Can Pakistan’s environmental-related technologies (ERT) and nuclear and renewable energy mitigate environmental pollution? As global warming and climate change rise dramatically, economies shift to friendly energy substitutions and eco-friendly technologies, contributing to the mitigation of environmental contamination. In this scenario, policy and academic analysts have paid more concentration to renewable and nuclear energy deployment with ERT installation. To achieve this goal, the present study scrutinizes the asymmetric effects of nuclear energy, renewable energy, and ERT on the ecological footprint of Pakistan. The current research applies a novel non-linear autoregressive distributive lag method from 1991 to 2020. The results of the current analysis show that negative changes in nuclear energy increase emissions levels in the long run, while positive and negative changes in renewable energy deployment significantly overcome the burden on the environment. Similarly, positive and... [more]

Low permeability tight gas resources account for 90% of the Xihu Sag. Under the background of extensive development of low permeability and tight reservoirs, the key to economic and effective development is to find sweet reservoir formation. To clarify the origin and distribution of a sweet reservoir in the study area, it is important to study the formation and evolution mechanisms of chlorite. In this study, based on the analysis of thin section, X-ray diffraction and SEM, through the analysis of the key factors in the formation of authigenic chlorite of the Huagang Formation in the middle and north of the central inversion structural belt, we reasoned the formation and evolution process of chlorite in the whole life cycle. According to the sedimentary diagenetic response characteristics of chlorite, two types of favorable sedimentary facies belts of chlorite are identified. The results showed that the development of pore-lined chlorite is a natural advantage of reservoirs in the East... [more]

Energy security could be jointly maintained through the cooperation of different countries or regions. In this circumstance, there has been a large number of energy-related international investment studies. However, the existing academic literature lacks a systematic scientometric analysis of this research topic, so this paper will fill this gap. Using CiteSpace, VOSviewer, and HisCite, this paper analyzes 1014 articles published in the WoS SSCI Collection from January 1998 to March 2022 on the energy-related international investment. This paper comprehensively analyzes this field from four evolutionary dimensions. In the discipline and mainstream journals dimension, the largest change lies in the fact that more than three different disciplines flow into mathematics, while the journal “Environmental Science and Pollution Research” shows a dramatic growth in relevant publications after 2015. Keyword evolution shows a gradual deepening emphasis from attracting energy-related internationa... [more]

Buildings worldwide use a large amount of energy and, hence, contribute to increasing the level of greenhouse gases emission (GHG). It was realized that most electrical energy is used in buildings for heating, cooling, and ventilation purposes. To deal with environmental issues, the concepts of renewable energies and clean or green energy sources have been a part of academic discussions. A review of the literature unveils that most of the prior research in the GHG domain focused on the production side of producing renewable energy by opting for different cleaner energy sources (for example, solar energy). Although such studies have contributed significantly to advancing the field, it is also important to change the energy consumption behavior at the level of individuals for decarbonization. However, such a debate to promote the pro-environmental behavior (PEB) of employees from the perspective of energy consumption remains an understudied area. Against this backdrop, this research was... [more]

Atmospheric environmental quality affects the high quality and sustainable development of the economy. The optimisation and upgrading of the industrial system are important to improve the operation efficiency of the economy and society. Firstly, this paper constructs the theoretical analysis framework of coupling and coordination between the atmospheric environment system and the industrial system and analyses the internal mechanism of the interaction and coordinated development of the two systems. Then, it puts forward the combination of the coupling coordination model and the VAR model (Vector autoregressive model) and presents the analysis and evaluation method of the relationship between them from the two perspectives of “static” and “dynamic”. Finally, the empirical study is conducted in Taiyuan, a resource-based city in China. The results show that: (1) The two systems in Taiyuan have an obvious interaction and develop in the direction of benign coupling. (2) The impact of the tw... [more]

Beach-bar reservoirs have been promising hydrocarbon-bearing exploration advances in the Beibuwan Basin, especially in the WZ12-2 area within the Weixinan sag. The sedimentary characteristics, distribution and formation mechanisms of beach-bar sand bodies in Mbr2 (Member 2) of the Paleogene Liushagang Fm. in the WZ12-2 area within the Weixinan sag were analyzed based on well-log, seismic and core data on thin section and heavy mineral data. Mbr2 in the WZ12-2 area comprises a third-order sequence, which consists of three systems tracts (lowstand systems tract, transgressive systems tract and a locally developed highstand systems tract). Thick beach-bar sand bodies are developed in the WZ12-2 area during the lowstand systems tract stage. The formation of sandy beach-bar sand bodies can be divided into five stages. By integrating lithology, mineral composition, sedimentary structures and geophysical characteristics, it can be concluded that the beach-bar sand bodies in the study area wer... [more]

