A team of researchers from Khalifa University has developed a techno-economic model to evaluate and compare energy-storage systems (ESS) in green building design. 

Dr. Ahmad Mayyas, Assistant Professor, Assia Chadly, MSc student, Dr. Elie Azar, Associate Professor, and Dr. Maher Maalouf, Associate Professor, all from the Khalifa University Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, published their results in the journal and also recently had their work feature as a story in pv magazine, which is a monthly trade publication widely read by the international photovoltaics (PV) community.

They compared lithium-ion batteries, proton-exchange membranes reversible fuel cells (PEM RFC), and reversible solid oxide cells (RSOC), with all three types of storage systems connected to a stand-alone photovoltaic system. Their model was tested on what would be a typical commercial building located in Los Angeles to determine the most efficient energy-storage system of the three.

“Low-energy buildings can be designed to be self-sufficient if connected to a suitably sized renewable-energy system, supported by energy-efficiency measures that minimize their energy demand,” Dr. Mayyas said. “Since energy generation is often intermittent and weather-dependent, we need to consider and plan for situations where energy is not available.”

The electric grid must always be balanced so that electricity generation exactly equals electricity usage. Though we often think of intermittent renewable energy resources, such as solar and wind, as susceptible to not being able to provide enough energy, there are invariably times when there is more electricity generated than we can use. Excess electricity in the system leads to curtailment, where output is intentionally reduced, limiting the value of impacted renewable energy systems.

“The main role of the ESS is to store energy when supply exceeds demand and release it when the situation is reversed,” Dr. Mayyas said.

There are a wide range of specifications and classifications for ESS, depending on their storage mechanism and potential applications, with key differences found in their structure and mode of operation. Some systems use supercapacitors, some use lithium-ion batteries. Others use fuel cells or flywheels, but all have lifetimes measured by the total number of cycles the system can offer.

“Batteries and hydrogen-based ESS offer high power ratings, energy density, and storage duration, all of which make them suitable for medium- and long-term storage needs,” Dr. Mayyas said. “But system aging lowers their performance and typically increases the energy-storage cost. Plus, they age at varying rates: hydrogen systems suffer from higher levels of degradation at the cell and stack levels, for example.”

The team’s model considered a medium office building, defined as a three-floor office building, located in Los Angeles. Its assumed electricity demand ranged from 18.69kW during the night to 178.30kW during the day in August. The team chose a rooftop solar array with a capacity of 400kW and 19 percent efficiency.

Their model looked at the levelized cost of storage (LCOS), considering the economic burden of the three energy-storage systems. They found that upfront capital in installing the technologies accounts for more than 65 percent of the total LCOS, making it the most important component in the model. Bringing the capital cost down would have the most impact on reducing the overall cost of such systems.

Additionally, as each system had a different rate of aging and therefore a different operating lifetime, the LCOS depended on the lifetime of each system.

“The LCOS is sensitive to changes in capital costs and lifetime among many other things,” Dr. Mayyas said. “Of the three storage systems, lithium-ion batteries were the most sensitive, but they also offered the lowest LCOS. All three systems are economically appealing, however.”

However, the fuel cells in the two other systems, although expensive, help improve the reliability and resiliency of the commercial building when supplied with renewable-energy.

“Further work could include other energy-storage systems and hybrid models looking at lower capital costs and higher efficiencies,” Dr. Mayyas said. “Also, expanding the analysis to a comparison between different locations would help understand how the LCOS changes with different climates.” 

Jade Sterling
Science Writer
19 July 2022

The post Comparing the Cost of Energy-Storage Systems for Renewable Energy appeared first on Khalifa University.

Blockchain could revolutionize the oil and gas industry, but there are several open research challenges hindering its successful implementation. 

Legacy systems, approaches, and technologies leveraged for managing oil and gas supply-chain operations fall short of providing operational transparency, traceability, audit, security, and trusted–data-provenance features. They also tend to be centralized, manual, and not integrated, which make them vulnerable to manipulation and the single-point-of-failure problem.

A Khalifa University team researched the issue and found reason to be excited for blockchain technology’s potential in the industry. But there are challenges ahead despite the fact that the industry has already begun adopting blockchain solutions.

