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As a relatively mature technology, biomass molded fuel (BMF) is widely used in distributed and centralized heating in China and has received considerable government attention. Although many BFM incentive policies have been developed, decreased domestic traditional fuel prices in China have caused BMF to lose its economic viability and new policy recommendations are needed to stimulate this industry. The present study built a regionalized net present value (NPV) model based on real production process simulation to test the impacts of each policy factor. The calculations showed that BMF production costs vary remarkably between regions, with the cost of agricultural briquette fuel (ABF) ranging from 86 US dollar per metric ton (USD/t) to 110 (USD/t), while that of woody pellet fuel (WPF) varies from 122 USD/t to 154 USD/t. The largest part of BMF’s cost composition is feedstock, which accounts for up 50%–60% of the total; accordingly a feedstock subsidy is the most effective policy factor, but in consideration of policy implementation, it would be better to use a production subsidy. For ABF, the optimal product subsidy varies from 26 USD/t to 57 USD/t among different regions of China, while for WPF, the range is 36 USD/t to 75 USD/t. Based on the data, a regional BMF development strategy is also proposed in this study.

A promising route to transition wastewater treatment facilities (WWTFs) from energy-consuming to net energy-positive is to retrofit existing facilities with process modifications, residual biosolid upcycling, and effluent thermal energy recovery. This study assesses the economics and life cycle environmental impacts of three proposed retrofits of WWTFs that consider thermochemical conversion technologies, namely, hydrothermal liquefaction, slow pyrolysis, and fast pyrolysis, along with advanced bioreactors. The results are in turn compared to the reference design, showing the retrofitting design with hydrothermal liquefaction, and an up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket has the highest net present value (NPV) of $177.36MM over a 20-year plant lifetime despite 15% higher annual production costs than the reference design. According to the ReCiPe method, chlorination is identified as the major contributor for most impact categories in all cases. There are several uncertainties embedded in the techno-economic analysis and life cycle assessment, including the discount rate, capital investment, sewer rate, and prices of main products; among which, the price of biochar presents the widest variation from $50 to $1900/t. Sensitivity analyses reveal that the variation of discount rates causes the most significant changes in NPVs. The impact of the biochar price is more pronounced in the slow pyrolysis-based pathway compared to the fast pyrolysis since biochar is the main product of slow pyrolysis.

The increasing depletion of natural resources, combined with a wider set of pressures on the environment, has, in recent years, highlighted the need for a more efficient use of energy and a development process that involves alternative energy sources. Energy efficiency has received much attention as a solution, implying both monetary and emissions savings. However, the latter may be partially offset by the income and demand effects of the former, both in more efficient sectors and in spreading to the wider economy. This is the problem of rebound effects. Taking Spain as a case study, and introducing an energy-related CGE model that develops the inclusion of renewables, this paper evaluates a combination of efficiency initiatives to deliver both reduced energy use by households and a more sustainable supply of energy. Our findings suggest that a package aimed at improving efficiency in household electricity and petroleum use, combined with a more competitive supply of energy from renewable sources, may be the only way to get reductions in all energy use, and thus benefit the economy. Specifically, we consider how this package may lead to positive economic impacts and associated rebound effects, where the latter are focused on a greener energy supply.

With the fast growth of the global economy, energy supply and demand have a strong impact on social, economic, and environmental aspects. As a consequence, this has pushed the decision-makers to formulate objectives, guiding economic policies toward sustainable goals. The process is known as Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that have been proposed by the United Nations. This being said, the energy sector is a vital domain with a vast potential for improvments in terms of technologies and ligistalations. Solar energy is among the most efficient solutions proposed to reduce the economic and environmental footprints of energy. In this frame, the current paper aims to localize solar energy within SDGs and analyze the contribution of the solar energy towards the achievement of the SDGs. Moreover, the current work highlights the contributions of Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum (MBR) Solar Park in the United Arab Emirates to achieving the SDGs. Indeed, the MBR Solar Park concept offers valuable insights of environmental impacts by deploying clean and affordable energy sources in place of conventional fossil fuel power plants that are still heavily used in the region. The MBR Solar Park operation has already mitigated 6.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent and this number will likely rise when all phases are installed and operational. Moreover, it has been shown that MBR Solar Park achieve several SDGs such SDG 8: decent work and economic growth, SDG 9: industry, innovation and infrastructure, SDG 11: sustainable cities and communities, and SDG 15: life on land.

