A greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction obligation system has been implemented in the Swedish road transport sector to promote the use of biofuels. For transportation fuel suppliers to fulfil this obligation, the volume of biofuel required decreases with decreasing life cycle GHG emission for the biofuel, linking lower GHG emission to higher economic value. The aim of this study was to investigate how the economic competitiveness of a Swedish emerging lignocellulosic-based ethanol production system would be influenced by the reduction obligation. The life cycle GHG emission for sawdust-based ethanol was calculated by applying the method advocated in the EU Renewable Energy Directive (RED II). The saving in GHG emissions, compared with fossil liquid transportation fuels, was 93% for a potential commercial production system in southern Sweden. This, in turn, will increase the competitiveness of sawdust-based ethanol compared to the mainly crop-based ethanol currently used in the Swedis... [more]

Solar thermal power is nowadays one of the trendiest topics in the construction industry, and it represents a valuable energy source of heating that reduces energy consumption. As solar panels produce heating during the day and consumers demand calefaction during the whole day, we use standby tanks (for domestic hot water) and buffer tanks (for heating) for storage. The latest developments improved the efficiency and useful life while reducing the volume of tanks. So, the presented research work deals with analyzing the solar thermal power in a family house. This work presents a method to create a decision support system to compare solar energy systems in houses from economical, technical, availability, and environmental concerns. The weights of the criteria selected considering the analytical hierarchy process are computed. Parameters required for energy production calculations (location, temperature, etc.) and energy consumption (inhabitants, outdoor temperature, etc.) are summarized... [more]

Climate change, other environmental impacts due to increased energy use worldwide, and the exhaustion of energy resources are some of the major challenges facing today’s society. Considering this, this paper assesses the importance of biomass-based heating and hot-water systems in the achievement of more sustainable buildings. Using a simplified calculation method, we jointly analyzed the potential operational cost savings and reduction of CO2 emissions that would be achieved when the traditional energy model, based on the use of fossil fuels, is replaced by biomass-based heating systems. Evidence stems from a case study in public buildings in the province of Pontevedra, in the northwest of Spain. The results of this research not only show a huge impact on CO2 emission reduction just by adapting the kind of fuel use, but also considerable annual cost reduction without compromising activity development and workers’ comfort. Thus, the findings obtained should encourage governments to sup... [more]

The subsea tree is one of the critical pieces of equipment in the subsea production system, and its installation is related to the safe production of offshore oil and gas. Due to the differences in the form of the structures, the speed of entering the water, the marine environment, and other factors, the process of the structure entering the water is exceedingly complicated. During the engineering installation, the most dangerous phase involves the structure passing through the splash zone. Based on the theory of the movement of the subsea tree passing through the splash zone, Lingshui 17-2 subsea tree installation was analyzed with the marine engineering software OrcaFlex, and a sensitivity analysis of the lowering of the subsea tree was performed. During the splash zone phase, the wave height had the highest impact on the subsea tree, affecting the horizontal offset and cable load, which may lead to the oil tree capsizing and cable breakage. Furthermore, the velocity only affected th... [more]

Furfural is a platform molecule obtained from hemicellulose. Among the products that can be produced from furfural, furfuryl alcohol is one of the most extensively studied. It is synthesized at an industrial scale in the presence of CuCr catalyst, but this process suffers from an environmental negative impact. Here, we demonstrate that a non-noble metal catalyst (Co/SiO2) was active (100% conversion of furfural) and selective (100% selectivity to furfuryl alcohol) in the hydrogenation of furfural to furfuryl alcohol at 150 °C under 20 bar of hydrogen. This catalyst was recyclable up to 3 cycles, and then the activity decreased. Thus, a comparison between batch and continuous flow reactors shows that changing the reactor type helps to increase the stability of the catalyst and the space-time yield. This study shows that using a continuous flow reactor can be a solution to the catalyst suffering from a lack of stability in the batch process.

Climate change will require societal-scale infrastructural changes. Balancing priorities for water, energy, and climate will demand that approaches to water and energy management deviate from historical practice. Infrastructure designed to mitigate environmental harm, particularly related to climate change, is likely to become increasingly prevalent. Understanding the implications of such infrastructure for environmental quality is thus of interest. Environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) is a common sustainability assessment tool that aims to quantify the total, multicriteria environmental impact caused by a functional unit. Notably, however, LCA quantifies impacts in the form of environmental “costs” of delivering the functional unit. In the case of mitigation infrastructures, LCA results can be confusing because they are generally reported as the harmful impacts of performing mitigation rather than as net impacts that incorporate benefits of successful mitigation. This paper argue... [more]

