Publications related to Need for harmonized long-term multi-lake monitoring of African Great Lakes

The Effect of Rivers on Energy Balance at the Neighborhood Scale. A comparative analysis of four Rhodanian sites in France and Switzerland

Emmanuel Rey, Sara Sonia Formery Regazzoni, Martine Laprise, Sergi Aguacil Moreno

This research aims to compare the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of new neighbourhood projects near the Rhône River in France and Switzerland. The study considers the influence of the river on energy demand and resilience to climate change of 12 project-ba ...

Wrocław University of Science and Technology Publishing House2024

Multiscale Spatiotemporal Characterization of Embodied Environmental Performance of Building Structures in Geneva from 1850 to 2018

Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Catherine Elvire L. De Wolf, Serena Vanbutsele

Load-bearing systems in buildings, significant in material use and embodied greenhouse gas emissions (EGHGE), have lacked detailed analysis on their environmental and functional relationships over time and space. This study evaluates the environmental impa ...

2024

Embodied Carbon Premium for Cantilevers

David Michael Volpe Ruggiero, Paola Costanza Miglietta

This study addresses the critical need for sustainable architectural designs within the context of climate change and the significant role the built environment plays in greenhouse gas emissions. The focus of this paper is on understanding the influence of ...

2024

Reuse of cut concrete slabs in new buildings for circular ultra-low-carbon floor designs

Numa Joy Bertola, Célia Marine Küpfer, Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet

The study explores an original idea that responds to the urgent need to reduce the detrimental environmental impacts of load-bearing floor construction in new buildings by reusing saw-cut reinforced concrete (RC) pieces salvaged from soon-to-be demolished ...

2024

Decarbonizing the fertilizers sector: an alternative pathway for urea and nitric acid production

François Maréchal, Daniel Alexander Florez Orrego, Meire Ellen Gorete Ribeiro Domingos

In order to alleviate the environmental impact that nitrogen fertilizers production is responsible for, several efforts have been addressed to incentivize the partial or total decarbonization of the supply chains of ammonia and its derivatives. The decarbo ...

2024

Renewable energy integration and waste heat valorization in aluminum remelting for co-producing kerosene and methanol

François Maréchal, Daniel Alexander Florez Orrego, Meire Ellen Gorete Ribeiro Domingos, Réginald Germanier

The aluminium sector relies on natural gas for the conversion of recycled scrap into new feedstock, which results in substantial atmospheric emissions. Hydric resources are also impacted, as they serve as heat sinks for the waste heat generated during the ...

Associazione Italiana Di Ingegneria Chimica2024

Design and Synthesis of Bio-based Amphiphiles from Lignocellulosic Biomass

Songlan Sun

In the pursuit of a carbon-neutral chemical industry, minimizing fossil feedstock consumption while integrating renewable carbon sources is imperative. Surfactants, inherently amphiphilic, pose challenges in separation and recovery processes. Given their e ...

EPFL2024

Mesh-based topology, shape and sizing optimization of ribbed plates

In this paper, we present a new parameterization and optimization procedure for minimizing the weight of ribbed plates. The primary goal is to reduce embodied CO2 in concrete floors as part of the effort to diminish the carbon footprint of the construction ...

Springer2024

The impacts of decarbonization pathways on Sustainable Development Goals in the European Union

Marc Vielle, Sigit Pria Perdana

Climate action to achieve the Paris Agreement should respect the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Here, we use an integrated assessment modelling framework comprising nine climate policy models and quantify the impacts of decarbonisation pathw ...

2024

Atlas Narratives of Anthropogenic Transformations across the Vietnamese Mekong Delta's Urban-Rural Territories: Water Ecosystems as Subject for the Social Ecological Transition

Sylvie Tram Nguyen

Well beyond the impact of climate change, anthropogenic modifications of the Vietnam Mekong Delta's ecosystems have resulted in environmental degradation and subsequent loss in ecosystems. The environmental impacts include but are not limited to accelerate ...

