A lattice-based query system for assessing the quality of hydro-ecosystems

International audienceConcept lattices are useful tools for organising and querying data. In this paper we present an application of lattices for analysing and classifying stream sites described by physical, physico-chemical and biological parameters. Lattices are first used for building a hierarchy of site profiles which are annotated by hydro-ecologists. This hierarchy can then be queried to classify and assess new sites. The whole approach relies on an information system storing data about Alsatian stream sites and their parameters. A specific interface has been designed to manipulate the lattices and an incremental algorithm has been implemented to perform the query operations

An intelligent system to ensure interoperability for the dairy farm business model

Publisher Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.Picking reliable partners, negotiating synchronously with all partners, and managing similar proposals are challenging tasks for any manager. This challenge is even harder when it concerns small and medium enterprises (SMEs) who need to deal with short budgets and evident size limitations, often leading them to avoid handling very large contracts. This size problem can only be mitigated by collaboration efforts between multiple SMEs, but then again this brings back the initially stated issues. To address these problems, this paper proposes a collaborative negotiation system that automates the outsourcing part by assisting the manager throughout a negotiation. The described system provides a comprehensive view of all negotiations, facilitates simultaneous bilateral negotiations, and provides support for ensuring interoperability among multiple partners negotiating on a task described by multiple attributes. In addition, it relies on an ontology to cope with the challenges of semantic interoperability, it automates the selection of reliable partners by using a lattice-based approach, and it manages similar proposals by allowing domain experts to define a satisfaction degree for each SME. To showcase this method, this research focused on small and medium-size dairy farms (DFs) and describes a negotiation scenario in which a few DFs are able to assess and generate proposals.publishersversionpublishe

Geographic Information Systems, Spatial Data Analysis and Spatial Modelling. - Problems and Possibilities -

This article is the position paper for the ESF-GISDATA Specialist Meeting on GIS & Spatial Analysis, Amsterdam, 1-5December1993. The focus here is on the two major themes of the meeting: Spatial Data Analysis and Spatial Modelling. Special emphasis is laid on specific problems and possibilities for interfacing spatial analysis tools (i.e. spatial data analysis techniques and spatial models) and GIS. Both GIS application fields, the environmental sciences and the social sciences, are taken into consideration. (authors' abstract)Series: Discussion Papers of the Institute for Economic Geography and GIScienc

A framework for planning sustainable development in coastal regions: An island pilot project in Croatia

There have been few empirical studies demonstrating how sustainable development has been realized in a specific regime. This project developed and tested a framework for comprehensive planning including environmental, social, and economic considerations on the island Cres in the Croatian Coastal Zone. The approach defines sustainable development in coastal regions, and develops a generic framework incorporating biological, geological, chemical, physical, social, and economic factors necessary for sustainable development. The generic framework ensures that planning decisions will be based on environmental concerns of the area. A prime principle of the approach is that any plan must work with the environmental limits for sustainable development. Within these limits, however, many options for environmental and social development exist. Successful resource management demands knowledge and understanding of the resources being used, the consequences of those uses, and awareness that decisions ultimately reduce remaining options. In addition, the awareness of these consequences can be used to mitigate bad choice decisions. The use options are based on environmental carrying capacities, and incorporate a resource-based economy in agriculture, fisheries, aquaculture, and ecotourism. The project uses integrated Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and remote sensing technology to define existing environmental conditions, and identify resource limitations and constraints caused by potential uses, as well as environmental requirements and options for each potential use. Insufficiencies in the database that could hinder the full implementation of a comprehensive resource use plan were identified early. Using GIS, potential use conflicts were identified, and possible use scenarios in conjunction with various managements were evaluated. Finally, the GIS database was combined with current use-impact models creating an analytical tool for evaluating impacts of alternative development scenarios. The generic resource framework for sustainable development, planning and policy development establishes a base to which political, economical, and social considerations can be added. This integrated coastal system model is intended to guide the development of rational and integrated long-term social and economical policies for the continuing use of the coastal zone

ECOLOGIES OF COHESION. An ecological perspective on territorial cohesion through the lens of landscapes as social ecological systems.

