• Energy Research
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AbstractGlobal impact models represent process-level understanding of how natural and human systems may be affected by climate change. Their projections are used in integrated assessments of climate change. Here we test, for the first time, systematically across many important systems, how well such impact models capture the impacts of extreme climate conditions. Using the 2003 European heat wave and drought as a historical analogue for comparable events in the future, we find that a majority of models underestimate the extremeness of impacts in important sectors such as agriculture, terrestrial ecosystems, and heat-related human mortality, while impacts on water resources and hydropower are overestimated in some river basins; and the spread across models is often large. This has important implications for economic assessments of climate change impacts that rely on these models. It also means that societal risks from future extreme events may be greater than previously thought.

Abstract Millions of tonnes (teragrams) of plastic waste are traded around the world every year, which plays an important role in partially substituting virgin plastics as a source of raw materials in plastic product manufacturing. In this paper, global plastic waste trade networks (GPWTNs) from 1988 to 2017 are established using the UN-Comtrade database. The spatiotemporal evolution of the GPWTNs is analyzed. Attention is given to the country ranks, inter- and intra-continental trade flows, and geo-visual communities in the GPWTNs. We also evaluate the direct and indirect impacts of China’s plastic waste import ban on the GPWTNs. The results show that the GPWTNs have small-world and scale-free properties and a core-periphery structure. The geography of the plastic waste trade is structured by Asia as the dominant importer and North America and Europe as the largest sources of plastic waste. China is the unrivaled colossus in the global plastic waste trade. After China’s import ban, the plastic waste trade flows have been largely redirected to Southeast Asian countries. Compared with import countries, export countries are more important for the robustness of GPWTNs. Clearly, developed countries will not announce bans on plastic waste exports; these countries have strong motivation to continue to shift plastic waste to poorer countries. However, the import bans from developing countries will compel developed countries to build new disposal facilities and deal with their plastic waste domestically.

A fundamental theory including photoelectric response, ion migration and photon recycling effects for back-contact perovskite solar cells is established.

A carbonate-based electrolyte is well-designedviaa multifunctional lithium difluorobis(oxalato) phosphate (LiDFBOP) additive, endowing 4.5 V sodium metal batteries with high energy density, excellent cycling stability and a wide temperature range.

Abstract The transient cooling process of an underground water pit thermal storage with inclined sidewalls is investigated in this paper. An experimental device was designed in order to validate the mathematical model proposed. Materials properties have been assumed constant with temperature, except for the water’s density that has been treated using the Boussinesq approximation. The simulations of temperature distributions are proved well by comparison with the experimental results. Results show that the water temperature decreasing next to the tank walls by the heat losses from the top and sidewalls of the tank, which creates a downward flow along the tank wall. At the center of the tank, a slight upward flow is generated, which lifts the warmer water at the bulk of the tank to a higher level. In this way, the buoyancy-driven flow gradually builds up the thermal stratification in the tank. The Nusselt number values show that comparing with the upper surface of the storage tank, there is more radical heat exchange at the bottom and inclined sidewalls. The maximum velocity appears near the top part of the inclined sidewalls, and its value decreases as the cooling continues.