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Renewable Generation and Environmental Impact Management: A Review of Current Knowledge and Practices

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A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Energy Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (1 October 2021) | Viewed by 11620

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Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Vladimir Strezov

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Guest Editor

School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW 2109, Australia
Interests: environmental modelling; energy modelling
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. Ravinder Kumar

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Guest Editor

Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Macquarie University, Macquarie Park, NSW 2109, Australia
Interests: renewable energy; biofuels; catalytic fast pyrolysis; heterogeneous catalysis; bio-oil upgrading; phytoremediation; bioelectrochemical cells; bioelectricity generation; wastewater treatment; waste to energy technologies; life cycle assessment; microplastic pollution
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

One of the main challenges we are facing today is meeting increased energy demands while reducing greenhouse gas and pollutant emissions. The world energy demand has been predicted to increase by 28% by 2040. Currently, the energy is primarily obtained from fossil fuels, which are the dominant source of greenhouse gas emissions, posing significant threats to the environment through climate change. There is an impetus to produce more sustainable and ecofriendly energy fuels to reduce carbon emissions. The renewable energy sector is the fastest-growing source of energy. Several types of technologies (thermal, thermochemical, biochemical, and biological) are used to generate different types of renewable energy fuels and sustainable chemicals that can be utilized to produce energy. It is essential to examine the environmental impact and benefits of renewable energy technologies to improve their efficiency and build a sustainable environment.

Considering the significance of the topic, this Special Issue, “Renewable Generation and Environmental Impact Management: A Review of Current Knowledge and Practices” aims to cover the most recent progress and the advances in the field of renewable energy and environmental impact management. This Special Issue includes but is not limited to the following topics:

Renewable energy
Waste to energy technologies
Environmental impact assessment
Life cycle assessment
Thermochemical conversion of biomass into energy fuels
Solar energy
Wind energy
Geothermal energy
Hydroelectric power
Biofuels
Sustainable chemicals
Renewable hydrogen

Prof. Dr. Vladimir Strezov
Dr. Ravinder Kumar
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

renewable energy
environmental impact
climate change
carbon missions
biofuels
life cycle assessment

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

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12 pages, 851 KiB

Open AccessFeature PaperArticle

Economic Feasibility and Sustainability Assessment of Residual Municipal Solid Waste Management Scenarios in NSW, Australia

by Behnam Hosseini Dastjerdi, Vladimir Strezov, Ravinder Kumar and Masud Behnia

Sustainability 2021, 13(16), 8972; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13168972 - 11 Aug 2021

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2554

Abstract

This study evaluates the economic cost and sustainability of treating residual municipal solid waste (MSW) through five waste management scenarios. In the baseline scenario (Bsc), all waste was managed through landfilling, while in scenario 1 (Sc1) all waste was treated by incineration. Sc2 employed anaerobic digestion (AD) for food waste and landfilling, and Sc3 treated the waste through AD for food waste, incineration of combustible and plastic wastes, and landfilling. Sc4 treated the waste using AD, incineration, landfilling, and recycling of the plastic waste. The economic cost of waste management scenarios was estimated by calculating different economic variables, such as gate fees, including capital and operating costs, governmental incentives and levies, and also the potential of employed waste treatment technologies for resource recovery. The results revealed that Sc3 has the lowest economic cost of 238.1 mAUD/year, followed by Sc1 (261.9 mAUD/year), while Bsc proved to be the highest cost at 476.1 mAUD/year for MSW treatment. It was noticed that scenarios employing incineration had lower economic costs compared to Bsc and Sc2, mainly because incineration resulted in higher electricity generation and reduced greenhouse gas emissions. The sustainability assessment results confirmed that Sc3 had the lowest and Bcs the highest total economic cost and environmental damage. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Generation and Environmental Impact Management: A Review of Current Knowledge and Practices)

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26 pages, 6976 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Optimizing the Power Generation of a Wind Farm in Low Wind Speed Regions

by Hanan M. Taleb and Bassam Abu Hijleh

Sustainability 2021, 13(9), 5110; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13095110 - 2 May 2021

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2520

Abstract

The aim of this research is to optimize the power generation of a wind farm (WF) in order to maximize the energy output, especially in low wind speeds regions such as UAE. A new WF was proposed to be built in Sir Bani Yas Island in the UAE. This project was chosen to act as the main case configuration for this research. Four configuration parameters were proposed and assessed as follows: (1) inserting smaller turbines between the original larger main turbines; (2) changing the spacing between the turbines; (3) substituting new higher efficiency turbines in place of the existing ones; (4) moving the WFs to completely new locations in different emirates within the UAE. Through using the WindFarm simulation software, the impact of these four strategies was analyzed and calculated. The main finding of this research indicates that introducing more efficient WT units has a great impact in that it can increase output by 24.5%. Bearing in mind that the UAE has a vision for a renewable energy, as well as the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, this paper will draw a novel recommendation to optimize the wind power generation in this low-speed region. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Generation and Environmental Impact Management: A Review of Current Knowledge and Practices)

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Review

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16 pages, 1123 KiB

Open AccessReview

A Decade of Transitioning Malaysia toward a High-Solar PV Energy Penetration Nation

by Alaa A. F. Husain, Maryam Huda Ahmad Phesal, Mohd Zainal Abidin Ab Kadir, Ungku Anisa Ungku Amirulddin and Abdulhadi H. J. Junaidi

Sustainability 2021, 13(17), 9959; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13179959 - 6 Sep 2021

Cited by 16 | Viewed by 5679

Abstract

In the last 10 years, Malaysia has aggressively moved towards a higher penetration of 20% of renewable energy (RE) in the Malaysian energy mix by 2025. Several incentives and initiatives have taken place with the aim of achieving the goals in terms of installed capacity and catching up with the leading countries in these sectors. Since 2011, Malaysia started the Feed-in-Tariff (FiT) before introducing Net Energy Metering (NEM) in 2017, and recently, another initiative known as NEM 3.0 has been introduced. This paper reviews all policies undertaken by the Malaysian government from 2011 to 2021 in spearheading the country to be on par with others, especially those in the Southeast Asian (SEA) region. The effectiveness of each policy on the growth of photovoltaic PV energy installation is highlighted, and the latest update on the NEM 3.0 policy is also discussed. A comparison of each approach in terms of installed capacity and system connection setup to the grid is also considered for the benefit and sharing of knowledge from one of the fastest-developing countries in the region. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Renewable Generation and Environmental Impact Management: A Review of Current Knowledge and Practices)

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