Search results for: environmental destruction

Authors: Gopinath Rathod, Vinod Puranik

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Growing business recognizes environmental consciousness as an important concept for survival in the competitive scenario. Environmental consciousness is a critical intersection between manufacturing and product design processes with environmental issues and concerns. This article presents a project in which quality function deployment (QFD) for environment (ECQFD) has been applied to rotary switches for enabling environmentally conscious design in the early stage of product development. ECQFD is capable of handling simultaneously the environmental and traditional product quality requirements. ECQFD consists of four phases. ECQFD phases I and II are concerned with the identification of parts that are important in enhancing environmental consciousness. ECQFD phases III and IV are concerned with the evaluation of effect of design improvement on environmental quality requirements. The case study has been practically validated which indicated the receptivity of applying ECQFD in industrial scenario.

Keywords: quality function deployment, environment, product design, design for environment, rotary switches

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Authors: Alana C. M. Santana, Mary L. G. S. Senna

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T Sustainable development is very important for the existence of life on the planet. The use of any space without planning can cause impacts on the environment, which depending on the proportion may be irreversible. Buritis beach is very frequented by visitors, but it has no information on use and does not have enough infrastructure to collaborate with the preservation of the environment. Therefore, the objective of this study was to adopt a simple control list of environmental impacts in river beaches, in order to identify the environmental impacts generated in the post-holiday seasons of Buritis beach and to characterize the beach in terms of infrastructure. The holidays that carried out the analyzes were the nationals of the second half of 2017, as well as the universal fraternization holiday of 2018. The results show that the beach needs investments in its infrastructure and educational campaigns to minimize environmental impacts caused by anthropic action.

Keywords: environmental impacts, sustainable development, Buritis Beach, Brazil.

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Authors: Abdelsalam Omran Gebril

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Pollution and solid waste are the most important environmental problems plaguing the city of Benghazi as well as other cities and towns in Libya. These problems are caused by the lack of environmental planning and sound environmental management. Environmental planning is very important at present for the development of projects that preserve the environment, therefore, the planning process should be prioritized over the management process. Pollution caused by poor planning and environmental management exists not only in Benghazi but also in all other Libyan cities. This study was conducted through various field visits to several neighborhoods and areas within Benghazi as well as its neighboring regions. Follow-ups in these areas were conducted from March 2013 to October 2013 and documented by photographs. The existing methods of waste collection and means of transportation were investigated. Interviews were conducted with relevant authorities, including the Environment Public Authority in Benghazi and the Public Service Company of Benghazi. The objective of this study is to determine the causes of solid waste pollution in Benghazi City and its surrounding areas. Results show that solid waste pollution in Benghazi and its surrounding areas is the result of poor planning and environmental management, population growth, and the lack of hardware and equipment for the collection and transport of waste from the city to the landfill site. One of the most important recommendations in this study is the development of a complete and comprehensive plan that includes environmental planning and environmental management to reduce solid waste pollution.

Keywords: solid waste, pollution, environmental planning, management, Benghazi, Libya

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Authors: Ejikeme Johnson Kanu

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This research explores the environmental justice of host communities in south-eastern Nigeria whose source of livelihood has been destroyed due to oil exploitation. Environmental justice scholarship in the area often adopts Western liberal ideology from a more macro level synthesis (Niger Delta). This study therefore explored the sufficiency or otherwise of the adoption of Western liberal ideology in the framing of environmental justice (EJ) in the area which neglects the impact of colonialism and cultural domination. Mixed archival research supplemented by secondary analysis guided this study. Drawing from data analysis, the paper first argues that micro-level studies are required to either validate or invalidate the studies done at the macro-level (Niger Delta) which has often been used to generalise around environmental injustice done within the host communities even though the communities (South-eastern) differ significantly from (South-south) in terms of language, culture, socio-political and economic formation which indicate that the drivers of EJ may differ among them. Secondly, the paper argues that EJ framing from the Western worldview adopted in the study area is insufficient to understand environmental injustice suffered in the study area and there is the need for environmental justice framing that will consider the impact of colonialism and nonrecognition of the cultural identities of the host communities which breed environmental justice. The study, therefore, concludes by drawing from decolonial theory to consider how the framing of EJ would move beyond the western liberal EJ to Indigenous environmental justice.

