Academic literature on the topic 'Refining Western Australia'

Alcoa World Alumina Australia has undertaken comprehensive air emissions monitoring aimed at characterising and quantifying the complete range of emissions to the atmosphere from Bayer refining of alumina at its Western Australian refineries. To the best of our knowledge, this project represents the most complete air emissions inventory of a Bayer refinery conducted in the worldwide alumina industry. It adds considerably to knowledge of air emission factors available for use in emissions estimation required under national pollutant release and transfer registers (NPRTs), such as the Toxic Releases Inventory, USA, and the National Pollutant Inventory, Australia. It also allows the preliminary identification of the key chemical components responsible for characteristic alumina refinery odours and the contribution of these components to the quality, or hedonic tone, of the odours. The strength and acceptability of refinery odours to employees and neighbours appears to be dependent upon where and in what proportion the odorous gases have been emitted from the refineries. This paper presents the results of the programme and develops a basis for classifying the odour properties of the key emission sources in the alumina-refining process.

Examination of 211 Delphinus specimens from the coasts of Western Australia to New South Wales, including Tasmania, was conducted using 62 quantitative and 11 qualitative variables. After refining the dataset, multivariate analyses were performed on 130 cranially mature specimens using 21 cranial variables. MANOVA showed males to be slightly larger than females, but with substantial overlap, allowing analyses to combine genders. UPGMA Cluster Analysis and MDS Ordination showed three largely overlapping groups based on a size gradient. K-means analysis of these groups found no significant differences and confirmed a size gradient. Discriminant analysis of specimens grouped by geography and water depth showed a tendency for large skulls to be from coasts adjacent to deep water and small skulls from shallow water coasts. Cranial measurements were significant, postcranial measurements and features were not. Tooth counts were within the range for D. delphis for all specimens examined. This study confirms genetic evidence for a single continuously variable species (Delphinus delphis Linnaeus, 1758) in southern Australian waters. Compared with either D. delphis or D. capensis from the eastern North Pacific, the skulls of D. delphis in southern Australia were more variable for many characters.

Barrow Island, off the north-west coast of Western Australia, was declared a Class 'A' Nature Reserve for the protection of flora and fauna in 1908. Since 1963, West Australian Petroleum Pty Limited (WAPET) has conducted oil exploration and production operations on the island, producing over 235 million barrels of oil. The fact that the introduction of exotic plants and animals has been prevented and the island's full suite of native species remains intact is due to a rigorous environmental program. In developing and refining that management program over the past 25 years, WAPET has pioneered environmental management and rehabilitation techniques. In 1988-89, WAPET carried out a comprehensive review and audit of its management procedures to satisfy itself that its operations continued to meet the high environmental standards expected of our industry. The review critically examined the impacts of operational procedures including seismic exploration, gravel extraction, quarantine, rehabilitation and workforce education to determine the effect of the operations on the conservation values of Barrow Island. The Barrow Island operation demonstrates that with proper management and planning, development and conservation are not incompatible.

Australia’s lack of gas supply infrastructure and market opportunities means that in the northwest of our nation more than 100 trillion cubic feet of gas remains uncommitted to customer contracts.Because of Western Australia’s relatively small domestic gas markets and the long transport distances to larger markets, the belief has been that only the LNG industry has the scale to monetise the large volumes of gas required to underpin greenfield developments and expansion of gas supply infrastructure.Changing fuel specifications around the world, combined with the limited opportunities for new LNG contracts, has renewed interest in gas-to-liquids (GTL) technology as an alternative to crude oil refining for a source of clean and efficient transport fuels. GTL is an exciting new market opportunity for Australian gas.Exploration interest in Australia appears to be waning. Declining opportunities for oil discoveries and the lack of markets for natural gas make investments in Australia’s upstream sector unattractive compared to other locations around the world.In addition, Australia has dwindling crude oil supplies and faces the prospect of increasing reliance on imported crude oil and refined products. An Australian GTL Clean Diesel industry can help overcome these hurdles by creating a designer blendstock and a valuable new GTL Clean Diesel export industry.A GTL Clean Diesel industry would not only help resolve many of Australia’s current upstream and downstream problems in the petroleum industry, but would also provide massive economic benefits to Australia.This paper will look not only at the making but also the marketing of this fuel of the future.

