The influence of sustainable packaging on brand perception in fast-moving consumer goods : Comparing perceptions of international consumers

Packaging holds a number of benefits, including its ability to protect products through transportation and its ability to convey the brand and usage of the product. Although most materials used in packaging can be recycled, a great amount cannot, and the production, use, disposal and recovery of packaging not only create substantial amounts of waste, but they also consume raw materials and energy. A way to lower one’s environmental impact is by preferring sustainable packaging, which is packaging that is effective, efficient, recyclable and safe. However, a number of external factors influence our likelihood to behave sustainably, including our psychological capabilities and cultural conventions. The objective of this thesis is to gather a better understanding of what the factors are that influence consumer behaviour in relation to sustainable packaging. A quantitative approach using survey questionnaire was chosen for this thesis as it was seen as the best method for gaining insight on attitudes and the relationships between constructs. The theory of planned behaviour (TPB) in combination with the norm activation model (NAM) were used to formulate the conceptual framework of the study and the survey questions. Statistical analysis was employed to examine the responses gathered with the survey questionnaire. The results of the study supported previous research as both the TPB and NAM constructs were found to predict intention and, perpetually, sustainable consumer behaviour, while neither the brand of the product nor the cultural background of the respondent could be found to influence either. Respondents generally had very positive attitudes towards sustainability, however, this was not visible in their behavioural preferences suggesting an attitude-behaviour gap. Respondents were also somewhat unsure of what constituted as sustainable and viewed informativity as the most important aspect of packaging. One of the key challenges for managers, markets and designers of sustainable packaging is to develop packaging designs that are not only sustainable but also accepted by consumers as different materials communicate different levels of sustainability to different people. Further, packaging should be able to evoke positive emotions in consumers while retaining its functional properties

Food web positioning of a recent coloniser: the North American Harris mud crab Rhithropanopeus harrisii (Gould, 1841) in the northern Baltic Sea

Identifying resource use and functional traits of non-indigenous species are promising means to increase the ability to predict ecological consequences of invasions. One of the most widely spread brachyuran crab species, and a recent invader in the northern Baltic Sea, is the North American Harris mud crab, Rhithropanopeus harrisii (Gould, 1841). Although spread, establishment, and population structure have been studied for this species, little is known about its role and impact in a new environment. We investigated the position and role of R. harrisii in the coastal food web by combining spatial and temporal estimates of trophic position using stable isotopes (δ13C and δ15N), with short-term food- and habitat-choice experiments. We observed a stable pattern in the trophic position between two environmentally different locations in the Archipelago Sea over the production season. The identification of a natural breakpoint in carbon stable isotopes at the size of 12 mm carapace width suggested a presence of an ontogenetic diet shift, which was confirmed by isotope signatures positioning large R. harrisii among secondary consumers and small individuals with primary consumers. The generalist consumer nature of R. harrisii and preference for structured habitat was supported by an active habitat and food choice, revealing no preference for prey species (polychaetes versus amphipod), but selection of brown algae over bare mud. To broaden the understanding of the functional role of R. harrisii, we combined our findings with other known biological and ecological traits of the species and qualitatively compared these to characteristics of other benthic organisms in the northern Baltic Sea, suggesting a general similarity in traits

Generating Semantic Graph Corpora with Graph Expansion Grammar

We introduce Lovelace, a tool for creating corpora of semantic graphs. The system uses graph expansion grammar as a representational language, thus allowing users to craft a grammar that describes a corpus with desired properties. When given such grammar as input, the system generates a set of output graphs that are well-formed according to the grammar, i.e., a graph bank. The generation process can be controlled via a number of configurable parameters that allow the user to, for example, specify a range of desired output graph sizes. Central use cases are the creation of synthetic data to augment existing corpora, and as a pedagogical tool for teaching formal language theory.Comment: In Proceedings NCMA 2023, arXiv:2309.0733