Keywords: environmental justice, culture, decolonial, nonrecognition, indigenous environmental justice

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Authors: Tao Zhang

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As the competition of all kinds of festival events becomes more and more fierce, more and more event organizers try to design a blended festivalscape by integrating multifaceted environmental cues in order to raise the service quality of festival events and then raise visitors’ satisfaction. As the main type of festival events, food festivals are popular in all over the world. The organizers’ of food festivals also try to mix food with multifaceted environmental cues (e.g., music, stage, light, dance) to design a blended festivalscape. However, until now little studies explore the environmental cues of food festivals and their relationship with visitors’ satisfaction. Therefore, the aim of this study is to ascertain the environmental cues of food festival and their relationship with visitors’ satisfaction by using the blended festivalscape theory. Using convenient sampling method, this study investigated 1,000 food festival visitors in Macau. Factor analysis showed there are mainly six environmental cues (i.e., food, atmosphere, program, staff, facility, and information). All six environmental cues are positively related with visitors’ satisfaction, while the most influential factors are food, atmosphere, and program. This study showed that festival event organizers’ should focus on the topic of their festival event, build festival atmosphere, and create interesting programs in order to design a blended festivalscape and then raise visitors’ satisfaction.

Keywords: environmental cue, event, festival, satisfaction

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Authors: Gholamhassan Kakha, Mohsen Jami, Daniel Alex Merino Natorce

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Sustainable development refers to the creation of a balance between the development and the environment too; it consists of three key principles namely environment, society and economy. These three parameters are related to each other and the imbalance occurs in each will lead to the disparity of the other parts. Mining is one of the most important tools of the economic growth and social welfare in many countries. Meanwhile, assessment of the environmental impacts has directed to the attention of planners toward the natural environment of the areas surrounded by mines and allowing for monitoring and controlling of the current situation by the designers. In this look upon, a semi-quantitative model using a matrix method is presented for assessing the environmental impacts in the BOOG Granite Mine located in Sistan and Balouchestan, one of the provinces of Iran for determining the effective factors and environmental components. For accomplishing this purpose, the initial data are collected by the experts at the next stage; the effect of the factors affects each environmental component is determined by specifying the qualitative viewpoints. Based on the results, factors including air quality, ecology, human health and safety along with the environmental damages resulted from mining activities in that area. Finally, the results gained from the assessment of the environmental impact are used to evaluate the sustainability by using Philips mathematical model. The results show that the sustainability of this area is weak, so environmental preventive measures are recommended to reduce the environmental damages to its components.

Keywords: sustainable development, environmental impacts' assessment, BOOG granite, Philips mathematical model

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Authors: Buket Metin

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Buildings cause a variety of loads on the environment due to activities performed at each stage of the building life cycle. Construction is the first stage that affects both the natural and built environments at different steps of the process, which can be defined as transportation of materials within the construction site, formation and preparation of materials on-site and the application of materials to realize the building subsystems. All of these steps require the use of technology, which varies based on the facilities that contractors and subcontractors have. Hence, environmental consequences of the construction process should be tackled by focusing on construction technology options used in every step of the process. This paper presents an environmental decision-making model for assessing on-site performances of subcontractors based on the construction technology options which they can supply. First, construction technologies, which constitute information, tools and methods, are classified. Then, environmental performance criteria are set forth related to resource consumption, ecosystem quality, and human health issues. Finally, the model is developed based on the relationships between the construction technology components and the environmental performance criteria. The Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process (FAHP) method is used for weighting the environmental performance criteria according to environmental priorities of decision-maker(s), while the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) method is used for ranking on-site environmental performances of subcontractors using quantitative data related to the construction technology components. Thus, the model aims to provide an insight to decision-maker(s) about the environmental consequences of the construction process and to provide an opportunity to improve the overall environmental performance of construction sites.

Keywords: construction process, construction technology, decision making, environmental performance, subcontractor

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Authors: Ieva Bruzauskaite, Jovile Raudoniute, Karina Poliakovaite, Danguole Zabulyte, Daiva Bironaite, Ruta Aldonyte

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Introduction: Air pollution is a growing global problem which has been shown to be responsible for various adverse health outcomes. Immunotoxicity, such as dysregulated inflammation, has been proposed as one of the main mechanisms in air pollution-associated diseases. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is among major morbidity and mortality causes worldwide and is characterized by persistent airflow limitation caused by the small airways disease (obstructive bronchiolitis) and irreversible parenchymal destruction (emphysema). Exact pathways explaining the air pollution induced and mediated disease states are still not clear. However, modern societies understand dangers of polluted air, seek to mitigate such effects and are in need for reliable biomarkers of air pollution. We hypothesise that post-translational modifications of structural proteins, e.g. citrullination, might be a good candidate biomarker. Thus, we have designed this study, where mice were exposed to diesel exhaust and the ongoing protein modifications and inflammation in lungs and other tissues were assessed. Materials And Methods: To assess the effects of diesel exhaust a in vivo study was designed. Mice (n=10) were subjected to everyday 2-hour exposure to diesel exhaust for 14 days. Control mice were treated the same way without diesel exhaust. The effects within lung and other tissues were assessed by immunohistochemistry of formalin-fixed and paraffin-embedded tissues. Levels of inflammation and citrullination related markers were investigated. Levels of parenchymal damage were also measured. Results: In vivo study corroborates our own data from in vitro and reveals diesel exhaust initiated inflammatory shift and modulation of lung peptidyl arginine deiminase 4 (PAD4), citrullination associated enzyme, levels. In addition, high levels of citrulline were observed in exposed lung tissue sections co-localising with increased parenchymal destruction. Conclusions: Subacute exposure to diesel exhaust renders mice lungs inflammatory and modifies certain structural proteins. Such structural changes of proteins may pave a pathways to lost/gain function of affected molecules and also propagate autoimmune processes within the lung and systemically.

