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Spring 2023

Gomaa, Ahmed

Tetrahydrofurfuryl alcohol (THFA) is a widely used solvent. It is a preferred solvent since it is derived from biomass. Multiple patents have reported that adding THFA during heavy oil processing improves the efficiency of the process and increases the yield. One patent for instance reported that...

Fall 2023

Mutlu Tuncer, Idil

Canada's 2021 Critical Minerals Strategy underscores the prominence of tungsten as a rare and critical element. Today, tungsten production relies on scheelite, categorized as a secondary resource due to its complex ore composition and lower-grade nature. This phenomenon stems from the depletion...

Spring 2023

Phan, Calvin

Asphaltenes offer a cheap alternative to the predominant precursor currently used in the manufacture of carbon fibres. Melt spinning is typically employed for transforming asphaltenes into a fibrous form but faces two challenges: inconsistent or poor spinnability and a large diameter variation in...

Spring 2023

Ebrahimi, Hadiseh

The Canadian economy relies heavily on its transportation network. It supports hundreds of thousands of jobs, contributes billions to the economy, and facilitates the movement of goods within the country as well as internationally. Railways provide affordable and efficient transportation to over...

Fall 2023

Yanez Jaramillo, Lina Maria

At the heart of heavy oil and bitumen upgrading, thermal conversion technologies are found. One such process is visbreaking where bitumen is thermally converted into lighter materials. However, the conversion by visbreaking is limited by the onset of the formation of solid carbonaceous materials...

Fall 2023

Hu, Hang

Electrochemical energy storage devices such as Li-ion or Zn-air batteries (ZABs) are utilized to store energy generated by renewable sources, since these sources are intermittent. Li-ion batteries uses flammable organic electrolytes (less safe than nonflammable aqueous electrolytes) and have high...

Spring 2023

Pedraza, Henry B

Fast pyrolysis bio-oil is a promising renewable energy source derived from biomass. However, its high corrosivity and poor thermal stability have limited its widespread use as a drop-in fuel. One promising method for transforming low-quality biocrudes into drop-in fuels is co-processing with...

Spring 2023

Esmaeeli, Nafiseh

Canada’s national rail network is the third-largest in the world, playing a vital role in moving goods and people across the country. Rail transportation transfers $320 billion worth of goods and over 100 million passengers annually. Although railway activities are beneficial to Canada’s...

Fall 2023

Yang, Shu-Bo

With the advances made in machine learning and data science, data-driven modeling and optimization techniques have garnered significant attention in recent years. However, despite the availability of various data-driven methods for addressing optimization problems under uncertainty, their...

Spring 2023

Sloetjes, Kilian

Bitumen extracted from oil sands has been a major source of wealth for Canada, but it comes at a high price because the Clark hot water process generates large volumes of tailings which must be stored in ponds that threaten the environment. These tailing ponds must be treated to meet the land...