Search results for: sustainability solutions

Authors: Intan Azura Mokhtar, Yaacob Ibrahim

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In recent years, learning about sustainable development and sustainability has become an increasingly significant component in universities’ degree programmes and curricula. As the world comes together and races to fulfil the 17 United Nations’ sustainable development goals (SDGs) by the year 2030, our educational curricula and landscapes simultaneously evolve to integrate lessons and opportunities for sustainable development and sustainability to redefine our university education and set the trajectory for our young people to take the lead in co-creating solutions for a better world. In this paper, initiatives and projects that revolved around themes of sustainable development and sustainability in a young university in Singapore are discussed. These initiatives and projects were curated by a new centre in the university that focuses on community leadership, social innovation, and service learning and was led by the university’s academic staff. The university’s undergraduate students were also involved in these initiatives and projects and played an active role in reaching out to and engaging members of different segments of the community – to better understand their needs and concerns and to co-create with them relevant and sustainable solutions that generate positive social impact.

Keywords: singapore, sustainable development, sustainability, undergraduate education

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Authors: Edmund Gyimah

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Using data from 146 annual reports of listed firms in Ghana for the period 2013-2020, this study presents indicative findings which inspire practical actions and future research. Firms which prepared and presented sustainability reports were excluded from this study for a coverage of corporate sustainability disclosures centred on annual reports. Also, corporate sustainability disclosures of the firms on corporate websites were not included in the study considering the tendency of updates which cannot easily be traced. The corporate sustainability disclosures in the annual reports since the commencement of the G4 Guidelines in 2013 have been below average for all the dimensions of sustainability and the general sustainability disclosures. Few traditional elements of the board composition such as board size and board independence could affect the corporate sustainability disclosures in the annual reports as well as the age of the firm, firm size, and industry classification of the firm. Sustainability disclosures are greater in sustainability reports than in annual reports, however, firms without sustainability reports should have a considerable amount of sustainability disclosures in their annual reports. Also, because of the essence of sustainability, this study suggests to firms to have sustainability committee perhaps, they could make a difference in disclosing the enough sustainability information even when they do not present sustainability information in stand-alone reports.

Keywords: disclosures, sustainability, board, reports

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Authors: L. S. Zavodna, J. Zavodny Pospisil

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The aim of this paper is to identify the factors for sustainability in the accommodation sector. Although sustainability is a current trend in tourism, not many facilities know how to apply the concept in practice. This paper presents a model for the implementation of sustainability in hotels, hostels, campgrounds, or other facilities. First, there are identified sections of each accommodation facility, which can contribute to sustainability. Furthermore, concrete steps are presented to transfer this model into reality.

Keywords: accommodation sector, model, sustainable tourism, sustainability

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Authors: Nur Bella Octoria Bella, Ayomi Dita Rarasati

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DKI Jakarta is Indonesia's capital city with the 10th highest congestion rate in the world based on the 2019 traffic index. Other than that based on World Air Quality Report in 2019 showed DKI Jakarta's air pollutant concentrate 49.4 µg and the 5th highest air pollutant in the world. In the urban city nowadays, the mobility rate is high enough and the efficiency for sustainability assessment in transport infrastructure development is needed. This efficiency is the important key for sustainable infrastructure development. DKI Jakarta is nowadays in the process of constructing the railway infrastructure to support the transportation system. The problems appearing are the railway infrastructure networks and the service in DKI Jakarta already planned based on sustainability factors or not. Therefore, the aim of this research is to make the evaluation of railways infrastructure networks performance and services in DKI Jakarta regards on the railway sustainability key factors. Further, this evaluation will be used to make the railway sustainability assessment framework and to offer some of the alternative solutions to improve railway transportation sustainability in DKI Jakarta. Firstly a very detailed literature review of papers that have focused on railway sustainability factors and their improvements of railway sustainability, published in the scientific journal in the period 2011 until 2021. Regarding the sustainability factors from the literature review, further, it is used to assess the current condition of railway infrastructure in DKI Jakarta. The evaluation will be using a Likert rate questionnaire and directed to the transportation railway expert and the passenger. Furthermore, the mapping and evaluation rate based on the sustainability factors will be compared to the effect factors using the Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP). This research offers the network's performance and service rate impact on the sustainability aspect and the passenger willingness for using the rail public transportation in DKI Jakarta.