In recent decades, China’s cement production has been the highest in the world, but the extensive development model, which has been formed for a long time, has brought serious damage to the natural environment. In order to promote the transformation of the production mode of China’s cement industry, this paper adopts the nonparametric frontier method to analyze the environmental efficiency of China’s cement manufacturing industry using the input−output and pollutant emission data of China’s cement manufacturing industry from 2004 to 2016. The results show that the overall environmental efficiency of China’s cement industry is low, and there is still much room for improvement. Moreover, there are serious imbalances from very low to very high between different regions. Further investigation found that during the study period, strict environmental supervision brought an average compliance cost of CNY 23.41 billion to China’s cement manufacturing industry, but the overall environmental eff... [more]

The global climate, ecological, and energy crisis has increased the interest in the green economy (GE) concept that aims to resolve environmental problems while promoting economic growth, social stabilization, and creating favorable conditions for sustainable economic growth. The implementation of GE solutions requires an assessment system for evaluating the extent to which business operations are consistent with GE principles. In this study, the environmental, economic, and social dimensions of the quality of life were identified, and agricultural factors were considered to determine the progress in the implementation of GE principles. The correlation between the success of GE implementation and the utilization of environmental funding provided by the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) was analyzed. A composite GE index composed of 19 variables was developed for this purpose with the use of Hellwig’s taxonomic measure of development. The strength of the correlation between GE implementa... [more]

Gaseous sulfur compounds are emitted from many facilities, such as wastewater facilities or biomass power plants, due to the decay of organic compounds. Gaseous dimethyl sulfide removal by ozone catalytic oxidation was investigated in this study. A Vacuum-Ultra-Violet (VUV) xenon excimer lamp of 172 nm was used for ozone generation without NOx generation, and activated carbon impregnated with iodic acid and H2SO4 was utilized as a catalyst. Performance assessment of dimethyl sulfide removal ability was carried out by a dynamic adsorption experiment. Empty-Bed-Contact-Time (EBCT), superficial velocity, concentration of dimethyl sulfide, temperature and humidity were set at 0.48 s, 0.15 m/s, 3.0 ppm, 25 °C and 45%, respectively. Without ozone addition, the adsorption capacity of impregnated activated carbon was 0.01 kg/kg. When ozone of 7.5 ppm was added, the adsorption capacity of impregnated activated carbon was increased to 0.15 kg/kg. Methane sulfonic acid, a reaction product of dime... [more]

South Korea announced an energy transition roadmap, CO2 roadmap, and national greenhouse gas reduction target of nationally determined contribution (NDC) for the Paris Agreement. Furthermore, the government has also set a goal of reducing its CO2 emissions to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Additionally, the Korean government submitted an enhanced update of the first NDC at the end of 2021. In the electricity sector, the updated NDC proposed the GHG emissions target of 149.9 million tons in 2030. In this study, we model eight scenarios based on future energy mix and demand forecast considering the government’s latest plans to evaluate the possible emission reduction and impacts in the electricity sector. The scenario-based analysis is conducted to check whether it can satisfy the CO2 reduction target by using PLEXOS, a production simulation model. The results show that emission reduction targets are difficult to accomplish in the short term and can lead to significant changes... [more]

Modern observations and geological records suggest that anthropogenic ocean warming could destabilise marine methane hydrate, resulting in methane release from the seafloor to the ocean-atmosphere, and potentially triggering a positive feedback on global temperature. On the decadal to millennial timescales over which hydrate-sourced methane release is hypothesized to occur, several processes consuming methane below and above the seafloor have the potential to slow, reduce or even prevent such release. Yet, the modulating effect of these processes on seafloor methane emissions remains poorly quantified, and the full impact of benthic methane consumption on ocean carbon chemistry is still to be explored. In this review, we document the dynamic interplay between hydrate thermodynamics, benthic transport and biogeochemical reaction processes, that ultimately determines the impact of hydrate destabilisation on seafloor methane emissions and the ocean carbon cycle. Then, we provide an overvi... [more]

Consolidation with European social, economic and environmental programmes in the framework of Ukraine’s integration into the European energy space has become extremely important given the growing threats to energy security and should become the basis for greening regional and national innovation systems in the context of decarbonisation, the minimisation of carbon emissions and the transition to alternative energy sources. The comparison of the regions of the country by the level of enterprise innovation and the extrapolation of these results to the share of such enterprises in the total number of industrial entities in the regions helped identify their lack of correlation and emphasised the lack of stable dependence between industrial development and innovation activity. The methodology of the article includes a number of general scientific, special and interdisciplinary methods that allowed the screening of areas for the most favourable economic development, taking into account the s... [more]

