Domestic UK retrofit challenge: Barriers, incentives and current performance leading into the green deal

Copyright @ 2012 Elsevier - The official published version can be accessed from the link below.This paper reviews the thermal performance of the existing UK housing stock, the main fabric efficiency incentive schemes and the barriers to obtaining deep energy and CO2 savings throughout the stock. The UK faces a major challenge to improve the thermal performance of its existing housing stock. Millions of dwellings possess ‘hard-to-treat’ solid walls and have glazing which is not cost effective to improve. A range of fabric efficiency incentive schemes exist, but many do not target the full range of private and social housing. From now on, the Green Deal will be the UK's key energy efficiency policy. However, the scheme is forecasted to have low consumer appeal and low incentives for investors. Moreover, calculated Green Deal loan repayments will be reliant upon estimated energy savings, yet it is claimed that retrofit measures may only be half as effective as anticipated due to a lack of monitoring, poor quality installation and the increased use of heating following refurbishment. Looking to Germany, there has been success through the Passivhaus standard, but the UK currently lacks appropriate skills and cost effective components to replicate this approach. In addition, the embodied energy in retrofit products and materials threatens to counter operational savings.This study is funded by the EPSRC, Brunel University and Buro Happold Ltd

Contingent Fee Lobbying: Inflaming Avarice or Facilitating Constitutional Rights?

Contingent fee lobbying has long been a disfavored practice. Although some commentators argue that use of a contingent fee lobbying contract could open up federal legislative and regulatory processes to greater participation by Americans of limited means, many others, including the Supreme Court, have declared that lobbying a legislature or agency under a contingent fee contract is generally both illegal and unethical. However, the conclusion that the practice is illegal is often based on a declaration that the practice is unethical . . . without a thorough examination of the sources of law that led to the presumption of illegality in the first instance. Is it legal to lobby Congress or federal agencies on a contingent fee contract? If legal, would such a contract be ethical? These are the two core issues addressed in this article. On the way to our answers to these questions, we examine the history of lobbying and the legal treatment of lobbying. We review the early Supreme Court precedent that is often cited in support of a contingent fee lobbying ban, finding that the cases more reliably stand for a general ban on lobbying, not for a specific ban on contingent fee lobbying. We look at the evolution of lobbying – from reviled practice to respected profession – through the lenses of Senate hearings and executive branch procurement practices. We turn to the example of state law to review the competing philosophies underlying state regulation of contingent fee lobbying and to emphasize how the early Supreme Court pronouncements on lobbying may be easily employed to support either philosophy. Because the First Amendment may be implicated in any restriction on speech, we highlight how the Supreme Court’s more recent jurisprudence addressing restrictions on political speech is likely to affect any future evaluation of contingent free lobbying. Finally, regardless whether the practice of contingent fee lobbying is legal, we examine whether certain ethical boundaries should be drawn to curb any particular tendency to corruption that may result from use of a contingent fee lobbying contract. We conclude that contingent fee lobbying should not summarily be condemned or prohibited, but propose imposing a more rigorous disclosure regime specifically aimed at this type of lobbying compensation agreement

PERBEDAAN KEAKTIFAN DAN HASIL BELAJAR MATERI SISTEM AC MENGGUNAKAN MODEL PEMBELAJARAN PROJECT BASED LEARNING DAN DISCOVERY LEARNING PADA PROGAM KEAHLIAN TKRO DI SMK MUHAMMADIYAH 1 KOTA MALANG

Penelitian ini memiliki beberapa tujuan yaitu mengetahui pengaruh pembelajaran berbasis proyek terhadap keaktifan belajar siswa pada mata pelajaran Sistem AC Mobil di SMK Muhammadiyah 1 Kota Malang, dan mengetahui pengaruh pembelajaran berbasis proyek terhadap hasil belajar siswa pada mata pelajaran AC Mobil di SMK Muhammadiyah 1 Kota Malang. Metodologi penelitian ini adalah penelitian kuasi-eksperimental kelompok kontrol pre-test-post-test. Kelas XI TKRO 1 sebagai kelas eksperimen untuk penelitian ini, dan kelas XI TKRO 2 sebagai kelas kontrol. Pada kelas kontrol menggunakan model pembelajaran Discovery Learning, sedangkan kelas eksperimen mendapatkan perlakuan menggunakan model pembelajaran Project Based Learning. Tes dan catatan pengamatan digunakan sebagai alat pengumpulan data utama penelitian. menggunakan analisis independent sample t-test dan analisis deskriptif untuk mengkarakterisasi keaktifan dan hasil belajar siswa, untuk mengetahui pengaruh model pembelajaran yang diterapkan terhadap keaktifan dan hasil belajar siswa. Hasil penelitian ini menunjukkan bahwa setelah diberikan perlakuan pada mata pelajaran Sistem AC kelas XI Jurusan TKRO SMK Muhammadiyah 1 Kota Malang terdapat perbedaan keaktifan dan hasil belajar siswa yang cukup mencolok antara penggunaan model pembelajaran Project Based Learning dan Discovery Learning

Structural, vibrational and thermal properties of densified silicates : insights from Molecular Dynamics

Structural, vibrational and thermal properties of densified sodium silicate (NS2) are investigated with classical molecular dynamics simulations of the glass and the liquid state. A systematic investigation of the glass structure with respect to density was performed. We observe a repolymerization of the network manifested by a transition from a tetrahedral to an octahedral silicon environment, the decrease of the amount of non-bridging oxygen atoms and the appearance of three-fold coordinated oxygen atoms (triclusters). Anomalous changes in the medium range order are observed, the first sharp diffraction peak showing a minimum of its full-width at half maximum according to density. The previously reported vibrational trends in densified glasses are observed, such as the shift of the Boson peak intensity to higher frequencies and the decrease of its intensity. Finally, we show that the thermal behavior of the liquid can be reproduced by the Birch-Murnaghan equation of states, thus allowing us to compute the isothermal compressibility

Use of the Model Organism Caenorhabditis elegans to Elucidate Neurotoxic and Behavioral Effects of Commercial Fungicides

Fungicides are widely used in agriculture and medicine and there are several different types of fungicides that are distributed globally in the soil and water through water runoff and drift from spraying as well as other avenues of distribution. Understanding the biological effects of fungicide contaminants in the environment on non-target organisms including humans is critical. This chapter considers the use of the model organism and key beneficial soil nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans, as an effective strategy for examining fungicide effects on growth, reproduction, nervous system and behavior. We present novel evidence of the effects of a general use fungicide, mancozeb, on behavior and neuronal structure