Keywords: air pollution, citrullination, in vivo, lungs

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Authors: Emil Aliyev

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The main focus of this conference paper is on the aspects of the environmental sustainability of onshore hydrocarbon pipelines. The latter is notorious for being a source of major environmental contamination and a consumer of vast amounts of natural resources such as water, land, steel, etc. Therefore, the environmentally sustainable operation of pipelines is a concern that requires attention and research. The geographical scope of the paper is confined to onshore hydrocarbon pipelines operated in the Middle East region. The research contains elements of originality as it draws on the author’s field experience and practical implementation of environmental and sustainability solutions in a major Middle East-based pipeline organization. The authors describe some of the most common significant environmental aspects of pipeline operations and provide examples of various approaches and technologies that can be successfully utilized to make pipelines more environmentally sustainable. The author concludes that the operation of onshore hydrocarbon pipelines can be made environmentally sustainable. This can be achieved by adopting a systematic framework, focusing limited resources on significant aspects, integrating a circular economy into day-to-day activities, and having strong management support.

Keywords: pipelines, onshore hydrocarbon pipelines, environmental sustainability, significant environmental aspects

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Authors: Summer Isaacson

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Research on gender differences in environmental behavior has long claimed that women engage less than men in environmental political participation (EPP) (protests, petitions), despite their higher levels of environmental concern and vulnerability. Using recent data from the ISSP’s 2020 Environment module including 28 countries, we revisit the gender gap in EPP. Arguing that increasing gender equality and socio-economic development can allow women to voice their environmental grievances, we use multi-level models to examine the effects of macro-level gender equality on gender differences in environmental protests, petitions, and boycotts. By distinguishing individual from collective and non-confrontational from confrontational engagement forms, this study offers an encompassing understanding of gendered patterns of participation. Women do participate more than men, but mainly in individual and non-confrontational EPP forms (petitions, boycotts) and with substantial variation across countries. Moreover, considering how women have historically been restrained from participating in politics, we argue that structural gender inequality remains an important limitation to women’s engagement. Cross-level interactions indicate that in more egalitarian countries, women are more likely to engage in several types of EPP than men. The study offers new perspectives and findings on gender differences in EPP, highlighting the impact of gender inequality on women’s participation.

Keywords: environmental activism, political participation, gender equality, pro-environmental behavior

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Authors: Pradip Kumar Das

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As the entire world continues its rapid move towards industrialization, it has seriously threatened mankind’s ability to maintain an ecological balance. Geographical and natural forces have a significant influence on the location of industries. Industrialization is the foundation stone of the development of any country, while the unplanned industrialization and discharge of waste by industries is the cause of environmental pollution. There is growing degree of awareness and concern globally among nations about environmental degradation or pollution. Environmental resources endowed by the gift of nature and not manmade are invaluable natural resources of a country like India. Any developmental activity is directly related to natural and environmental resources. Economic development without environmental considerations brings about environmental crises and damages the quality of life of present, as well as future generation. As corporate sectors in the global market, especially in India, are becoming anxious about environmental degradation, naturally more and more emphasis will be ascribed to how environment-friendly the outcomes are. Maintaining accounts of such environmental and natural resources in the country has become more urgent. Moreover, international awareness and acceptance of the importance of environmental issues has motivated the development of a branch of accounting called “Environmental Accounting”. Environmental accounting attempts to detect and focus the resources consumed and the costs rendered by an industrial unit to the environment. For the sustainable development of mankind, a healthy environment is indispensable. Gradually, therefore, in many countries including India, environment matters are being given top most priority. Accounting and disclosure of environmental matters have been increasingly manifesting as an important dimension of corporate accounting and reporting practices. But, as conventional accounting deals with mainly non-living things, the formulation of valuation, and measurement and accounting techniques for incorporating environment-related matters in the corporate financial statement sometimes creates problems for the accountant. In the light of this situation, the conceptual analysis of the study is concerned with the rationale of environmental accounting on the economy and society as a whole, and focuses the failures of the traditional accounting system. A modest attempt has been made to throw light on the environmental awareness in developing nations like India and discuss the problems associated with the implementation of environmental accounting. The conceptual study also reflects that despite different anomalies, environmental accounting is becoming an increasing important aspect of the accounting agenda within the corporate sector in India. Lastly, a conclusion, along with recommendations, has been given to overcome the situation.

