Chinese cities are amongst the fasted growing cities in the world and they have per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) emission rates that are similar to western cities. This research quantifies GHG emissions for the three Chinese city-provinces of Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin. A computer model is then developed for projecting the future growth in Shanghai’s emissions under current policies and infracstructure plans.

It has been a common practice to discharge water, wastewater and industrial effluents into open channels such as rivers and streams.   Such discharges, in the form of jets, often enter shallow bodies of water typically found in rivers and coastal bays.  In contrast to the existing body of knowledge on unconfined turbulent jets in which the influence of the bounding surface is either absent or minimal, shallowness has a dramatic effect on the flow field of shallow jets.  To better understand and control the a flows/processes, knowledge of the velocity field is an essential ingredient.

The goal of the project is to further develop the Fork Configuration Damper – FCD (patents pending in 7 countries) to enable its implementation in real structures and its commercialization through a University of Toronto startup company. The FCD is a new damping technology developed at the University of Toronto to mitigate wind and earthquake vibrations of high-rise buildings by increasing the level of distributed viscous damping in the structure. The FCD is embedded within structural configurations that are commonly used for high-rise buildings.

The objective of the proposed R & D project is to recommend a methodology for using tuned liquid damper as a passive damper placed in elevated tanks. A portion of contained liquid can be utilized to act as a tuned liquid damper with some modifications. This methodology can be used to control displacements due to wind and earthquake effects. A numerical program using the finite element method is proposed, which will be conducted to simulate a structure with a TLD attached and subjected to transient loading. The results of this study will be applied to elevated tanks.

Recently, a new kind of cell phones known as “smartphones” is introduced and sold to the public in great numbers. A smartphone generally refers to a cell phone that is capable of communicating through the internet (via wireless internet or data network), determining its current positions (with Global Positioning System, GPS), and taking photos (with high resolution cameras) in addition to the classic voice communications. Most smartphones are also equipped with touch screens that provide a user-friendly intuitive interface.