Passive infrared optical gas imaging (IOGI) is sensitive to toxic or greenhouse gases of interest, offers non-invasive remote sensing, and provides the capability for spatially resolved measurements. It has been broadly applied to emission detection, localization, and visualization; however, emission quantification is a long-standing challenge for passive IOGI. In order to facilitate the development of quantitative IOGI, in this review, we summarize theoretical findings suggesting that a single pixel value does not provide sufficient information for quantification and then we proceed to collect, organize, and summarize effective and potential methods that can support IOGI to quantify column density, concentration, and emission rate. Along the way, we highlight the potential of the strong coupling of artificial intelligence (AI) with quantitative IOGI in all aspects, which substantially enhances the feasibility, performance, and agility of quantitative IOGI, and alleviates its heavy rel... [more]

In order to study the strong electromagnetic pulse effect of critically vulnerable equipment in power systems and evaluate the survivability under high-altitude electromagnetic pulses, it is necessary to study the characteristics of the transient response of metal oxide arresters to the high-altitude electromagnetic pulse by experiment. In this paper, an experimental platform for high-altitude electromagnetic pulse conduction current injection for a typical 10 kV metal oxide arrester was set up, and the key parameters such as peak value of overshoot voltage, peak value of residual voltage, action voltage and response time were obtained by the experiment. The results show that: the action voltage of this type of metal oxide arrester is 3.53 times higher than that of its rated voltage; the peak value of overshoot voltage is 2.19 times that of the peak value of residual voltage under lightning impulse current; the peak value of residual voltage is 1.57 times that under lightning impulse;... [more]

In this paper, an attempt is undertaken to identify the acoustic signature of railway vehicles travelling at 200 km/h. In the framework of conducted experimental research, test fields were determined, measurement apparatus was selected and a methodology for making measurements was specified, including the assessment of noise emission on curved and straight track for electric multiple units of Alstom type ETR610-series ED250, the so-called Pendolino. The measurements were made with the use of an acoustic camera and a 4 × 2 microphone array, including four equipped measurement points and two microphones located at the level of the head of the rail and at a height of 4 m above this level. As a result of the conducted experimental research, the dominant noise sources were identified and amplitude−frequency characteristics for these sources were determined by dividing the spectrum into one-third octave bands in the range from 20 Hz to 20 kHz. The paper also considers issues related to the v... [more]

A vessel of a laboratory setup for hosting molten alkali carbonate immersion experiments was recently decommissioned after about 4000 h discontinuous operation at 800 °C. In this article, we want to describe the long-term damage of the vessel caused by evaporated alkali carbonate species in a carbon dioxide gas environment. The vessel is made of alloy 253MA and coated by an aluminum powder pack diffusion process. The degree of material loss and internal degradation did not correlate with the temperature profile across the vessel but rather with the vicinity to the gas and salt evaporation source. One millimeter of the vessel’s initial 5 mm wall thickness was completely consumed at the strongest attacked location plus another 800 µm of internal attack beneath the metal−oxide interface.

The Jizhong depression contains several geothermal reservoirs that are characterized by localized low-velocity anomalies. In this article, full-waveform inversion (FWI) is used to characterize these anomalies and determine their extent. This is a challenging problem because the reservoirs are quite small and the available data have usable frequencies only down to 5 Hz. An accurate-enough starting model is carefully built by using an iterative travel time tomography method combined with a cycle-skipping assessment method to begin the inversion at 5 Hz. A multiscale Laplace−Fourier-domain FWI with a layer-stripping approach is implemented on the starting model by gradually increasing the maximum offset. The result of overlapping the recovered velocity model on the migrated seismic profile shows a good correlation between the two results. The recovered model is assessed by ray tracing, synthetic seismogram modeling, checkerboard testing and comparisons with nearby borehole data. These tes... [more]

The Huainan Coalfield is a typical multi-coal seam coalfield. In order to systematically investigate the distribution, occurrence, and integration of arsenic (As) in Shanxi coal, 26 coal samples and three rock samples were collected in the No. 1 coal seam of Huainan coalfield. The minerals, major element oxides, and As were analyzed by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), polarized light microscopy, X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (XRF) and inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The results indicated that the coals of Shanxi Formation were characterized by very low ash yields and low total sulfur contents. The identified minerals by XRD in the studied coals are dominated by kaolinite, quartz, calcite, and a lesser amount of pyrite. The As content ranges from 10.33 mg/kg to 95.03 mg/kg, with an average of 44.74 mg/kg. Compared with world coals, the studied coals have higher contents of As, which are characterized by enrichment. Based on statistica... [more]

The emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases through electricity consumption by firms is one of the significant drivers of climate change. The performance of a firm’s environmental programme is to a large extent dependent on employee behaviour. Drawing on the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB), the study tested a theoretical model that incorporates benefits and leadership as antecedents of attitude towards electricity saving by the employees of small firms in the hospitality sector. The effects of five benefits (intrinsic, extrinsic, organisational, social, and environmental) and two leadership factors (leadership behaviour and leadership support) were examined. Investigating the antecedents of TPB constructs can help in understanding the process through which the constructs are associated with intention. In addition, the moderating effect of green psychological climate in the relationship between intention and electricity saving behaviour was examined. The study used the q... [more]

