Lean and green management along the food life cycle

As industries´ decisions give environmental consequences both upstream and downstream the value chain, there is need of a tool for valuation of decisions and actions. The lean concept is one of those actions that have been used for a long time by several industries, while green lean is a relatively new concept. The question is: How green is lean along the life cycle? In our research project we have developed an actor based LCA methodology for the food industry, and will evaluate the environmental consequences of applying the lean concept along the food life cycle in a case study of pork. This paper presents scenarios on lean farming, lean industry, and lean life cycle, as well as gives ideas for lean collaboration along the value chain

Illustrating limitations of energy studies of buildings with LCA and actor analysis

Does passive housing really have better environmental performance than conventional housing? Three passive houses and four conventional houses were compared using a life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology. The comparison also provided an actor analysis for the building supply chain and building inhabitants. Results are presented for two scenarios: 'conventional choices' and 'green choices' by the actors. The comparison confirms that passive houses have lower energy use than conventional houses, but when the environmental impact of energy production is taken into consideration, the outcome is less clear. Conventional houses can be equally good environmentally in terms of global warming, acidification, or radioactive waste as typical passive houses with electrical heating depending on the actors' choices. Actor analysis shows that inhabitants' and material producers' electricity choice are very important, while other choices (e.g. green transport) are less important. The findings highlight the importance of environmentally responsible decisions throughout the whole life cycle and the need for appropriate behaviours and actions, along with implications for improved communication. Les logements passifs ont-ils un rendement environnemental vraiment meilleur que les logements classiques ? Trois maisons passives et quatre maisons classiques ont ete comparees en utilisant une methodologie faisant appel a l'analyse du cycle de vie (ACV). Cette comparaison a egalement fourni une analyse des acteurs concernant la chaine logistique dans le batiment et les habitants des immeubles. Les resultats sont presentes pour deux scenarios, les acteurs operant dans l'un des << choix classiques >> et dans l'autre des << choix verts >>. La comparaison confirme que les maisons passives ont une consommation energetique moindre que les maisons classiques, mais lorsque l'impact environnemental de la production d'energie est pris en compte, le resultat est moins clair. Selon les choix operes par les acteurs, les maisons classiques peuvent etre aussi bonnes en termes de rechauffement climatique, d'acidification ou de dechets radioactifs que les maisons passives types equipees de chauffage electrique. L'analyse des acteurs montre que les choix faits en matiere d'electricite par les habitants et les fabricants de materiaux ont beaucoup d'importance, tandis que les autres choix (par ex. transport vert) sont moins importants. Ces constatations mettent en evidence l'importance de la prise de decisions environnementalement responsables tout au long du cycle de vie, la necessite de comportements et de mesures adaptes, ainsi que les implications qui en decoulent en termes d'amelioration de la communication. Mots cles: analyse des acteurs, evaluation environnementale, logement, comportement des habitants, analyse du cycle de vie (ACV), batiment bas carbone, maison passive

Organising matters for the environment: Environmental studies of housing management and buildings

Buildings give rise to several environmental problems over the whole life cycle. To reduce these, technical measures with focus on energy are commonly used. However, environmental problems are more than energy and cannot be solved with technical measures alone. This thesis seeks to understand the relationship between organisation and the environment. The question is how environmental effects of organising can be studied and how organisation and management influence environmental performance. These issues are explored in the field of housing management and life cycle assessment (LCA). Understanding is sought through comparative studies of housing management companies and their buildings, in which qualitative organisational data were collected from interviews, observations and internal documents and quantitative data were collected from internal documents (Papers II and III). A ‘hybrid’ methodology based on the concept of environmental assessment of organising (EAO) has been developed here (Paper I). Research literature on environmental management and indicators are also explored and compared with housing management practice (Paper IV). Furthermore, a life cycle methodology was used for the comparison of passive and conventional building chains including actors and their choices along the chain (Paper V). This thesis has shown that it is possible to study the environmental effects of organising by including humans in the life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology. The way organisation and management influence environmental performance is through the combination of many actions. The concept of ‘action nets’ and the ‘theory of practice’ are found to be especially useful here. It is concluded that organising matters for the environment. A form of organising that pays close attention to the building and its physical flows seems to be important for a better environmental performance. Environmental indicators need to be specific for work processes and physical environmental flows. Passive house buildings are not always better than conventional buildings and that resident’s choice of eco-labelled electricity matters most

Autism and attention‐deficit/hyperactivity disorder in Dravet syndrome

No abstract available

The Usefulness of an Actor’s Perspective in LCA

This paper is an argumentation for adding an actor’s perspective to lifecycle assessment (LCA). The need for this perspective stems from a criticism about the usefulness of LCA interpretation methods comparing the relative contribution of life-cycle phases of a product. Our argumentation is based on four previously published studies providing practical examples of how value chain actors’ influence may be considered in an LCA and the benefit of doing so. Manufacturing sector examples show how one company's influence can be illustrated in results and how it may relate all relevant emissions to its own processes. The food sector study shows how to assess several value chain actors’ individual improvement potential. The final example, taken from building sector, explore how to consider the fact that actors in one part of the value chain can influence other actors to improve

