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The most significant thermal water resource in the Carpathian Basin can be found under the territory of the Hungarian-Serbian border, in the Szeged-Morahalom-Subotica triangle. The abstraction for extensive and complex utilization is currently being started on both sides of the border. For the safe and sustainable abstraction, and its international monitoring, it is necessary to determine the hydrogeological-hydrodynamic features of the common thermal water base, and to elaborate a two-phase 4D model of the water base for the mapping of the water resource and its gas content. FP7

Recent extreme weather events have resulted in an ongoing discussion on the issues of land use and compensation payments within Austrian agriculture. Building on a functional evaluation system for agricultural lands as developed within the Interreg IIIB project “ILUP”, the national project “Agriculture and Flooding” has as its goal to classify the flood-protection contribution and flood sensitivity of agricultural lands. This, in turn, enables the recommendation of targeted measures for potentially improving flood situations, as well as an estimate of their implementation costs. In addition to the digital soil map, other fundamental sources used for the project are the digital flood risk map, IACS land-use data and works by the Institute for Land and Water Management Research. Reference values and marginal returns sourced from the Federal Institute of Agricultural Economics also flow into the cost estimates for the recommended combination. The results will contribute to an understanding of the multifunctionality of agricultural lands and to the setting of priorities on a regional scale regarding packaged flood-prevention and damage-minimization. However, the results at hand can only serve as one step toward regional flood protection projects, whose development will require the cooperation of all interest groups.

Der prognostizierte Klimawandel wird auch den Wasserkreislauf beeinflussen. Das Ausmaß dieser Änderung frühzeitig zu bestimmen ist eine wichtige Aufgabe, da sie Grundlage notwendiger Entscheidungen ist. Dieses Ausmaß hängt allerdings stark von der Datenlage und den Methoden ab, mit denen an diese Aufgabe herangegangen wird. Selbst wenn die derzeit verwendeten Methoden stimmige Ergebnisse für den gegenwärtigen Klimazustand liefern, kann nicht davon ausgegangen werden, dass die mit diesen Methoden berechneten Ergebnisse auch für ein geändertes Klima Gültigkeit haben werden. Die Unsicherheiten der Vorhersagen sind teils meteorologischer, teils hydrologischer Herkunft. Während die Unsicherheiten der GCMs bereits bekannt und in der Diskussion sind, wurden die in diesem Kontext existierenden Probleme der hydrologischen Modelle bisher nur selten untersucht. Insbesondere die Unsicherheit in der Prozessbeschreibung innerhalb der hydrologischen Modelle muss genauer geprüft werden. In dieser Dissertation wurden verschiedene Beschreibungen des Evapotranspirationsprozesses (ET) untersucht, denn dieser Prozess wird durch den Klimawandel stark beeinflusst werden. Neun verschiedene ET-Modelle wurden ausgewählt und getestet. Anhand einer einfachen theoretischen Untersuchung zeigte sich, dass die ET-Modelle bereits auf eine geringfügige Änderung von nur einer Eingangsvariablen sehr unterschiedlich reagieren. Fraglich ist nun, wie sich die durch diese Modelle berechnete ET verändert, wenn die gesamten durch den Klimawandel hervorgerufenen Änderungen der Eingangsgrößen berücksichtigt werden. Dazu wurde ein auf dem HBV-Konzept basierendes räumlich verteiltes hydrologisches Modell aufgestellt und mit den aus den verschiedenen ET-Modellen resultierenden Ergebnissen als Input nacheinander gespeist. Die Modellierung wurde auf das Einzugsgebiet des Oberen Neckars (ca. 4000 km2) angewandt. Das Einzugsgebiet wurde in 13 Teileinzugsgebiete mit deutlichen Unterschieden eingeteilt. Die verschiedenen ET-Modelle wurden getestet, indem das hydrologische Modell auf klimatisch verschiedene Jahre geeicht und dann auf klimatisch entgegengesetzte Jahre ausgewertet wurde. Dazu wurden verschiedene Zeitreihen mit jeweils 10 klimatisch ähnlichen Jahren (10 kalte, 10 warme, 10 nasse und 10 trockene Jahre aus der Zeitreihe 1961-1990) zusammengestellt. Das hydrologische Modell wurde auf jeweils eine dieser Zeitreihen geeicht und anschließend folgendermaßen validiert. Im ersten Schritt wurde das Modell für dieselbe Zeitreihe ausgewertet, die auch für die Eichung verwendet worden war. Danach erfolgte die Auswertung auf die klimatisch entgegengesetzte Zeitreihe, beispielsweise wurde das Modell, dass auf die kalten Jahre geeicht worden war, nun hinsichtlich der erzielten Ergebnisse für die warmen Jahre untersucht. Eine geringe Abweichung der beiden Ergebnisse bedeutet eine gute Übertragbarkeit des Modells. Indem das Modell auch auf die kontinuierliche Zeitreihe 1991–2000 angewandt