneconomical to apply more than 720 kJ/L as the solubilization efficiency per energy input declines afterwards. Volatile fatty acids concentration increased after the ultrasonic sludge hydrolysis. Anaerobic batch digestion showed that methane volume reached 64.7 and 84.5 mL after 18 days of incubation with the control sludge and ultrasonically hydrolyzed sludge, respectively. Methane production potential, maximum methane production rate, and the lag time of modified Gompertz equation were changed from 70 mL, 6.4 mL/day, and 1.2 days to 89 mL, 9.6 mL/day, and 0.5 day, respectively, after the ultrasonic sludge treatment. The results proved that ultrasonic pre-treatment contributed significantly not only for the methane production but also for the reduction of anaerobic digestion time which is critical for the performance of anaerobic sludge digestion.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.63 no.12
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• pp.1627-1636
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• 2014

In real-time electricity price environment, the energy management system can provide the significant advantage to the residential, commercial and industrial customers since it can reduce the electricity charge by controlling the load operation effectively in response to time-varying price. However, the earlier studies for load management mainly focus on the residential and commercial customers except for the industrial customers because most of load operations in industrial sector are intimately related with production schedule. So, it is possible that the inappropriate control of loads in industrial sector causes huge economic loss. In this paper, therefore, we propose load control algorithm for factory energy management system(F-EMS) to achieve not only minimizing the electricity charges but also maintaining production efficiency by considering characteristics of load operation and production schedule. Considering characteristics of load operation and production schedule, the proposed load control algorithm can reflect the various characteristics of specific industrial customer and control their loads within the range that the production efficiency is maintained. Simulation results show that the proposed load control algorithm for F-EMS leads to significant reduction in the electricity charges and peak power in industrial sector.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.559-563
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• 2001

The effects of feeding a mannan oligosaccharide (Bio-Mos) from 0 to 3 g/kg diet and vaccination program on 1- to 35-day performance (growth and feed efficiency), metabolizable energy, nitrogen utilization and carcass composition of meat chickens were investigated. A general vaccination program was used against IB, IBD and ND with half of the birds per diet receiving a booster dose of IB and ND vaccines at 12 days of age. Dietary supplementation of Bio-Mos (BM) did not influence body weight gain, feed efficiency and nutrient utilization. The highest dietary BM (3 versus 1.5 or 0 g/kg) increased carcass abdominal fat and reduced the proportion of drumstick in the carcass of meat chickens. The booster dose reduced the performance of birds. It was concluded that the addition of BM to the diet of chickens did not significantly influence the performance and nutrient utilization of meat chickens.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.16 no.8
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• pp.1093-1101
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• 2003

Reproductive data, such as numbers of days to the first estrus and A.I. service postpartum, number of days to conception, number of A.I. services required for conception, interval between the first estrus and first A.I. service and the average interval of A.I. service in Thai native-Friesian crossbred and pure Friesian dairy cows, were compiled in the National Dairy Training and Applied Research Institute in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The data were analyzed statistically and the effect of milk production on these reproductive traits was investigated. The reproductive efficiency of purebred cows was obviously inferior when compared with crossbred animals, in spite of special care being given to the purebred only in order to alleviate the effect of a tropical climate and provide better feeding. However, the regression analysis between reproductive and lactational parameters revealed a definite antagonistic effect of lactation on reproduction, especially in the purebred cows, which had a larger amount of milk production and longer lactation period. If these effects of lactation were eliminated, there would be no evident difference in reproductive efficiency between purebred and crossbred cows in the conditions of this study. Among the reproductive parameters examined, the number of days to the first estrus and interval between the first estrus and first A.I. service were less affected by breed difference and the magnitude of lactation than other reasons.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.249-254
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• 1994

An experiment was conducted to investigate the performance and production cost of Pekin ducklings fed varying levels of dietary protein. One hundred and twenty ducklings in four separate groups received either 16, 18, 20 or 22% CP in the starter period (day-old to 3rd week of age). These four groups ate either 12, 14, 16 or 18% CP respectively during the grower-finisher period (4th week to 12th week of age). The results of the study indicated that in a tropical country like Bangladesh, the protein needs of Pekin ducklings should be satisfied depending on the age at which the birds are to be marketed. If the ducklings are to be marketed at 6 weeks, 22/18% CP would be sufficient. When the marketing is aimed at 9 weeks of age, 20/16% would be adequate. For ducklings which are to be marketed at 12 weeks of age, a protein level of 18/14% would be required. All these results should help the producers to keep production cost to a minimum. The exceptional capacity of ducklings for compensatory growth would help keep birds on low protein levels if they are reared upto 9 or 12 weeks before marketing.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.87-90
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• 2000

This paper has reviewed the China Sericulture history in the 20th century. On the basis of the current sericulture production, sericulture area distribution, problems and challenges, it has been forecasted that China sericulture will be developed as following points: 1) On a stable basis, cocoon production increased gradually to a suitable amount; 2) Quality cocoon production bases established to form a regionalized, industrialized and specialized sericulture structure; 3) With increase of householding rearing capacities, rearing facilities improved; 4) Production efficiency raised and silk product quality improved through technical innovation; 5) New and diversified products developed from Sericultural resources with new and high technologies.