Keywords: environmental accounting, environmental degradation, environmental management, environmental resources

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Authors: Esmaeil Khodadad

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The environment is one of the hotbeds of global politics. It is only necessary to emphasize the human being on this word, and to take it as a serious political-social debate, so as to prevent the collapse of the harmony of the system of nature governing the earth, the landlord and its creatures. Earth, water and humans are three interconnected arms that should be kept in balance and harmony. The collapse of one of these arms disrupts the entire framework of the philosophy of life on earth. Environmental issues were found worldwide in the late 20th century and were given serious attention by experts. At the same time, international environmental issues have brought to the forefront the challenges of international relations. These ideas have introduced environmental issues and some of the main features of the causes and consequences of global environmental change, as well as ways to deal with this change Has been discussed. The objectives of this study are environmental issues in the world and in Iran, and it shows what factors contribute to the formation of spatial systems and its supporting systems, and finally what the goals should be about the ideal state of the future of the global environment and its issues. The information required for this research is a combination of documentary, descriptive-analytical and library methods.

Keywords: environment, environmental issues, flower, oeacen

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Authors: Alicia Muñoz, Pedro Oyola, Cristian Henriquez

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Pollution in Santiago de Chile has a spatial variability due to different factors, including meteorological parameters and emission sources. Socioenvironmental aspects are also significant for pollution in the canopy layer since it influences the type of edification, vegetal mass proportion and other environmental conditions. This study analyzes spatially urban pollution in Santiago, specifically, from the bike path perspective. Bike paths are located in high traffic zones, as consequence, users are constantly exposed to urban pollution. Measurements were made at the higher polluted hour, three days a week, including three transit regimes, on the most polluted month of the year. The environmental parameters are fine particulate matter (Model 8520, DustTrak Aerosol Monitor, TSI), temperature and relative humidity; it was also considerate urban parameters as sky view factor and vegetal mass. Identification of an environmental injustice will be achieved with a spatial modeling, including all urban factors and environmental mediations with an economic index of population.

Keywords: canopy layer, environmental injustice, spatial modeling, urban pollution

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Authors: Celine Delacroix

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Analyses of global emission scenarios demonstrate that slowing population growth could lead to substantial emissions reductions and play an important role to avoid dangerous climate change. For this reason, the advancement of individual reproductive rights might represent a valid climate change mitigation and adaptation option. With this focus, we reflected on population ethics and the ethical dilemmas associated with environmental degradation and climate change. We conducted a mixed-methods qualitative data study consisting of an online survey followed by in-depth interviews with stakeholders of the reproductive health and rights and environmental sustainability movements to capture the ways in which the linkages between family planning, population growth, and environmental sustainability are perceived by these actors. We found that the multi-layered marginalization of this issue resulted in two processes, the polarization of opinions and its eschewal from the public fora through population reductionism. Our results indicate that stakeholders of the reproductive rights and environmental sustainability movements find that population size and family planning influence environmental sustainability and overwhelmingly find that the reproductive health and rights ideological framework should be integrated in a wider sustainability frame reflecting environmental considerations. This position, whilst majoritarily shared by all participants, was more likely to be adopted by stakeholders of the environmental sustainability sector than those from the reproductive health and rights sector. We conclude that these processes, taken in the context of a context of a climate emergency, threaten to weaken the reproductive health and rights movement.

Keywords: environmental sustainability, family planning, population growth, population ethics, reproductive rights

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Authors: Emery Jr. Coppola

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Water resources are being depleted and degraded at an alarming and non-sustainable rate worldwide. In some areas, it is progressing more slowly. In other areas, irreversible damage has already occurred, rendering regions largely unsuitable for human existence with destruction of the environment and the economy. Today, 2.5 billion people or 36 percent of the world population live in water-stressed areas. The convergence of factors that created this global water crisis includes local, regional, and global failures. In this paper, a survey of some of these factors is presented. They include abuse of political power and regulatory acquiescence, improper planning and design, ignoring good science and models, systemic failures, and division between the powerful and the powerless. Increasing water demand imposed by exploding human populations and growing economies with short-falls exacerbated by climate change and continuing water quality degradation will accelerate this growing water crisis in many areas. Without regional measures to improve water efficiencies and protect dwindling and vulnerable water resources, environmental and economic displacement of populations and conflict over water resources will only grow. Perhaps more challenging, a global commitment is necessary to curtail if not reverse the devastating effects of climate change. Factors will be illustrated by real-world examples, followed by some partial solutions offered by water experts for helping to mitigate the growing water crisis. These solutions include more water efficient technologies, education and incentivization for water conservation, wastewater treatment for reuse, and improved data collection and utilization.