Scientific research plays an important role in the achievement of a sustainable society. However, grasping the trends in sustainability research is difficult because studies are not devised and conducted in a top-down manner with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To understand the bottom-up research activities, we analyzed over 300,000 publications concerned with sustainability by using citation network analysis and natural language processing. The results suggest that sustainability science’s diverse and dynamic changes have been occurring over the last few years; several new topics, such as nanocellulose and global health, have begun to attract widespread scientific attention. We further examined the relationship between sustainability research subjects and SDGs and found significant correspondence between the two. Moreover, we extracted SDG topics that were discussed following a convergent approach in academic studies, such as “inclusive society” and “early childhood development... [more]

Our paper focuses on the renewable energy and EU 2020 target for energy efficiency in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. We study the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in these two EU Member States through the prism of the Europe 2020 strategy and the 3 × 20 climate and energy package and economic growth (represented by the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) that allows to measure the national dynamics and provide cross-country comparisons) without attributing specific attention to issues such as the electrification of transport or heating, and thence leaving them outside the scope of this paper. Both Czech Republic and Slovakia are two post-Communist countries that still face the consequences of economic transformation and struggle with the optimal management of natural resources. Both countries encountered profound system transformation after 1989 that are apparent in all three measures of sustainable development used in our study. We show that it is unlikely that the planned incre... [more]

The aim of this article is to provide an overview of greenhouse gas emission reduction potentials for 2030 based on the assessment of detailed sectoral studies. The overview updates a previous assessment that dates back more than ten years. We find a total emission reduction potential of 30−36 GtCO2e compared to a current-policies baseline of 61 GtCO2e. The energy production and conversion sector is responsible for about one third of this potential and the agriculture, buildings, forestry, industry, and transport sectors all contribute substantially to the total potential. The potential for 2030 is enough to bridge the gap towards emissions pathways that are compatible with a maximum global temperature rise of 1.5−2 °C compared to preindustrial levels.

With the continuous implementation of a plan for reconstruction of “Beautiful Countryside” in China, the rural environment and appearance of rural houses have been significantly improved. However, those houses in cold areas of China have great trouble with indoor temperature and heating-related energy consumption. After investigating the current situation of the layout, building envelope, indoor temperature, and energy consumption of the rural houses renovated by the plan of “Beautiful Countryside” in Shandong Province, this paper puts forward the improvement measures of raising indoor temperature and reducing energy consumption. On this basis, a typical rural house was selected, and DesignBuilder was utilized to simulate the effects before and after the application of different renovation measures for this house. The results show that the main way to raise indoor temperature and reduce energy consumption is to improve the thermal insulation performance of the building envelope, includ... [more]

The lower cost of sensors is making possible the acquisition of big data sets in several applications and research areas. Indoor air quality and commuter exposure to pollutants are some of these areas, which can have impacts on our livelihood. The main objective of this exploratory research was to assemble portable equipment along with a prototype, one low-cost and easy to replicate in any location worldwide. We answer how CO2, noise and energy expenditure compare in different transportation modes with indoor environments (metro, bus and car). It was intended to be carried by a subject on all commutes. The low-cost equipment assembled has the ability to measure ambient CO2, noise levels, heart rate and geographic coordinates. The field campaign was conducted on an urban commuting route, in Lisbon city, between Rossio (downtown of Lisbon city) and Campo Grande (near FCUL campus). It took place during 3 weeks in school break and 3 weeks in the school period to grasp some differences betw... [more]

The origin of the organic-rich shale in the Upper Ordovician Wufeng Formation and Lower Silurian Longmaxi Formation is complex and controversial. This paper reports the geochemical data of Wufeng-Longmaxi Formations in the Upper Yangtze region to restore the paleoenvironment and explore the accumulation mechanism of organic matter. The total organic carbon (TOC) content of the Wufeng Formation was relatively high, with an average of 2.86%. The Lower Longmaxi Formation showed the highest TOC content, with an average of 3.99%, and the upper part was a continuously low value with an average of 1.22%. The paleoproductivity proxies (Babio, Cu/Al, Ni/Al, Siexcess) showed that in the Katian and Rhuddanian-Aeronian Stages, the Upper Yangtze Sea had high primary productivity, indicating that organic matter accumulation was more affected by terrigenous influx and redox conditions. Al, Zr, and Zr/Al indicated that terrigenous influx was relatively high in the Kaitian-Hirnantian Stages, it was at... [more]