Keywords: transportation sustainability, railway transportation, sustainability, DKI Jakarta

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Authors: Laura Álvarez Antón, Joaquín Díaz

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The construction industry is turning towards sustainability. It is a well-known fact that sustainability is based on a balance between environmental, social and economic aspects. In order to achieve sustainability efficiently, these three criteria should be taken into account in the initial project phases, since that is when a project can be influenced most effectively. Thus the aim must be to integrate important tools like BIM and LCA at an early stage in order to make full use of their potential. With the synergies resulting from the integration of BIM and LCA, a wider approach to sustainability becomes possible, covering the three pillars of sustainability.

Keywords: building information modeling (BIM), construction industry, design phase, life cycle assessment (LCA), sustainability

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Authors: Narendra Babu Bommenahalli Veerabhadrappa

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Teaching sustainability concepts along with profit maximizing philosophy of business in management education is a challenge. This paper explores and evaluates various learning models to inculcate sustainability concepts in management education. The paper explains about a new pedagogy that was tested in a business management school (Indus Business Academy, Bangalore, India) to teach sustainability. The pedagogy was designed by intertwining concepts related to sustainability with digital marketing concepts. As part of this experimental method, students (in groups) were assigned with various topics of sustainability and were asked to work with concepts of digital marketing and thus market the concepts of sustainability. The paper explains as a case study as to how sustainability was integrated with digital marketing tools and how learning towards sustainability was facilitated. It also explains the outcomes of this pedagogical method, in terms of inculcating sustainability concepts amongst management students as well as marketing and proliferation of sustainability concepts to bring about the behavioral changes amongst target audience towards sustainability.

Keywords: management-education, pedagogy, sustainability, behavior

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Authors: Dike Felix Okechukwu

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Studies and reports from authoritative sources such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have stated that to effectively solve environmental sustainability challenges such as pollution, inappropriate waste disposal, and unsustainable consumption, there is a need for more research to seek solutions towards environmentally sustainable behavior. However, literature thus far reports only sporadic developments of TL in Environmental Sustainability because there are scarce reports showing the reliable process(es) to produce TL - for sustainability projects or otherwise. Nonetheless, a recently published article demonstrates how TL can be used to help young adults gain transformed mindsets and habits toward environmental sustainability behaviors and practices. This study, however, does not demonstrate, on a repeated basis, the dependability of the method or reliability of the procedures in using its proposed methodology to help young adults achieve transformed habits towards environmental sustainability behaviors, especially in diverse contexts. In this study, it is demonstrated, through repeated measures, a reliable process that can be used to achieve transformations in habits and mindsets toward environmental sustainability behaviors. To achieve this, the design adopted is multiple case studies and a thematic analysis techniques. Five cases in diverse contexts were used to analyze pieces of evidence of Transformative Learning Outcomes toward environmentally sustainable behaviors. Results from the study offer fresh perspectives on a reliable methodology that can be adopted to achieve Transformations in Habits and mindsets toward environmental sustainability behaviors.

