diff --git a/requirements-local.txt b/requirements-local.txt
index 492e0ba..77aabf1 100644
--- a/requirements-local.txt
+++ b/requirements-local.txt
@@ -1,6 +1,8 @@
 temporalio
 psycopg2-binary
-sqlalchemy
+# SQLAlchemy 2.1 makes psycopg (v3) the default driver for postgresql:// URLs; sientia_do
+# builds that URL and ships only psycopg2-binary, so 2.1 fails with "No module named psycopg".
+sqlalchemy<2.1
 asyncua==1.0.6
 redis
 git+ssh://git@github.com/Aignosi/sientia-dataops-library.git@1.12.2
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 4e57c46..e2cdfcb 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -1,6 +1,8 @@
 temporalio
 psycopg2-binary
-sqlalchemy
+# SQLAlchemy 2.1 makes psycopg (v3) the default driver for postgresql:// URLs; sientia_do
+# builds that URL and ships only psycopg2-binary, so 2.1 fails with "No module named psycopg".
+sqlalchemy<2.1
 asyncua==1.0.6
 redis
 sientia_do>=1.12.2
diff --git a/tests/laborious/activities/test_mlflow.py b/tests/laborious/activities/test_mlflow.py
index 700e9b3..c6b56cf 100644
--- a/tests/laborious/activities/test_mlflow.py
+++ b/tests/laborious/activities/test_mlflow.py
@@ -375,9 +375,9 @@ def test_request_predict_failure(mock_to_datetime, mock_from_dataframe, mlflow):
 @patch('laborious.activities.mlflow.rmtree')
 @patch('laborious.activities.mlflow.to_datetime')
 def test_retrain_model_success_data_success_retrain(
-    mock_to_datetime, mock_rmtree, mock_mkdtemp, mock_log_artifact, mlflow
+    mock_to_datetime, mock_rmtree, mock_mkdtemp, mock_log_artifact, mlflow, tmp_path
 ):
-    mock_mkdtemp.return_value = 'tmp'
+    mock_mkdtemp.return_value = str(tmp_path)
     mock_to_datetime.side_effect = lambda idx, **kwargs: pd.DatetimeIndex(idx)
 
     mv_alias = MagicMock()
@@ -428,9 +428,9 @@ def test_retrain_model_success_data_success_retrain(
 @patch('laborious.activities.mlflow.rmtree')
 @patch('laborious.activities.mlflow.to_datetime')
 def test_retrain_model_success_with_payload_data(
-    mock_to_datetime, mock_rmtree, mock_mkdtemp, mock_log_artifact, mlflow
+    mock_to_datetime, mock_rmtree, mock_mkdtemp, mock_log_artifact, mlflow, tmp_path
 ):
-    mock_mkdtemp.return_value = 'tmp'
+    mock_mkdtemp.return_value = str(tmp_path)
     mock_to_datetime.side_effect = lambda idx, **kwargs: pd.DatetimeIndex(idx)
     mv_alias = MagicMock(run_id='src')
     mlflow.mlflow_repository._client.get_model_version_by_alias.return_value = mv_alias
@@ -473,9 +473,9 @@ def test_retrain_model_success_with_payload_data(
 @patch('laborious.activities.mlflow.rmtree')
 @patch('laborious.activities.mlflow.to_datetime')
 def test_retrain_model_always_uses_retrain_even_with_full_retrain_flag(
-    mock_to_datetime, mock_rmtree, mock_mkdtemp, mock_log_artifact, mlflow
+    mock_to_datetime, mock_rmtree, mock_mkdtemp, mock_log_artifact, mlflow, tmp_path
 ):
-    mock_mkdtemp.return_value = 'tmp'
+    mock_mkdtemp.return_value = str(tmp_path)
     mock_to_datetime.side_effect = lambda idx, **kwargs: pd.DatetimeIndex(idx)
     mv_alias = MagicMock(run_id='src')
     mlflow.mlflow_repository._client.get_model_version_by_alias.return_value = mv_alias