Emergency Evacuation Route Choice Based on Improved Ant Colony Algorithm

 In order to explore the optimal route choice for emergency evacuation in the campus, we propose a novel route choice method based on brittle characteristics of campus system and improved ant colony algorithm. Both optimal and worst-case emergency evacuation routes are simulated in the campus of Ningbo University of Technology. From the simulation, the length of optimal and worse-case evacuation routes between the starting point and eight exits can be obtained by adjusting the importance value of trip distance and the degree of conformity, under the condition of static relative importance of pheromone concentration to graph G. The optimal route of emergency evacuation in the campus can be obtained when the importance of trip distance is above 5 and the degree of conformity is above 0.3; while the worse-case route is obtained with the importance of trip distance above 5 and the degree of conformity below 0.5

WP3: participation in the multi-level governance of European water and biodiversity - a review of case studies

Participation is said to improve decisions on environmental conflicts. When investigating 16 case studies of participatory processes in European Water and Biodiversity Governance, which necessarily is multi-level, the picture becomes blurred: many different forms of participation can be observed, only few of them are well-defined and well organised; most of them are dominated by ad-hoc decisions on whom to include, how to close debates, and how to deal with uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. While nearly all of these processes could be improved by a more conscious and careful setting, the application blueprints will necessarily remain out of scope. Natural, cultural and institutional contingencies make each case special and often unique and the multi-level characteristic of European governance of natural resources adds an additional layer of complexity on how to organise participation. The empirical account of whether deliberation can deliver what it promises in theory is still incomplete. --

Co-constructing a new framework for evaluating social innovation in marginalized rural areas

The EU funded H2020 project \u2018Social Innovation in Marginalised Rural Areas\u2019 (SIMRA; www.simra-h2020.eu) has the overall objective of advancing the state-of-the-art in social innovation. This paper outlines the process for co- developing an evaluation framework with stakeholders, drawn from across Europe and the Mediterranean area, in the fields of agriculture, forestry and rural development. Preliminary results show the importance of integrating process and outcome-oriented evaluations, and implementing participatory approaches in evaluation practice. They also raise critical issues related to the comparability of primary data in diverse regional contexts and highlight the need for mixed methods approaches in evaluation

Methodological framework for resilience assessment of electricity infrastructure in conditions of Slovak Republic

The quality of the environment as well as public health is convincingly coupled with the functioning of a power subsector. The power subsector plays a pivotal role in the sense that it emerges as the key cross-sectional element for the society’s functioning (production, services, healthcare, education and others). A modern society consists of infrastructure systems that are primarily dependent on continuous electricity supplies. Each and every element of the electric power infrastructure is unique, and thus, its malfunction can disrupt the functioning of an important part of the electric power infrastructure. In conjunction with ensuring the functioning of electric power infrastructure, our attention must be drawn to the resilience issue. As far as the resilience of electric power infrastructure is concerned, it can resist weather-related events ensuring there are no disruptions in continuous electricity supplies. First, in the introductory part, the article presents the legal framework in the Slovak Republic. Second, it describes the current state of the electric power infrastructure of Slovakia. Third, it handles the state of the level of security risk assessment. Later on, in the literature review, besides turning to the issue of resilience assessment, the authors focused on the area of resilience of power engineering. Furthermore, the article scrutinizes resilience assessment in Slovakia, and it briefly examines approaches towards natural threats. In addition, the article demonstrates several approaches towards flood resilience. Having used different methods, the primary concern is to devise a framework for resilience assessment. Therefore, the included case study examines aspects of the proposed framework for resilience assessment. In conclusion, our aim was, in most respects, to outline an innovative methodological framework for increasing the resilience of electricity infrastructure. © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.Ministerstvo Vnitra České Republiky: VI20192022151; Vedecká Grantová Agentúra MŠVVaŠ SR a SAV, VEGA: 1/0371/19Ministry of the interior of the Czech Republic [VI20192022151]; VEGAVedecka grantova agentura MSVVaS SR a SAV (VEGA)European Commission [1/0371/19