Keywords: environmental sustainability, transformative learning, behaviour, learning, education

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Authors: Anand Ankush, Wani Mohammed Farooq

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A procedure based on digraph and matrix method is developed for modelling and evaluation of sustainability of Mechanical System in a concurrent engineering environment.The sustainability parameters of a Mechanical System are identified and are called sustainability attributes. Consideration of attributes and their interrelations is rudiment in modeling and evaluation of sustainability index. Sustainability attributes of a Mechanical System are modelled in termsof sustainability digraph. The graph is represented by a one-to-one matrix for sustainability expression which is based on sustainability attributes. A variable sustainability relationship permanent matrix is defined to develop sustainability expression(VPF-t) which is also useful in comparing two systems in a concurrent environment. The sustainability index of Mechanical System is obtained from permanent of matrix by substituting the numerical values of attributes and their interrelations. A higher value of index implies better sustainability of system.The ideal value of index is obtained from matrix expression which is useful in assessing relative sustainability of a Mechanical System in a concurrent engineering environment. The procedure is not only useful for evaluation of sustainability of a Mechanical System at conceptual design stage but can also be used for design and development of systems at system design stage. A step-by-step procedure for evaluation of sustainability index is also suggested and is illustrated by means of an example.

Keywords: digraph, matrix method, mechanical system, sustainability

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Authors: Shahbaz Abbas, Lin Han Chiang Hsieh

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The significant population growth and climate change issues have contributed to the natural resources depletion and their sustainability in the future. Manufacturing industries have a substantial impact on every country’s economy, but the sustainability of the industrial resources is challenging, and the policymakers have been developing the possible solutions to manage the sustainability of industrial resources such as raw material, energy, water, and industrial supply chain. In order to address these challenges, nexus approach is one of the optimization and modelling techniques in the recent sustainable environmental research. The interactions between the nexus components acknowledge that all components are dependent upon each other, and they are interrelated; therefore, their sustainability is also associated with each other. In addition, the nexus concept does not only provide the resources sustainability but also environmental sustainability can be achieved through nexus approach by utilizing the industrial waste as a resource for the industrial processes. Based on energy-water nexus, this study has developed a resource-energy-water for the sugar industry to understand the interactions between sugarcane, energy, and water towards the sustainable sugar industry. In particular, the focus of the research is the Taiwanese sugar industry; however, the same approach can be adapted worldwide to optimize the sustainability of sugar industries. It has been concluded that there are significant interactions between sugarcane, energy consumption, and water consumption in the sugar industry to manage the scarcity of resources in the future. The interactions between sugarcane and energy also deliver a mechanism to reuse the sugar industrial waste as a source of energy, consequently validating industrial and environmental sustainability. The desired outcomes from the nexus can be achieved with the modifications in the policy and regulations of Taiwanese industrial sector.

Keywords: energy-water nexus, environmental sustainability, industrial sustainability, natural resource management

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Authors: H. Nejadriahi

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This paper focuses on the performance of Iwan as one of the significant spaces in the traditional architecture of Iran. The aim of this study is to investigate on the role of Iwan in sustainability enhancement of traditional houses of different climatic regions of Iran. Iwan is considered as a semi-open space, which its form and location in the building highly depends to the climatic situation of that region. For that reason, Iwan is recognized as one of the sustainable elements in the traditional houses of Iran, which can provide more comfort with less use of energy. In this study, the history and emergence of Iwan in the traditional architecture of Iran as well as the concept of sustainability in architecture are explained briefly. Then, the change of performance or form of Iwan is analysed in different climatic regions of Iran in accordance to the sustainability concepts. The methods used in this study are descriptive and analytic. Results of this paper verify that studying the sustainability solutions in the traditional architecture of Iran, would be a valuable source of inspiration for the current designers to create an environmental and sustainable architecture for the future.

Keywords: climatic regions of Iran, Iwan, sustainability, traditional houses

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Authors: Bayan Ahmed Alsaffar

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The aim of this study is to assess the sustainability initiatives at Applied Sciences University (ASU) in Bahrain using a mixed-methods approach based on students, staff, and faculty perceptions. The study involves a literature review, interviews with faculty members and students, and a survey of ASU's level of sustainability in education, research, operations, administration, and finance that depended on the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System (STARS). STARS is a tool used to evaluate the sustainability performance of higher education institutions. The study concludes that a mixed-methods approach can provide a powerful tool for assessing sustainability initiatives at ASU and ultimately lead to insights that can inform effective strategies for improving sustainability efforts. The current study contributes to the field of sustainability in universities and highlights the importance of user engagement and awareness for achieving sustainability goals.

