Modelling and Assessment of Biomass-PV Tradeoff within the Framework of the Food-Energy-Water Nexus

Food, water and energy are three essential resources for human well-being, poverty reduction and sustainable development. These resources are very much linked to one another, meaning that the actions in any one particular area often can have effects in one or both of the other areas. At the same time, an economy's shift towards climate neutrality requires a massive expansion of energy production from renewable sources. Among these ground-mounted photovoltaic (PV) and biomass will be expanded massively to meet the clean energy generation goal, simultaneously influence regional water and food availability and supply security. It is crucial to understand Food-Water-Energy Nexus (FWE) nexus during the energy transition. However, current studies have limitation both methodically (qualitative assessments) and spatially (aggregated data on a national level is more available). Firstly, a consistent share input data set in geographical format was created with the resolution of building/field. An energy simulation platform (SimStadt) was then extended with new workflows on biomass potential, ground-mounted PV potential, food demand/potential, and urban water demand. Combining with existing workflows on urban building heating/electricity demand and roof PV potential, the dissertation created a complete simulation environmental covering most-relating FWE topics in energy transition with consistent input and output structures at a fine resolution. Secondly, the most representative inter-linkage between ground-mounted PV and biomass on hinterland is investigated in details with the new tools. The output data of each field from ground-mounted PV and biomass workflows are linked and ranked according to the scenarios emphasizing PV yield, feasibility, profit, or biomass. The assessment and scenarios are applied at three representative German counties with distinguished land-use structures and geometries as case studies. Results show that current policies does not guarantee the technically efficient allocation of fields. The optimal technical strategy is to follow the individual market profit drive, which is very likely, at the same time for the social good, to achieve high PV yields with limited biomass losses and more significant crop water-saving effects. The local food, water, and energy demands are also included as a metric for resource allocation on the potential side. Besides focusing on the biomass-PV tradeoff simulation and analysis, pioneer works have also been done to test the transferability of the method in cases outside Germany, and the complement of urban solid waste to agricultural biomass is explored to achieve energy autarky

Socio-Environmental Vulnerability Assessment for Sustainable Management

This Special Issue explores the cross-disciplinary approaches, methodologies, and applications of socio-environmental vulnerability assessment that can be incorporated into sustainable management. The volume comprises 20 different points of view, which cover environmental protection and development, urban planning, geography, public policymaking, participation processes, and other cross-disciplinary fields. The articles collected in this volume come from all over the world and present the current state of the world’s environmental and social systems at a local, regional, and national level. New approaches and analytical tools for the assessment of environmental and social systems are studied. The practical implementation of sustainable development as well as progressive environmental and development policymaking are discussed. Finally, the authors deliberate about the perspectives of social–environmental systems in a rapidly changing world

Constitutional Challenges in the Algorithmic Society

The law struggles to address the constitutional challenges of the algorithmic society. This book is for scholars and lawyers interested in the intersections of law and technology. It addresses the challenges for fundamental rights and democracy, the role of policy and regulation, and the responsibilities of private actors

The HBP1 tumor suppressor is a negative epigenetic regulator of MYCN driven neuroblastoma through interaction with the PRC2 complex

C

Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Energy Efficiency in Domestic Appliances and Lighting

At the EEDAL'15 conference 128 papers dealing with energy consumption and energy efficiency improvements for the residential sector have been presented. Papers focused policies and programmes, technologies and consumer behaviour. Special focus was on standards and labels, demand response and smart meters. All the paper s have been peer reviewed by experts in the sector.JRC.F.7-Renewables and Energy Efficienc

Build the cradle later: An examination of perinatal care and mortality in village nepal.

Background: As perinatal and neonatal mortality move to the foreground of the debate on how best to improve child survival in poor countries, there appears a pressing need to test potential interventions. Implicit in testing is the ability to document birth and neonatal outcomes in rural communities. The thesis sets perinatal events in the context of the child survival literature and critically examines current knowledge about practices, outcomes and interventions. This knowledge is found to be limited, particularly in terms of practices and outcomes in rural settings in developing countries. Methods: Two methods are described to document perinatal events in villages in Makwanpur district, Nepal. (1) a census of women of reproductive age, collecting information about previous pregnancies and most recent live births (2) a prospective system of registration that tracked women through childbirth and infants through the neonatal period. Both methods yielded information on pregnancies, birth outcomes, care practices and health care seeking patterns. Results: The census collected information from 12,170 women, of whom 4867 had given birth in the preceding two years. The prospective surveillance collected information on 3522 pregnancies over two years. The thesis presents results under two broad themes: (1) a description of the birth experience of women in rural Makwanpur, its outcomes, practices and care seeking patterns (2) a comparison of the two methods of data collection. Poverty was the norm in rural Makwanpur and only a quarter of participants were literate. 30% of pregnant women had any antenatal care, which tended to be both late and limited, and 95% gave birth at home. Three percent of women were helped by trained health workers and there were compromises in hygiene and warmth at the time of delivery. Breastfeeding rates were high. The prospective registration process suggested a neonatal mortality rate of 37 per thousand live births, a figure higher than that from the census (27 per thousand), and thus higher than would be estimated by existing methodologies. Discussion: Antenatal, delivery, postnatal and neonatal care practices and care seeking are compared with existing knowledge from other studies. Their implications for programmatic intervention are considered. The issue of recall-based data collection is discussed as it bears upon the evaluation of public health interventions. The feasibility of registration systems is assessed and recommendations made for increasing reliability, expansion and replication, and reducing system costs. 386 words

Clemson Newsletter, 1987-1989

Information for the faculty and staff of Clemson Universityhttps://tigerprints.clemson.edu/clemson_newsletter/1020/thumbnail.jp