by Simon Damkjaer

The water resources community remains stuck in a futile debate of whether water constitutes a human right or a commodity, which is resolved through the content of General Comment 15: water constitutes a human right, which puts conditions on economic approaches to water and its commodification. Instead, it is time to
address the issue of globally adopted misrepresentative water scarcity metrics that misleadingly show increasing conditions of scarcity, which risks biasing the argument towards the commodification of water. Redefining these metrics to portray hydrologic realities, will more precisely inform the formulation of water policies and help advance solutions to global water problems.

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by Christina Chang and Rebecca Farnum

Our world is running out of fossil fuels to burn for energy. Therefore, even if we were not concerned with climate change, we need to be able to produce and store energy sustainably from renewable sources. Sunlight is an abundant energy supply, and the blueprint for sustainable energy creation and storage has long been right under our noses – and on our salad forks. This article draws attention to an emerging solar energy storage technology being developed in labs around the world, called artificial photosynthesis. Artificial photosynthesis can be used to make ‘artificial leaves’ that act like ‘solar batteries’, creating and storing fuel. We describe how artificial photosynthesis works and discuss how it may provide a way forward for renewable energy storage, reduce our negative impacts on the planet, and make electricity accessible to our most vulnerable population.

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by Christina Schweitzer

While most scientists look to the future, heritage scientists focus on preserving the past. Bridging science and art, this little-known field encompasses the conservation, interpretation and management of cultural assets. The educational and cultural importance of the UK’s historical assets is widely acknowledged, but they also contribute billions of pounds to the economy in the form of heritage tourism and conservation of historic buildings. Despite the economic benefits of investment in heritage science, the field is largely overlooked by policymakers and the scientific community at large, and has suffered from a lack of funding and career opportunities for scientists.

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by Enora Robin

Cities have become key players in the global economic landscape, with only 600 cities contributing to 60% of the world’s economic output. The proportion of world’s population living in urban areas is projected to be rising from 50% today to 75% in 2050. Despite the economic benefits derived from the concentration of economic activities, concern has emerged about the negative externalities of urbanised modes of development. As a response to these challenges, more attention has been given to inclusive and sustainable urban modes of development that would reconcile the objectives of sustainability and economic competitiveness. The concept of smart cities has gained in popularity among policy-makers over the last two decades. However, smart city programmes have often been focusing on the development of ICT infrastructures. This brief article argues that digital strategies must be complemented by policies that improve people’s and local firms’ ability to grasp the potential benefits of these new technological and networking opportunities.

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by Victoria Plutshack

As the UK aims to produce 15% of its energy consumption from renewables by 2020, planning policy becomes increasingly important to facilitate the large-scale implementation of renewable technologies. As it stands, there is great opposition to wind farms across Wales, the North East of England and Scotland. How can we improve the planning process and companies’ engagement with the local community to increase the success rate for planning applications? This piece looks at what we can learn from psychological and sociological frameworks, such as the Theory of Planned Behaviour and concepts of place attachment, to craft a suitable government response.

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