Dr. Raja Ahmad, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Prof. Khaled Salah, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Dr. Raja Jayaraman, Associate Professor, Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Dr. Ibrar Yaqoob, Research Scientist, and Dr. Mohammed Omar, Chair of the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, have investigated the use of blockchain in the oil and gas industry, analyzing the applications, challenges and future trends of this technology in one of the world’s most important industries. Their research was published in.

Industry players believe digital technologies could boost their productivity by 10 to 15 percent. Trading of oil and gas products, such as gasoline and diesel, is a highly standardized and quality-sensitive process that requires high security, privacy and fast data processing, but the majority of systems that currently exist to monitor and manage this trade are centralized, unreliable and non-transparent.

Blockchain, however, is a secure, distributed ledger of transactions that uses cryptographic hash algorithms, which the researchers believe can make oil and gas operations more efficient, transparent, and trustworthy.

A Shell, BP, and Statoil research study estimates that adopting blockchain could reduce the oil and gas industry’s transaction-execution time by 30 percent, Dr. Yaqoob said.

Blockchain offers an immutable and tamper-proof ledger, where each record created forms a block, and each block is confirmed by the community among which the platform is shared before it can be paired up with the previous entry in the chain. The blockchain is a shared database, validated by a wider community rather than a central authority, making it a public ledger that cannot be easily tampered with, as no one person can go back and change things.

Many blockchain solutions use programmable smart contracts – simple programs that can be used to automatically exchange information under predetermined conditions.

Dr. Yaqoob said. “More specifically, blockchain assists in securing and simplifying oil and gas trading, shipment tracking, inventory control, documentation, and billing and payments. It simplifies the unwieldy and complex supply chain processes by introducing transparency to the involved business processes.”

The researchers say blockchain technology uses resource-efficient consensus algorithms and irreversible hashing-based data encryption methods to secure the data and transactions relating to this industry. However, the successful adoption of blockchain technology into the oil and gas industry is affected by many factors, including immature and globally differing blockchain standards, which need to be standardized across the world for such an international industry. Additionally, blockchain technology has a high implementation cost, and legal and regulatory frameworks for blockchain need to be built.

Additionally, the computing processes behind blockchain require a large amount of energy and computing resources to unlock the mathematical challenges of building each block. The energy demands result in increased carbon-dioxide emissions, so finding a more energy-efficient mining process is a crucial research challenge.

Dr. Yaqoob said. “While there are many open challenges still hindering its implementation, we present these as future research directions, and believe there are several systems using blockchain-based smart contracts that can greatly improve critical services in the oil and gas industry.”

Jade Sterling
Science Writer
22 June 2022

The post Blockchain in the Oil and Gas Industry has Promise but Faces Challenges appeared first on Khalifa University.

Maha AlDhaheri and Mariam Ramadan, both BSc in Industrial and Systems Engineering students, successfully optimized the service delivery at Bab Al Qasr hotel, a luxury hotel in Abu Dhabi, in Spring 2019, as part of their Six Sigma Methodology and Applications course.

The course, delivered by Dr. Maher Maalouf, Associate Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering, engages the students through an experiential learning approach with real-life projects and activities. The students learn-by-doing the Six Sigma set of tools and methodologies, these include powerful techniques used by major companies worldwide to help improve production processes, eliminate defects, and guarantee quality. 

Mahriam and Maha put their retained skills from the Six Sigma course into work to help identify optimal ways to streamline the beverage delivery at Bab Al Qasr hotel. Using DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) tools, the students streamlined the chain of activities at the hotel, resulting in an improved workers’ efficiency by 16.5%, with a 1000% return on investment (ROI) as judged by the Hotel management.

“This project has opened our eyes to the importance of Six Sigma and process improvement in hospitality to enhance organizations’ operational and financial performance,” the students shared. 

They credit the experience for improving their communication and technical skills, as they had to collect information from several different stations, machines and people across many departments.

“Working on this project also helped us identify non-value-added activities and inefficiencies in the hospitality sector, a field in which Six Sigma application is limited in the existing literature,” they said.

“In terms of technical skills, the project boosted our data collection and analyses skills. These are vital to being able to better identify the problem, validate its existence, understand where opportunities exist, and make significant and sustained improvements that help the organization.”