Keywords: environment, initiatives, society, sustainability, STARS, university

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Authors: Trinh Bui, A. Cappellieri

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The fashion industry has become one of the most polluting industries in the world. In this context, designers can contribute solutions to the problem by applying Design for Sustainability (DfS) criteria, which will enable to promote designing products and services toward Sustainability. Therefore, 'Slow Fashion' movement has been receiving the attention of researchers, designers, and customers who are sensitive to sustainable development. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of DfS in fashion. In particular, how can apply sustainable design principles to the fashion accessory in order to minimize the negative impact on the environment and society? The research method of this study is qualitative, utilising a multi-method case study approach. Grounded theory analysis was applied to analyse the data of the case studies collected and the results obtained. Also, research findings indicate that DfS applied to Fashion Accessory design processes might have great potential and win-win approaches toward a sustainable future. An important implication is that understanding the concepts and applying DfS to fashion accessory design processes can support designers to face challenges and seize opportunities. Furthermore, identify the key concept of sustainability and social responsibility could raise awareness on sustainable fashion for both producers and customers more effectively.

Keywords: design for sustainability, fashion accessory, sustainable fashion, sustainability

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Authors: Lobna Hafez, Eman Elakkad

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Sustainability is no longer a choice for firms. To achieve sustainable supply chain, all three dimensions of sustainability should be considered. Unlike the economic and environmental aspects, social sustainability has been rarely given attention. The problem surrounding social sustainability and employees’ welfare in Egypt is complex and remains unsolved. The aim of this study is to qualitatively assess the current level of application of social sustainability in the retailing sector in Egypt through using the social sustainability indicators identified in the literature. The purpose of this investigation is to gain knowledge about the complexity of the system involved. A case study is conducted on one of the largest retailers in Egypt. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with managers and employees to determine the level of application and identify the major obstacles affecting the social sustainability in the retailing context. The work developed gives insights about the details and complexities of the application of social sustainability in developing countries, from the retailing perspective. The outcomes of this study will help managers to understand the enablers of social sustainability and will direct them to methods of sound implementation.

Keywords: developing countries, Egyptian retailing sector, sustainability, social sustainability

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Authors: Muhammad Younis

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In this article, the novel (G′/G)-expansion method is successfully applied to construct the abundant travelling wave solutions to the modified Burgers’ equation with the aid of computation. The method is reliable and useful, which gives more general exact travelling wave solutions than the existing methods. These obtained solutions are in the form of hyperbolic, trigonometric and rational functions including solitary, singular and periodic solutions which have many potential applications in physical science and engineering. Some of these solutions are new and some have already been constructed. Additionally, the constraint conditions, for the existence of the solutions are also listed.

Keywords: traveling wave solutions, NLPDE, computation, integrability

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Authors: Rahma Amri, Narjès Bellamine Ben Saoud

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Sustainable development or sustainability is one of the most urgent issues in actual debate in almost domains. Particularly the significant way the software pervades our live should make it in the center of sustainability concerns. The social aspects of sustainability haven’t been well studied in the context of software systems and still immature research field that needs more interest among researchers’ community. This paper presents a Goal-Question-Metric based approach to assess social sustainability of software systems. The approach is based on a generic social sustainability model taken from Social sciences.

