5,342 research outputs found
A Method for Assessing Regional Bioenergy Potentials Based on GIS Data and a Dynamic Yield Simulation Model
The assessment of regional bioenergy potentials from different types of natural land cover is an integral part of simulation tools that aim to assess local renewable energy systems. This work introduces a new workflow, which evaluates regional bioenergy potentials and its impact on water demand based on geographical information system (GIS)-based land use data, satellite maps on local crop types and soil types, and conversion factors from biomass to bioenergy. The actual annual biomass yield of crops is assessed through an automated process considering the factors of local climate, crop type, soil, and irrigation. The crop biomass yields are validated with historic statistical data, with deviation less than 7% in most cases. Additionally, the resulting bioenergy potentials yield between 10.7 and 12.0 GWh/ha compared with 13.3 GWh/ha from other studies. The potential contribution from bioenergy on the energy demand were investigated in the two case studies, representing the agricultural-dominant rural area in North Germany and suburban region in South Germany: Simulation of the future bioenergy potential for 2050 shows only smaller effects from climate change (less than 4%) and irrigation (below 3%), but the potential to cover up to 21% of the transport fuels demand in scenario supporting biodiesel and bioethanol for transportation
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Can I Get a Witness?—Living While Black Death is Trending
It is not uncommon for graphic scenes of violence and death to infiltrate our timelinesfrom retweets, reposts, and shares. I often question how much control do we really have over the images that enter our feed? In what ways are we affected and influenced by these images? How do we relate to these images and video clips that are played and replayed before us? In what ways are these images evoking or are related to past scenes of racist violence? In what ways are these racially violent moments captured in photos and videos and shared online speaking to a Black consciousness?
This project comparatively researches and examines the relationship between past modes and methods of Black trauma curation in the past, to contemporary modes of dissemination on social media in order to argue that contemporary uses of spaces such as Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter serve as an extension of previous scrapbooking methods. By comparing The Emmet Till Generation and their curation of trauma via scrapbooks which were used to galvanize social movements, and impact organizing efforts of the youth, The Trayvon Generation today uses social media in a similar fashion; to bear witness, to organize, and to curate digital memorials for the dead. Witnessing is further extended and complicated on digital platforms, providing an abundance of visual evidence that has proven to be vital in leading tp prosecutions and arrests of violent state officials, and perpetrators of extrajudicial violence.
These live or recorded moments of witnessing are used not only as evidence, but to inform the public. However, we have always known that it’s always happening somewhere, even if we aren’t around to witness it. With that said, what are the effects of having the duty, and the responsibility to bear witness? Paying particular attention to Black youth, this project examines their presence and usage of social media spaces. By analyzing young Black people’s use of social media platforms in relation to Darnella Frazier’s strategic use Facebook, this project examines how Black youth and witnessing is currently driving a cultural shift in entertainment media that highlights witnessing death as a significant milestone for Black youth that marks the transition between childhood and adulthood. It is also impacting entertainment media that is not marketed towards Black people, further highlighting Black witnessing of racialized violence at the intersection of technology as both a contemporary and future issue through its inclusion in contemporary media.Witnessing for Black people is framed as being both necessary and traumatic.
This project concludes with an in depth examination of speculative media to reveal the implications of both the present and the future intersections of race relations, state violence and technology. Through analyses of interviews, image circulation and dissemination, magazine articles, social media platforms, visual and speculative media, this dissertation works to address and attempts to answer the aforementioned questions
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Ensuring Access to Safe and Nutritious Food for All Through the Transformation of Food Systems
A Design Science Research Approach to Smart and Collaborative Urban Supply Networks
Urban supply networks are facing increasing demands and challenges and thus constitute a relevant field for research and practical development. Supply chain management holds enormous potential and relevance for society and everyday life as the flow of goods and information are important economic functions. Being a heterogeneous field, the literature base of supply chain management research is difficult to manage and navigate. Disruptive digital technologies and the implementation of cross-network information analysis and sharing drive the need for new organisational and technological approaches. Practical issues are manifold and include mega trends such as digital transformation, urbanisation, and environmental awareness.
