Movement-based Group Awareness with Wireless Sensor Networks

We propose a method through which dynamic sensor nodes determine that they move together, by communicating and correlating their movement information. We describe two possible solutions, one using inexpensive tilt switches, and another one using low-cost MEMS accelerometers. We implement a fast, incremental correlation algorithm, with an execution time of 6ms, which can run on resource constrained devices. The tests with the implementation on real sensor nodes show that the method is reliable and distinguishes between joint and separate movements. In addition, we analyze the scalability from four different perspectives: communication, energy, memory and execution speed. The solution using tilt switches proves to be simpler, cheaper and more energy efficient, while the accelerometer-based solution is more reliable, more robust to sensor alignment problems and, potentially, more accurate by using extended features, such as speed and distance

Screening of energy efficient technologies for industrial buildings' retrofit

This chapter discusses screening of energy efficient technologies for industrial buildings' retrofit

Economics of Water Quality Protection from Nonpoint Sources: Theory and Practice

Water quality is a major environmental issue. Pollution from nonpoint sources is the single largest remaining source of water quality impairments in the United States. Agriculture is a major source of several nonpoint-source pollutants, including nutrients, sediment, pesticides, and salts. Agricultural nonpoint pollution reduction policies can be designed to induce producers to change their production practices in ways that improve the environmental and related economic consequences of production. The information necessary to design economically efficient pollution control policies is almost always lacking. Instead, policies can be designed to achieve specific environmental or other similarly related goals at least cost, given transaction costs and any other political, legal, or informational constraints that may exist. This report outlines the economic characteristics of five instruments that can be used to reduce agricultural nonpoint source pollution (economic incentives, standards, education, liability, and research) and discusses empirical research related to the use of these instruments.water quality, nonpoint-source pollution, economic incentives, standards, education, liability, research, Environmental Economics and Policy,

Applications notice

The discipline programs of the Space and Terrestrial (S&T) Applications Program are described and examples of research areas of current interest are given. Application of space techniques to improve conditions on earth are summarized. Discipline programs discussed include: resource observations; environmental observations; communications; materials processing in space; and applications systems/information systems. Format information on submission of unsolicited proposals for research related to the S&T Applications Program are given

量子ドット太陽電池とペロブスカイト太陽電池における界面エンジニアリングと界面電荷移動ダイナミクス

電気通信大学201

Study to determine potential flight applications and human factors design guidelines for voice recognition and synthesis systems

A study was conducted to determine potential commercial aircraft flight deck applications and implementation guidelines for voice recognition and synthesis. At first, a survey of voice recognition and synthesis technology was undertaken to develop a working knowledge base. Then, numerous potential aircraft and simulator flight deck voice applications were identified and each proposed application was rated on a number of criteria in order to achieve an overall payoff rating. The potential voice recognition applications fell into five general categories: programming, interrogation, data entry, switch and mode selection, and continuous/time-critical action control. The ratings of the first three categories showed the most promise of being beneficial to flight deck operations. Possible applications of voice synthesis systems were categorized as automatic or pilot selectable and many were rated as being potentially beneficial. In addition, voice system implementation guidelines and pertinent performance criteria are proposed. Finally, the findings of this study are compared with those made in a recent NASA study of a 1995 transport concept

Guidance and Control Division

Flight computers and sequencers, spacecraft power and control systems, and guidance and control analysis and integratio

A Review of Integrated Pollution Control Efforts in Selected Countries

This report describes the reasons why integrated pollution control (IPC) became accepted as a necessary part of the environmental regulatory systems of the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and Sweden and examines the experience these countries have had with unified environmental statutes, alternative compliance approaches, cross-media permitting, and other aspects of IPC that are under consideration in this country. The report is organized into five chapters. In the first chapter we provide a brief overview of the intellectual pedigree of integrated pollution control and discuss arguments that have been put forward by advocates of IPC as well as the counter-arguments of those who have taken a more skeptical view of the technical and political feasibility of implementing IPC measures. Chapter two details how the United Kingdom, long considered the dirty man of Europe, is developing an integrated system of industrial pollution control based on its 1990 Environmental Protection Act. The Act introduced new controls to limit and prevent pollution from a wide range of industries and has created a unified pollution inspectorate to ensure that the best practical environmental option (BPEO) for all media is achieved. We consider both the progress the UK Environmental Agency has made in IPC as well as the barriers it has encountered. In chapter three, we examine how the Dutch Environmental Ministry (VROM) was able to forge a consensus among diverse groups for the need to embrace innovative, integrated policies and then examine in detail the Dutch experience with alternative compliance efforts, notably their covenant system. The long-standing success of Sweden’s industrial permitting system is analyzed in chapter 4 and in the fifth and final chapter we consider the development and implications of the European Union’s recently adopted Directive on Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control, a document which is likely to have a profound influence on environmental management in Europe and elsewhere.

National Environmental Policy During the Clinton Years

We review major developments in national environmental policy during the Clinton Administration, defining environmental policy to include not only the statutes, regulations, and policies associated with reducing pollution, but also major issues of public lands management and species preservation. We adopt economic criteria for policy assessment and highlight a set of five themes that emerge in the economics of national environmental policy over the past decade. First, over the course of the decade, national environmental targets were made more stringent, and environmental quality improved. Most important among the new targets were the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for ambient ozone and particulate matter, issued by EPA in July 1997, which could turn out to be one of the Clinton Administration's most enduring environmental legacies. Also, natural resource policy during the Clinton years was heavily weighted toward environmental protection. Environmental quality improved overall during the decade, continuing a trend that began in the 1970s, although improvements were much less than during the previous two decades. Second, the use of benefit-cost analysis for assessing environmental regulation was controversial in the Clinton Administration, while economic efficiency emerged as a central goal of the regulatory reform movement in the Congress during the 1990s. When attention was given to increased efficiency, the locus of that attention during the Clinton years was the Congress in the case of environmental policies and the Administration in the case of natural resource policies. Ironically, the increased attention given to benefit-cost analysis may not have had a marked effect on the economic efficiency of environmental regulations. Third, cost-effectiveness achieved a much more prominent position in public discourse regarding environmental policy during the 1990s. From the Bush Administration through the Clinton Administration, interest and activity regarding market-based instruments for environmental protection, particularly tradeable permit systems, continued to increase. Fourth, the Clinton Administration put much greater emphasis than previous administrations on expanding the role of environmental information disclosure and voluntary programs. While such programs can provide cost-effective ways of reaching environmental policy goals, little is known about their actual costs or effectiveness. Fifth and finally, the Environmental Protection Agency placed much less emphasis on economic analysis during the 1990s. EPA leadership was more hostile to economic analysis than it had been under the prior Bush Administration, and it made organizational changes to reflect this change in priorities.