wurde, wurde die Übertragbarkeit zusätzlich getestet. Die Kalibrierung eines hydrologischen Modells, das den Einfluss eines Klimawandels bestimmen soll, stellt eine besondere Herausforderung dar - nicht nur bei der Auswahl von geeigneten Perioden für die Kalibrierung und die Validierung, sondern auch bei der Aufstellung einer geeigneten Zielfunktion. Eine gängige Zielfunktion ist die Nash-Sutcliffe-Effizienz. Die Güte des Modells wird dabei durch den Vergleich berechneter Werte mit beobachteten Werten ermittelt. Dieser Vergleich wird meist anhand von Tageswerten durchgeführt, was zu unerkannten systematischen Fehlern führen kann. In dem hier gewählten Ansatz wird ein auf Simulated-Annealing basierender Optimierungsalgorithmus vorgestellt, der zur Kalibrierung nicht nur Tageswerte, sondern zusätzlich auch Jahres- und Extremwerte in unterschiedlichen Kombinationen verwendet. Welche Kalibrierung sich am besten zur Bestimmung der Auswirkungen von Klimaänderungen eignet, wurde durch einen umfangreichen Vergleich der Ergebnisse festgestellt. Auch dabei wurden wieder unterschiedliche Zeitskalen verwendet: die Ergebnisse wurden nicht nur auf Tagesbasis ausgewertet, sondern auch zu Wochen, Monaten, Jahreszeiten, Halbjahren und ganzen Jahren aggregiert. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass einige der ET-Modelle, die unter den gegenwärtigen Klimabedingungen realistische Werte berechnen, dies bei geänderten Klimabedingungen nicht mehr vermögen. Weiterhin hat sich gezeigt, dass eine nur auf Tageswerten basierende Kalibrierung zu unzureichenden Ergebnissen bei der Übertragung der Modelle zwischen klimatisch unterschiedlich ausgeprägten Zeitreihen führt. Der Einsatz einer Zielfunktion, die sowohl Tageswerte als auch Jahresaggregationen der Tageswerte berücksichtigt, hat sich hingegen bewährt. Climate change (CC) will impact water resources. Assessing the extent of these impacts in due time is an important task, as it forms the basis for decision making. Unfortunately, the extent of this forecasted impact depends very much on data and tools used for this task. Although such methods might work well with present climatic conditions, it has to be doubted whether their results can still be relied upon in a changed climate. The uncertainties in the forecasts are partly of meteorological and partly of hydrological origin. Whereas the uncertainties of GCMs are well known and often discussed, the problems of hydrological models in this context are seldom investigated. In particular the uncertainty in process representation within the hydrological models must be revised. This dissertation focuses on the representation of the evapotranspiration (ET) process, because this process will be strongly influenced by CC. For this purpose, the suitability of nine different ET models was investigated. In a theoretical investigation, the sensitivity of the ET models to only a small change in temperature was found to be very different. Thus the question had to be raised as to how the resulting ET from these models will change with the entire predicted CC. Therefore a spatially distributed hydrological model based on the HBV concept was set up and the results of the different ET models were used consecutively as input to the hydrological model. The modelling was applied on the Upper Neckar catchment, a mesoscale river in southwestern Germany with a basin size of about 4,000 km2. This catchment was divided into 13 subcatchments with different subcatchment characteristics. The suitability of the different ET approaches was checked by calibrating the hydrological model on different climatic periods and then applying the model on other climatic periods. Thus, different 10-year periods with different climatic conditions were compiled: 10 cold, 10 warm, 10 wet and 10 dry years from the time series 1961–1990 were collected. The first step was to adapt the model to the same period it was calibrated to. Then the model was applied to other 10 years, i.e. the model calibrated on for example, the cold years was used on the warm years. The transferability was also checked by applying the models on the period 1991–2000. For the investigation of the impact of CC, the calibration of the model must meet special requirements. Apart from the selection of proper periods for calibration and validation, this also concerns the establishment of a suitable objective function. Such a function is the Nash Sutcliffe efficiency. Usually it is calculated comparing observed and modelled daily values. In this study it is shown that problems in the transfer from one climatic condition to the other cannot be detected on the base of daily values. Therefore parameter sets were optimized by an automatic calibration procedure based on Simulated Annealing, which considered the model performance on different time scales simultaneously (days up to years). As the results show, some of the ET models, which work well under stationary conditions, are not able to reproduce changes in a realistic manner. The results also show that calibrating a hydrological model that is supposed to handle short as well as long term signals becomes an important task; the objective function especially has to be chosen very carefully.