A promising approach to solving these problems is the realisation of smart and collaborative supply networks. The growth of artificial intelligence applications in recent years has led to a wide range of applications in a variety of domains. However, the potential of artificial intelligence utilisation in supply chain management has not yet been fully exploited. Similarly, value creation increasingly takes place in networked value creation cycles that have become continuously more collaborative, complex, and dynamic as interactions in business processes involving information technologies have become more intense.
Following a design science research approach this cumulative thesis comprises the development and discussion of four artefacts for the analysis and advancement of smart and collaborative urban supply networks. This thesis aims to highlight the potential of artificial intelligence-based supply networks, to advance data-driven inter-organisational collaboration, and to improve last mile supply network sustainability. Based on thorough machine learning and systematic literature reviews, reference and system dynamics modelling, simulation, and qualitative empirical research, the artefacts provide a valuable contribution to research and practice
Corporate Social Responsibility: the institutionalization of ESG
Understanding the impact of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) on firm performance as it relates to industries reliant on technological innovation is a complex and perpetually evolving challenge. To thoroughly investigate this topic, this dissertation will adopt an economics-based structure to address three primary hypotheses. This structure allows for each hypothesis to essentially be a standalone empirical paper, unified by an overall analysis of the nature of impact that ESG has on firm performance. The first hypothesis explores the evolution of CSR to the modern quantified iteration of ESG has led to the institutionalization and standardization of the CSR concept. The second hypothesis fills gaps in existing literature testing the relationship between firm performance and ESG by finding that the relationship is significantly positive in long-term, strategic metrics (ROA and ROIC) and that there is no correlation in short-term metrics (ROE and ROS). Finally, the third hypothesis states that if a firm has a long-term strategic ESG plan, as proxied by the publication of CSR reports, then it is more resilience to damage from controversies. This is supported by the finding that pro-ESG firms consistently fared better than their counterparts in both financial and ESG performance, even in the event of a controversy. However, firms with consistent reporting are also held to a higher standard than their nonreporting peers, suggesting a higher risk and higher reward dynamic. These findings support the theory of good management, in that long-term strategic planning is both immediately economically beneficial and serves as a means of risk management and social impact mitigation. Overall, this contributes to the literature by fillings gaps in the nature of impact that ESG has on firm performance, particularly from a management perspective
Can analytics software measure end user computing electricity consumption?
The purpose of this research is to answer the question, ‘can analytics software measure end user computing electricity consumption?’ The rationale being that the success of traditional methodologies, such as watt metres, is limited by newly evolved barriers such as mobility and scale (Greenblatt et al., in Field data collection of miscellaneous electrical loads in Northern California: initial results. Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory research paper, pp 4–5, 2013). Such limitations significantly reduce the availability of end user computing use phase energy consumption field data (Karpagam and Yung, in J Clean Prod 156:828, 2017). This causes computer manufacturers to instead rely upon no-user present energy efficiency benchmarks (Energy Star, in Product finder, product, certified computers, results. Washington, D.C.: United States Department of Energy. https://www.energystar.gov/productfinder/product/certified-computers/results, 2021) to act as baseline data for product carbon footprint reports. As the benchmark approach is previously tested to cause scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions quantification to be inaccurate by − 48% to + 107% (Sutton-Parker, in Determining end user computing device Scope 2 GHG emissions with accurate use phase energy consumption measurement, 1877-0509. Amsterdam: Science Direct, Elsevier B.V., 2020), testing a new methodology that includes the impact of human–computer interaction is arguably of value. As such, the proposed method is tested using a distributed node based analytics software to capture both computer asset and human use profile data sets from one hundred and eleven computer users operating in a subject organisation for 30-days. The simple rationale is that the node, unlike a watt metre, is not restricted by location, can be deployed and monitored globally from a centralised location and can move with the computer to ensure constant measurement. The resulting data sets are used to populate a current use phase electricity consumption calculation data flow (Kawamoto et al., in Energy 27:255, 2001; Roth et al., in Energy consumption by office and telecommunications equipment in commercial buildings: energy consumption baseline, 2002) in