EPFL2023

Integrated production of urea and nitric acid in the pulp industry: techno-economic and environmental analysis of black liquor gasification-based processes

François Maréchal, Shivom Sharma, Daniel Alexander Florez Orrego, Meire Ellen Gorete Ribeiro Domingos

The pursuit of alternative energy sources for the nitrogen fertilizers sector has recently earned renewed interest due to increasing concerns regarding the world dependence on non-renewable energy resources and also motivated by the more stringent environm ...

2022

Decision support for the design of integrated biorefineries

Julia Granacher

A shift from fossil-based energy and products to more sustainable alternatives is essential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and associated climate change impacts. Biomass represents a promising alternative for providing fuels and carbon-based products w ...

EPFL2023

Integration of Life Cycle Impact Assessment in Energy System Modelling

Manuele Domenico Margni, François Maréchal, Jonas Schnidrig, Justine Brun

The Paris agreement is the first-ever universally accepted and legally binding agreement on global climate change. It is a bridge between today’s and climate-neutrality policies and strategies before the end of the century. However, government and private ...

2023

Reuse of Load-Bearing Timber Elements - Case Study of a Lookout Tower in Lausanne, Switzerland

Julius Natterer, Benoît Pascal Kälin, Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Jonas Warmuth, Edisson Xavier Estrella Arcos

The construction industry is jeopardizing Earth’s environment; current mitigation efforts do not suffice; and additional sustainable strategies are required. One such strategy consists of reusing structural building elements over multiple service lives. In ...

Curran Associates, Inc.2023

Surfactant-based enrichment of rare earth elements from NdFeB magnet e-waste: Optimisation of cloud formation and rare earths extraction

Christian Ludwig, Rudolf Paul Wilhelm Jozef Struis, Mohamed Tarik, Ajay Bhagwan Patil

Appropriate waste and resource management are essential for a sustainable circular economy with reduced environmental impact. With critical resources, e-waste may serve as indirect raw material. For example, with NdFeB permanent magnets, Neodymium (Nd) and ...

2023

Action Levers towards Sustainable Wellbeing: Re-Thinking Negative Emissions, Sufficiency, Deliberative Democracy

Sascha Nick

Systems theory defines leverage points as places to intervene in order to change a system. Points with high impact on system behavior are notoriously hard to act upon, and indeed most policy intervention is based at the lowest level (#12 in Donella Meadows ...

EPFL2023

ROSMOSE: A Web-based Optimization Tool to Aid Decision-making for the Design and Operation of Industrial and Urban Energy Systems

François Maréchal, Cédric Terrier, Daniel Alexander Florez Orrego, Michel Lopez, Meire Ellen Gorete Ribeiro Domingos

Energy efficiency is crucial for the sustainable operation of all industrial and urban sectors. However, practicing engineers have seldom access to open-source tools that can readily evaluate and compare scenarios in terms of energy consumption, cost, and ...

2023

Multiscale pattern analysis of building replacements in Zurich from 2000 to 2019

Corentin Jean Dominique Fivet, Jingxian Ye

Building replacement (BR) – i.e., the demolition of existing structures and subsequent construction of new buildings on the same site – is often understood as a necessary urban planning strategy despite significant environmental implications regarding soli ...

2023

Leveraging industrial biorefineries for the energy transition

François Maréchal, Julia Granacher

Biorefineries hold the potential to provide products and energy carriers at reduced environmental impact compared to their fossil-based counterparts. Thus, they can contribute to the decarbonization of sectors in which electrification of demands is challen ...

Elsevier Sci Ltd2023

A full year of aerosol size distribution data from the central Arctic under an extreme positive Arctic Oscillation: insights from the Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAiC) expedition

Benjamin Jérémy Laurent Heutte, Federico Bianchi, Julia Schmale, Ivo Fabio Beck, Lubna Dada, Hélène Paule Angot, Jakob Boyd Pernov

The Arctic environment is rapidly changing due to accelerated warming in the region. The warming trend is driving a decline in sea ice extent, which thereby enhances feedback loops in the surface energy budget in the Arctic. Arctic aerosols play an importa ...

Copernicus Publications2023