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AbstractClimate change effects along with anthropogenic activities present the main factors that threaten the existence of heritage sites across the north Nile Delta of Egypt close to the coastline of the Mediterranean Sea. Observing the changes in the landscape close to the archaeological sites is an important issue for decision‐makers in terms of reducing the negative impact of natural events and human activities. The coastal heritage sites are becoming strongly threatened by the rising sea level phenomena that will happen due to global warming. Focusing on the distribution of the archaeological sites, this study aims to detect the areas at risk of shoreline erosion or accretion in the northern shoreline of the Nile Delta. In this study, the changes in the northern shoreline of the Nile Delta were observed and calculated during the last hundred years based on the integration between the old topographic maps from surveys in 1900, 1925 and 1945, optical satellite images captured by Landsat in 1972, 1986 and 2000; Sentinel2 2021; and the Radar SRTM data. The results of this study showed that the changes were enormous with a great shoreline erosion process over the last 121 years recorded along the shoreline in the periods between 1900–1925, 1925–1945, 1945–1972, 1972–1986, 1986–2000 and 2000–2021. The areas eroded were about 5.3, 4.7, 5.6, 8.9, 2.5 and 5.4 km2, respectively. Such negative movements caused the loss of two heritage sites, and the expected changes will lead to the loss of additional heritage sites in the next 500 years. Furthermore, a model was suggested for protecting the coastal heritage sites threatened by the risk of submergence. This study can help the decision‐makers to detect the coastal archaeological sites at risk and create innovative solutions for protecting these irreplaceable heritage sites.

The morphology of built environments has a significant effect on human well-being. To match the emotional effect of natural environment, architects need to create connections with its stimuli. In Islamic architecture, and due to the strict prohibition of depictions of human and animal forms, geometry was the only appropriate tool to create these connections through tessellations, stalactites, and motifs that cascade without an end. This paper employs Christopher Alexander’s 15 properties of Art and Nature as a preliminary qualitative tool for analyzing the visual properties of Nasir El-Molk mosque to measure how far the architects succeeded in creating these connections. A numerical model by Nikos Salingaros was also employed for a quantitative measurement of these qualities. The paper concludes that the building's design was based on a thoughtful process focused on extracting the qualities of Creation and reproducing them in abstract compositions to give the building qualities of Nature and Life.

The sudden increase in the concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere due to the high dependency on fossil products has created the need for an urgent solution to mitigate this challenge. Global warming, which is a direct result of excessive CO2 emissions into the atmosphere, is one major issue that the world is trying to curb, especially in the 21st Century where most energy generation mediums operate using fossil products. This investigation considered a number of materials ideal for the capturing of CO2 in the post-combustion process. The application of aqueous ammonia, amine solutions, ionic liquids, and activated carbons is thoroughly discussed. Notable challenges are impeding their advancement, which are clearly expatiated in the report. Some merits and demerits of these technologies are also presented. Future research directions for each of these technologies are also analyzed and explained in detail. Furthermore, the impact of post-combustion CO2 capture on the circular economy is also presented.

Abstract The purpose of this work is two-fold. First, to introduce a comparison between steady state and dynamic test methods for two different collectors. Second, to design a solar water heating system to satisfy both hot water and space heating demands for a multi-family house in Alexandria, Egypt.

Purpose This study aims to investigate the interrelationships and elasticities between the production of renewable energy (RE) and three key variables: oil prices, gross domestic product (GDP) and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Design/methodology/approach The research uses panel data and time-series analyses for 10 developed and 16 emerging countries for the period 1976–2018, to identify panel and country-specific elasticity of RE production and dynamic causal relationships between these variables. The study uses an autoregressive distributed lag model to determine the long- and short-run dynamics between RE production and the three variables in each country. Findings Results show a long-run elasticity between RE and GDP, and short-run dynamics between RE and oil prices and CO2 emissions in the developed countries. Whereas in the emerging countries category, there were long-run relationships between RE and GDP, CO2 emissions and oil prices. Practical implications Results of this study are in fact crucial and can be applied in the drafting of resilience policies to tackle energy vulnerability as well as sustainable growth. The study results will inform and guide governments on the right policies to stimulate RE production in their own countries in the interests of both their national security and sustainable development globally. Originality/value This paper attempts to contribute to the literature in at least two ways. First, research on identifying common determining factors, including socioeconomic factors, in both emerging and advanced economies is considerably scarce. Most of the previous research in this field has focused only on the absolute value of RE production in a particular geographical area. Second, many studies have focused on RE consumption. This research differs from them by focusing on the production of RE. Thus, the main contribution of this study is to fill these gaps. The study also presents novel empirical evidence to determine RE production elasticity from 26 countries.

