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The Niger River basin
Published in Anton Earle, Ana Elisa Cascão, Stina Hansson, Anders Jägerskog, Ashok Swain, Joakim Öjendal, Transboundary Water Management and the Climate Change Debate, 2015
Anton Earle, Ana Elisa Cascão, Stina Hansson, Anders Jägerskog, Ashok Swain, Joakim Öjendal
From Guinea, the Niger enters Mali to the north, where it is joined by an important tributary, the Bani River.3 Between Segou and Timbuktu, the river opens up into the biologically important inner delta, also known as Macina.4 The delta is important for cultivation as well as fisheries, and it provides the most important habitat for migrating birds in the region. In the inner delta, the river loses much of its flow to seepage and evaporation as it diverts into a complex network of channels, lakes, tributaries, and swamps. Two-thirds of the river’s potential flow is reduced in the Macina. After the delta, the river forms the Niger loop as it touches the Sahara desert and takes a southward turn through the arid areas of Mali and Niger, where it further loses some of its flow. Despite the important inflow from tributaries upstream, the flow of the river is less when it enters Niger than at its source in Guinea. The river then constitutes the border between Benin and Niger before it enters Nigeria. In Nigeria, it is joined by several tributaries, the most important of which is the Benue River.5 As the Niger River enters the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean it again opens up, this time as the oil-rich maritime Niger delta.
Structural analysis of the offshore wind turbine tower
Published in C. Guedes Soares, Developments in Renewable Energies Offshore, 2020
M.J. Legaz, P. Mayorga, J. Fernández, J. Muñoz, M. Bruno
The importance of blue growth is highlighted by the European Commission (EC, 2018). Within maritime affairs, the energy of the ocean can be found as a relevant aspect. W2Power concept was introduced by Pelagic Power in 2009 (Pelagic Power, 2009) for the upcoming offshore floating wind market in Europe and the entire world. This floating structure can be combined with wind and wave energy production, integrating a wave energy converters array and two commercial wind turbines. This design is under development, applying BV and DNV-GL standards, as well as design criteria based on stability, reliability and safety.
Information technology and electronic data interchange
Published in Alan E. Branch, Michael Robarts, Branch's Elements of Shipping, 2014
Alan E. Branch, Michael Robarts
The first INMARSAT fleet service, Fleet F77, provides the high quality and speed of a full 64 kbit/s Mobile ISDN service, as well as the flexibility of the INMARSAT Mobile Packet Data service, where users are charged for the amount of information sent and received rather than the time for which they are connected. This combination provides cost-effective, almost total global communications, with immediate and secure access to business critical information, image transfer and video communications – whenever it is needed. INMARSAT Fleet F77 is also equipped to meet the latest distress and safety specifications of the Global Maritime Distress and Safety System (GMDSS). Through four-stage voice pre-emption and prioritization, INMARSAT Fleet F77 supports the accreditation of vessels’ systems and ensures high priority distress and safety needs are met as follows: Proven reliability. INMARSAT has provided effective communication to maritime industry for many years. Via INMARSAT customers have access to proven technology and outstanding service.Choice and flexibility. INMARSAT offers solutions that meet the specific needs of maritime industry, allowing end-users to create communications that suit individual requirements.Cost-effective. Customers can choose the most cost-effective communications channel, be it Mobile ISDN or the Mobile Packet Data service – allowing ‘always on’ working.High speed. A mobile office at sea, INMARSAT offers fast online and intranet access, image transfer and video communications at high speed.Global coverage. Coverage of all ocean areas is available to maritime users.Enhanced safety. Voice prioritization and pre-emption ensure that all distress and safety needs are prioritized and dealt with effectively.Ease of installation. INMARSAT offers ease of installation through new, lightweight antenna technologies and light, compact below-decks equipment, offering comprehensive connection options.Compatibility. INMARSAT is accessed through a satcoms unit, compatible with standard applications and systems, allowing users to carry out business as usual virtually wherever they are. It operates using industry standard Mobile IP and ISDN user interfaces. A wide variety of standard applications are also available, extending the availability of commonly used, off-the-shelf software to the ship at sea.