A reduction in the availability of phosphate rock resources for fertiliser production coincides with an increase in phosphorus-rich dairy wastewater in Europe. This confluence of events has led to the development of technologies for phosphorus recovery from dairy wastewater and the use of the products as fertilisers in agriculture. This thesis aims to contribute both to the technical development of this emerging technical system and methodological development of assessing the sustainability of it with regard to (1) the identification and selection of sustainability indicators, and (2) the assessment of life cycle environmental impacts. The thesis describes an approach developed for identifying and selecting sustainability indicators by reviewing scientific documents and interviews as well as an approach employed for performing a meta-analysis of previously published life cycle assessment results to cope with lack of inventory data. The employed method for indicator selection narrows down an initial set of 382 sustainability indicators identified in the literature to 26, which were considered representative and useful for the assessment of the considered innovative conceptual system. The meta-analysis results suggested that the examined phosphorus recovery technologies exhibited a lower global warming potential and cumulative energy demand than those of dairy wastewater treatment processes and that those technologies recovering phosphorus from the liquid phase had lower impacts than those recovering phosphorus from sludge or ash.

The core aim of this thesis was to quantify the effects of co-digesting forage silages with animal slurries on methane yields and to investigate if antagonistic or synergistic outcomes occur. In order to complete this assessment, the economic impacts of changing forage silage characteristics, of changing the mixing ratios of forage silage and cattle slurry in binary mixtures (and the presence of synergy or antagonism) and of changing the costs of providing these feedstocks for anaerobic digestion (AD) on the cost of methane production in an on-farm AD facility were accessed. An initial objective, however, was to define an optimal methodology for laboratory-scale anaerobic digestion, specifically to determine the impact of altering the headspace volume within incubation bottles and the overhead pressure measurement and release (OHPMR) frequency on methane yield using a manual manometric biochemical methane potential (mBMP) batch digestion method. Two anaerobic batch co-digestion experiments were conducted with forage silages and animal slurries. In the first experiment, oven-dried perennial ryegrass (harvested at two growth stages) or red clover (harvested at two growth stages) silages and cattle slurry were co-digested. Each binary mixture had synergistic effects which resulted in 2.8-7.5% higher methane yields than predicted from mono-digestion of individual substrates. In the second experiment, cattle slurry (two types) or pig slurry was co-digested with undried perennial ryegrass silages (harvested at two growth stages). Each silage and slurry mixture had antagonistic effects which resulted in methane yields 5.7-7.6% below those predicted from mono-digestion of individual substrates. In the initial experiment and in order to broaden the conditions under which the assessment was made, the biogas and methane yields of cellulose, barley grain, grass silage and cattle slurry were determined in response to three incubation bottle headspace volumes and four OHPMR frequencies. The methane yields of barley, silage and slurry were also compared with those from an automated volumetric method (i.e. AMPTS). Headspace volume and OHPMR frequency effects on biogas yield were mediated mainly through headspace pressure, with the latter having a negative effect on the biogas yield measured but relatively little effect on methane yield. Two mBMP treatments that produced methane yields equivalent to AMPTS were identified. Economic modelling results showed significant impacts of AD feedstock characteristics and their provision cost on the cost of methane production in an AD facility. The feedstock provision cost contributed about half of the total cost of methane production when the AD facility solely operated on grass silage. The total cost of methane produced from mono-digestion of cattle slurry that was supplied free of charge was more than double the cost of methane produced from grass silage. For co-digestion of grass silage and cattle slurry, the total cost of methane production progressively increased as the proportion of slurry in the co-digested mixture increased. Antagonistic and synergistic methanogenesis resulted in a corresponding 6% higher and 5% lower total cost of methane production during co-digestion of grass silage and cattle slurry (at a silage:slurry volatile solids ratio of 0.8:0.2) compared to the binary mixture without these effects.