Urbanization together with growing human activities is leading to increasing marginalization and regional inequalities. While cities are mostly associated with economic success and power, the inland areas – defined as territories remote from the delivering of services such as health, education, and mobility – are undergoing a process of socio-economic decline. Nevertheless, inland areas are crucial in the delivery of goods and services to society. The multiple ways society benefits from ecosystems is captured by the definition of “Ecosystem Services” (ES), and its integration into regional planning can help researchers and policy-makers to identify trade-offs between ecological and socioeconomic aspects. On that account, this dissertation investigates regional interdependencies through the lens of ES, proposing an ecological perspective on territorial cohesion. The analysis builds on the concept of landscapes – conceived as the result of the interplay between human and nature through the perception of people – framed in this work as social-ecological systems. The spatial relations within systems are assessed through the concept of ES bundles and developing it in the direction of the supply-demand perspective. Yet, as benefits from nature do not occur independently but often require significant human contributions, the role of social systems is further analyzed though ES co-production. Within this theoretical framework, the thesis develops three main investigations: i) the critical examination of the applications of the ES framework in planning through a literature review; ii) the characterization of landscapes as social-ecological systems through ES bundles, offering insights for landscape planning and territorial cohesion; iii) the development of a framework to assess the role of social actors within landscapes though the analysis of ES co-production. The empirical work is applied to a regional and a local case study within the Mediterranean region of Le Marche, Italy. The results of this dissertation prove “ES in planning” to be a promising research area, both for its conceptual and methodological applications. The spatial analysis developed a functional landscape characterization in terms of bundles of ES demand and supply, further characterized though social- economic assets. This allowed the interpretation of the regional landscapes systems along a coastal-mountain gradient drawn by the raising of altitude and decreasing of population density. The analysis of interdependencies highlighted a strong dependency of urban poles on inland systems, concerning nearly the total 12 ES taken into consideration. Results from social analysis showed that rural actors associate great cultural values to local landscapes. The ES were co- produced both physically by actions on the state of ecosystems, and cognitively through users' values. In relation to the global pressures faced by inland ecosystems, the thesis offers a set of recommendations for sustainable landscape planning, concerning the preservation of the identity of inland systems through the enhancement of local ecosystems management. While incorporating the central role of people in landscape assessment, governance should foster collaboration and social learning, integrating innovative tools for ensuring participation. Overall, the thesis produces a new environmental-based argument toward territorial cohesion where place-based policies should build on local territorial assets, recognizing the central role of inland areas in the provision of ES

Spatial decision support system for coastal flood management in Victoria, Australia

