Renting in converted green buildings : exploratory study on office tenants views

PURPOSE : Greening the existing stock of non-green office buildings in South Africa is a significant challenge faced by the local green industry. This study evaluated the opinions of tenants of nongreen office buildings in Gauteng, South Africa on renting green office space in existing office buildings. METHODOLOGY : This report builds on a previous study by Hoffman & Pedregal1 on the opinions and believes of Gauteng office tenants on converting existing office buildings into Green Star SA certified buildings. Data was acquired with a Likert-scale based questionnaire completed by 32 randomly selected commercial office tenants from A-rated office buildings in Sandton, Rosebank and Centurion. FINDINGS : The study indicated that 81% of office tenants support knowledge about environmental sustainability but only 50% have green building strategies and only 22% are considering renting space in a converted Green Star SA certified office building soon. Small firms and recently established firms were much less supportive of green building practices. LIMITATIONS : A larger, more representative follow-up study is necessary to provide industry stakeholders with more authoritative findings. More specific information is required on what will persuade tenants to actively pursue green office space. VALUE : This study described the views of commercial office tenants regarding renting green office space offered in existing office buildings. Evidence was provided that supplying focussed information and education to office tenants may be an efficient way to stimulate demand for green office spacehttp://asocsa.orgpublications.htmlam2018Construction Economic

Evaluation of office space utilisation in South African municipalities

PURPOSE: Office space planning requires design skills and space planning norms to ensure space efficient office areas allowing occupants to perform optimally. No specific space norms exist for South African municipalities. Municipal facilities are unique and fulfil many functions, challenging the application of space norms. This study was part of work commissioned by the Development Bank of South Africa (DBSA) to understand municipal office space use in preparing a guideline for future municipal office building funding applications. The study evaluated current South African municipal office space allocation, compared it to office space planning norms for South African organs of state and identified possible challenges to applying the said space planning norms to municipal office space planning. DESIGN: The study was based on data from fieldwork surveys by professional quantity surveyors and valuators on municipal office space utilisation. Time and cost constraints restricted the survey to non-metropolitan municipalities in four provinces. The study adopted qualitative and quantitative methods to reach the findings. FINDINGS: The study revealed significant comparisons and deviations from South African and international space planning norms and identified challenges for municipalities to apply space planning norms. VALUE: This study provides insight into the current state and efficiency of municipal office space utilisation. By identifying challenges for applying space planning norms to municipalities the study suggests where future action should be focused to address the problem.http://asocsa.org/publications.htmlam201

Dynamic pulse buckling of cylindrical shells under axial impact: A benchmark study of 2D and 3D finite element calculations

A series of tests investigating dynamic pulse buckling of a cylindrical shell under axial impact is compared to several 2D and 3D finite element simulations of the event. The purpose of the work is to investigate the performance of various analysis codes and element types on a problem which is applicable to radioactive material transport packages, and ultimately to develop a benchmark problem to qualify finite element analysis codes for the transport package design industry. During the pulse buckling tests, a buckle formed at each end of the cylinder, and one of the two buckles became unstable and collapsed. Numerical simulations of the test were performed using PRONTO, a Sandia developed transient dynamics analysis code, and ABAQUS/Explicit with both shell and continuum elements. The calculations are compared to the tests with respect to deformed shape and impact load history

'Investigating water supply challenges in the Elias Motsoaledi Municipality of Limpopo Province, South Africa : a case of Motetema Settlement

PURPOSE : The study discussed water supply challenges in rural South Africa and evaluated community perceptions of the municipal capacity. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH : Municipal planning documents described the targeted study area. Questionnaires by 98 randomly selected community respondents profiled the respondents and evaluated several aspects of water delivery in the community. FINDINGS : The results reveal several operational challenges. Water delivery was sporadic and unreliable, the water quality was poor and the breakdowns response time was unacceptable. RESEARCH LIMITATIONS/IMPLICATIONS : The causes of the water delivery problems were not investigated. The study suggested solutions and was restricted to one municipal area only. PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS : The local municipality should response should focus on quality control, monitoring, training, funding and capacity building of their service delivery function. More efficient communication with the community is required. WHAT IS ORIGINAL/VALUE OF THE PAPER : Several water service delivery challenges were revealed and will be of value to the municipality to mobilise, plan and structure a proper response to challenges.http://asocsa.orgpublications.htmlam2017Construction Economic