Keywords: climate change, water conservation, water crisis, water technologies

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Authors: Lubica Hikkerova, Jean-Michel Sahut

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Environmental protection remains a global challenge but, since 2012, there has been a progressive decline in corporate engagement in environmental protection issues. This study seeks to investigate the role of financial capacity and governance in improving the level of environmental engagement of companies. The regression technique is applied to data on 351 large European companies from the ASSET4-ESG database for the 2007-2015 period. Firstly, the results show that the companies in the sample are fairly engaged in environmental protection, with a strong dispersion representing nearly four times the average. This means that the companies in the sample do not share the same level of engagement in matters of environmental protection, some being more committed than others. Secondly, the results reveal that the financial capacity of the company, as assessed through its indicators, has a significant effect on its level of environmental protection engagement in the present sample. This effect is more positive the higher the profits the company makes, and more negative the more heavily indebted or, the higher the rates of dividends it pays per share. Lastly, the results also show that a better quality of governance plays an important role in the decision to undertake actions leading to environmental protection. More specifically, the degree of management implication in the running of the business, the respect of the rights of the shareholders, the effectiveness of the control exerted by the board of directors, and, to a lesser extent, the independence of the audit committee, are variables which have a positive and significant influence on the level of environmental engagement of companies.

Keywords: financial capacity, corporate governance, environmental engagement, stakeholder theory, theory of organizational legitimacy, theory of resources and capabilities

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Authors: Thabo M. Bafitlhile, Adewole Oladele

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Botswana has been affected by floods since long ago and is still experiencing this tragic event. Flooding occurs mostly in the North-West, North-East, and parts of Central district due to heavy rainfalls experienced in these areas. The torrential rains destroyed homes, roads, flooded dams, fields and destroyed livestock and livelihoods. Palapye is one area in the central district that has been experiencing floods ever since 1995 when its greatest flood on record occurred. Heavy storms result in floods and inundation; this has been exacerbated by poor and absence of drainage structures. Since floods are a part of nature, they have existed and will to continue to exist, hence more destruction. Furthermore floods and highway plays major role in erosion and destruction of roads structures. Already today, many culverts, trenches, and other drainage facilities lack the capacity to deal with current frequency for extreme flows. Future changes in the pattern of hydro climatic events will have implications for the design and maintenance costs of roads. Increase in rainfall and severe weather events can affect the demand for emergent responses. Therefore flood forecasting and warning is a prerequisite for successful mitigation of flood damage. In flood prone areas like Palapye, preventive measures should be taken to reduce possible adverse effects of floods on the environment including road structures. Therefore this paper attempts to estimate return periods associated with huge storms of different magnitude from recorded historical rainfall depth using statistical method. The method of annual maxima was used to select data sets for the rainfall analysis. In the statistical method, the Type 1 extreme value (Gumbel), Log Normal, Log Pearson 3 distributions were all applied to the annual maximum series for Palapye area to produce IDF curves. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and Chi Squared were used to confirm the appropriateness of fitted distributions for the location and the data do fit the distributions used to predict expected frequencies. This will be a beneficial tool for urgent flood forecasting and water resource administration as proper drainage design will be design based on the estimated flood events and will help to reclaim and protect the road structures from adverse impacts of flood.

Keywords: drainage, estimate, evaluation, floods, flood forecasting

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Authors: Amália S. Botter Fabbri

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This paper proposes the analysis of the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) in relation to the three pillars of the sustainable development, highlighting its particular importance to combat climate change. Theoretical and practical examples from Europe show how SEA has been implemented under the SEA Directive in the recent years, while the Brazilian case study shows a situation in which no regulation on SEA was implemented, despite the strong demand for it, as revealed by past experiences and future planning needs. In the end, some aspects to the formulation of a SEA Act are suggested, in an attempt to contribute to a better Brazilian environmental governance in relation to the future plans, programmes and policies required to the reduction of greenhouse gases emissions.

Keywords: Brazil, climate change, Europe, strategic environmental assessment

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Authors: Tamas Jancso, Andrea Podor, Eva Nagyne Hajnal, Peter Udvardy, Gabor Nagy, Attila Varga, Meng Qingyan

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The paper deals with the conditions and circumstances of integration of remotely sensed data for rural environmental monitoring purposes. The main task is to make decisions during the integration process when we have data sources with different resolution, location, spectral channels, and dimension. In order to have exact knowledge about the integration and data fusion possibilities, it is necessary to know the properties (metadata) that characterize the data. The paper explains the joining of these data sources using their attribute data through a sample project. The resulted product will be used for rural environmental analysis.