This paper investigates the effect of the physical location of the auxiliary source of energy in thermosyphon solar water heaters and shows that the performance of the system can be optimised with respect to the geometry of the system components. The investigation has been based on a domestic thermosyphon solar water heating system, which was simulated using the TRNSYS programme. The annual solar fraction of the system, at the weather and socioeconomic conditions of Cyprus, is, at best, approximately 77% with an in-tank auxiliary heater configuration and 86% with an external auxiliary heater. It is demonstrated that the arrangement with the external auxiliary unit has a higher collector efficiency and results in a higher annual solar fraction. In the case of in-tank auxiliary, the system performance increases with the height of the auxiliary position from the bottom of the storage tank; with the auxiliary at the bottom of the storage tank the annual solar fraction is approximately 59%, compared to 77% when the auxiliary is located at the top of the tank. The system performance also depends on the height of the collector return from the bottom of the tank.

Climate change adds extra stress on the current global situations and the regional development plans. Despite, Africa being rated the least among the continents contributing to the atmospheric pollution, it continues to be responsible for the least global emissions (estimated at 4%). Although they contributed to anthropogenic emission slightly, African continent is one of the highly vulnerable to impacts of long-term climate variability and extreme weather events, especially on the Nile. Moreover, developing countries are the most vulnerable to climate change impacts because they have fewer resources to adapt: socially, technologically and financially. Therefore, this paper is seeking to find and modify the regional development process in the frame of climate change along the Nile river. By considering some examples to accelerate the development process and methods in the Nile’s valley regions. Strongly related to the climate change impacts on different sectors and activities such agriculture, industry, energy, and the water supply and demand as well.

Despite the negative consequences on society and environment, urban freight transport is critical for the prosperity of cities. Decision makers have considered the horizontal collaboration between carriers as a solution to reduce the total transportation cost and the related negative impacts. In literature, the collaborative freight delivery is modelled as a Multi-Depot Vehicle Routing Problem (MDVRP) that can be solved by being decomposed into two sub-problems, i.e. assignment problem and a set of vehicle routing problems. The assignment problem allocates customers to the nearest depots while vehicle routing problem determines the optimal routes to serve customers assigned to each depot. However, most of existing approaches did not consider the interrelation between these two sub-problems, which in turn impairs the solution quality of the overall problem. This paper presents an improved two-level mathematical modelling approach to evaluate and optimize the implementation of the collaborative freight distribution in urban areas. Unlike existing studies, the proposed approach considers the interrelation among the two-sub problems. A real-life case is used to illustrate the savings obtained from the collaborative distribution. In addition, the significance of the proposed approach is demonstrated by a comparison against a similar approach found in literature.

Living organisms' energy conversion is considered as an essential and sustainable green energy source and future bio-hybrid technologies. Recently, plants were used after harvesting as biomass in bio-fermentation as an energy source. In bio-electrochemical systems, microorganisms work with plants to generate electricity, hydrogen, or methane. This work discusses the simultaneous pollutant removal and electricity generation in plant-based bio-electrochemical systems (P-BES). Factors affecting the P-BES performance and the removal efficiencies of the different organic and inorganic pollutants were illustrated. Furthermore, the plant-based bioelectrochemical systems' role in achieving the sustainable development goals (SDGs) was discussed. The SDGs contribution of plant-based bioelectrochemical systems were presented and discussed to evaluate such systems' ability to achieve the three pillars of sustainable development, i.e., economic, environmental, and social.