Keywords: software assessment approach, social sustainability, goal-question-metric paradigm, software project metrics

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Authors: Mkhitaryan Davit

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The tourism and hospitality industry plays a significant role in China's economy, but it also poses environmental, social, and economic challenges. This paper examines the concept of sustainability within the context of China's tourism and hospitality industry, exploring best practices from 26 Hotels in 15 cities and identifying key challenges. Drawing upon a comprehensive review of existing literature, case studies, and interviews with industry experts, the paper highlights successful sustainability initiatives implemented by various stakeholders, including government bodies, businesses, and non-governmental organizations. Additionally, it discusses the barriers and obstacles hindering the widespread adoption of sustainable practices in the sector, such as lack of awareness, financial constraints, and regulatory issues. The findings provide insights for policymakers, industry practitioners, and researchers to develop strategies and solutions for promoting sustainable tourism and hospitality practices in China, ultimately contributing to the long-term viability and resilience of the industry.

Keywords: sustainability, waste management, renewable energy, hospitality

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Authors: Shian Saroop, Dhiren Allopi

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In order to stay competitive and to meet upcoming stricter environmental regulations and customer requirements, designers have a key role in designing civil infrastructure so that it is environmentally sustainable. There is an urgent need for engineers to apply technologies and methods that deliver better and more sustainable performance of civil infrastructure as well as a need to establish a standard of measurement for greener infrastructure, rather than merely use tradition solutions. However, there are no systems in place at the design stage that assesses the environmental impact of design decisions on township infrastructure projects. This paper identifies alternative eco-efficient civil infrastructure design solutions and developed sustainability criteria and a toolkit to analyse the eco efficiency of infrastructure projects. The proposed toolkit is aimed at promoting high-performance, eco-efficient, economical and environmentally friendly design decisions on stormwater, roads, water and sanitation related to township infrastructure projects. These green solutions would bring a whole new class of eco-friendly solutions to current infrastructure problems, while at the same time adding a fresh perspective to the traditional infrastructure design process. A variety of projects were evaluated using the green infrastructure toolkit and their results are compared to each other, to assess the results of using greener infrastructure verses the traditional method of designing infrastructure. The application of ‘green technology’ would ensure a sustainable design of township infrastructure services assisting the design to consider alternative resources, the environmental impacts of design decisions, ecological sensitivity issues, innovation, maintenance and materials, at the design stage of a project.

Keywords: eco-efficiency, green infrastructure, infrastructure design, sustainable development

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Authors: Mary Panko, Rashika Sharma

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Sustainability often appears to be an unfamiliar concept to many international students that enrol in a New Zealand technological degree. Lecturers’ experiences with classroom interactions and evaluation of assessments indicate that studying the concept enlightens and enhances international students understanding of sustainability. However, in most cases, even after studying sustainability in their degree programme, students are not given an opportunity to practice and apply this concept into their professions in their home countries. Therefore, using a qualitative approach, the academics conducted research to determine the change in international students understanding of sustainability before and after their enrolment in an Applied Technology degree. The research also aimed to evaluate if international students viewed sustainability of relevance to their professions and whether the students felt that they will be provided with an opportunity to apply their knowledge about sustainability in the industry. The findings of the research are presented in this paper.

Keywords: education for sustainability, international students, vocational education

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Authors: Lynn Ruggieri

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The worldwide pandemic has only increased sustainability awareness. The public is demanding that businesses be held accountable for their impact on the environment. While financial data enjoys uniformity in reporting requirements, there are no uniform reporting requirements for non-financial data. Europe is leading the way with some standards being implemented for reporting non-financial sustainability data; however, there is no uniformity globally. And without uniformity, there is not a clear understanding of what information to include and how to disclose it. Sustainability reporting will provide important information to stakeholders and will enable businesses to understand their impact on the environment. Therefore, there is a crucial need for this data. This paper looks at the history of sustainability reporting in the countries of the European Union and throughout the world and makes a case for worldwide reporting requirements for sustainability.