Keywords: remote sensing, GIS, metadata, integration, environmental analysis

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Authors: Hong Geng, Zaiyu Fan

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With the acceleration of urbanization and motorization in China, the scale of cities and the travel distance of residents are constantly expanding, and the number of cars is continuously increasing, so the urban traffic problem is more and more serious. Traffic congestion, environmental pollution, energy consumption, travel safety and direct interference between traffic and other urban activities are increasingly prominent problems brought about by motorized development. This not only has a serious impact on the lives of the residents but also has a major impact on the healthy development of the city. The paper found that, in order to solve the development of motorization, a number of problems will arise; urban planning and traffic planning and design in residential planning often take into account the development of motorized traffic but neglects the demand for street life. This kind of planning has resulted in the destruction of the traditional communication space of the residential area, the pollution of noise and exhaust gas, and the potential safety risks of the residential area, which has disturbed the previously quiet and comfortable life of the residential area, resulting in the inconvenience of residents' life and the loss of street vitality. Based on these facts, this paper takes a residential area in Wuhan as the research object, through the actual investigation and research, from the perspective of micro-transformation analysis, combined with the concept of traffic micro-reconstruction governance. And research puts forward the residential traffic optimization strategies such as strengthening the interaction and connection between the residential area and the urban street system, street traffic classification and organization.

Keywords: micro-transformation, residential traffic, residents demand, traffic microcirculation

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Authors: Mahmoud Hassan

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Understanding the impact of market- and non-market-based environmental policy instruments on renewable energy consumption (REC) is crucial for the design and choice of policy packages. This study aims to empirically investigate the effect of environmental policy stringency index (EPS) and its components on REC in 27 OECD countries over the period from 1990 to 2015, and then use the results to identify what the appropriate environmental policy mix should look like. By relying on the two-step system GMM estimator, we provide evidence that increasing environmental policy stringency as a whole promotes renewable energy consumption in these 27 developed economies. Moreover, policymakers are able, through the market- and non-market-based environmental policy instruments, to increase the use of renewable energy. However, not all of these instruments are effective for achieving this goal. The results indicate that R&D subsidies and trading schemes have a positive and significant impact on REC, while taxes, feed-in tariff and emission standards have not a significant effect. Furthermore, R&D subsidies are more effective than trading schemes for stimulating the use of clean energy. These findings proved to be robust across the three alternative panel techniques used.

Keywords: environmental policy stringency, renewable energy consumption, two-step system-GMM estimation, linear dynamic panel data model

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Authors: Iman Shabanzadeh

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Earthquake is known as one of the most frequent natural hazards in Iran. Therefore, policy making to improve the strengthening of structures is one of the requirements of the approach to prevent and reduce the risk of the destructive effects of earthquakes. In order to choose the optimal policy in the face of earthquakes, this article tries to examine the cost of financial damages caused by earthquakes in the building sector and compare it with the costs of retrofitting. In this study, the results of adopting the scenario of "action after the earthquake" and the policy scenario of "strengthening structures before the earthquake" have been collected, calculated and finally analyzed by putting them together. Methodologically, data received from governorates and building retrofitting engineering companies have been used. The scope of the study is earthquakes occurred in the geographical area of Iran, and among them, eight earthquakes have been specifically studied: Miane, Ahar and Haris, Qator, Momor, Khorasan, Damghan and Shahroud, Gohran, Hormozgan and Ezgole. The main basis of the calculations is the data obtained from retrofitting companies regarding the cost per square meter of building retrofitting and the data of the governorate regarding the power of earthquake destruction, the realized costs for the reconstruction and construction of residential units. The estimated costs have been converted to the value of 2021 using the time value of money method to enable comparison and aggregation. The cost-benefit comparison of the two policies of action after the earthquake and retrofitting before the earthquake in the eight earthquakes investigated shows that the country has suffered five thousand billion Tomans of losses due to the lack of retrofitting of buildings against earthquakes. Based on the data of the Budget Law's of Iran, this figure was approximately twice the budget of the Ministry of Roads and Urban Development and five times the budget of the Islamic Revolution Housing Foundation in 2021. The results show that the policy of retrofitting structures before an earthquake is significantly more optimal than the competing scenario. The comparison of the two policy scenarios examined in this study shows that the policy of retrofitting buildings before an earthquake, on the one hand, prevents huge losses, and on the other hand, by increasing the number of earthquake-resistant houses, it reduces the amount of earthquake destruction. In addition to other positive effects of retrofitting, such as the reduction of mortality due to earthquake resistance of buildings and the reduction of other economic and social effects caused by earthquakes. These are things that can prove the cost-effectiveness of the policy scenario of "strengthening structures before earthquakes" in Iran.

