Special issue editorial

Abstract

There is a growing understanding that environmental challenges which the mankind is facing cannot be solved only by means of technological or societal sciences. A complex approach is needed, an approach that combines the strengths of novel developments in clean technologies and political implementation of the societal demands for sustainable development and clean environment. Considerable efforts are being made both in technical and political fields to pursue this goal and it is important for the scientific community and decision makers to be aware of those efforts. With this aim in mind the organisers of the 14th International Conference on Process Integration, Modelling and Optimisation for Energy Saving and Pollution Reduction—PRES’11and the publishers of the Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy are joining their efforts and publishing this Special Issue. PRES’11 was held in 2011 in the uniquely historical Italian city Florence known for its fine architecture and arts. PRES is an annual venue and ranks as one of the world leading conferences of its kind. Being initially envisaged as a conference dedicated to process integration topics; it is nowadays a comprehensive and established platform for researchers, industry people and policy makers. It provided excellent opportunity for its participants to exchange novel ideas, processes, procedures and energy saving policies and establish close links among academia, industry and policy makers. What also distinguishes this conference from its counterparts is its strong and elaborate publishing strategy. All conference papers are now published as refereed type papers in Chemical Engineering Transactions, which testifies for the quality of the contributions. Besides that, the selected conference contributions are published as considerably extended versions in special issues of various internationally recognised journals, including Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy. Twelve papers were invited for the publication and accepted after a thorough peer-review following Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy reviewing procedure. They have been authored by researchers from 15 institutions in 11 countries worldwide—from Austria, Brazil, Croatia, France, Hungary, Iran, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Slovenia and the United Kingdom. This selection of papers starts with exergy analysis and process integration, followed by integration of membranes, fibrous separation and advanced environmental protection methodologies. They are specific renewables related issues included in those themes: biorefineries, bioethanol, biogas, biodiesel, biowaste treatment, tradeoffs between carbon and nitrogen footprints, decarbonised coal energy systems, solar energy integration and CO2 capture. The contributions have been selected to provide insight into various fields related to environmental policies and pollution reduction technologies. Publication of Special Issues of Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy following yet another PRES conference has become a good tradition based on high quality of the presentations delivered by the conference participants. We are convinced that providing broader access to the research and information contained in those presentations will be beneficial for a wide range of the audience in industry, academy and local and central authorities. J. J. Klemes (&) P. S. Varbanov Centre for Process Integration and Intensification–CPI, Research Institute of Chemical and Process Engineering, Faculty of Information Technology, University of Pannonia, Egyetem utca 10, 8200 Veszprem, Hungary e-mail: klemes@cpi.uni-pannon.hu