Keywords: financial reporting, non-financial data, sustainability, global financial reporting

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Authors: Chunfang Zhou

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The growing issues of sustainability have increased the discussions on how to foster “green engineers” from diverse perspectives in both contexts of education and organizations. As creativity has been considered as the first stage of innovation process that can also be regarded as a path to sustainability, this paper will particularly propose creativity as a scientific literacy meaning a collection of awareness, ability, and skills about sustainability. From this sense, creativity should be an element in IT engineering education and organizational learning programmes, since IT engineers are one group of key actors in designing, researching and developing social media products that are most important channels of improving public awareness of sustainability. This further leads this paper to discuss by which pedagogical strategies and by which training methods in organizations, creativity and sustainability can be integrated into IT engineering education and IT enterprise innovation process in order to meeting the needs of ‘creative engineers’ in the society changes towards sustainability. Accordingly, this paper contributes to future work on the links between creativity, innovation, sustainability, and IT engineering development both theoretically and practically.

Keywords: creativity, innovation, IT engineers, sustainability

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Authors: H. Nejadriahi

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A growing demand for sustainability makes sustainability as one of the significant debates of nowadays. Energy saving is one of the main criteria to be considered in the context of sustainability. Reducing energy use in buildings is one of the most important ways to reduce humans’ overall environmental impact. Taking this into consideration, study of different design strategies, which can assist in reducing energy use and subsequently improving the sustainability level of today's buildings would be an essential task. The sustainability level of a building is highly affected by the sustainability performance of its components. One of the main building components, which can have a great impact on energy saving and sustainability level of the building, is its facade. The aim of this study is to investigate on the role of facade in sustainability enhancement of the contemporary buildings of Iran. In this study, the concept of sustainability in architecture, the building facades, and their relationship to sustainability are explained briefly. Following that, a number of contemporary Iranian buildings are discussed and analyzed in terms of different design strategies used in their facades in accordance to the sustainability concepts. The methods used in this study are descriptive and analytic. The results of this paper would assist in generating a wider vision and a source of inspiration for the current designers to design and create environmental and sustainable buildings for the future.

Keywords: building facade, contemporary buildings, Iran, sustainability

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Authors: Magdy G. Asaad

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Solitons are among the most beneficial solutions for science and technology for their applicability in physical applications including plasma, energy transport along protein molecules, wave transport along poly-acetylene molecules, ocean waves, constructing optical communication systems, transmission of information through optical fibers and Josephson junctions. In this talk, we will apply the bilinear technique to generate a class of soliton solutions to the (3+1)-dimensional nonlinear soliton equation of Jimbo-Miwa type. Examples of the resulting soliton solutions are computed and a few solutions are plotted.

Keywords: Pfaffian solutions, N-soliton solutions, soliton equations, Jimbo-Miwa

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Authors: Ramona Zharfpeykan

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This study analyses the trend and nature of sustainability key performance indicators (KPIs) reporting in firms globally. It presents both trend and panel data of sustainability reports of 798 firms in the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) database from 2010 to 2014. The results show some fluctuations in the frequency of sustainability KPI reporting globally across the time while the major focus of reports in firms stayed almost the same. It made us further analyse this trend and found that there are some indicators, such as 'environmental protect expenses' and 'number of grievances', that was barely reported over this period along with some highly popular ones such as 'direct economic value' and 'employment rate'. We could not find any statistical correlation between the KPI reporting percentage and the firms’ industries generally and neither if they belong to environmentally sensitive industries.

Keywords: global reporting initiatives, sustainability reporting, sustainability KPI, trends of sustainability reporting

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Authors: Yuan Long, Fabrizio Ceschin, David Harrison

