Raising the bar on the type, size and timeline of a 'successful' decoupling

Peer reviewe

Decoupling for ecological sustainability : A categorisation and review of research literature

The idea of decoupling "environmental bads" from "economic goods" has been proposed as a path towards sustainability by organizations such as the OECD and UN. Scientific consensus reports on environmental impacts (e.g., greenhouse gas emissions) and resource use give an indication of the kind of decoupling needed for ecological sustainability: global, absolute, fast-enough and long-enough. This goal gives grounds for a categorisation of the different kinds of decoupling, with regard to their relevance. We conducted a survey of recent (1990-2019) research on decoupling on Web of Science and reviewed the results in the research according to the categorisation. The reviewed 179 articles contain evidence of absolute impact decoupling, especially between CO2 (and SOX) emissions and evidence on geographically limited (national level) cases of absolute decoupling of land and blue water use from GDP, but not of economy-wide resource decoupling, neither on national nor international scales. Evidence of the needed absolute global fast-enough decoupling is missing.Peer reviewe

Sectoral low-carbon roadmaps and the role of forest biomass in Finland's carbon neutrality 2035 target

As a part of its climate policy, Finnish government facilitated the creation of low-carbon roadmaps by sectors of industry. The roadmap process and the roadmaps were promoted as an international benchmark in COP26. They also form a part of the policy process towards the government's goal of carbon neutrality by 2035. We analyse the need and role of biomass use contained in the roadmaps of the key sectors and compare it to data on available forest biomass. The combined need for forest biomass in the roadmaps is well over 140 Mm(3), which is over double that of the logging level in 2019, and drastically over the roadmaps' projection of future sustainable yield. This creates a challenge for the carbon neutrality goal via the loss of carbon sinks in forests, risking the carbon neutrality target and other sustainability goals. Although, up to date, the roadmaps present the most detailed picture of industrial transformation towards carbon neutrality in an EU member state, they are made unrealistic by the omission of a comprehensive material perspective. The addition of such a perspective and a clear setting of boundaries would increase the viability of the roadmaps as a policy tool.Peer reviewe

The unitary Fermi gas at finite temperature: Momentum distribution and contact

The Unitary Fermi Gas (UFG) is one of the most strongly interacting systems known to date, as it saturates the unitarity bound on the quantum mechanical scattering cross section. The UFG corresponds to a two-component Fermi gas in the limit of short interaction range and large scattering length, and is currently realized in ultracold-atom experiments via Feshbach resonances. While easy to define, the UFG poses a challenging quantum many-body problem, as it lacks any characteristic scale other than the density. As a consequence, accurate quantitative predictions of the thermodynamic properties of the UFG require Monte Carlo calculations. However, significant progress has also been made with purely analytical methods. Notably, in 2005 Tan derived a set of exact thermodynamic relations in which a universal quantity known as the "contact" C plays a crucial role. Recently, C has also been found to determine the prefactor of the high- frequency power-law decay of correlators as well as the right-hand-sides of shear- and bulk viscosity sum rules. The contact is therefore a central piece of information on the UFG in equilibrium as well as away from equilibrium. In this talk we describe some of the known aspects of Fermi gases at and around unitarity, show our latest Monte Carlo results for the contact at finite temperature, and summarize the open questions in the field, some of which we are starting to answer using large-scale Monte Carlo calculations by adapting methods from Lattice QCD

Momentum distribution and contact of the unitary Fermi gas

We calculate the momentum distribution n(k) of the unitary Fermi gas by using quantum Monte Carlo calculations at finite temperature T/εF as well as in the ground state. At large momenta k/k F, we find that n(k) falls off as C/k4, in agreement with the Tan relations. From the asymptotics of n(k), we determine the contact C as a function of T/εF and present a comparison with theory. At low T/εF, we find that C increases with temperature, and we tentatively identify a maximum around T/εF0.4. Our calculations are performed on lattices of spatial extent up to Nx=14 with a particle number per unit volume of 0.03-0.07

A Lot of Talk, But Little Action : The Blind Spots of Nordic Environmental Security Policy