Introduction The waterfront of Stockholm, one of Europe's fastest-growing cities, stands at the forefront of climate change challenges. As such, there is a pressing need for innovative solutions and resilient urban design. The SOS Climate Waterfront research project gathered international experts and local representatives, coming from different disciplines to work together in May-June 2022 to discuss, explore proposals and design Sustainable Open Solutions (SOS). This book explores three urban sites in Stockholm, holding significant implications for the city's waterfront— Lövholmen, Frihamnen, and Södra Värtan. During the workshop, SOS Climate Waterfront participants, mainly European researchers, analyzed future challenges, raised new questions, and depicted solutions, which can now contribute to cross-country comparisons in a larger EU-framework. The three sites are not only driven by the demand for more housing but also face crucial issues related to cultural heritage, climate change, landscape ecology, and social development. Achieving a delicate balance between these aspects and economic interests presents a significant task for the city. The waterfront of Stockholm holds substantial relevance in the context of climate change and its impact on coastal areas. Thus, analysis of the Swedish context, based on data collected and on-site knowledge sustains a deeper understanding of the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. Stockholm is expected to be affected by the impacts of climate change, including temperature increases, changing precipitation patterns, and the potential for more frequent cloudbursts. While the rising sea level is a long-term challenge rather than an immediate concern, increasing risks of extreme weather events and flooding were taken in consideration. Stockholm rests on two different bodies of water, at a location where the Baltic Sea (Östersjön in Swedish) with brackish water meets Lake Mälaren, which is an important provider of freshwater for the larger Stockholm area. As the lyrics of a popular contemporary Swedish song (by Robert Broberg) describe it: “the city is full of water”. However, to ensure that the ecological and chemical status will be maintained, in facing future challenges in terms of urbanisation and climate change, much attention has been paid to ensure the preservation of the water quality of the Mälaren Lake, a vital water source for two million people. The city values its water and continuously invests in improving the situation (e.g. the new sluice at Slussen). The activities carried out in the SOS Climate Waterfront workshop in Stockholm integrated this relationship to water as well as the continuing land-rise, the balance of which adds complexity to the sea level modelling and therefore also to the anticipations and scenarios for the future. In this book, the authors explore innovative strategies and design proposals to tackle these challenges while preserving the cultural identity and heritage value of the sites. Researchers from various European cities, supported by experts and academic lectures, analyze extensive input materials and information, ranging from planning documents and historical records to consultation reports and city visions. By drawing upon multidisciplinary backgrounds and experiences, the researchers identify the socioeconomic and environmental qualities of each site, ultimately developing site design concepts and solutions that address climate change challenges, the maintenance of cultural identities, and the protection of biodiversity. Throughout the book, the proposed designs emphasize the importance of finding a balance between preserving cultural heritage, the values of local communities, the stimulating economic growth, and promotion of sustainable urban development. Key elements include the reuse of existing infrastructure, the integration of green-blue schemes, the improvement of biodiversity, and the creation of vibrant and multi-functional neighbourhoods that connect people to each other and their surroundings. While design solutions present promising approaches, their implementation and the institutional challenges that may arise in specific city contexts remain external to the results presented here. The book acknowledges the need for further research and highlights the shared recognition among the workshop participants regarding the gaps and blind spots in their findings. The following chapters of the book delve into climate change in Sweden, the role of culture and arts in the environmental movement, and specific case studies and design proposals for each site. By exploring these diverse perspectives, this book aims to