Keywords: disaster economy, earthquake economy, cost-benefit analysis, resilience

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Authors: Dongqi Li, Yunjia Huang, Tomo Inoue, Kohei Inoue

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With urbanization, urban cultural heritage is facing the impact and destruction of modernization and urbanization. Many historical areas are losing their historical information and regional cultural characteristics, so it is necessary to carry out systematic color planning for historical areas in conservation. As an early focus on urban color planning, Japan has a systematic approach to urban color planning. Hence, this paper selects five merchant towns from the category of important traditional building preservation areas in Japan as the subject of this study to explore the color structure and emotion of this type of historic area. First, the image semantic segmentation method identifies the buildings, roads, and landscape environments. Their color data were extracted for color composition and emotion analysis to summarize their common features. Second, the obtained Internet evaluations were extracted by natural language processing for keyword extraction. The correlation analysis of the color structure and keywords provides a valuable reference for conservation decisions for this historic area in the town. This paper also combines the color structure and Internet evaluation results with generative adversarial networks to generate predicted images of color structure improvements and color improvement schemes. The methods and conclusions of this paper can provide new ideas for the digital management of environmental colors in historic districts and provide a valuable reference for the inheritance of local traditional culture.

Keywords: historic districts, color planning, semantic segmentation, natural language processing

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Authors: Peter Ugbedeojo Nelson

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Despite the tremendous advancements and knowledge acquisition around entrepreneurship orientation (EO) research, there may still be more to learn on how environmental dynamics would permute organizational processes and determine the extent to which success would be achieved. Using the contingency theory, we test a model that proposes a moderating influence of external relational capital and environmental hostility on the EO-performance effect of 423 managers/owners of small and medium scale enterprises. The hypotheses were tested using Hayes simultaneous regression, and the results showed that all EO dimensions (risk-taking, innovation, and performance) had a main effect on performance while the moderating variables interacted well with risk-taking (more than other EO dimensions) to improve performance. However, external relational capital, more than environmental hostility, influences the EO-performance relationship. Our findings highlight the differential ways that EO dimensions interact with environmental contingencies to influence performance. Further studies can examine how competitive aggressiveness and autonomy are moderated by external relational capital and environmental hostility.

Keywords: external relational capital, entrepreneurial orientation, risk-taking, innovation, proactiveness

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Authors: S. Halioui, I. Arikan, M. Schmidt

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Tourism sector in Tunisia faces several problems that range from economic challenges to environmental degradation and social instability. These problems have been intensified because of the increased competition in the tourism market, the political instability, financial crises, and recently terrorism problems have aggravated the situation. As a consequence, a new framework that promotes sustainable tourism in the country and increases its competitiveness is urgently needed. Planning for sustainable tourism sector requires the integration of complex interactions between economic, social and environmental aspects. Sustainable tourism principles can be implemented with the help of Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) process, which ensures the full integration of economic, social and environmental considerations while planning for the tourism sector in Tunisia. Results of the paper have broad implications for policy makers and tourism professionals.

Keywords: sustainable tourism, strategic environmental assessment, tourism planning, policy

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Authors: Ana Asratashvili

Abstract:

One of the main issues of state’s economic policy is the environmental problems. The development of society is implementing by the connection with nature. A human being needs different material resources which must be got by the influence on the nature. This relationship between nature and society is complicated and controversial and it was changing from time to time according to human’s evolution. The imprudent and unreasonable usage of natural resources, scientific-technological revolution and the hard pollution of nature related to it caused the disruption of environmental balance between nature and society which has been made for ages and destructively acted on society and environment. Environmental protection is one of the major issues of the European Union all over the world. The aim of EU environmental policy is to improve ecological conditions. Besides, it aims encouraging of careful and rational usage of natural resources. At the same time, the union tries to raise problems related to environmental protection at the international level. After that when scientists concluded anthropogenic impact of human on the nature causes climate changes, the special attention was paid to the environmental protection by developed countries. Global warming will cause floods, storms, draughts and desertification and to solve these results presumably will cost 20% of World GDP by 2050 for developed countries, if, of course, it does not make strict environmental policy. EU member countries have pretty strict environmental standards. Their defense is observed by different state institutions. According to impacts on nature throughout the world the most polluted fumes are made by electricity facilities (44%), transport (20%), industry (18%), domestic and service sector (17%). The special concern to the issues related to the importance of environment by environmentalists is caused by low self-esteem of population about the problems of environment. According to their mind, population is engaged with daily difficulties so that they don’t react much on environmental problems. Correspondingly, the main task for environmental organizations is to inform population and raise self-esteem about environmental issues.

Keywords: economic policy, environment, technological revolution, pollution, environmental, standards, self-esteem

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Authors: S. Arpit, P. K. Das, S. K. Dash

Abstract:

In this paper, a comparative study is done between two fuels, naphtha and natural gas (NG), for a gas turbine (GT) plant of 32.5 MW with the same thermodynamic configuration. From the energy analysis, it is confirmed that the turbine inlet temperature (TIT) of the gas turbine in the case of natural gas is higher as compared to naphtha, and hence the isentropic efficiency of the turbine is better. The result from the exergy analysis also confirms that due to high turbine inlet temperature in the case of natural gas, exergy destruction in combustion chamber is less. But comparing two fuels for overall analysis, naphtha has higher energy and exergetic efficiency as compared to natural gas.

