Cost gain of implementing load shifting in residential buildings

There is a clear trend today that we use more and more appliances with a higher power demand, something that is a real challenge for the electricity grid. Also, the shift towards electrification of the transport system gives a high volatility in consumption of electricity which is reflected in the distribution grid. Traditionally, the power distribution companies reinvest in grid upgrades to handle the increase in peak load demand. However, another alternative (short/midterm) solution to this problem is creating incentives to the customers to change their consumption patterns. This thesis investigates whether it is possible to control the use of household devices in order to reduce the electricity costs, and whether this process is economically feasible for the end users. To achieve this goal, a series of different grid tariff models were tested against real consumption patterns of buildings of different types. The results show that “Observed power” and “Subscribed power” tariff models compare to other studied models induce higher financial incentive to end-users to change their consumption behavior. In addition, the use of storage units and local solar production is another alternative to further increase the flexibility in Norwegian households.submittedVersionM-Ø

The impacts on Indian farmers when converting to organic cotton production

Changes in the environment are affecting the world market, and pressures from several stakeholders’ are forcing different enterprises to adjust to the current situation. Farmers’ difficult working conditions and environmental impacts of the conventional cotton production in India have been highlighted. The small-scale production that is characterising India’s cotton farmers implies an insufficient competition power. Conventional farming is thus, and due to high input costs, leaving farmers with a low and uncertain income. A suicide wave was reported by media, as a consequence of the high debts that the farmers ended up with when borrowing money to afford the chemicals. By interviewing six farmers about the change to organic certified cotton production, this thesis takes an organisational perspective to investigate farmers’ living and working situation. Through semi structured interviews, qualitative data from six farmers in Warangal, district of Andhra Pradesh in India, was collected. The thesis concludes that the main differences of the change to organic cotton production are the pest control and the fertilising process, since organic production implies no use of synthetic chemicals. In order for a farmer to go through with the change new information and knowledge is required, and which the study states is a limiting resource that farmers need help with. Thus, different NGOs are working to support farmers in the changing process. However, the corporation with an organisation will put farmers in a new situation where they need to adjust to a third party. Throughout the interviews it became clear that the farmers’ main reasons to go through with the change were to receive a higher and more secure income. In conjunction with the change the farmers became a part of a network, which they highly appreciate. The network provides them with access to knowledge and also a better power on the market, since they are buying their inputs and selling their harvest in a group. The change has further, mainly affected the farmers basic needs, this has probably to do with their difficulties in meeting those before the change. As a result of the change, some farmers did however state that they also feel more self-confident.Miljöförändringar påverkar världsmarknaden och påtryckningar från olika intressenter driver olika företag till att anpassa sig nuvarande situationen. Miljöpåverkan av den konventionella bomullen samt böndernas dåliga arbetsförhållanden har uppmärksammats. Bomullsodlingarna i Indien präglas av småskalighet, vilket innebär att bönderna får en låg konkurrenskraft på marknaden. De höga kostnaderna för insatsvarorna i det konventionella jordbruket ger bönderna en låg och osäker inkomst. Media rapporterade för några år sedan om en självmordsvåg bland bomullsodlare i Indien, som en följd av de höga skulderna från de dyra kemikalierna i det konventionella jordbruket. Intervjuerna i uppsatsen antar ett organisationsteoretiskt perspektiv, där jordbrukarnas syn på förändringen till en ekologisk certifierad bomullsproduktion har undersökts med ett fokus på förändringarna i deras familj- och arbetssituation. Kvalitativ data har samlats in genom semi-strukturerade intervjuer från sex bomullsbönder i Warangal, ett distrikt i Andhra Pradesh i Indien. Studien bekräftar att de huvudsakliga förändringarna med övergången var skadedjursförändringen samt gödslingsprocessen, som numera göras utan syntetiska kemikalier. För att en jordbrukare ska kunna genomföra förändringen kräver hen tillgång till ny kunskap. Studien visade även att kunskap är en begränsande resurser för bönderna och att en förändring kräver hjälp utifrån. Flertalet frivilligorganisationer arbetar därmed med att hjälpa bönderna. Detta innebär dock att bönderna hamnar i en situation där de måste anpassa sig till en annan part. De intervjuade böndernas främsta orsak till att börja odla ekologiskt var för att få en högre och säkrare inkomst. Förändringen gav även bönderna tillgång till ett nytt nätverk, vilket visade sig vara högt värderat av dem. Nätverket ger bönderna tillgång till kunskap, men även en möjlighet till en starkare marknadskraft, då bönderna i nätverket tillsammans köper sina insatsvaror och säljer sin bomull. Förändringen har huvudsakligen påverkat jordbrukarnas möjligheter till att uppfylla människans grundläggande behov, förmodligen då det fanns svårigheter i att uppfylla dessa behov redan före förändringen. Förändringen tycks dock även ha påverkat några bönder till att känna sig mer självsäkra

Correction to: Phenotate: crowdsourcing phenotype annotations as exercises in undergraduate classes (Genetics in Medicine, (2020), 22, 8, (1391-1400), 10.1038/s41436-020-0812-7)

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper

Influencing Change : Organizational Change and the Implementation of Self-Managing Teams

Organizational changes are inevitable, yet up to 70% fail. Technological development and competition in a volatile environment require more flexible organizations. As such, implementing self-managed teams (SMTs) has become a more common approach. The fact that SMTs ought to be self-managed has further raised a debate, since it is argued that some form of manager still is required. Therefore, the following research question was proposed; How does the interplay of influences unfold between the manager and the organizational context when implementing SMTs? The purpose of the study is to increase the understanding of how different activities, events and actions during a change process of implementing SMTs influence the manager, as well as how the manager influences the change process of implementing SMTs. The research was conducted by a qualitative, abductive approach based on a case study. The results show that managers influence perceived history of change, control and the SMTs. Managers are influenced by perceived history of change, employee commitment to change, control, and by the SMT. These influences determine how the manager is influenced by, and how the manager influences the organizational change towards the implementation of SMTs.

A combinatorial theorem for a class of residual treatment effects designs

In this paper a combinatorial theorem for a class of residual treatment effects designs is proved. It is assumed that the number of treatments of a design in this class is a prime or a prime power. A method of constructions of the class of designs under consideration is given in detail. The theorem presented here gives complete information on the frequencies of occurrences of ordered pairs of treatments among various types of ordered pairs of treatments arising from the sequences of the design. The proof of the theorem is based on the properties of symmetrically repeated difference sets. © 1993

A combinatorial theorem for a class of residual treatment effects designs

In this paper a combinatorial theorem for a class of residual treatment effects designs is proved. It is assumed that the number of treatments of a design in this class is a prime or a prime power. A method of constructions of the class of designs under consideration is given in detail. The theorem presented here gives complete information on the frequencies of occurrences of ordered pairs of treatments among various types of ordered pairs of treatments arising from the sequences of the design. The proof of the theorem is based on the properties of symmetrically repeated difference sets.Combinatorially balanced design difference sets residual treatment effects Galios field