Several courses in the Industrial and Systems Engineering department, including Six Sigma, involve hands-on projects like this one, to help emphasize the experiential learning and learn-by-doing approach.

Erica Solomon
Senior Publication Specialist
14 November 2021

The post KU Students Complete Six Sigma Project at Bab Al Qasr Hotel appeared first on Khalifa University.

The International Lean Six Sigma Institute (ILSSI) presented Dr. Jiju Antony, Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering, with the prestigious “Lifetime Outstanding Contribution to Lean Six Sigma” award in recognition for Dr. Antony’s work and contributions to the understanding and standardization of Lean Six Sigma, a team-focused managerial approach that seeks to improve performance by eliminating waste and defects.

John Dennis, Chairman of the ILSSI (UK), presented Dr. Antony with the award on 19 July 2021 at the Edinburgh Business School, where Dr. Antony was also celebrated by colleagues and other ILSSI members. He commented: “Professor Antony has made a remarkable contribution to the field of quality management, quality engineering and now an advancement to the field of Lean Six Sigma. The ILSSI would like to thank him for his lifetime of service to the advancement of Lean Six Sigma.” 

Dr. Antony has been a pillar in the field of Six Sigma. In 2004, he founded the Centre for Research in Six Sigma and Process Excellence (CRISSPE), the first Six Sigma research center in Europe. The center aims to further promote Six Sigma, Lean Strategy, Quality Management and Business Process Improvement Methods in the UK and Europe. 

Dr. Antony is also a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society (UK), Fellow of the Chartered Quality Institute (CQI), Fellow of the Institute of Operations Management (FIOM), Fellow of the American Society of Quality (FASQ), Fellow of the International Lean Six Sigma Institute (ILSSi) and a Fellow of the Institute of the Six Sigma Professionals (ISSP).

“I am truly honored to receive this Lifetime Achievement award from the International Lean Six Sigma Institute and will be delighted to work closely with the chairman and other colleagues for further advancement of Lean Six Sigma,” Dr. Antony said. 

The ILSSI is based in Cambridge, England and was established as a partnership of Lean Six Sigma professionals in the UK, EU, USA, Asia and the Middle-East that focuses on providing International collaboration, common understanding and standards for both Lean and Six Sigma principles, tools and techniques. The ILSSI offers training, certification, coaching, and consulting services directly and through the network. It also hosts an annual conference for Lean Six Sigma practitioners. 

Ara Maj Cruz
Creative Writer
20 September 2021

The post ILSSI honors Professor Jiju Antony with Lifetime Outstanding Contribution to Lean Six Sigma appeared first on Khalifa University.

Blockchain technology can offer significant opportunities to online auctions via enhanced transparency, data integrity and data traceability. 

Online auctions bring customers from around the world to a seller and mitigate geographical barriers that would previously have stood in the way of an enterprising salesman. However, these online auctions typically require a third-party to act as an intermediary between buyer and seller to facilitate and maintain the integrity of the transaction. As a result, online platforms rely on human interactions for data integrity, security, transparency and traceability with potential bidders having to trust an auction organizer with ensuring that bids are legitimate and transactions properly settled.

To overcome this, a team of researchers from Khalifa University’s Industrial and Systems Engineering Department has investigated using blockchain technology—a distributed, immutable ledger of transactions organized as blocks and maintained by a community of users—to run online auctions. Ilhaam Omar, Research Associate, Haya Hasan, Research Associate, Dr. Raja Jayaraman, Associate Professor, Dr. Khaled Salah, Professor, and Dr. Mohammed Omar, Professor and Director of the KU Research Center for Digital Supply Chain and Operations Management (DSOM), published their research in

“Our team is actively researching the most pressing challenges in supply chain and logistics,” said Dr. Jayaraman. “Our work on blockchain-based auctions was inspired by a real industry problem from a UAE-based company offering a heavy equipment rental service through a competitive bidding process. However, the existing auction process lacks trust and transparency with results that cannot be audited or verified In addition, the role of third-party intermediaries causes significant information delays and a results in a costly process. Our proposed solution has broad applications in ecommerce and related service industries.”