Keywords: exergy analysis, gas turbine, naphtha, natural gas

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Authors: Pierre-Marie Basset, Gabriel Reboul, Binh DangVu, Sébastien Mercier

Abstract:

Rotorcraft provides invaluable services thanks to their Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL), hover and low speed capabilities. Yet their use is still often limited by their cost and environmental impact, especially noise and energy consumption. One of the main brakes to the expansion of the use of rotorcraft for urban missions is the environmental impact. The first main concern for the population is the noise. In order to develop the transversal competency to assess the rotorcraft environmental footprint, a collaboration has been launched between six research departments within ONERA. The progress in terms of models and methods are capitalized into the numerical workshop C.R.E.A.T.I.O.N. “Concepts of Rotorcraft Enhanced Assessment Through Integrated Optimization Network”. A typical mission for which the environmental impact issue is of great relevance has been defined. The first milestone is to perform the pre-sizing of a reference helicopter for this mission. In a second milestone, an alternate rotorcraft concept has been defined: a tandem rotorcraft with optional propulsion. The key design trends are given for the pre-sizing of this rotorcraft aiming at a significant reduction of the global environmental impact while still giving equivalent flight performance and safety with respect to the reference helicopter. The models and methods have been improved for catching sooner and more globally, the relative variations on the environmental impact when changing the rotorcraft architecture, the pre-design variables and the operation parameters.

Keywords: environmental impact, flight performance, helicopter, multi objectives multidisciplinary optimization, rotorcraft

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Authors: Jhuang Jin-Jhong, Hsieh Wei-Fan

Abstract:

Climate change causes natural disasters persistently. Therefore, nowadays environmental planning objective tends to the issues of respecting nature and coexisting with nature. As a result, the natural environment analysis, e.g., the analysis of topography, soil, hydrology, climate, vegetation, is highly emphasized. On the other hand, Feng Shui has been a criterion of site selection for residence in Eastern since the ancient times and has had farther influence on site selection for castles and even for temples and tombs. The primary criterion of site selection is judging the quality of Long: mountain range, Sha: nearby mountains, Shui: hydrology, Xue: foundation, Xiang: aspect, which are similar to the environmental variables of mountain range, topography, hydrology and aspect. For the reason, a lot researchers attempt to probe into the connection between the criterion of Feng Shui and environmental planning factors. Most researches only discussed with the composition and theory of space of Feng Shui, but there is no research which explained Feng Shui through the environmental field. Consequently, this study reviewed the theory of Feng Shui through the environmental planning viewpoint and assembled essential composition factors of Feng Shui. The results of this study point. From literature review and comparison of theoretical meanings, we find that the ideal principles for planning the Feng Shui environment can also be used for environmental planning. Therefore, this article uses 12 ideal environmental features used in Feng Shui to contrast the natural aspects of the environment and make comparisons with previous research and classifies the environmental factors into climate, topography, hydrology, vegetation, and soil.

Keywords: the composition of Feng Shui, environmental planning, site selection, main components of the Feng Shui environment

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Authors: Mohd Fadzil Mohd Idris, Aida Nasirah Abdullah, Kalthom Husain, Hanipah Hussin

Abstract:

Online campaigns reflect all the advantages; namely speed, low cost, accessibility, customization, interactivity, and persuasive ability over other media channels. Normally via websites, expensive campaigns could be done not only faster and cheaper, but also successfully. Web interactivity seems to be highly beneficial to ENGOs in advocating environmental campaigns and trigger interaction. This paper looks into the environmental online campaigns through websites of the environmental NGOs in Malaysia (MENGO); particularly on how is web interactivity structured and employed by the selected the MENGO to conduct campaigns on important issues and encourage dialogue among the audience. In this study, a quantitative method for website content analysis was conducted to investigate the availability of the coded units and to determine on which level(s) the units were placed. Twelve (12) interactivity features were coded, including the placement of units of analysis for interactivity category as units of analysis until the fourth level (Level 0-Level 3). The result demonstrates how the MENGO do not effectively structure and employ the web interactivity to conduct campaigns on important issues and encourage dialogue among the audience. It is suggested that the MENGO should redevelop the interactive website in order to effectively advocate environmental campaigns on important issues and encourage dialogue among the audience.

Keywords: environmental NGOs (ENGO), Malaysia environmental NGOs (MENGO), internet, website, online campaigns, web interactivity

Procedia PDF Downloads 440