The December issue of CJCE features the Energy and Environmental Sustainability Development Special Issue Section. In the special issue section preface, guest editor Pankaj Kumar from Guru Ghasidas Vishwavidyalaya, Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh, India, notes that this special section “aims to highlight the latest progress, breakthroughs, key findings, insights, and innovative research in the field of energy and environment for sustainable development” and it “discusses the possible cutting-edge solutions for the current global energy and environmental challenges”. Be sure to explore this special issue section for more on this topic!
This month’s Editor’s Choice is an open access research article from Lizbeth Moreno Bravo and Jan Kopyscinski of McGill University titled “Trade-offs in stability and activity: A study of ordered mesoporous alumina and γ-Al2O3 supported Ni catalysts for CO2 methanation”. In this study, the authors synthesized “A series of K-Ni-γ-Al2O3 samples containing 15 wt.% Ni and varying potassium loadings (0–10 wt.%)” via “incipient wetness impregnation and evaporation-induced self-assembly (EISA) for CO2 methanation.” They found that “the higher surface availability of potassium in impregnated catalysts enhances CO2 adsorption, compensating for the partial blockage of nickel sites. These results highlight the trade-offs between stability and activity, with OMA supports excelling in long-term high-temperature applications and γ-Al2O3 supports offering a cost-effective solution with simpler preparation methods for large-scale CO2 methanation.”
The second issue highlight is an open access article titled “Removal of benzotriazoles from domestic wastewater using Pleurotus ostreatus fungal pellets” by Evrydiki Markoulatou, Georgia Gatidou, Athanasios S. Stasinakis, and Michail S. Fountoulakis from University of the Aegean, Mytilene, Greece. This article examines the “potential removal capability of four benzotriazoles and one benzothiazole (1H-benzotriazole, BTR; 4-methyl-1H-benzotriazole, 4TTR; 5-methyl-1H-benzotriazole, 5TTR; 5-chlorobenzotriazole, CBTR; xylytriazole, XTR; and 2-Hydroxybenzothiazole, OH-BTH) from domestic wastewater…using the white-rot fungus Pleurotus ostreatus in pellet form” as “benzotriazoles are a group of persistent and mobile substances commonly found in aquatic environments” that require degradation to “avoid their adverse effects on the environment and human health”.
The next issue highlight is another open access article: “Bioelectrochemical treatment of oil sands process-affected water: A comparative study” by Louis-B. Jugnia, Dominic Manno, Jie Sui, Xiaomeng Wang, and Boris Tartakovsky from National Research Council Canada and Natural Resources Canada. Within this study, the “removal of dissolved organic carbon and naphthenic acids (NAs) from oil sands process-affected water (OSPW) was evaluated in flow-through microbial fuel cell (MFC), microbial electrolysis cell (MEC), and microbial electrosynthesis (MES) cell setups with aerated cathodic compartments.”
The final issue highlight is yet another open access article: “Crude oil viscosity reduction using TiO2, MgO, and Al2O3 nanoparticles” by Iman Nowrouzi, Amir H. Mohammadi, and Abbas Khaksar Manshad from University of KwaZulu-Natal, Howard College Campus, Durban, South Africa, and Petroleum University of Technology (PUT), Abadan, Iran. Within this article, the authors note “The viscosity of crude oil plays a crucial role in enhancing oil recovery and flow efficiency within well columns and pipelines. However, the production and transportation of heavier, more viscous crude oils pose significant challenges.” This study therefore “investigates the effects of three metal oxide nanoparticles (TiO2, MgO, and Al2O3) on the viscosity of six crude oil samples with API gravities ranging from 11.04 to 34.50 and initial viscosities between 613 and 24 cP at different temperatures. The results demonstrate that TiO2 nanoparticles achieve the highest viscosity reduction, followed by Al2O3 and MgO.”