contribute to the ongoing discourse on sustainable urban design and planning, to inspire innovative approaches in addressing complex challenges faced by Stockholm in the future. PART 1 of the book offers a comprehensive understanding of climate change in Sweden, street fishing in Stockholm, and the role of culture and arts in the environmental movement in the Nordic Region and internationally. Furthermore, the lessons from Stockholm and its surroundings in this report draw on presentations, by professionals and researchers from various fields, made during the workshop. Some of these lessons have been written into interesting articles, introduced below. The chapter “Climate change in Sweden” by Magnus Joelsson from the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI) provides an updated analysis with data and the context for discussing climate change in Sweden. The text makes the distinction between weather and climate, referring to the expression “Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get” that Mark Twain is said to have coined. Moreover, calling for actions by emphasising that the trend of climate change is expected to continue, both globally and in Sweden. What will happen in the far future still depends on our actions, now and in the future. The contribution entitled “Urban nature does not stop at the waterfront, neither should urban planning, a case study of street fishing in Stockholm” raises questions about how planning and strategies for waterfront areas in cities should consider more perspectives from a wider group of interests. It discusses how urban dwellers live with water, with a focus on recreational fishing and what this use entails. The authors (Anja Moum Rieser, from KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Wieben Johannes Boonstra and Rikard Hedling, both from Uppsala University) go beyond the human-centric view and expand the gaze to other species’ needs and also incorporating the body of water in planning for the urban waterfront areas. The chapter “The role of culture and arts in the environmental movement in the Nordic Region and internationally” by Elisavet Papageorgiou and Iwona Preis from Intercult, discusses artistic perspectives on sustainability and climate change. This focuses on how art and culture can raise awareness, provide inspiring actions, and promote social cohesion around sustainable practices. Drawing on experiences from projects aiming to invite and engage community dialogues, they argue that artistic strategies can challenge dominant narratives and promote alternative visions for a sustainable future. The contribution “Sense the Marsh” by Thelma Dethelfsen from KTH The Royal Institute of Technology, emphasises the importance of architecture and landscape design in creating adaptive and resilient strategies to manage flooding and sea level rise. The study focuses on how designs can encourage interaction and awareness with the surroundings. Thereby highlighting the interfaces between humans and nature and raising questions about how flooding can be used as a quality and catalyst to attract more people to an area. The resulting design provides an opportunity to experience nature though the design and architectural solutions, situated on the border between human, non-human species and nature. In PART 2, readers will explore the detailed design proposals developed by different groups for the urban sites in focus. These proposals aim to intertwine sustainability, cultural identity, and economic interests, offering insights into the potential for resilient and vibrant urban spaces. By assessing existing conditions on three sites analysed in Stockholm, including Lövholmen, Frihamnen, and Södra Värtan, the teams participating in the workshop actively contributed to the analysis of the sites and development of design solutions for the areas, in the end forming strategies for better preparedness for future challenges and better lives for the inhabitants. Lövholmen is located in the north-western part of Liljeholmen, one of the major developmental centres in Stockholm. The area is currently a closed-off industrial site, but the municipality’s intention is to redevelop it into a mixed urban space with homes, workplaces, shops, schools, and more. It's expected that 1500 new homes will be built in the area. Many of the current industrial buildings are empty and in bad shape. While some of these will be replaced with housing, other industrial buildings have heritage value and should be protected during the development, after which a new use should be found for them. Frihamnen is, together with the Södra Värtan project, part of the larger development of ”Norra Djurgårdsstaden”, the Stockholm Royal Seaport. Frihamnen is located to the south of Värtahamnen and is in turn strongly connected to Loudden in the south. The municipality plans for the area to contain approximately 1700 homes, 4000 workplaces and 75,000 m2 of retail