Accelerating mitigation of climate change with sustainable development of energy, water and environment systems

Integrated approaches across energy, water and environment systems can accelerate the process of mitigating climate change through urgent action. New scientific advances that extend multiple opportunities in this direction have emanated from the 2nd Latin American, 1st Asia Pacific, 4th South East European and 15th Conferences on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems as represented in this editorial. The review of recent scientific advances connects the 27 research articles in this special issue with those of other researchers based on eight main themes. The first two themes relate to system flexibility for renewable energy penetration and urban solutions in the energy transition. The foci of these themes include enabling energy system flexibility, climate neutral islands, electrification solutions, optimizing urban energy systems, spatiotemporal modelling of heat demand and smart energy hubs. The next three themes relate to solar energy technologies, hydrokinetic, wind and osmotic innovations as well as bioenergy and combustion modelling. These themes include new advances for predicting and monitoring photovoltaic module performance, thermochemical energy storage for concentrated solar options, artificial intelligence for wind energy, micro-cogeneration, and waste-water utilization. The last three themes relate to batteries and hydrogen energy advances, including sector coupling opportunities, optimizing heat exchangers and networks as well as solutions for redesigning sectors and repurposing post-mining reservoirs for energy storage. There are multi-disciplinary interrelations among these themes and each contribution will support the wide-ranging opportunities for realizing the European Climate Law and any other similar targets around the world for sustaining planetary life-support systems on which sustainable development depends

Advancements in sustainable development of energy, water and environment systems

The integration of sectors for more sustainable systems and processes provide a multi-disciplinary research domain to which researchers are contributing with intense motivation in the context of urgency for addressing global climate change. The 26 papers in the current special issue of the 12th Conference on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems represent a pursuit of excellence for leading related advancements. This editorial contains a review of these advances with a focus on the themes of effective valorisation of bioenergy resources, energy-water nexus in wastewater treatment processes, optimized local energy supply for efficient and clean systems, solar energy technologies for the energy transition, and technologies for efficient combustion and electric transport. Other themes are alternative and cross-cutting technologies for the energy system in addition to analyses of thermal energy recovery and heat transfer. Significant contributions under these themes relate to biomass residues and biogas upgrading processes, novel renewable energy and performance comparisons in the wastewater sector, efficient micro-cogeneration, polygeneration and load sharing approaches, clustering techniques in district heating networks as well as hybrid and concentrated solar power systems. Control strategies for latent energy storage, aging processes in battery packs, engine knock occurrence and coupled numerical engine modelling, fuel blends with nanoparticle additives, utilization of flue gas, soot formation in plastic waste pyrolysis, high altitude wind energy systems as well as exergy analyses for heat and cold recovery and reverse electrodialysis are other key contributions. The advances are expected to enable more sustainable energy conversion and management processes in a time when an integrated approach is nothing less than essential to maintain a coherent and liveable Planet

Advances in integration of energy, water and environment systems towards climate neutrality for sustainable development

The integration of energy, water and environment systems represents important opportunities for addressing the urgent imperative of climate neutrality. The 29 original papers in the virtual special issue of the 14th Conference on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems exemplify multiple advances in integrated approaches. This editorial provides a review of recent scientific contributions in energy system integration, urban synergies in the energy transition, integration of energy and water systems as well as valorization of waste heat. Advances that relate to sustainable combustion, biomass, and managing emissions provide further perspectives. All seven themes contain new research directions in such areas as solar energy technologies, thermal energy storage, power-to-X technologies, district heating and cooling networks, wastewater treatment plants, water desalination, and salinity gradient technologies. Advanced optimization approaches, big data analytics for cogeneration, thermal management applications, pollution minimization, lignocellulosic biomass, catalysts for alternative fuels as well as carbon capture, storage and utilization are described among other scientific contributions. Across the world, the focus on integration is gaining prominence, especially with the European Union Strategy on Energy System Integration that recognizes the role of a coordinated approach for planning and operating the energy system as a whole. The research advances that are contained in this editorial will support the realization of a coherent approach on the path towards sustaining the life-support systems of the planet and thereby support sustainable development

Integrated approach for sustainable development of energy, water and environment systems

The Conferences on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems (SDEWES) at the beginning of the 21st century have become a significant venue for researchers to meet, and initiate, discuss, share, and disseminate new ideas in various disciplines of sustainable development. In 2002, the first conference was organised in Dubrovnik, Croatia and since then, 10 more successful conferences were realised. Following the success of international conferences in Dubrovnik, the organizing committees decided to organize the main conference and regional conferences all over the world in even years. In 2016, the second regional SDEWES conference, namely the 2nd South East European Conference on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems, was held June 15-18 in Piran/Portorose, Slovenia while the 11th SDEWES conference was organised in Lisbon, Portugal on September 4-8. There were 10 special sessions dedicated to various sustain ability topics organised in both conferences

Sustainable development of energy, water and environment systems for future energy technologies and concepts

The Conferences on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems - SDEWES conferences at the beginning of the 21st century become a significant venue for researchers to meet, and initiate, discuss, share, and disseminate new ideas in various disciplines of sustainable development. In 2002, the first conference was organised in Dubrovnik, Croatia and following the tradition for odd years, the 10th SDEWES Conference again took place in Dubrovnik, Croatia from September 27th to October 2nd 2015. The total number of 1204 submitted abstracts resulted with 551 accepted manuscripts bringing 538 participants from 65 countries that participated in a number of oral and poster presentations, panels, invited lectures, and special events. Moreover, 17 special sessions were organised including 166 invited speakers

Research frontiers in sustainable development of energy, water and environment systems in a time of climate crisis

Sustainable energy conversion and management processes increasingly require an integrated approach, especially in the context of addressing the climate crisis. This editorial puts forth related research frontiers based on 28 research articles of the special issue that is dedicated to the 13th Conference on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems and regional series based on the 1st Latin American and 3rd South East European Conferences. Seven research frontiers are reviewed, the first three of which are (i) sustainable technologies for local energy systems, (ii) energy storage and advances in flexibility and (iii) solar energy penetration across multiple sectors. These research frontiers contain contributions based on renewable energy for waste-water treatment in islands, energy savings across urban built infrastructure, advanced district heating and cooling networks, power-to-gas and hydrogen production technologies, demand response in industrial systems, hybrid thermal energy storage, hybrid solar energy power plants, novel photovoltaic thermal technologies, and improved solar energy dispatchability. The research frontiers continue with (iv) wind, water based energy and the energy-water nexus, (v) effective valorization and upgrading of resources, (vi) combustion processes and better utilization of heat and (vii) carbon capture, storage and utilization. Significant contributions include innovative wind and hydrokinetic turbines, osmotic power technologies, synergetic solutions for water desalination, efficient catalytic pyrolysis, upgrading to reduce particle pollution, co-processing for alternative fuels, combustion characterization, electricity generation from waste heat sources, advances in heat exchangers and heat transfer, oxy-fuel combustion, post-combustion capture, and fly ash recycling for energy storage material. The research frontiers in this editorial provide ample opportunities to support societal transformations in the next decades to sustain planetary life-support systems

Waveforms for sub-THz 6G:design guidelines

Abstract The projected sub-THz (100 — 300 GHz) part of the upcoming 6G standard will require a careful design of the waveform and choice of slot structure. Not only that the design of the physical layer for 6G will be driven by ambitious system performance requirements, but also hardware limitations, specific to sub-THz frequencies, pose a fundamental design constraint for the waveform. In this contribution, general guidelines for the waveform design are given, together with a non-exhaustive list of exemplary waveforms that can be used to meet the design requirements