The enhancement of the financial sector significantly drives a nation’s economy and thereby increase energy intensity. Considering this situation, the current study aims to examine the link between globalization and financial advancements with the energy intensity of the top 5 ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) economies. The development structure of the ASEAN region is considered significant for having stable growth. The authors used the annual data from 1990 to 2018 for five of the largest ASEAN economies: Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines. The present study used novel methodology, the Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS), to examine the nonlinear behaviour among globalization, financial development, and energy intensity in the top 5 ASEAN countries. The study results using ANFIS confirm that globalization and financial development are positively correlated and have a significant impact on the energy intensity level in the top ASEAN co... [more]

Given the environmental footprints of the conventional agriculture, it is imperative to test and validate alternative production systems, with lower environmental impacts to mitigate and adapt our production systems. In this study, we identified six production systems, four in Italy and two in Denmark, to assess the environmental footprint for comparison among the production systems and additionally with conventional production systems. SimaPro 8.4 software was used to carry out the life cycle impact assessment. Among other indicators, three significantly important indicators, namely global warming potential, acidification, and eutrophication, were used as the proxy for life cycle impact assessment. In Italy, the production systems compared were silvopastoral, organic, traditional, and conventional olive production systems, whereas in Denmark, combined food and energy production system was compared with the conventional wheat production system. Among the six production systems, convent... [more]

The objective of this study is to develop (1) a pose-categorization model that classifies the poses of an occupant based on their image in an indoor space and (2) an activity-decision algorithm that identifies the activity being performed by the occupant. For developing an automated intelligent model, a deep neural network is adopted. The model considers the coordinates of the joints of the occupant in the image as input data and returns the pose of the occupant. Datasets composed of indoor images of home and office environments are used for training and testing the model. The training and testing accuracies of the optimized model were 100% for both the home and office environments. A representative activity of an occupant for a certain period has to be decided to control an indoor environment for comfort. The activity-decision algorithm employs a frequency-based method to determine the representative activity type for real-time occupant poses using the pose-categorization model. This... [more]

The industrial sector dominates the global energy consumption and carbon emissions in end use sectors, and it faces challenges in emission reductions to reach the Paris Agreement goals. This paper analyzes and quantifies the relationship between industrialization, energy systems, and carbon emissions. Firstly, it forecasts the global and regional industrialization trends under Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) and Shared Socioeconomic Pathway2 (SSP2) scenarios. Then, it projects the global and regional energy consumption that aligns with the industrialization trend, and optimizes the global energy supply system using the Model for Energy Supply Strategy Alternatives and their General Environmental Impact (MESSAGE) model for the industrial sector. Moreover, it develops an expanded Kaya identity to comprehensively investigate the drivers of industrial carbon emissions. In addition, it employs a Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index (LMDI) approach to track the historical contributions... [more]

The solar thermochemical fuel pathway offers the possibility to defossilize the transportation sector by producing renewable fuels that emit significantly less greenhouse gases than conventional fuels over the whole life cycle. Especially for the aviation sector, the availability of renewable liquid hydrocarbon fuels enables climate impact goals to be reached. In this paper, both the geographical potential and life-cycle fuel production costs are analyzed. The assessment of the geographical potential of solar thermochemical fuels excludes areas based on sustainability criteria such as competing land use, protected areas, slope, or shifting sands. On the remaining suitable areas, the production potential surpasses the current global jet fuel demand by a factor of more than fifty, enabling all but one country to cover its own demand. In many cases, a single country can even supply the world demand for jet fuel. A dedicated economic model expresses the life-cycle fuel production costs as... [more]

There are increasing traffic pollution issues in the process of urbanization in many countries; urban rail transit is low-carbon and widely regarded as an effective way to solve such problems. The passenger flow proportion of different transportation types is changing along with the adjustment of the urban traffic structure and a growing demand from passengers. The reduction of carbon emissions brought about by rail transit lacks specific quantitative research. Based on a travel survey of urban residents, this paper constructed a method of estimating carbon emissions from two different scenarios where rail transit is and is not available. This study uses the traditional four-stage model to forecast passenger volume demand at the city level and then obtains the basic target parameters for constructing the carbon emission reduction model, including the trip origin-destination (OD), mode, and corresponding distance range of different modes on the urban road network. This model was applied... [more]

In order to solve issues concerning performance induction and in-cylinder heat accumulation of a certain heavy-duty diesel engine in a plateau environment, working state parameters and performance indexes of diesel engine are calculated and optimized using the method of artificial neural network and genetic algorithm cycle multi-objective optimization. First, with an established diesel engine simulation model and an orthogonal experimental method, the influence rule of five performance indexes affected by five working state parameters are calculated and analyzed. Results indicate the first four of five working state parameters have a more prominent influence on those five performance indexes. Subsequently, further calculation generates correspondences among four working state parameters and five performance indexes with the method of radial basis function neural network. The predicted value of the trained neural network matches well with the original one. The approach can fulfill seria... [more]