and office space. Some of the existing businesses in Frihamnen will remain, but much of the existing infrastructure is planned to be removed. The harbour no longer handles freight shipping, but passenger ships will continue to depart from the harbour (Frihamnspiren). Södra Värtan is planned to contain 1500 apartments, 20 preschool departments, 155,000 m2 of office and retail space, as well as 10,000 m2 of parks and a 600 m long waterfront walkway. The new development is intended to co-exist with the activities in the harbour, which creates challenges such as the blocking of noise stemming from the cruise ships. The walkways along the waterfront are planned to have shops and restaurants. The contributions of the articles, together with the SOS Climate Waterfront teams’ analysis of the three sites in Stockholm, provides relevant and timely interdisciplinary efforts to co-create novel solutions and future strategies to manage the climate challenges ahead. The solutions relate to the history of the urban territory, actors involved (or those excluded) and changes, over time, of planning ideals. A key theme is how to plan by creating inclusive strategies for the future by involving representatives of diverse interests, competences, and future visions for the sites. The consequences of climate change are affecting these different stakeholders and citizens in a wide range of ways, so including them in the process is crucial. This also includes the inclusion of future generations’ views on urban transformation. The largest challenge is to create new, novel solutions where these human interests, as well as those of local nature and non-human species, can be incorporated, in an effort to plan and design for a mitigation and management of the consequences of climate change. As we embark on this journey of exploration and innovation, we invite readers to delve into the pages of this book, where interdisciplinary research, creative design, and a shared commitment to sustainable urban development and decarbonisation strategies converge. Together, let us envision a future where cities thrive, harmoniously balancing their heritage, environment, and economic aspirations. QC 20231115 SOS Climate Waterfront https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/823901

Tropical rainforests in the Amazon and Congo River basins and their climate are mutually dependent. Evaporation from these forests help regulate the regional and global water cycle. Furthermore, these rainforests themselves depend on precipitation to sustain their structure and functions. However, the rapid increase in human activities (such as burning fossil fuels and deforestation) has significantly changed the rainforests’ climate. Due to the effect of human-induced perturbations on moisture feedbacks (i.e., precipitation and evaporation patterns), these rainforests risk tipping to a savanna or treeless state. Understanding how these forests respond to climate change will aid in assessing their resilience to water-induced perturbations as well as in anticipating and preparing for potential tipping risks in the future. However, our understanding of how vegetation responds to climate change is fragmented, which limits our capacity to predict these risks. Previous studies have primarily relied on precipitation data to understand these forest-to-savanna transitions. However, ecosystem transition risks are also associated with water-stress, which depends on the vegetation’s capacity to adapt to drier conditions by storing water in its root zone. This thesis investigates the effect of hydroclimatic changes on root zone adaptation and its implications for forest resilience. Paper I uses remote sensing data to analyse water-stress and drought coping strategies across the rainforest-savanna transects. Paper II uses the root zone storage capacity to quantify the resilience of forest ecosystems. Using the empirical understanding of root zone forest dynamics and hydroclimatic estimates from Earth System Models, Paper III projects future forest transitions and estimates tipping risks by the end of the 21st century under four different shared socio-economic pathways. Paper IV uses atmospheric moisture tracking data to investigate the leverage landholders in South America have over precipitation and the resilience of forest ecosystems. Papers I and II reveal the non-linear relationship between the ecosystem’s above-ground structure and root zone storage capacity. These studies indicate that, under hydroclimatic changes, the ecosystem’s root zone storage capacity is much more dynamic than its above-ground forest structure and is more representative of the ecosystem’s transient state than precipitation. Ignoring this root zone adaptive capacity can underestimate forest resilience, primarily observed in the Congo rainforest. Paper III projects that the risk of forest-savanna transition will increase with climate change severity, most