A novel industrial-scale bioreactor was implemented by Alcoa of Australia (Alcoa) at its Kwinana alumina refinery (Western Australia) for the degradation of oxalate, an organic byproduct of the Bayer alumina refining process. At the Kwinana refinery oxalate is removed from the Bayer Liquor via a separate side-stream as it increases the operating costs associated with the process and, at sufficiently high levels, may adversely affect the quality and yield of the final alumina product. The bioreactor process provides a more economic and environmentally friendly method for the treatment of removed oxalate compared with chemical conversion or storage of the solid by-product. In previous studies, the microbial community composition of the bioreactor was investigated and was found to be largely dominated by microorganisms of the α-, β- and γ-Proteobacteriasubgroups. During the present study, two bacteria that had the ability to use oxalate as a sole source of carbon and energy were isolated from samples obtained from the bioreactor. Phylogenetic and physiological analyses indicated that the two isolates were probably strains of a novel species of a novel genus within the β-Proteobacteriasubgroup. Isolation and characterisation of the microbial communities within the bioreactor system has the potential to improve process operation, which may have a positive impact on the biological oxalate destruction process and the footprint of alumina production.

The use of wireline and core spectral gamma data as a tool for defining clay types and mineral assemblages in the subsurface environment has been widely used for many years within the petroleum industry. However, the qualitative use of radiometric data for interpreting rock types as used with airborne surveys in the mineral industry has not undergone detailed assessment as a well correlation tool.Applying the principles of qualitative airborne radiometric interpretation to the assessment of wireline spectral gamma ray data has proved extremely useful as a well correlation tool in the Carnarvon Basin of Western Australia. Data is presented from the Stag Field detailing the application of the technique as an effective fieldwide correlation tool. The sandstone reservoirs exhibit mineralogical variation and individual sand packages can be discontinuous. However, the major shale packages are laterally continuous and individual shales show remarkable character consistency over several kilometres. Such character continuity has proved a valuable correlation tool for confirming and refining the stratigraphic packages observed in the Cretaceous section of Stag.Success on the Stag Field led to application of the technique for regional correlations on the Enderby Terrace. The results of regional work show that correlations still hold when the technique is applied to correlations of over 70 km even though some lateral variation due to provenance and depositional environment impact on clay types was evident. Hence this qualitative approach of wireline log evaluation has proved an effective and valuable correlation tool.

An aerial survey along a transect from eastern side of the Arnhem Land Plateau where Aboriginal people still lead a semi-traditional lifestyle, to the unoccupied western side of the Plateau, revealed systematic differences in the proportion of living and dead Callitris intratropica trees. Multiple regression analysis showed that the highest proportion of dead C. intratropica stems occurred on unoccupied, level terrain dominated by open Eucalyptus forests, with a minor or complete absence of Allosyncarpia ternata closed-canopy forests. A detailed study of one population of C. intratropica in western Arnhem Land adjacent to a small patch of A. ternata forest, known as Round Jungle, showed that the population had a unimodal size-class distribution, reflecting a low density of stems less than 10 cm in diameter at breast height (dbh). A computer simulation model was developed on the basis of estimates of annual fecundity, mortality and growth rates derived from observations of the stand. Sensitivity analyses suggested that a well-stocked stand could be transformed to one similar to that observed at Round Jungle after 50 years, if annual mortality rate of the immature stems (i.e. <12 cm dbh) was greater than 85%. Under these conditions, the stand would become extinct after 325 years. Variation in estimates of mature-stem (>12 cm dbh) mortality and fecundity had much less effect on the predictions of the model than the rate of mortality of the smallest size class. The model suggests that C. intratropica populations can rapidly fluctuate in response to changes in fire regime, while extinction is a gradual process and is consequently unlikely if some seedlings can escape burning, for instance by establishing in fire-protected microsites. This conclusion is consistent with the observed greater mortality of C. intratropica on sand sheets that have little topographic variability at the micro- or mesoscale, compared with other habitat types in areas that are currently unoccupied by Aboriginal people. Our study shows that predicting the fate of individual populations will require careful consideration of local factors such as the presence of micro-topographically safe sites for seedling establishment, as well as the surrounding pattern of vegetation and landforms that mediate the impact of fire on C. intratropica. However, we suggest that rather than refining details of the adjustment of C. intratropica in response to changed fire regimes associated with European colonisation, subsequent research should focus on the effect and significance of these changes for other organisms.