The COVID‐19 pandemic has impacted social, economic, and environmental systems worldwide, slowing down and reversing the progress made in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). SDGs belong to the 2030 Agenda to transform our world by tackling humankind's challenges to ensure well‐being, economic prosperity, and environmental protection. We explore the potential impacts of the pandemic on SDGs for Nepal. We followed a knowledge co‐creation process with experts from various professional backgrounds, involving five steps: online survey, online workshop, assessment of expert's opinions, review and validation, and revision and synthesis. The pandemic has negatively impacted most SDGs in the short term. Particularly, the targets of SDG 1, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 13 have and will continue to have weakly to moderately restricting impacts. However, a few targets of SDG 2, 3, 6, and 11 could also have weakly promoting impacts. The negative impacts have resulted from impeding factors linked to the pandemic. Many of the negative impacts may subside in the medium and long terms. The key five impeding factors are lockdowns, underemployment and unemployment, closure of institutions and facilities, diluted focus and funds for non‐COVID‐19‐related issues, and anticipated reduction in support from development partners. The pandemic has also opened a window of opportunity for sustainable transformation, which is short‐lived and narrow. These opportunities are lessons learned for planning and action, socio‐economic recovery plan, use of information and communication technologies and the digital economy, reverse migration and “brain gain,” and local governments' exercising authorities.

Municipal solid waste (MSW) is rising globally, and improper management harms the environment and public health. As a result, there is heightened interest in finding effective solutions, and identifying research trends helps determine the best management and valorization pathways. However, the existing reviews often focus narrowly on specific technologies or regional case studies, lacking a comprehensive analysis of global research trends. This study addresses this significant gap by conducting a large-scale trend analysis based on 15,646 relevant articles screened from 25,068 Scopus-indexed publications from 1904 to 2023 using title, abstract, and keyword analysis. Literature-based comparative assessments were conducted to critically evaluate the pathways through TEE (techno-economic and environmental), SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats), and PESTEL (political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal) frameworks. Since 1990, article publication has increased by about 10% annually, consistently concentrating on thermochemical conversion and, more recently, on sustainability and circular economy perspectives. Seven distinct pathways for MSW management were identified, with recycling and material recovery, followed by thermochemical conversion for high-calorific waste and biochemical conversion for high-organic waste, showing the most promise. The findings aim to help researchers understand MSW research trends and assist planners in identifying effective management and valorization strategies.

The academic institute, a huge consumer of energy, is still depending upon the grid and/or conventional fuel despite having potential areas of a solar PV installation. No such study has been reported in Nepal which has techno-economically discussed the potential use of academic institute rooftops for solar PV installation. In this study, we have investigated the techno-economic and environmental assessment of a 1 megawatt (MW) rooftop solar PV using PVsyst for Purwanchal Campus, Nepal. It has been estimated the plant will produce about 1,660 MWh of usable AC electricity annually and out of which 95% can be supplied to the grid. The remaining can fulfill the demand of the campus at sunshine hours. For this, a capital investment of about USD 961,404 is needed for the plant with an annual operating cost of USD 8,008. This project gives a 190% return of investment within its life of 25 years with a Levelized cost of energy (LCOE) of 0.069 USD/kWh. The performance ratio and payback period of the project are calculated at about 0.765 and 8.4 years, respectively. The system will produce about 97% less emission than that of diesel generator, which is currently being used for power backup. It is concluded that a 1 MW grid-connected solar PV system is feasible for the studied campus.