University presents eight research papers at Malta international conference

Researchers at the University’s Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Institute for Sustainable Energy presented eight papers during the ninth inter-national conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics (HEFAT 2012), which was recently held in Malta and attended by 225 delegates from 46 countries.

A total of 207 papers were presented in five parallel sessions during the conference on topics such as renewable energy, heating, ventilation and air conditioning, engines and nanotechnology.

A paper by Paul Refalo, Robert Ghirlando and Stephen Abela entitled ‘Simulation and experimentation of heat transfer in a solar distillation still’ was chosen as the best paper presented in the session on renewable energy.

Jonathan Cauchi, Prof. Ghirlando and Mario Farrugia presented a paper on computer modelling of high temperature air combustion.

Sean Agius and Tonio Sant presented insights into the un­steady aerodynamics of floating wind turbines with tension-leg platforms using a blade element momentum-based model.

Glenn Zammit, Dr Farrugia and Prof. Ghirlando presented the re­sults of an experimental inves­tigation of the effects of hydro-gen-enhanced combustion in spark ignition and compression ignition en­­gines on performance and emissions.

Ronald Mangion, Martin Muscat, Dr Sant, James Rizzo, Prof. Ghirlando, Joseph Cilia, Josef Mizzi and Sinan Vural presented a paper on the challenges in developing a solar-powered Stirling engine for domestic electricity generation.

Robert Farrugia, Dr Sant, Peter Mifsud and Godwin Sant spoke about the application of measure-correlate-predict tech­niques and computational fluid dynamics modelling for wind resource assessment in a Mediterranean island context.

Keith Zammit and Prof. Ghirlando presented a paper about improving the energy efficiency of a control cabinet air conditioner through the use of variable refrigerant flow capacity control, while Nadia Grech and Mario Farrugia presented the results of an experimental investigation on the variable speed operation of air-conditioning.