Self-help books aim to empower their readers and deliver happiness and personal fulfilment but do they really live up to this? This book offers a fresh perspective on self-help culture and popular psychology. Research on this subject matter has generally focused on the USA and the Global Northwest. In contrast, this book explores the production, circulation and consumption of self-help books from an innovative transnational perspective. Case studies on Trinidad, Mexico, the People's Republic of China, the UK and the USA explore the roles which self-help's therapeutic narratives of self and social relationships play in the contemporary world. In this context, the book questions the extent to which self-help fulfils its promise of individual autonomy and contentment. At the same time, it addresses debates about contemporary political change under transnational processes of cultural standardization.

1. 1. Greenhouse gas emissions and climate change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 1. 1. 1. Emissions and concentrations of greenhouse gases 3 1. 1. 2. Impact of increasing greenhouse gases concentration 4 1. 2. Options to reduce carbon dioxide emissions 5 1. 2. 1. Carbon dioxide removal 8 1. 3. Scope of the thesis 10 1. 4. Outline of the thesis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 1. 4. 1. General evaluation method. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 1. 4. 2. Some notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 II. Simulation and optimization of carbon dioxide recovery from the flue gases of a coal-fired power plant using amines 14 Abstract 19 2. 1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 2. 2. The chemical absorption process. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 2. 2. 1. General process description. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 2. 2. 2. Types of absorbent 23 2. 2. 3. Effects of flue gas contaminants 24 2. 3. Simulation of the scrubber in ASPEN PLUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 2. 3. 1. ASPEN PLUS for flow sheet simulation 26 2. 3. 2. Simulation of the performance for the base-case design . . 26 the scrubber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 2. 3. 3. Optimization of 2. 3. 4. Design and results 32 2. 3. 5. Discussion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 2. 4. Integration of the scrubber in the power plant 35 2. 4. 1. Power loss caused by steam extraction 36 2. 4. 2. Power saved by avoiding preheating boiler feed water . . . 38 2. 4. 3. Power consumption by the carbon dioxide scrubber . . . . . 38 2. 4. 4. Power consumption for carbon dioxide compression . . . . . 38 2. 4. 5. Calculation of plant efficiency losses " . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 2. 5.

Self-help books aim to empower their readers and deliver happiness and personal fulfilment but do they really live up to this? This book offers a fresh perspective on self-help culture and popular psychology. Research on this subject matter has generally focused on the USA and the Global Northwest. In contrast, this book explores the production, circulation and consumption of self-help books from an innovative transnational perspective. Case studies on Trinidad, Mexico, the People's Republic of China, the UK and the USA explore the roles which self-help's therapeutic narratives of self and social relationships play in the contemporary world. In this context, the book questions the extent to which self-help fulfils its promise of individual autonomy and contentment. At the same time, it addresses debates about contemporary political change under transnational processes of cultural standardization.

1. 1. Greenhouse gas emissions and climate change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 1. 1. 1. Emissions and concentrations of greenhouse gases 3 1. 1. 2. Impact of increasing greenhouse gases concentration 4 1. 2. Options to reduce carbon dioxide emissions 5 1. 2. 1. Carbon dioxide removal 8 1. 3. Scope of the thesis 10 1. 4. Outline of the thesis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 1. 4. 1. General evaluation method. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 1. 4. 2. Some notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 II. Simulation and optimization of carbon dioxide recovery from the flue gases of a coal-fired power plant using amines 14 Abstract 19 2. 1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 2. 2. The chemical absorption process. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 2. 2. 1. General process description. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 2. 2. 2. Types of absorbent 23 2. 2. 3. Effects of flue gas contaminants 24 2. 3. Simulation of the scrubber in ASPEN PLUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 2. 3. 1. ASPEN PLUS for flow sheet simulation 26 2. 3. 2. Simulation of the performance for the base-case design . . 26 the scrubber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 2. 3. 3. Optimization of 2. 3. 4. Design and results 32 2. 3. 5. Discussion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 2. 4. Integration of the scrubber in the power plant 35 2. 4. 1. Power loss caused by steam extraction 36 2. 4. 2. Power saved by avoiding preheating boiler feed water . . . 38 2. 4. 3. Power consumption by the carbon dioxide scrubber . . . . . 38 2. 4. 4. Power consumption for carbon dioxide compression . . . . . 38 2. 4. 5. Calculation of plant efficiency losses " . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 2. 5.

As speech processing devices like mobile phones, voice controlled devices, and hearing aids have increased in popularity, people expect them to work anywhere and at any time without user intervention. However, the presence of acoustical disturbances limits the use of these applications, degrades their performance, or causes the user difficulties in understanding the conversation or appreciating the device. A common way to reduce the effects of such disturbances is through the use of single-microphone noise reduction algorithms for speech enhancement. The field of single-microphone noise reduction for speech enhancement comprises a history of more than 30 years of research. In this survey, we wish to demonstrate the significant advances that have been made during the last decade in the field of discrete Fourier transform domain-based single-channel noise reduction for speech enhancement.Furthermore, our goal is to provide a concise description of a state-of-the-art speech enhancement system, and demonstrate the relative importance of the various building blocks of such a system. This allows the non-expert DSP practitioner to judge the relevance of each building block and to implement a close-to-optimal enhancement system for the particular application at hand. Table of Contents: Introduction / Single Channel Speech Enhancement: General Principles / DFT-Based Speech Enhancement Methods: Signal Model and Notation / Speech DFT Estimators / Speech Presence Probability Estimation / Noise PSD Estimation / Speech PSD Estimation / Performance Evaluation Methods / Simulation Experiments with Single-Channel Enhancement Systems / Future Directions