The research team realized that Blockchain-based auctions can effectively remove intermediaries, thereby reducing transaction costs and ensuring trust among stakeholders. Their solution uses programmable Ethereum smart contracts hosted on the blockchain. These “contracts” are actually simple programs that can be used to automatically exchange information under predetermined conditions.

Blockchain technology offers an immutable and tamper-proof ledger of transactions as a shared database, validated by a wide community. Each record created forms a block, and as each block is confirmed by the community, it is paired up with the previous entry in the chain, creating a chain of blocks. The platform is decentralized, trusted, and secure, with tamper-proof records, logs and transactions. The actions enabled by smart contracts take the digital place of a third party and inherit the immutable and distributed properties from the blockchain; tampering with them becomes almost impossible.

Additionally, the blockchain-based solution would allow the seller to directly connect with many potential bidders without intermediaries, while the bidders would be able to monitor the auction process.

The team’s solution was tested on one type of auction where the highest bid is known throughout the bidding process. However, their design allows the platform to be applied to other auctioning types simply by altering the structure of the smart contracts.

They now plan to develop decentralized applications to fully automate the auctioning process. They also plan to develop more multipurpose smart contracts to cater to the broader needs and requirements of auctioneers and bidders.

“Blockchain is an emerging, disruptive, and transformational technology with incredible growth potential and impact,” said Dr. Jayaraman. “Our work, which is at the heart of the UAE’s blockchain vision that is articulated through the Emirates Blockchain Strategy 2021, will help save time, effort and resources while improving competitiveness and providing transparency and trusted transactions.”

Jade Sterling
Science Writer
13 June 2021

The post Bringing Increased Security and Transparency to Online Auctions with Blockchain Technology appeared first on Khalifa University.

A team of Industrial and Systems Engineering students at Khalifa University has won first place in the Industrial Engineering and Operations Management (IEOM) Senior Design Project Competition. The team, who beat out over 100 other student projects, won for their innovative project that describes a streamlined waste collection system.

The team includes Shamma Al-Ali, Khadija Alhmoudi, Rawdha Alawadhi and Khalid Alhosani, and was supervised by Dr. Ali Bouabid, Assistant Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering, and Dr. Andrei Sleptchenko, Assistant Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering.

Their paper, titled “Improving Waste Collection & Transportation System,” describes their Senior Design Project, which is an innovative system they designed to improve the waste collection and transportation system in Abu Dhabi in collaboration with Tadweer (Abu Dhabi Waste Management​ ​Center). 

“Leveraging industrial and systems engineering principles, the students proposed a simulation-based approach to streamline the waste collection process as part of the future strategic vision for waste management in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi,” explained Dr. Bouabid. 

Team member Khalid Alhosani said, “As industrial & systems engineers, we are committed to delivering our expertise in a way that will help our society. Directly aligned with the UAE’s 2021 vision, our proposed solutions express a genuine desire to deliver positive, real-world change in the UAE. We hope that our work will contribute to the success of the UAE in increasing the percentage of treated waste.”

The KU team successfully demonstrated problem solving, creative thinking, innovation, project planning, and teamwork through a challenging design and build project. They presented their poster and paper at the International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management (IEOM), and were awarded at the 2021 IEOM 11th Annual Conference Awards Ceremony on 11 March 2021.

“Our Senior Design Project series have been purposefully designed to showcase our students abilities and skills in real-world applications and industries, with direct benefits to the local community of service providers and supply chain enterprises. This is the second year in a row that our SDP students are recognized in international awards, which is testament to their work’s international impact as well,” said Dr. Mohammed Omar, Professor and Department Chair of Industrial and Systems Engineering.

The IEOM Society International is a non-profit organization that provides academics, researchers, scientists, and practitioners a platform and forum to exchange ideas and provide insights on the latest developments and advancements in the fields of Industrial Engineering and Operations Management. The IEOM conference was held in Singapore this year and welcomed competitors from more than 60 different nationalities.

With a number of waste management projects underway like this one at Masdar Institute, Khalifa University’s sustainability focused research institute, KU is helping to drive the technological and industrial innovation required to meet the UAE’s strategic sustainability goals.

Erica Solomon
Publication Senior Specialist
29 March 2021

The post Innovative Waste Collection System Wins KU Students First Place at 2021 IEOM Conference appeared first on Khalifa University.