INGENIEUR
Figure 4 : The plastic waste piles in Jenjarom , Kuala Langat ( Tan , 2019 ).
Burning of Illegal E-waste
The increasing generation of electronic waste , or e-waste , has become a common concern worldwide . In Malaysia , it is estimated that approximately 364 kilotons of e-waste were generated in 2019 ( Forti et al .). For industrial e-waste , Malaysia has already established a collection system to manage and dispose of it properly . However , it is still very difficult to manage and collect e-waste from households and individuals .
There is still a lot of illegal e-waste smuggled into Malaysia from foreign countries . For example , the Penang Department of Environment ( DOE ) along with others recently discovered an e-waste container falsely declared as “ aluminium alloy ” within its borders and ordered its return to its country of origin . The container was found to contain printed circuit boards , internal hard disk drives , central processing units , and other electronic components as shown in Figure 5 . The concern is that these large amounts of e-waste are collected by illegal collectors and then disposed of through open burning to recover useful metals such as gold , copper , and lead .
The open burning of e-waste is a simple and inexpensive process , but it releases large amounts of dioxins and furans , as well as heavy metal particles into the environment , which will have a significant impact on the health of the surrounding population as well as other serious ecological impacts . The smart environment concept cannot be easily implemented with just the integration of sensors and IoT technology , especially when the source is unknown . The optimisation of the number and location of sensors is critical to ensure complete and cost-effective coverage of the area to be monitored , and this can be achieved with the aid of ML models . The concentration data from different leakage scenarios can be inputted into the ANN model to output the optimal layout of the sensor system , maximising performance whilst saving costs .
Ammonia Leakages and Dispersion
Ammonia is one of the most important industrial chemicals in the world due to its prominence as a raw material for the production of fertilisers . Recently , ammonia has garnered some interest as an alternative to fossil fuels due to its carbon-free nature . Some even considered ammonia as a carrier to hydrogen due to the relatively lower conditions for compression and liquefication , allowing for easier storage and transport . Malaysian corporations have partnered with foreign corporations , such as JERA , IHI Corporation , Samsung Engineering , Lotte Chemical , and POSCO , to produce green ammonia and other green products to be exported as well
30 VOL 93 JANUARY-MARCH 2023