Annual climate impact and primary energy use of Swedish transport infrastructure

By 2045, Sweden is to have zero net emissions of greenhouse gases. To reach this goal, stakeholders involved in planning and construction of Swedish transport infrastructure aim to half their climate impact by 2030. Planning for emission reduction measures require network level studies showing environmental impacts of the infrastructure network. Previous studies do not allow assessment of current hotspots in the infrastructure network, which limits their relevance for decision-support in this question. The aim of this paper is to assess the current annual climate impact and primary energy use of Swedish transport infrastructure by using a methodological approach based on life cycle assessment. The scope includes new construction and management (operation, maintenance, and reinvestment) of existing roads, railways, airports, ports, and fairway channels. The annual climate impact was estimated to 2.8 million tonnes carbon dioxide equivalents and the annual primary energy use was estimated to 27 terawatt hours. Mainly road and rail infrastructure contributed to these impacts. Environmental hotspots of the infrastructure network were management of the infrastructure stock (particularly reinvestment of road and rail infrastructure) and material production (particularly production of asphalt, steel, and concrete). If climate targets are to be met, these areas are particularly important to address. Additional research on impacts of small construction measures, the size of biogenic carbon emissions (in standing biomass as well as soil carbon), and the use and impacts of asphalt for road construction and management would further increase the understanding of impacts related to Swedish transport infrastructure at the network level. (Note: an Erratum has been published to this paper in volume 20(2)

Erratum to: Annual climate impact and primary energy use of Swedish transport infrastructure

In the original version of this paper, some figures and units in Table 5 (in the main text) and Table A1, A2, A6, and A7 (in the Appendix) were found to be incorrect. The corrected tables are presented below. These changes only concern the presentation of data. They do not concern any of the calculations made; hence, they do not affect any of the results or conclusions in the paper. (the original paper was published in volume 19(2)) &nbsp

IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF ENHANCED EXPOSURE FROM NATURALLY OCCURRING RADIOACTIVE MATERIALS (NORM) WITHIN LCA

The potential impact of ionising radiation from enhanced exposure to Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (NORM) to humans and the environment is not currently accounted for sufficiently in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). Here we present midpoint and endpoint characterisation factors resulting from the implementation of impact assessment models for human health and ecosystems for NORM exposure. These models build upon existing fate, exposure and effect models from the LCA and radiological literature. The newly developed models are applied to a theoretical study of the utilisation of bauxite residue, a by-product of alumina processing enriched in natural radionuclides, in building materials. The ecosystem models have significant sensitivity to uncertainties surrounding the differential environmental fate of parent and daughter radionuclides that are produced as a part of decay chains, and to assumptions regarding long term releases from landfill sites. However, conservative results for environmental exposure suggest that in addition to landfill of materials, power consumption (burning coal and mining uranium) is a potentially significant source of radiological impact to the environment. From a human perspective, exposure to NORM in the use phase of building materials is the dominant source of impact, with environmental releases of nuclides playing a comparatively minor role. At an endpoint level, the impact of NORM exposure is highly significant in comparison to other impact categories in the area of protection of human health. This highlights the importance within LCA of having sufficient impact assessment models to capture all potential impacts, such that issues of burden shifting between impact measures can be captured, interpreted and resolved in the optimisation of product systems.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2017.11.13

Social Life Cycle Inventory and Impact Assessment of Informal recycling

ABSTRACT In order to meet the growing needs of information and communication technology, companies are producing new and improved products every day. With every new product in the market another product becomes obsolete. These obsolete products are being added to the world's fastest growing waste stream. 20-50 million computers become waste each year. It has been estimated that 20% of electronic waste is formally recycled, while 80% is shipped to developing countries where it is recycled informally through crude process. It's manually dismantled, burned, dumped and dipped in acids to extract precious metals. One such nation which is at the receiving end of this waste stream is Pakistan. This business has become a very profitable business and requires very little expertise to conduct these crude procedures. These activities do not just add toxics to the environment but has great social and health impact on its workers. There lies a great need to study the impacts of these processes on environment, workers, community and the society. In order to study this, a detailed on-site inventory and assessment of informal electronic waste recycling has been conducted using the UNEP guidelines on Social Life Cycle Assessment. This study shows that apart from income generation and recovery of various metals and materials, informal recycling has drastic impacts on its workers and the local community

Transcriptional networks controlling the cell cycle.

In this work, we map the transcriptional targets of 107 previously identified Drosophila genes whose loss caused the strongest cell-cycle phenotypes in a genome-wide RNA interference screen and mine the resulting data computationally. Besides confirming existing knowledge, the analysis revealed several regulatory systems, among which were two highly-specific and interconnected feedback circuits, one between the ribosome and the proteasome that controls overall protein homeostasis, and the other between the ribosome and Myc/Max that regulates the protein synthesis capacity of cells. We also identified a set of genes that alter the timing of mitosis without affecting gene expression, indicating that the cyclic transcriptional program that produces the components required for cell division can be partially uncoupled from the cell division process itself. These genes all have a function in a pathway that regulates the phosphorylation state of Cdk1. We provide evidence showing that this pathway is involved in regulation of cell size, indicating that a Cdk1-regulated cell size checkpoint exists in metazoans