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This paper presents the editorial for the Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews joint special issue devoted to the research work discussed and presented at the 11th Conference on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems (SDEWES), held from the 4th September to the 9th September 2016 in Lisbon, Portugal and the 2nd South East European (SEE) SDEWES Conference held from June 15th to June 18th, 2016 in Piran, Slovenia. This special issue is in line with the journal's aim of publishing research from across the ever-broadening field of renewable and sustainable energy with a strong review element. Previous SDEWES conference special issues have gathered a significant knowledge base in the field of sustainable development that reflects the continuous research efforts of the SDEWES research community. Therefore, this editorial provides not only an overview of the papers published in this particular special issue, but also a wider overview of the current trends in the domain of sustainable and renewable energy. This year's special issue focuses particularly on the benefits of the bio-based economy, energy security issues, fossil fuel thermal plant alternatives and environmental constraints, district heating and cooling together with cross sector energy efficiency and energy conservation issues. Sustainable transport systems, the issue of fuel poverty in urban neighbourhoods and renewable energy to support development of peripheral rural areas, optimising passive building design for hot climates and solar-powered heating and cooling are further topics featured in this special issue. In the process of selecting papers for this special issue, the guest editors invited in total 23 extended manuscripts for consideration for publication. After a rigorous review process by expert reviewers overseen by the guest editors a total of 16 articles were accepted for publication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy storage (ES) is an important device to ensure operation stability and efficiency of a renewable energy based distributed energy generation (DEG) system. As such, many researchers have modelled the operation (scheduling) of energy storage in a DEG system, where it is mostly portrayed to operate on a daily cycle. In this paper, an analysis of the operation mode of energy storage is presented. Two modes of operation are defined, daily mode (DM) (ES operates in daily cycles) and weekly mode (WM) (ES operates in weekly cycles) which are modelled accordingly. This paper then attempts to analyse and compare between both modes in term of operation and cost. The analysis is performed through a mixed integer linear programming (MILP) model programmed via the General Algebraic Modelling System (GAMS). In general, with high capital cost of ES, it is advisable to program the ES to operate in a DM. The reason to this conclusion is mainly due to three factors, intermittency of renewable resources, varying weather conditions, and discharge rate of ES(s). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This editorial in Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews (RSER) is a virtual special issue (VSI) dedicated to the three conferences on Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems (SDEWES) held in 2018. These included the 13th SDEWES Conference (30 September to the 4 October in Palermo, Italy), the 3rd South East European SDEWES Conference (30 June to 4 July in Novi Sad, Serbia and the 1st Latin American SDEWES Conference (28–31 January in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil). In line with the RSER's policy, this VSI published two types of articles, either high quality review papers or original research papers with a strong review component. The guest editors invited 55 extended articles presented at the 2018 SDEWES conferences. These articles went through rigorous peer review process, and a total of 17 articles were finally accepted and published in this VSI. This editorial overviews these articles and examines their contribution to the field. In addition this editorial also provides an overview of the SDEWES 2018 conference series in order to reflect the continuous research efforts of the SDEWES research community and knowledge body on topics such as sustainable mobility, energy storage systems, various sustainability assessments, renewable energy source (RES) potential and biorefineries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: World energy demand is projected to rise to 1000EJ (EJ=1018 J) or more by 2050 if economic growth continues its course of recent decades. Both reserve depletion and greenhouse gas emissions will necessitate a major shift from fossil fuels as the dominant energy source. Since nuclear power is now unlikely to increase its present modest share, renewable energy (RE) will have to provide for most energy in the future. This paper addresses the questions of what energy levels RE can eventually provide, and in what time frame. We find that when the energy costs of energy are considered, it is unlikely that RE can provide anywhere near a 1000EJ by 2050. We further show that the overall technical potential for RE will fall if climate change continues. We conclude that the global shift to RE will have to be accompanied by large reductions in overall energy use for environmental sustainability. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The combined effects of climate change, the continued volatility of fuel prices, the recent food crisis and global economic turbulence have triggered a sense of urgency among policymakers, industries and development practitioners to find sustainable and viable solutions in the area of biofuels. This sense of urgency is reflected in the rapid expansion of global biofuels production and markets over the past few years. Biofuels development offers developing countries some prospect of self-reliant energy supplies at national and local levels, with potential economic, ecological, social, and security benefits. Forty-two African countries are net oil importers. This makes them particularly vulnerable to volatility in global fuel prices and dependent on foreign exchange to cover their domestic energy needs. The goal therefore is to reduce the high dependence on imported petroleum by developing domestic, renewable energy. But can this objective be achieved while leaving a minimal social and environmental footprint? A fundamental question is if biofuels can be produced with consideration of social, economic and environmental factors without setting unrealistic expectation for an evolving renewable energy industry that holds such great promise. The overall performance of different biofuels in reducing non-renewable energy use and greenhouse gas emissions varies when considering the entire lifecycle from production through to use. The net performance depends on the type of feedstock, the production process and the amount of non-renewable energy needed. This paper presents an overview of the development of biofuels in Africa, and highlights country-specific economic, environmental and social issues. It proposes a combination framework of policy incentives as a function of technology maturity, discusses practices, processes and technologies that can improve efficiency, lower energy and water demand, and further reduce the social and environmental footprint of biofuels production thereby contributing to sustainable development. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Climate change mitigation is considered as a high priority internationally and is placed in the top of the agenda for most politicians and decision makers. The key challenge is that low-carbon sustainable technologies need to be adopted both by developed as well as developing countries, in an effort to avoid past unsustainable practices and being locked into old, less sustainable technologies. Technology transfer (TT), as an important feature of both the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its Kyoto Protocol can play a key role. TT can allow countries to move quickly to environmentally sound and sustainable practices, institutions and technologies. Indeed, the transfer or innovation process must be fast enough, to reduce global vulnerability to climate change. The aim of this paper is to analyse the TT challenges and emerging opportunities under the new climate regime, in terms of the process of innovation into an existing energy system, the related barriers and the supporting diffusion mechanisms. Good practices for renewable energy are also presented and discussed by both the developed and the developing countries in this respect. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]