Despite an increasing recognition that environmental change may have implications for security, there only are few policies to address the issue. This article will look at environmental security policies in Finland and Sweden and propose ways to develop more effective measures. It relies on a three-level framework that aims to enable the identification of environmental security impacts by categorising them into local, geopolitical and structural ones. The article will examine present environmental security strategies and policies in Finland and Sweden, consider their efficacy for addressing various kinds of impacts and point out approaches that are currently missing. Based on the discussion, it argues that a comprehensive policy approach is needed to tackle environmental security impacts. This requires closer coordination and interchange between sectors as well as strategic intent. In addition, further research is needed on the structural impacts of mitigating and adapting to environmental change.Peer reviewe

Northern Warning Lights: Ambiguities of Environmental Security in Finland and Sweden

As the literature on environmental security has evolved and widened, knowledge of the full range of potential consequences of environmental change for different societies remains scattered. This article contributes to a more comprehensive approach to the implications of environmental change by providing a three-level framework of the security impacts. In particular, it will address gaps in knowledge by pointing out the relevance of geopolitical and structural factors behind environmental security impacts. The article will focus on the cases of two countries, Finland and Sweden—both seen as stable, high-income democracies that are well equipped to adapt to climate risks. Yet even under these conditions, preparedness to threat-prevention will not follow without a recognition of the full range of risks, including ones that are linked to socio-economic and geopolitical factors. On the basis of the Finnish and Swedish cases, the article proposes an analytical framework of three categories of environmental security impacts: local, geopolitical and structural

Improved Analysis of J/psi Decays into a Vector Meson and Two Pseudoscalars

Recently, the BES collaboration has published an extensive partial wave analysis of experimental data on J/psi -> phi pi+pi-, J/psi -> omega pi+pi-, J/psi -> phi K+K- and J/psi -> omega K+K-. These new results are analyzed here, with full account of detection efficiencies, in the framework of a chiral unitary description with coupled-channel final state interactions between pi-pi and K-bar K pairs. The emission of a dimeson pair is described in terms of the strange and nonstrange scalar form factors of the pion and the kaon, which include the final state interaction and are constrained by unitarity and by matching to the next-to-leading-order chiral expressions. This procedure allows for a calculation of the S-wave component of the dimeson spectrum including the f_0(980) resonance, and for an estimation of the low-energy constants of Chiral Perturbation Theory, in particular the large N_c suppressed constants L_4^r and L_6^r. The decays in question are also sensitive to physics associated with OZI violation in the 0++ channel. It is found that the S-wave contributions to phi pi+pi-, phi K+K- and omega pi+pi- given by the BES partial-wave analysis may be very well fitted up to a dimeson center-of-mass energy of ~1.2 GeV, for a large and positive value of L_4^r and a value of L_6^r compatible with zero. An accurate determination of the amount of OZI violation in the J/psi -> phi pi+pi- decay is achieved, and the S-wave contribution to omega K+K- near threshold is predicted.Comment: 18 pages, 6 figures, title changed, accepted version for PR

Co-Al spinel-based nanoparticles synthesized by flame spray pyrolysis for glycerol conversion

The catalytic properties of Co-Al spinel nanoparticles prepared by liquid-feed flame spray pyrolysis (L-F FSP) were investigated in the glycerol conversion in gas phase in an atmosphere of hydrogen. Reduction at 1123 K of the as-synthesized spinel nanoparticles induced the formation a new phase containing metallic cobalt species. Although, the reducibility of cobalt oxides is greatly decreased due to interaction with aluminium species, this strong interaction may prevent the aggregation of Co particles under the harsh reduction conditions. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) of the reduced spinel nanoparticles at 1123 K revealed that the Co/Al atomic ratio has decreased to Co/Al = 0.11, which may indicate a redistribution of the aluminum and cobalt species at the surface of the sample submitted to the reduction in a flow of hydrogen at 1123 K. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and high resolution electron microscopy (HRTEM) also reinforced the formation of metallic cobalt species after reduction of cobalt from the spinel nanoparticles at 1123 K. The main products obtained from the conversion of glycerol in the gas phase were hydroxyacetone, pyruvaldehyde, lactic acid and lactide. FSP ensured uniform dispersion of the active metal on a support material