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Environmental sustainability is under the threat of excessive single-use plastic packaging waste, and current waste management fails to address this issue. Therefore, it has led to a reidentification of the alternative, which can curb the packaging waste without reducing social needs. Reusable packaging represents a circular approach to close the loop of consumption in which packaging can stay longer in the system to satisfy social needs. However, the implementation of reusable packaging is fragmented and lacks systematic approaches. The product-service system (PSS) is widely regarded as a sustainable business model innovation for embracing circular consumption. As a result, applying PSS to reusable packaging solutions will be promising to address the packaging waste issue. This paper aims at filling the knowledge gap relating to apply PSS to reusable packaging solutions and provide a strategic design tool that could support packaging professionals to design reusable packaging solutions. The methodology of this paper is case studies and workshops to provide a design tool. The respondents are packaging professionals who are packaging consultants, NGO professionals, and entrepreneurs. 57 cases collected show that 15 archetypal models operate in the market. Subsequently, a polarity diagram is developed to embrace those 15 archetypal models, and a total number of 24 experts were invited for the workshop to evaluate the design tool. This research finally provides a strategic design tool to support packaging professionals to design reusable packaging solutions. The application of the tool is to support the understanding of the reusable packaging solutions, analyzing the markets, identifying new opportunities, and generate new business models. The implication of this research is to provide insights for academics and businesses in terms of tackling single-use packaging waste and build a foundation for further development of the reusable packaging solution tool.

Keywords: environmental sustainability, product-service system, reusable packaging, design tool

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Authors: Nadia Theuma

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Climate change is a reality that has started to leave an impact on the physical environment as well as on the built environment, in particular built heritage. This paper explores the argument that climate change is also a trigger which can lead to identifying a number of creative solutions that can transform built heritage into sustainable buildings. Using the Maltese Islands, and in particular the city of Valletta which is also a World Heritage Site, this paper illustrates some of the innovative solutions that are being developed to make heritage buildings more sustainable and in doing so, mitigating the negative impacts of climate change. The paper looks in detail at the most notable initiatives being developed, their implementation and application, which at times is not easy considering the restrictions within protected built heritage areas and the positive impacts that they will have on visitor experience and overall sustainability of the Maltese tourism product. The paper will conclude by outlining how these solutions can be adapted to buildings with similar climatic conditions.

Keywords: built heritage, creative solutions, climate change, Maltese Islands

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Authors: Ramona Zharfpeykan, Paul Rouse

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Organizational sustainability is important to both organizations themselves and their stakeholders. Despite its increasing popularity and increasing numbers of organizations reporting sustainability, research on evaluating and comparing the sustainability performance of companies is limited. The aim of this study was to develop models to measure sustainability performance for both cross-sectional and longitudinal comparisons across companies in the same or different industries. A secondary aim was to see if sustainability reports can be used to evaluate sustainability performance. The study used both a content analysis of Australian sustainability reports in mining and metals and financial services for 2011-2014 and a survey of Australian and New Zealand organizations. Two methods ranging from a composite index using uniform weights to data envelopment analysis (DEA) were employed to analyze the data and develop the models. The results show strong statistically significant relationships between the developed models, which suggests that each model provides a consistent, systematic and reasonably robust analysis. The results of the models show that for both industries, companies that had sustainability scores above or below the industry average stayed almost the same during the study period. These indices and models can be used by companies to evaluate their sustainability performance and compare it with previous years, or with other companies in the same or different industries. These methods can also be used by various stakeholders and sustainability ranking companies such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI).

Keywords: data envelopment analysis, sustainability, sustainability performance measurement system, sustainability performance index, global reporting initiative

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Authors: Hasan Taştan, Ayşen Ciravoğlu