The economic and environmental performance of a district heating (DH) system is to a great extent affected by the size and dynamic behavior of the DH load. By implementing energy efficiency measures (EEMs) to increase a building’s thermal performance and by performing cost-optimal energy renovation, the operation of the DH system will be altered. This study presents a systematic approach consisting of building categorization, life cycle cost (LCC) optimization, building energy simulation and energy system optimization procedures, investigating the profitability and environmental performance of cost-optimal energy renovation of a historic building district on the DH system. The results show that the proposed approach can successfully be used to predict the economic and environmental effects of cost-optimal energy renovation of a building district on the local DH system. The results revealed that the financial gains of the district are between 186 MSEK (23%) and 218 MSEK (27%) and the fi... [more]

Combustion characteristics were studied experimentally for single droplets of fuel slurries based on wet coal processing waste with municipal solid waste components (cardboard, plastic, rubber, and wood) and used turbine oil. We established the ignition delay time for three various groups of fuel compositions in motionless air at 600−1000 °C. The minimum values are 3 s, and the maximum ones are 25 s. The maximum temperatures in the droplet vicinity reach 1300 °C during fuel combustion for compositions with 10% of used oil. The combustion temperatures of fuel compositions without oil are 200−300 °C lower. The concentrations of anthropogenic emissions in flue gases do not exceed those from dry coal combustion. Adding used oils to composite fuels reduces the concentrations of dioxins and furans in flue gases when municipal solid waste in the fuel burns out due to high combustion temperatures. Based on the experimental research findings, we have elaborated a strategy of combined industrial... [more]

The photovoltaic (PV) sector has undergone both major expansion and evolution over the last decades, and currently, the technologies already marketed or still in the laboratory/research phase are numerous and very different. Likewise, in order to assess the energy and environmental impacts of these devices, life cycle assessment (LCA) studies related to these systems are always increasing. The objective of this paper is to summarize and update the current literature of LCA applied to different types of grid-connected PV, as well as to critically analyze the results related to energy and environmental impacts generated during the life cycle of PV technologies, from 1st generation (traditional silicon based) up to the third generation (innovative non-silicon based). Most of the results regarded energy indices like energy payback time, cumulative energy demand, and primary energy demand, while environmental indices were variable based on different scopes and impact assessment methods. Mor... [more]

Based on the European energy directives, the building sector has to provide comfortable levels for occupants with minimum energy consumption as well as to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This paper aims to compare the impact of climate change on the energy performance of residential buildings in order to derive potential design strategies. Different climate file inputs of Madrid have been used to quantify comparatively the thermal needs of two reference residential buildings located in this city. One of them represents buildings older than 40 years built according to the applicable Spanish regulations prior to 1979. The other refers to buildings erected in the last decade under more energy-restrictive constructive regulations. Three different climate databases of Madrid have been used to assess the impact of the evolution of the climate in recent years on the thermal demands of these two reference buildings. Two of them are typical meteorological years (TMY) derived from weather data... [more]

The purpose of this study is to explore how pro-environmental energy behavior is manifested at a military unit and what behavioral change factors can enhance such behavior. The military unit represents an organization dominated by an exceptionally strong sense of community and belonging where individual pro-environmental energy behavior goes in line with a collective one. The application of Capability-Opportunity-Motivation-Behavior (COM-B) approach led to a better understanding of energy-saving behavior in the military as an organization where personnel are trained to increase their awareness of their peers’ behavior. Methods: The results were obtained using data collected from two independent samples of both professional soldiers and conscripts at a military unit of Lithuanian defense forces located in a fixed installation in the time frame of 2018−2019. The total sample of respondents (professional soldiers and conscripts) was N = 454. A series of statistical tests were performed at... [more]

Personal light electric vehicles (PLEVs) are a phenomenon that can currently be observed in cities, intended to be an ecological form of transport. The authors of the paper make an attempt to determine electricity consumption by PLEVs in the context of managing a large city in accordance with the concept of sustainable development. The article is of a cognitive nature. Research questions posed against the background of the goal formulated are as follows: how strong will the demand for PLEVs be (in the example of e-motor scooters, taking into consideration the number of vehicles) and for the electricity consumed by PLEVs. The method used is a simulation model. The conducted analyses demonstrate that a dynamic growth of PLEVs will result in an increased energy demand, which must be taken into account by the cities, developing according to the sustainable development conception.