Coastal climate impact can affect coastal areas in a variety of ways, such as flooding, storm surges, reduction in beach sands and increased beach erosion. While each of these can have major impacts on the operation of coastal drainage systems, this thesis focuses on coastal and riverine flooding in coastal areas. Coastal flood risk varies within Australia, with the northern parts in the cyclone belt most affected and high levels of risk similar to other Asian countries. However, in Australia, the responsibility for managing coastal areas is shared between the Commonwealth government, Australian states and territories, and local governments. Strategies for floodplain management to reduce and control flooding are best implemented at the land use planning stage. Local governments make local decisions about coastal flood risk management through the assessment and approval of planning permit applications. Statutory planning by local government is informed by policies related to coastal flooding and coastal erosion, advice from government departments, agencies, experts and local community experts. The West Gippsland Catchment Management Authority (WGCMA) works with local communities, Victorian State Emergency Services (VCSES), local government authorities (LGAs), and other local organizations to prepare the West Gippsland Flood Management Strategy (WGFMS). The strategy aims at identifying significant flood risks, mitigating those risks, and establishing a set of priorities for implementation of the strategy over a ten-year period. The Bass Coast Shire Council (BCSC) region has experienced significant flooding over the last few decades, causing the closure of roads, landslides and erosion. Wonthaggi was particularly affected during this period with roads were flooded causing the northern part of the city of Wonthaggi to be closed in the worst cases. Climate change and increased exposure through the growth of urban population have dramatically increased the frequency and the severity of flood events on human populations. Traditionally, while GIS has provided spatial data management, it has had limitations in modelling capability to solve complex hydrology problems such as flood events. Therefore, it has not been relied upon by decision-makers in the coastal management sector. Functionality improvements are therefore required to improve the processing or analytical capabilities of GIS in hydrology to provide more certainty for decision-makers. This research shows how the spatial data (LiDAR, Road, building, aerial photo) can be primarily processed by GIS and how by adopting the spatial analysis routines associated with hydrology these problems can be overcome. The aim of this research is to refine GIS-embedded hydrological modelling so they can be used to help communities better understand their exposure to flood risk and give them more control about how to adapt and respond. The research develops a new Spatial Decision Support System (SDSS) to improve the implementation of coastal flooding risk assessment and management in Victoria, Australia. It is a solution integrating a range of approaches including, Light Detection and Ranging (Rata et al., 2014), GIS (Petroselli and sensing, 2012), hydrological models, numerical models, flood risk modelling, and multi-criteria techniques. Bass Coast Shire Council is an interesting study region for coastal flooding as it involves (i) a high rainfall area, (ii) and a major river meeting coastal area affected by storm surges, with frequent flooding of urban areas. Also, very high-quality Digital Elevation Model (DEM) data is available from the Victorian Government to support first-pass screening of coastal risks from flooding. The methods include using advanced GIS hydrology modelling and LiDAR digital elevation data to determine surface runoff to evaluate the flood risk for BCSC. This methodology addresses the limitations in flood hazard modelling mentioned above and gives a logical basis to estimate tidal impacts on flooding, and the impact and changes in atmospheric conditions, including precipitation and sea levels. This study examines how GIS hydrological modelling and LiDAR digital elevation data can be used to map and visualise flood risk in coastal built-up areas in BCSC. While this kind of visualisation is often used for the assessment of flood impacts to infrastructure risk, it has not been utilized in the BCSC. Previous research identified terrestrial areas at risk of flooding using a conceptual hydrological model (Pourali et al., 2014b) that models the flood-risk regions and provides flooding extent maps for the BCSC. It examined the consequences of various components influencing flooding for use in creating a framework to manage flood risk. The BCSC has recognised the benefits of combining these techniques that allow them to analyse data, deal with the problems, create intuitive visualization methods, and make decisions about addressing flood risk. The SDSS involves a GIS-embedded hydrological model that interlinks data integration and processing systems that interact through a linear cascade. Each stage of the cascade produces results which are input into the next model in a modelling chain hierarchy. The output involves GIS-based hydrological modelling to improve the implementation of coastal flood risk management plans developed by local governments. The SDSS also derives a set of Coastal Climate Change (CCC) flood risk assessment parameters (performance indicators), such as land use, settlement, infrastructure and other relevant indicators for coastal and bayside ecosystems. By adopting the SDSS, coastal managers will be able to systematically compare alternative coastal flood-risk management plans and make decisions about the most appropriate option. By integrating relevant models within a structured framework, the system will promote transparency of policy development and flood risk management. This thesis focuses on extending the spatial data handling capability of GIS to integrate climatic and other spatial data to help local governments with coastal exposure develop programs to adapt to climate change. The SDSS will assist planners to prepare for changing climate conditions. BCSC is a municipal government body with a coastal boundary and has assisted in the development and testing of the SDSS and derived many benefits from using the SDSS developed as a result of this research. Local governments at risk of coastal flooding that use the SDSS can use the Google Earth data sharing tool to determine appropriate land use controls to manage long-term flood risk to human settlement. The present research describes an attempt to develop a Spatial Decision Support System (SDSS) to aid decision makers to identify the proper location of new settlements where additional land development could be located based on decision rules. Also presented is an online decision-support tool that all stakeholders can use to share the results

Water Resources Management and Modeling

Hydrology is the science that deals with the processes governing the depletion and replenishment of water resources of the earth's land areas. The purpose of this book is to put together recent developments on hydrology and water resources engineering. First section covers surface water modeling and second section deals with groundwater modeling. The aim of this book is to focus attention on the management of surface water and groundwater resources. Meeting the challenges and the impact of climate change on water resources is also discussed in the book. Most chapters give insights into the interpretation of field information, development of models, the use of computational models based on analytical and numerical techniques, assessment of model performance and the use of these models for predictive purposes. It is written for the practicing professionals and students, mathematical modelers, hydrogeologists and water resources specialists

Designing Data Spaces

This open access book provides a comprehensive view on data ecosystems and platform economics from methodical and technological foundations up to reports from practical implementations and applications in various industries. To this end, the book is structured in four parts: Part I “Foundations and Contexts” provides a general overview about building, running, and governing data spaces and an introduction to the IDS and GAIA-X projects. Part II “Data Space Technologies” subsequently details various implementation aspects of IDS and GAIA-X, including eg data usage control, the usage of blockchain technologies, or semantic data integration and interoperability. Next, Part III describes various “Use Cases and Data Ecosystems” from various application areas such as agriculture, healthcare, industry, energy, and mobility. Part IV eventually offers an overview of several “Solutions and Applications”, eg including products and experiences from companies like Google, SAP, Huawei, T-Systems, Innopay and many more. Overall, the book provides professionals in industry with an encompassing overview of the technological and economic aspects of data spaces, based on the International Data Spaces and Gaia-X initiatives. It presents implementations and business cases and gives an outlook to future developments. In doing so, it aims at proliferating the vision of a social data market economy based on data spaces which embrace trust and data sovereignty