prominently observed in the Amazon rainforest. Paper IV finds that all landholders have equal leverage over the moisture precipitating locally and over farther-downwind land systems. According to this study, smallholders have a disproportionately larger influence over forest rainfall. However, large landholders have a larger influence on forest resilience as well as over the moisture precipitating on croplands and pastures. These results warrant the need for policies to factor in the impact of deforestation on downwind actors and promote effective ecosystem stewardship. The insights from this thesis highlight the importance of understanding and assessing ecosystem dynamics under a rapidly changing climate for strengthening management and conservation efforts across the globe. Earth Resilience in the Anthropocene (ERA; ERC-2016-ADG 743080)

It is widely known that fossil fuels are limited; consequently, the generation of new sources of energy in a clean and environmentally friendly manner is a research priority. Bioethanol appears to be one potential solution, especially second-generation production from renewable biomass.In order to use lignocellulosic feedstock to produce bioethanol, its polysaccharide components, cellulose and hemicellulose, must be hydrolysed into soluble sugars, which can then be converted into ethanol by fermentative microorganisms such as Geobacillus thermoglucosidasius TM242 used by the company ReBio Technologies Ltd.To date, the cost of commercial enzymes used during the hydrolysis process remains a major economic consideration in the production of second-generation bioethanol as an alternative fuel. The research project presented in this thesis aims to improve this rate-limiting step of microbial bioethanol production through an investigation of the different enzymes associated with hemicellulose hydrolysis. Firstly, the TM242 genome sequence revealed a number of genes encoding glycoside-hydrolases. Six of these genes were cloned and expressed in E. coli and the recombinant enzymes characterised; three of them, two β-xylosidases and an α arabinofuranosidase, are relevant to xylan hydrolysis, and were found to be highly active and thermostable. Crystallisation of one of the β-xylosidases permitted the determination of a high-resolution (1.7 Å) structure of the apo-enzyme along with a lower resolution (2.6 Å) structure of the enzyme-substrate complex, resulting in the first reported structure of a GH52 family member (Espina et al., 2014).Secondly, as the TM242 microorganism lacks xylanase enzymes, four genes encoding xylanases from closely-related Geobacillus strains were cloned and expressed in E. coli, with one of them being also successfully cloned and expressed in G. thermoglucosidasius TM242. This heterologous xylanase was secreted in active form representing an enhanced biomass utilisation by TM242.In conclusion, it is felt that the findings presented here have the potential to make a valuable contribution towards second-generation bioethanol production.

The present report accounts for the spatial models of energy efficiency and the geospatial analysis carried out to quantify and locate energy efficiency potentials across sectors. In the building sector, future heat demands on national scales are being distributed using the age class of built-up areas and innovative models of future population distribution. District heat distribution capital costs combined with heat demand densities allow for the assessment of economic potentials of future district heating. Efficiency potentials in the transport and industrial sectors have been associated to locations, and transmission infrastructures have been mapped. Combining all these aspects, spatial analytics help understanding the opportunities and constraints that arise from the geography of energy systems. Energy efficiency in the three sectors has been mapped at different scales. Cost curves for district heating have been prepared for member states. For use in energy systems analysis, a matrix has been developed that relates energy efficiency in buildings and district heating potentials. Areas of interest for the conversion of natural gas to district heating have been mapped, combining present gas use with infrastructural aspects. Local potentials of district heating have been quantified for almost 150,000 settlements, and potential heat sources from industrial and wastewater treatment plants as well as locally available renewable energy sources have been allocated to potential district heating areas. Finally, to visualise and compare energy efficiency across sectors, technologies, and countries, the sEEnergies Index shows local potentials for improving energy efficiency and utilising synergies in all settlements of the EU27 plus the UK. In conclusion, the report documents how dissemination can be facilitated using the online geospatial information and mapping applications prepared in the sEEnergies Project.