Aromatic, microporous polymer networks with high surface area generated in Friedel-Crafts-type polycondensations

Dieser Beitrag ist mit Zustimmung des Rechteinhabers aufgrund einer (DFG geförderten) Allianz- bzw. Nationallizenz frei zugänglich.This publication is with permission of the rights owner freely accessible due to an Alliance licence and a national licence (funded by the DFG, German Research Foundation) respectively.A series of novel, microporous polymer networks (MPNs) have been generated in a simple, acid catalysed Friedel–Crafts-type self-condensation of A2B2- and A2B4-type fluorenone monomers. Two A2B4-type monomers with 2,7-bis(N,N-diphenylamino) A or 2,7-bis[4-(N,N-diphenylamino)phenyl] D substitution of the fluorenone cores lead to MPNs with high SBET surface areas of up to 1400 m2 g−1. Two MPNs made of binary monomer mixtures showed the highest Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface areas SBET of our series (SBET of up to 1800 m2 g−1) after washing the powdery samples with supercritical carbon dioxide. Total pore volumes of up to 1.6 cm3 g−1 have been detected. It is observed that the substitution pattern of the monomers is strongly influencing the resulting physicochemical properties of the microporous polymer networks (MPNs)

Ab-initio crystal structure analysis and refinement approaches of oligo p-benzamides based on electron diffraction data

Ab-initio crystal structure analysis of organic materials from electron diffraction data is presented. The data were collected using the automated electron diffraction tomography (ADT) technique. The structure solution and refinement route is first validated on the basis of the known crystal structure of tri-p-benzamide. The same procedure is then applied to solve the previously unknown crystal structure of tetra-p-benzamide. In the crystal structure of tetra-p-benzamide, an unusual hydrogen-bonding scheme is realised; the hydrogen-bonding scheme is, however, in perfect agreement with solid-state NMR data

Cation‐Assisted Lithium Ion Transport for High Performance PEO‑based Ternary Solid Polymer Electrolytes

AbstractN‐alkyl‐N‐alkyl pyrrolidinium‐based ionic liquids (ILs) are promising candidates as non‐flammable plasticizers for lowering the operation temperature of poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO)‐based solid polymer electrolytes (SPEs), but they present limitations in terms of lithium‐ion transport, such as a much lower lithium transference number. Thus, a pyrrolidinium cation was prepared with an oligo(ethylene oxide) substituent with seven repeating units. We show, by a combination of experimental characterizations and simulations, that the cation's solvating properties allow faster lithium‐ion transport than alkyl‐substituted analogues when incorporated in SPEs. This proceeds not only by accelerating the conduction modes of PEO, but also by enabling new conduction modes linked to the solvation of lithium by a single IL cation. This, combined with favorable interfacial properties versus lithium metal, leads to significantly improved performance on lithium‐metal polymer batteries

Delineation of functionally essential protein regions for 242 neurodevelopmental genes

Neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs), including severe paediatric epilepsy, autism and intellectual disabilities are heterogeneous conditions in which clinical genetic testing can often identify a pathogenic variant. For many of them, genetic therapies will be tested in this or the coming years in clinical trials. In contrast to first-generation symptomatic treatments, the new disease-modifying precision medicines require a genetic test-informed diagnosis before a patient can be enrolled in a clinical trial. However, even in 2022, most identified genetic variants in NDD genes are "variants of uncertain significance'. To safely enrol patients in precision medicine clinical trials, it is important to increase our knowledge about which regions in NDD-associated proteins can "tolerate' missense variants and which ones are "essential' and will cause a NDD when mutated. In addition, knowledge about functionally indispensable regions in the 3D structure context of proteins can also provide insights into the molecular mechanisms of disease variants. We developed a novel consensus approach that overlays evolutionary, and population based genomic scores to identify 3D essential sites (Essential3D) on protein structures. After extensive benchmarking of AlphaFold predicted and experimentally solved protein structures, we generated the currently largest expert curated protein structure set for 242 NDDs and identified 14 377 Essential3D sites across 189 gene disorders associated proteins. We demonstrate that the consensus annotation of Essential3D sites improves prioritization of disease mutations over single annotations. The identified Essential3D sites were enriched for functional features such as intermembrane regions or active sites and discovered key inter-molecule interactions in protein complexes that were otherwise not annotated. Using the currently largest autism, developmental disorders, and epilepsies exome sequencing studies including > 360 000 NDD patients and population controls, we found that missense variants at Essential3D sites are 8-fold enriched in patients.In summary, we developed a comprehensive protein structure set for 242 NDDs and identified 14377 Essential3D sites in these. All data are available at https://es-ndd.broadinstitute.org for interactive visual inspection to enhance variant interpretation and development of mechanistic hypotheses for 242 NDDs genes. The provided resources will enhance clinical variant interpretation and in silico drug target development for NDD-associated genes and encoded proteins.Peer reviewe