The Vestnesa Ridge, located off the west Svalbard margin, is a >60 km long ridge consisting of fine-grained sediments that host a deep-marine gas hydrate and associated seepage system. Geological and geophysical observations indicate the predominance of vertical fluid expulsion through fractures with pockmarks expressed on the seafloor along the entire ridge. However, despite the apparent evidence for an extended free gas zone (FGZ) below the base of the gas hydrate stability zone (BGHSZ), present-day seafloor seepage has been confirmed only on the eastern half of the sedimentary ridge. In this study, we combine the relationships between aqueous phase pressure, capillary pressure, sediment clay fraction, porosity, and total stress to simulate how much gas is required to open preexisting fractures from the BGHSZ towards the seafloor. Data from four specific sites with different lithology and pressure regime along the ridge are used to constrain the simulations. Results demonstrate that... [more]

The analysis of the implementation effect of the supply-side reform (SSR) in the industrial sector of China’s provinces and the reasons behind them are of great significance for China to formulate relevant policies in the future. However, this work has not yet been carried out. Industrial development performance is closely related to energy and environmental efficiency (EEE), and the effect of the SSR implementation is directly reflected in EEE. This study fills this gap by analyzing the EEE of 30 provinces in China from 2012 to 2017 using data envelopment analysis and Malmquist index methods. The results show that the positive effect of China’s implementation of SSR has emerged. This positive effect is mainly reflected in the implementation of measures such as reducing overcapacity, which has promoted the technological innovation of enterprises. However, the low management level and resource-allocation efficiency hinder the further improvement of the implementation effect of the SSR,... [more]

In order to achieve the European Union’s climate and energy goals, investments are required, mainly in the areas of energy efficiency, renewable energy sources and infrastructure. Buildings are responsible for almost half of total energy consumption, and nearly 80% of them are energy and ecologically inefficient. The policy of European countries is increasingly more focused on facilities with the highest potential in the areas of energy and matter saving and the possibly circular economy. The aim of the work was to assess the environmental loads occurring in the life cycle of an existing retail and service building. The analysis was performed using the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) method. By using the IMPACT 2002+ model, it has become possible to assess the impact of the life cycle of the studied facility on human health, environmental quality, climate change and raw material resources. The highest level of negative consequences in the above-mentioned areas was recorded for the life cyc... [more]

Because generating electricity significantly contributes to global greenhouse gas emissions, meeting the 2015 Paris Agreement and 2021 Glasgow Climate Pact requires rapidly transitioning to zero or low-emissions electricity grids. Though the installation of renewables-based generators—predominantly wind and solar-based systems—is accelerating worldwide, electrical energy storage systems, such as pumped storage hydropower, are needed to balance their weather-dependent output. The authors of this paper are the first to examine the status and potential for pumped storage hydropower development in 24 Pacific Rim economies (the 21 member economies of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation plus Cambodia, Lao PDR, and Myanmar). We show that there is 195 times the pumped storage hydropower potential in the 24 target economies as would be required to support 100% renewables-based electricity grids. Further to the electrical energy storage potential, we show that pumped storage hydropower is a lo... [more]

Considering increasingly ambitious pledges by countries and various forms of pressure from current international constellations, society, investors, and clients further up the supply chain, the question for companies is not so much whether to take decarbonisation action, but what action and by when. However, determining an ideal mix of measures to apply ‘decarbonisation efficiency’ requires more than knowledge of technically feasible measures and how to combine them to achieve the most economic outcome: In this paper, working in a ‘backcasting’ manner, the author describes seven aspects which heavily influence the composition of an ‘ideal mix’ that executive leadership needs to take a (strategic) position on. Contrary to previous studies, these aspects consider underlying motivations and span across (socio-)economic, technical, regulatory, strategic, corporate culture, and environmental factors and further underline the necessity of clarity of definitions. How these decisions influence... [more]

Building system operation faces the challenge of reducing energy use and implementing a demand response, which can be defined as a temporary modification in energy loads affecting dynamic energy price and reliability information. The heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) system in buildings provides an opportunity for implementing demand response strategies due to the thermal inertia in building zones. However, an HVAC-based demand response is not a prevalent strategy in actual facility management due to the lack of understanding among building operators of their facilities and occupants. Herein, we focus on developing a better understanding of the occupant side by obtaining a reliable prediction of occupants’ thermal satisfaction. We evaluate the prediction performance of a probabilistic model provided in our previous paper using a case study with a subset of the ASHRAE Global Thermal Comfort Database II. The influence of a better prediction of thermal satisfaction on the... [more]