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The rapid growth of the human population and the environmental degradation associated with increased consumption of resources raises concerns on sustainability. Social sustainability constitutes one of the three dimensions of sustainability together with environmental and economic dimensions. Even though there is not an agreement on what social sustainability consists of, it is a well known fact that it necessitates user participation. The fore, this study aims to observe and analyze the role of user participation on social sustainability. In this paper, the links between user participation and indicators of social sustainability have been searched. In order to achieve this, first of all a literature review on social sustainability has been done; accordingly, the information obtained from researches has been used in the evaluation of the projects conducted in the developing countries considering user participation. These examples are taken as role models with pros and cons for the development of the checklist for the evaluation of the case studies. Furthermore, a case study over the post earthquake residential settlements in Turkey have been conducted. The case study projects are selected considering different building scales (differing number of residential units), scale of the problem (post-earthquake settlements, rehabilitation of shanty dwellings) and the variety of users (differing socio-economic dimensions). Decisionmaking, design, building and usage processes of the selected projects and actors of these processes have been investigated in the context of social sustainability. The cases include: New Gourna Village by Hassan Fathy, Quinta Monroy dwelling units conducted in Chile by Alejandro Aravena and Beyköy and Beriköy projects in Turkey aiming to solve the problem of housing which have appeared after the earthquake happened in 1999 have been investigated. Results of the study possible links between social sustainability indicators and user participation and links between user participation and the peculiarities of place. Results are compared and discussed in order to find possible solutions to form social sustainability through user participation. Results show that social sustainability issues depend on communities' characteristics, socio-economic conditions and user profile but user participation has positive effects on some social sustainability indicators like user satisfaction, a sense of belonging and social stability.

Keywords: housing projects, residential areas, social sustainability, user participation

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Authors: Kari M. Solomon

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Companies with a culture accepting of change management and performance excellence are better suited to determine their sustainability performance and impacts. A mature corporate culture supportive of performance excellence is better positioned to integrate sustainability management tools into their standard business strategy. Companies use various sustainability management tools and reporting standards to communicate levels of sustainability performance to their stakeholders, more often focusing on shareholders and investors. A research gap remains in understanding how companies adapt business excellence models to define corporate sustainability performance. A content analysis of medium-sized enterprises using corporate sustainability reports and business excellence models reveals the challenges and opportunities of reporting sustainability performance in the context of organizational excellence. The outcomes of this content analysis contribute knowledge on the resources needed for companies to build sustainability performance management systems integral to existing management systems. The findings of this research inform academic research areas of corporate sustainability performance, the business community contributing to sustainable development initiatives, and integrating sustainable development issues into business excellence models. There are potential research links between sustainability performance management and the alignment of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) when organizations promote a culture of performance or business excellence.

Keywords: business excellence, corporate sustainability, performance excellence, sustainability performance

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Authors: Sun Jiaojiao, Fu Jiayan

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At present, in China, the research about the urban sustainability construction is still in the exploratory stage. The ecological problems of the coastal area are more sensitive and complicated. In the background of global warming with serious ecological damage, this paper deeply researches on the main characteristics of urban sustainability and measures how to build urban sustainability. Through combination with regional environmental and economic ability along the coastal area, we put forward the system planning framework, construction strategy and the evaluation index system in order to seek the way of building urban sustainability along coastal area in China.

Keywords: urban sustainability, coastal areas, construction strategy, evaluation index system

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Authors: Miguel Ramirez, Ivan Lizarazo

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The emergence of various interpretations of sustainability, including weak and strong paradigms, can be traced back to the definition of sustainable development provided in the 1987 Brundtland report and the subsequent evolution of the sustainability concept. However, there has been limited scholarly attention given to clarifying the concept of sustainability within the theoretical and conceptual framework of geography. The discipline has predominantly been focused on understanding the diverse conceptions of sustainability within its epistemological boundaries, resulting in tensions between sustainability paradigms and their associated dimensions, including the incorporation of political perspectives, with particular emphasis on environmental geography's epistemology. In response to this gap, a conceptual framework for sustainability is proposed, effectively integrating spatial and territorial concepts. This framework aims to enhance geography's role in contributing to sustainability by utilizing the land system theory, which is based on the dynamics of land use change. Such an integrated conceptual framework enables incorporating methodological tools such as remote sensing, encompassing various earth observations and fusion methods, and supervised classification techniques. Additionally, it looks for better integration of socioecological information, thereby capturing essential population-related features.

Keywords: geography, sustainability, land change science, territorial sustainability

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