Defect and anisotropic gap induced quasi-one-dimensional modulation of local density of states in YBa2_2Cu3_3O7−δ_{7-\delta}

Motivated by recent angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) measurement that superconducting YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{7-\delta}$ (YBCO) exhibits a $d_{x^2-y^2} + s$-symmetry gap, we show possible quasi-one-dimensional modulations of local density of states in YBCO. These aniostropic gap and defect induced stripe structures are most conspicuous at higher biases and arise due to the nesting effect associated with a Fermi liquid. Observation of these spectra by scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) would unify the picture among STM, ARPES, and inelastic neutron scattering for YBCO.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Circular dichroism and Raman optical activity in antiferromagnetic transition metal fluorides

The Raman optical activity (ROA) of magnons in rutile-structure antiferromagnetic FeF₂ (TN = 78 K) has been studied as a function of temperature and applied magnetic field. For exciting light incident along the c axis, ROA is observed for magnons but not for phonons. In zero field, a small splitting (0.09 cm⁻¹) of the two acoustic–magnon branches is observed for the first time by inelastic light scattering. The splitting in applied magnetic field is found to reduce with increasing temperature in accordance with theory. No ROA was detected for two-magnon excitations. In optical absorption measurements performed over thirty years ago, a very small circular dichroism (CD) was observed in the magnon sidebands of other simple rutile antiferromagnetic fluorides (MnF₂ and CoF₂). The origin of this CD was not understood at the time. The Raman studies of the one-magnon Raman scattering in FeF₂ have demonstrated that in zero field the degeneracy of the antiferromagnetic magnon branches is lifted by a weak magnetic dipole–dipole interaction, as predicted by Pincus and Loudon and by White four decades ago. The source of the observed CD in the magnon sidebands can now be traced to this same magnetic–dipole induced splitting

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In Reply - When comparing the infection risks of transparent vs gauze dressings used on central venous catheters, the RRs were 1.78 for catheter-tip infection, 1.63 for bacteremia, and 1.69 for catheter sepsis. These RRs represent the best assessment of the overall risk associated with the use of transparent dressings. (For catheter-tip infection, P<.001; for catheter sepsis, P=.06.) In our discussion we used the word "trend" in discussing this level of significance. The choice of .05 as the level of "statistical significance" is arbitrary, and given the RRs demonstrated in the meta-analysis, further studies are warranted before accepting transparent dressings as safe

Magnetic switching in granular FePt layers promoted by near-field laser enhancement

Light-matter interaction at the nanoscale in magnetic materials is a topic of intense research in view of potential applications in next-generation high-density magnetic recording. Laser-assisted switching provides a pathway for overcoming the material constraints of high-anisotropy and high-packing density media, though much about the dynamics of the switching process remains unexplored. We use ultrafast small-angle x-ray scattering at an x-ray free-electron laser to probe the magnetic switching dynamics of FePt nanoparticles embedded in a carbon matrix following excitation by an optical femtosecond laser pulse. We observe that the combination of laser excitation and applied static magnetic field, one order of magnitude smaller than the coercive field, can overcome the magnetic anisotropy barrier between "up" and "down" magnetization, enabling magnetization switching. This magnetic switching is found to be inhomogeneous throughout the material, with some individual FePt nanoparticles neither switching nor demagnetizing. The origin of this behavior is identified as the near-field modification of the incident laser radiation around FePt nanoparticles. The fraction of not-switching nanoparticles is influenced by the heat flow between FePt and a heat-sink layer

Axion-like particles as ultra high energy cosmic rays?

If Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECRs) with E>4 10^{19} eV originate from BL Lacertae at cosmological distances as suggested by recent studies, the absence of the GZK cutoff can not be reconciled with Standard-Model particle properties. Axions would escape the GZK cutoff, but even the coherent conversion and back-conversion between photons and axions in large-scale magnetic fields is not enough to produce the required flux. However, one may construct models of other novel (pseudo)scalar neutral particles with properties that would allow for sufficient rates of particle production in the source and shower production in the atmosphere to explain the observations. As an explicit example for such particles we consider SUSY models with light sgoldstinos.Comment: 5 pages, 2 postscript figures, ref. adde