Policy making under uncertainty in electric vehicle demand

The introduction of electric vehicles (EVs) into the passenger vehicle market has, in recent years, become viewed as a primary solution to the significant carbon dioxide emissions attributed to personal mobility. Moreover, EVs offer a means by which energy diversification and efficiency can be improved compared to the current system. The UK government and European Commission have played an active role in steering the development and market introduction of EVs. However, a great deal of uncertainty remains regarding the effectiveness of these policies and the viability of EV technology in the mainstream automotive market. This paper investigates the prevalence of uncertainty concerning the demand for EVs. This is achieved through the application of a conceptual framework that assesses the locations of uncertainty. UK and EU documents are assessed through a review of the published policy alongside contributions from academia to determine how uncertainty has been reduced. This assessment offers insights to decision makers in this area by evaluating the work done to date through a landscape analysis. Results have identified six different locations of uncertainty covering: consumer, policy, infrastructure, technical, economic and social issues

Cross-Sector Review of Drivers and Available 3Rs Approaches for Acute Systemic Toxicity Testing

Acute systemic toxicity studies are carried out in many sectors in which synthetic chemicals are manufactured or used and are among the most criticized of all toxicology tests on both scientific and ethical grounds. A review of the drivers for acute toxicity testing within the pharmaceutical industry led to a paradigm shift whereby in vivo acute toxicity data are no longer routinely required in advance of human clinical trials. Based on this experience, the following review was undertaken to identify (1) regulatory and scientific drivers for acute toxicity testing in other industrial sectors, (2) activities aimed at replacing, reducing, or refining the use of animals, and (3) recommendations for future work in this area

Co-evolution of soil and water conservation policy and human–environment linkages in the Yellow River Basin since 1949

Policy plays a very important role in natural resource management as it lays out a government framework for guiding long-term decisions, and evolves in light of the interactions between human and environment. This paper focuses on soil and water conservation (SWC) policy in the Yellow River Basin (YRB), China. The problems, rural poverty, severe soil erosion, great sediment loads and high flood risks, are analyzed over the period of 1949–present using the Driving force–Pressure–State–Impact–Response (DPSIR) framework as a way to organize analysis of the evolution of SWC policy. Three stages are identified in which SWC policy interacts differently with institutional, financial and technology support. In Stage 1 (1949–1979), SWC policy focused on rural development in eroded areas and on reducing sediment loads. Local farmers were mainly responsible for SWC. The aim of Stage 2 (1980–1990) was the overall development of rural industry and SWC. A more integrated management perspective was implemented taking a small watershed as a geographic interactional unit. This approach greatly improved the efficiency of SWC activities. In Stage 3 (1991 till now), SWC has been treated as the main measure for natural resource conservation, environmental protection, disaster mitigation and agriculture development. Prevention of new degradation became a priority. The government began to be responsible for SWC, using administrative, legal and financial approaches and various technologies that made large-scale SWC engineering possible. Over the historical period considered, with the implementation of the various SWC policies, the rural economic and ecological system improved continuously while the sediment load and flood risk decreased dramatically. The findings assist in providing a historical perspective that could inform more rational, scientific and effective natural resource management going forwar

Digital transition: the challenges for work and jobs

The presentation develops four points: - The first one suggests a framework to consider digital transition through the concept of the techno-economic paradigm. - Than in order to understand the very broad range of current forecasts for the impact of digitalisation on jobs it proposes a brief meta-analysis of different researches conducted in Europe and the US. - Than proposes a short glance back over past research into the relationship between work and technology. It shows that the current questions are not totally new. - It ends with some considerations regarding employment relation

Sustainable, efficient, and equitable water use: the three pillars under wise freshwater allocation

There are many river basins in the world where human water footprint needs to be reduced substantially. This article proposes three pillars under wise freshwater allocation: water footprint caps per river basin, water footprint benchmarks per product, and fair water footprint shares per community. Water footprint caps for all river basins in the world—setting maximums to the water volumes that can be consumed or polluted by the various human activities per basin—would aim to ensure a sustainable water use within each basin. Water footprint benchmarks for water-using processes aim to provide an incentive to producers to reduce the water footprint of their products toward reasonable benchmark levels. Benchmarks will enable the actors along supply chains—from primary producers and intermediate companies to final consumers—and governments responsible for water allocation to share information about what are ‘reasonable water footprints’ for various processes and products. The idea of a fair water footprint share per community aims to contribute to the debate about social equity. Water allocation may be environmentally sustainable and efficient from a resource point of view, but that does not automatically imply that water allocation is fair from a societal point of view. We need international agreement on what makes the water footprint of a community of consumers fair or reasonably acceptable, given the limited maximum sustainable water footprint per global citizen