It increased the demands on ground-water supplies that prolonged drought and improper maintenance of water resources. So it is necessary to evaluate ground-water resources in the hard rock terrain. In recent years, Remote-Sensing methods have been increasingly recognized as a means of obtaining crucial geoscientific data for both regional and site-specific investigations. This work aims to develop and apply integrated methods combining the information obtained by geo-hydrological field mapping and those obtained by analyzing multi-source remotely sensed data in a GIS environment for better understanding the Groundwater condition in hard rock terrain. In this study, digitally enhanced Landsat ETM+ data was used to extract information on geology, geomorphology. The Hill-Shading techniques are applied to SRTM DEM data to enhance terrain perspective views, and extract Geomorphological features and morphologically defined structures through the means of lineament analysis. A combination of Spectral information from Landsat ETM+ data plus spatial information from SRTM-DEM data is used to address the groundwater potential of alluvium, colluvium, and fractured crystalline rocks in the study area. The spatial distribution of groundwater potential zones shows regional patterns related to lithologies, lineaments, drainage systems, and landforms. High-yielding wells and springs are often related to large lineaments and corresponding structural features such as dykes. The results show that the combination of remote sensing, GIS, traditional fieldwork, and models provide a powerful tool for water resources assessment and management, and groundwater exploration planning.

A significant percentage of any nation’s economy comes from the building industry, and its performance can impact overall economic growth and development. This paper aims to identify the similarities and differences between the construction sector (CS) of developed and developing economies in terms of size, growth, and contribution to the Gross domestic product (GDP) to understand the similarities and variances in the CS dynamics, trends, and challenges, and to inform policy decisions and investments through the literature review. The study also explores the factors that affect the CS’s performance in both types of economies, such as government policies, market conditions, and technological advancements. This paper concludes that the CS in developed economies is more established and technologically advanced, but there is still significant room for growth in developing economies. Moreover, a framework is proposed that could assist developing nations in opting for the construction economy. Further, the review emphasizes the significance of government policies and investments in infrastructure development to stimulate the CS’s growth and support overall economic development. The results of the study will assist in enhancing understanding of the CS’s potential in both developed and developing economies and support decision-making for policymakers, industry practitioners, and academicians.

Due to rising global environmental challenges, air/water pollution treatment technologies, especially membrane techniques, have been focused on. In this context, air or purification membranes have been considered effective for environmental remediation. In the field of polymeric membranes, high-performance polymer/graphene nanocomposite membranes have gained increasing research attention. The polymer/graphene nanomaterials exposed several potential benefits when processed as membranes. This review explains the utilization of polymer and graphene-derived nanocomposites towards membrane formation and water or gas separation or decontamination properties. Here, different membrane designs have been developed depending upon the polymer types (poly(vinyl alcohol), poly(vinyl chloride), poly(dimethyl siloxane), polysulfone, poly(methyl methacrylate), etc.) and graphene functionalities. Including graphene in polymers influences membrane microstructure, physical features, molecular permeability or selectivity, and separations. Polysulfone/graphene oxide nanocomposite membranes have been found to be most efficient with an enhanced rejection rate of 90%–95%, a high water flux >180 L/m²/h, and a desirable water contact angle for water purification purposes. For gas separation membranes, efficient membranes have been reported as polysulfone/graphene oxide and poly(dimethyl siloxane)/graphene oxide nanocomposites. In these membranes, N₂, CO₂, and other gases permeability has been found to be higher than even >99.9%. Similarly, higher selectivity values for gases like CO₂/CH₄ have been observed. Thus, high-performance graphene-based nanocomposite membranes possess high potential to overcome the challenges related to water or gas molecular separations.

Border cities face significant challenges due to political, environmental, and social issues. Strong urban governance can help resolve many of these problems, but it requires identifying practical factors specific to each city’s location. This study aimed to assess the state of urban governance in Paveh, a border city with a population of 25,771 people. The research used both primary data collection (through a questionnaire) and secondary data sources (local and national databases and documents). The study randomly selected 379 households from Paveh’s population and determined a reliability value of 0.913 using the Cochrane procedure. To assess Paveh’s urban governance, eight criteria were used: participatory, rule-of-law compliance, transparency, responsiveness, consensus-oriented, equitable and inclusive, effective and efficient, and accountability. The findings revealed that Paveh’s urban governance, particularly in the dimensions of transparency and participation, is in an unfavorable situation.

The use of different energy sources and the worry of running out of some of them in the modern world have made factors such as environmental pollution and even energy sustainability vital. Vital resources for humanity include water, environment, food, and energy. As a result, building strong trust in these resources is crucial because of their interconnected nature. Sustainability in security of energy, water and food, generally decreases costs and improves durability. This study introduces and describes the components of a system named “Desktop Energetic Dark Greenhouse” in the context of the quadruple nexus of water, environment, food, and energy in urban life. This solution can concurrently serve to strengthen the sustainable security of water, environment, food, and energy. For home productivity, a small-scale version of this project was completed. The costs and revenues for this system have been determined after conducting an economic study from the viewpoints of the investor and the average household. The findings indicate that the capital return period is around five years from the investor’s perspective. The capital return on investment for this system is less than 4 years from the standpoint of the households. According to the estimates, this system annually supplies about 20 kg of vegetables or herbs, which means about one third of the annual needs of a family.

Seawater desalination has been studied with interest due to the scarcity of fresh water for human consumption. Solar distillation is an old method; the productivity, energy consumption of the process and the cost of the desalinated water thus obtained depend on the efficiency achieved in each of the stages of these systems. The limited capacity to absorb solar radiation and transform it into useful heat for evaporation, interaction with the surrounding medium, and heat losses restrict the overall efficiency of the thermal process and productivity. Since the energy comes from solar radiation, the maximum productivity of this process will be constrained by the magnitude of the total solar radiation available in an area of the planet due to its geographic location, time of year and local climatic conditions. The processes of this energy will be thermodynamically limited by the heat transfer coefficients achieved in the equipment, the maximum value that the evaporation heat can reach, as long as the losses to the environment by convection and radiation are minimal. Comparative analyses of several proposed models, reported data of distillers, reported data of solar radiation that reach average values of up to 7.2–7.4 kwh/m² in some regions of the planet are presented and estimates are made for productivity of these equipments that they reach between 6.7 and 6.9 kg/m² day with a theoretical maximum efficiency of about 0.16 of the total solar radiation.