National exergy efficiency analysis relates the quality of primary energy inputs to an economy with end useful work in sectoral energy uses such as transport, heat and electrical devices. This approach has been used by a range of authors to explore insights to macroscale energy systems and linkages with economic growth. However, these analyses use a variety of calculation methods with sometimes coarse assumptions, inhibiting comparisons. Therefore, building on previous studies, this paper first contributes toward a common useful work accounting framework, by developing more refined methodological techniques for electricity end use and transport exergy efficiencies. Second, to test this more consistent and granular approach, these advances are applied to the US and UK for 1960 to 2010. The results reveal divergent aggregate exergy efficiencies: US efficiency remains stable at around 11%, while UK efficiency rises from 9% to 15%. The US efficiency stagnation is due to "efficiency dilution", where structural shifts to lower efficiency consumption (e.g., air-conditioning) outweigh device-level efficiency gains. The results demonstrate this is an important area of research, with consequent implications for national energy efficiency policies.

SummaryThe German government has adopted a law that requires sewage plants to go beyond the recovery of phosphorus from wastewater and to promote recycling. We argue that there is no physical global short‐ or mid‐term phosphorus scarcity. However, we also argue that there are legitimate reasons for policies such as those of Germany, including: precaution as a way to ensure future generations’ long‐term supply security, promotion of technologies for closed‐loop economics in a promising stage of technology development, and decrease in the current supply risk with a new resource pool.

Abstract An energy access assessment conducted by Practical Action in 2018 as part of the Renewable Energy for Refugees project established that most households and small enterprises in Kigeme, Gihembe and Nyabiheke refugee camps in Rwanda had limited or no access to electricity. It also identified both demand in the camps for modern energy services and a willingness and ability to pay. To address the lack of access to electricity, two solar home system companies operating in Rwanda were supported by the project to access the camps and supply systems to refugees and the host community via market-based delivery models. This paper applies the diffusion of innovations theory as a framework to investigate the sales of solar home systems in the camps. It is the first paper to present data in this area and it assesses both the viability of market-based delivery of solar home systems in refugee camps and the suitability of using diffusion of innovations theory in these contexts. The results indicate that solar home systems can provide an advantage to households compared to existing energy solutions and are, in most cases, compatible with refugees' basic energy needs and expectations. However, the cost of systems remains a barrier and without subsidy, further reductions in costs or adaptations to payment models, solar home systems are unlikely to provide large proportions of households and small enterprises in the camps with access to energy. This seriously impacts the possibility of achieving Sustainable Development Goal 7 and for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to achieve the objectives it set out in its Clean Energy Challenge policy.

Abstract Rare earth permanent magnets are important components for modern (energy) technologies and are employed to reduce GHG emissions and combat climate change. The process of extracting these minerals from the ore has contentious economic, environmental and social implications. While the environmental impacts of their production have already been analyzed in several studies, the economic and the social perspective is still under-researched. The Social Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) approach employed in the present research explores whether there is a difference in social risks for rare earth permanent magnet production from three different rare earth ore production locations and the associated value chains. While one is located completely in China, another is composed of processes in Australia and Malaysia. The third process chain combines processes in the United States and Japan. The Product Social Impact Life Cycle Assessment (PSILCA) 2.0 database is used to assess the social implications. The analysis focuses on value chain actors, a stakeholder group of great interest to businesses but often underrepresented in S-LCA research. The impact categories describing this stakeholder group pertain to issues of social responsibility along the value chain, fair competition and corruption. Overall, the US value chain indicates the lowest level of social risk along the supply chain. However, in order to gain a deeper understanding of the social risks a sectoral and geographical analysis is conducted. Across all three cases, the mineral, fossil fuel and chemical sectors are shown to be problematic.