Download Actions and strategies for the urban pollution produced by

Actions and strategies for the urban pollution produced by heating plants
Giovanni Nicoletti*, Roberto Bruno, Natale Arcuri, Gerardo Nicoletti
Department of Mechanical, Energetic and Management Engineering, University of Calabria, 87030,
ARCAVACATA DI RENDE (CS) – Italy
Accepted for publication on 31st March 2015
In urban areas, the emissions of pollutants produced in various combustion processes cause the air
contamination; in this paper, the urban atmospheric pollution generated by fixed sources dedicated to
buildings heating has been investigated.
With reference to traditional combustion products released from heating plants, such as carbon
oxides, nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides, volatile organic compounds (VOC) and solid particulate, a
study on their environmental impact and the proposal of appropriate strategies for the reduction of
urban pollution, has been carried out.
In the first part, the paper considers some initiatives that local governments could undertake in order
to reduce urban air pollution and to increase the cities livableness, by contemplating differentiated
actions. For instance, the rational use of fuels, the focused use of the electric heating, the suitable
regulation of plants and the use of new and cleaner fuels.
The second part, the paper proposes a quantitative comparison among different fossil fuels employed
in heating plants, both under the thermodynamic and environmental points of view, by considering
also the solar hydrogen as a new energy carrier.
Particular properties related to the combustion reaction, such as the fuel flammability and
expansiveness, are quantified by appropriate indexes. From a thermodynamic point of view, the
chemical reaction are analyzed by the entropic production by measuring the irreversibility grade of
the whole heating system.
Recent studies reports for solar hydrogen a cost of 195 €/GJ, which is greater of 10 times than the
cost of traditional fossil fuels. However, if the costs related to the social and environmental nature
are considered, the gap results more reduced. Therefore, for the residential sector, the real costs
concerning the heating plants have been calculated by considering the real economy and the life
cycle of the investigated energy sources.
Keywords: Urban air pollution; Heating plants; Fossil fuels; Quality indexes; Entropic production