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Increased use of annual payments to land managers for ecological outcomes indicates a growing interest in exploring the potential of this approach. In this viewpoint, we drew on the experiences of all schemes paying for biodiversity outcomes/results on agricultural land operating in the EU and EFTA countries with the aim of reviewing the decisive elements of the schemes’ design and implementation as well as the challenges and opportunities of adopting a results-based approach. We analysed the characteristics of results-based schemes using evidence from peer-reviewed literature, technical reports, scheme practitioners and experts in agri-environment-climate policy. We developed a typology of the schemes and explored critical issues influencing the feasibility and performance of results-based schemes. The evidence to date shows that there are at least 11 advantages to the results-based approach not found in management-based schemes with similar objectives, dealing with environmental efficiency, farmers’ participation and development of local biodiversity-based projects. Although results-based approaches have specific challenges at every stage of design and implementation, for many of these the existing schemes provide potential solutions. There is also some apprehension about trying a results-based approach in Mediterranean, central and eastern EU Member States. We conclude that there is clear potential to expand the approach in the European Union for the Rural Development programming period for 2021–2028. Nevertheless, evidence is needed about the approach’s efficiency in delivering conservation outcomes in the long term, its additionality, impact on the knowledge and attitudes of land managers and society at large, development of ways of rewarding the achievement of actual results, as well as its potential for stimulating innovative grassroots solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact of decreasing the column diameter from 5 to 2 cm has been studied on the fluidization of a very dense powder both at ambient and high temperature. The final objective was to coat very dense nuclear fuel particles with silicon using a Fluidized Bed Chemical Vapor Deposition (FB-CVD) process with bed weights as low as possible. A surrogate tungsten powder, 19300 kg/m 3 in density, was used. Wall effects only appeared in the column with a 2 cm diameter. This was evidenced by an increase in the hysteretic behavior of the pressure drop curves and an increase of the minimum fluidization velocity, as well as by a decrease in the bed voidage. This critical diameter is higher than those found elsewhere for Geldart's group A and B powders, which is probably due to the very high density of the tungsten powder that increases the friction forces in the bed. Satisfactory thermal conditions were reached at 650 °C in a reactor with a 3 cm diameter using only 740 g of powder, thereby opening the way for future silicon coating experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Significant progresses in the performances under in-pile irradiation of particular U-Mo based fuels have been observed over the last fifteen years. One of the remaining issues has still to be tackled for use as a LEU fuel in the high power research reactors: the U-Mo recrystallization and its associated swelling have to be controlled or delayed. One way to mitigate this problem would be to optimize the initial microstructure of U-Mo atomized particle, by homogenizing Mo concentration and increasing grain size. This paper mainly focuses on U-Mo grain growth. Based on samples prepared in the framework of KOMO-5 and EMPIrE tests, a methodological work based on the use of EBSD is presented. In particular, surface preparation procedures are proposed for powders and rods, this last one being most likely readily applicable for plate analysis. As-atomized microstructures are analyzed in detail and subsequently compared to those obtained on particles annealed at 1000 °C under various conditions. It is found that 1 h annealing under vacuum is a good compromise of temperature and time to meet the development goals, provided that few impurity precipitates are present within U-Mo particles, since these can impact grain growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]