An environmental management system in seaports: evidence from Malaysia
Published in Maritime Policy & Management, 2022
Jagan Jeevan, Nurul Haqimin Mohd Salleh, Nur Hidayati Abdul Karim, Kevin Cullinane
Maritime transport is an important element in supporting trade both within and between regions. In 2018, approximately 80% of global trade by volume and over 70% by value was carried by sea and handled by ports worldwide (UNCTAD 2019). With increasing seaborne trade and shipping activity, concerns over the maritime industry’s environmental performance has grown, with respect to not only the emission of greenhouse gases and air pollution, but also water pollution, waste disposal, land use and energy consumption. As such, the global maritime sector has come under increasing pressure to conduct its activities in a less environmentally damaging manner.
The potential mental health effects of remote control in an autonomous maritime world
Published in Journal of International Maritime Safety, Environmental Affairs, and Shipping, 2021
Kimberly Tam, Rory Hopcraft, Tom Crichton, Kevin Jones
It has been shown that significant technological advancements are becoming a critical aspect of situational awareness. For example, in recent years, industrial robots in manufacturing have evolved to the point where they have changed the relationship between man and machine to become more reciprocal (Man, Lundh, and MacKinnon 2019). In the maritime industry, over the years, efficiency, safety, and environmental factors have similarly been addressed and reinforced by state-of-the-art technologies. Therefore, there is an increasing interface between humans and autonomy, which leads to the human-autonomy problem.
Hybrid boundary element and eigenfunction expansion method for wave trapping by a floating porous box near a rigid wall
Published in Ships and Offshore Structures, 2023
Haripriya Sahoo, R. Gayathri, Mohamin B. M. Khan, Harekrushna Behera
In recent times, the increased need for space has necessitated the construction of infrastructure facilities taking advantage of the vast ocean space. Many breakwater configurations are designed to protect the sea-shore and coastal facilities, marina, and inlets against wave attacks by mitigating wave load (e.g. Khan and Behera 2020). These facilities include floating structures that are also set up as storage centres, wave energy systems, military installations, aquaculture facilities, offshore oil and gas drilling and production activities (Dai et al. 2018; Gayathri and Behera 2021). Even though different types of floating structures are designed near the shore to facilitate various maritime and coastline operations, the most commonly used type of floating platforms are pontoon or box types and can be used as breakwaters, seawalls, bays, piers, oil drilling exploration, and ship navigation platforms, and so on. The use of floating breakwaters has grabbed attention as these structures do not impede ocean currents and cause minimal harm to the seabed (Tsai et al. 2018; Deng et al. 2019; Mackay and Johanning 2020; Zheng et al. 2020b). The floating structures are distinguished into four types such as box, pontoon, mat and tethered floats (McCartney 1985). The gravity wave scattering by a floating platform started with Kreisel (1949), whereas the diffraction of gravity waves by a floating breakwater was analysed by Penney et al. (1952). In the case of finite water depth, Mei and Black (1969) investigated the water wave scattering by a floating rectangular breakwater. The diffraction of waves by a single as well as dual floating structures was studied by McIver (1986) and reported that for a narrow bandwidth with larger frequency and for a combination of particular physical quantities resonance arises among the floating platforms and slam loads. Further, in the case of two-layered fluids, for both bottom-standing and surface-piercing structure dikes, the wave reflection strongly depends on the location of the interface and the density of the fluid (Kumar et al. 2007). The problem of wave scattering by a bottom with varying steps was investigated by Dhillon et al. (2016); their study reports that the increase in the length of the dock enhances the rate of reduction of wave transmission. A review on evolution of floating type breakwaters can be found in Dai et al. (2018). The wave scattering by a floating rectangular dock in the presence of bottom undulation was investigated by Kar et al. (2019).