order to examine for omissions. Additionally, to test for data accuracy, one computer user acts as a control subject, measuring electricity consumption with both a watt-metre and the analytics software. The rationale being that the watt-metre data is extensively proven to be accurate (Energy Star, in Energy star computers final version 8.0 Specification, Washington D.C., United States Department of Energy. https://www.energystar.gov/products/spec/computers_version_8_0_pd, 2020) and will therefore expose errors produced by the software in relation to power draw, on-time and resulting kilo-watt hours (kWh) values. Further to the data capture period, the findings are mixed. Positively, the new method overcomes the barriers of numerous, assorted devices (scale) operating in ever changing locations (mobility). This is achieved by the node reporting in real-time make and model asset data together with device specific electricity consumption and location data via internet technologies. Negatively, the control subject identifies that the electricity consumption values produced by the software are inaccurate by a relatively constant 48%. Furthermore, data omissions are experienced including the exclusion of computer displays caused by the node requiring an operating system to collect data. This latter point would exclude the energy consumption measurement and therefore concomitant greenhouse gas emissions of any displays connected to desktop or mobile computers. Consequently, whilst the research question is answered, the identification of the software exaggerating use phase energy consumption by 48% and excluding peripheral devices, determines the analytics methodology to be in need of further development. The rationale being that use phase consumption quantification is key to lifecycle assessment and greenhouse gas accounting protocol and both require high levels of accuracy (WBCSD and WRI, in The greenhouse gas protocol. A corporate accounting and reporting standard, Geneva, Switzerland and New York, USA. https://ghgprotocol.org/corporate-standard, 2004). It is therefore recommended that further research be undertaken to specifically address omissions and to reduce the over reporting aspect identified as caused by algorithms in the software used to calculate hardware power draw
CITIES: Energetic Efficiency, Sustainability; Infrastructures, Energy and the Environment; Mobility and IoT; Governance and Citizenship
This book collects important contributions on smart cities. This book was created in collaboration with the ICSC-CITIES2020, held in San José (Costa Rica) in 2020. This book collects articles on: energetic efficiency and sustainability; infrastructures, energy and the environment; mobility and IoT; governance and citizenship
Bibliographic Control in the Digital Ecosystem
With the contributions of international experts, the book aims to explore the new boundaries of universal bibliographic control. Bibliographic control is radically changing because the bibliographic universe is radically changing: resources, agents, technologies, standards and practices. Among the main topics addressed: library cooperation networks; legal deposit; national bibliographies; new tools and standards (IFLA LRM, RDA, BIBFRAME); authority control and new alliances (Wikidata, Wikibase, Identifiers); new ways of indexing resources (artificial intelligence); institutional repositories; new book supply chain; “discoverability” in the IIIF digital ecosystem; role of thesauri and ontologies in the digital ecosystem; bibliographic control and search engines
Technologies and Applications for Big Data Value
This open access book explores cutting-edge solutions and best practices for big data and data-driven AI applications for the data-driven economy. It provides the reader with a basis for understanding how technical issues can be overcome to offer real-world solutions to major industrial areas. The book starts with an introductory chapter that provides an overview of the book by positioning the following chapters in terms of their contributions to technology frameworks which are key elements of the Big Data Value Public-Private Partnership and the upcoming Partnership on AI, Data and Robotics. The remainder of the book is then arranged in two parts. The first part “Technologies and Methods” contains horizontal contributions of technologies and methods that enable data value chains to be applied in any sector. The second part “Processes and Applications” details experience reports and lessons from using big data and data-driven approaches in processes and applications. Its chapters are co-authored with industry experts and cover domains including health, law, finance, retail, manufacturing, mobility, and smart cities. Contributions emanate from the Big Data Value Public-Private Partnership and the Big Data Value Association, which have acted as the European data community's nucleus to bring together businesses with leading researchers to harness the value of data to benefit society, business, science, and industry. The book is of interest to two primary audiences, first, undergraduate and postgraduate students and researchers in various fields, including big data, data science, data engineering, and machine learning and AI. Second, practitioners and industry experts engaged in data-driven systems, software design and deployment projects who are interested in employing these advanced methods to address real-world problems
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