Cost-Effectiveness of Water Conservation Measures: A Multi-level Analysis with Policy Implications

Groundwater in Spain, as in other arid or semiarid countries worldwide, has been intensely used for the expansion of irrigated agriculture. This booming development has induced a remarkable socioeconomic development in many rural areas but has produced far-reaching environmental problems. In the Spanish Western La Mancha Aquifer, the excessive, and sometimes illegal, water abstraction for irrigation agriculture has resulted in the Aquifer’s overexploitation and has been responsible of the degradation of the associated wetlands “Tablas de Daimiel”, an internationally reputed, Ramsarnominated aquatic ecosystem. To undertake this analysis, a mathematical programming model has been developed to simulate farmers’ behaviour and their responses to different water policy scenarios. Specifically, the policy simulations selected are: alternative water pricing schemes (uniform volumetric and block-rate water tariffs), water use quota systems and water rights market. Results show that controlling illegal water mining is a necessary condition but it is not sufficient to recover the aquifer. Consequently, other measures will be necessary for an effective water management in this area. Among these, the block-rate water pricing scheme seems the most cost-effective system to reach the goal of aquifer sustainability but will entail important income losses in several farms. Therefore, we cannot conclude that a unique water conservation policy instrument will be the best overall solution for all types of holdings that will respond to efficiency as well as to equity considerations. It seems reasonable to make a combination of the tools proposed, even including additional measures that promote an environmental protection and develop sustainable agricultural systems.Environmental degradation, water policies, cost-effectiveness analysis, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

INTEGRATED ECONOMIC-HYDROLOGIC ANALYSIS OF POLICY RESPONSES TO PROMOTE SUSTAINABLE WATER USE UNDER CHANGING CLIMATIC CONDITIONS

Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Optimal Carbon Taxes for Emissions Targets in the Electricity Sector

The most dangerous effects of anthropogenic climate change can be mitigated by using emissions taxes or other regulatory interventions to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This paper takes a regulatory viewpoint and describes the Weighted Sum Bisection method to determine the lowest emission tax rate that can reduce the anticipated emissions of the power sector below a prescribed, regulatorily-defined target. This bi-level method accounts for a variety of operating conditions via stochastic programming and remains computationally tractable for realistically large planning test systems, even when binary commitment decisions and multi-period constraints on conventional generators are considered. Case studies on a modified ISO New England test system demonstrate that this method reliably finds the minimum tax rate that meets emissions targets. In addition, it investigates the relationship between system investments and the tax-setting process. Introducing GHG emissions taxes increases the value proposition for investment in new cleaner generation, transmission, and energy efficiency; conversely, investing in these technologies reduces the tax rate required to reach a given emissions target

Safety Program for the assembly and disassembly processes of Trópika, habitation module, in the Solar Decathlon 2014 competition

Proyecto de Graduación (Bachillerato en Ingeniería en Seguridad Laboral e Higiene Ambiental) Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Escuela de Ingeniería en Seguridad Laboral e Higiene Ambiental, 2014.This project was made for the participation of Team Tec (Tech Team Costa Rica) in intercollegiate competition, Solar Decathlon Europe (SDE), France 2014. In this competition 20 universities from around the world must design, build and test a housing module that works with solar energy and must be sustainable. The organization of the SDE requires compliance with European safety standards, which have a higher level than the ones in Costa Rica. To meet the level of security that should be, was defined as a general objective to propose a Safety Program for the assembly and disassembly process of the Trópika, habitation module proposed by Tec Team for the competition. In order not only to meet the requirements of the organization, but also to strengthen the safety of team members. Among the main results are the following: During assembly the members of the team will be exposed to activities that involve risks with extreme level. Any team member has experience about construction works, which increase the risk of accident or incident. The knowledge of the team members in construction safety matters is deficient. SDE organization requires higher level of safety during all the stages of the project but especially during the assembly and disassembly process. In response to the above a Safety Program for the assembly and disassembly of Trópika was developed, incorporating safety aspects that should be followed during these processes, safe work procedures in order to guide the team members in the work was prepared to be conducted. It also contains a training plan and an emergency plan. With this tool Tec Team is benefited mainly to have a guide document to perform the work of more securely way which helps to protect and care for the integrity of the team members.Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Ric

The fossil crown wasp Electrostephanus petiolatus Brues in Baltic Amber (Hymenoptera, Stephanidae): designation of a neotype, revised classification,and a key to amber Stephanidae.

The fossil crown wasp Electrostephanus petiolatus Brues comb. rev.(Stephanidae, Electrostephaninae) is re-described from a single male preserved in middle Eocene Baltic Amber. The holotype was lost or destroyed around the time of World War II and subsequent interpretations of its identity have been based solely on the brief descriptive comments provided by Brues in his original account. The new specimen matches the original description and illustration provided by Brues in every detail and we hereby consider them to be conspecific, selecting the specimen as a neotype for the purpose of stabilizing the nomenclature for this fossil species. This neotype exhibits a free first metasomal tergum and sternum, contrary to the assertion of previous workers who indicated these to be fused. Accordingly, this species does indeed belong to the genus Electrostephanus Brues rather than to Denaeostephanus Engel & Grimaldi (Stephaninae). Electrostephanus petiolatus is transferred to a new subgenus, Electrostephanodes n. subgen. , based on its elongate pseudo- petiole and slender gaster, but may eventually warrant generic status as the phylogenetic placement of these fossil lineages continues to be clarifi ed. A revised key to the Baltic amber crown wasps is provided

SEX AND STANDARD LEVELS DIFFERENCES IN ANTHROPOMETRIC AND PHYSICAL FITNESS CHARACTERISTICS IN YOUTH HANDBALL PLAYERS

This study analyzed the relationships between throwing velocity and anthropometric and fitness parameters at different ages in young female and male handball players. A total of 159 players participated: female under-16 (FU16, n=44), under-14 (FU14, n=21); male under-16 (MU16, n=54), under-14 (MU14, n=40). The follow measurements were completed: height, arm-span and body mass, total finger-span, hand-length, maximal isometric hand-grip force, handball throwing velocity, 20-m sprints, countermovement jump and change of direction. The MU16 group showed significantly (P&lt;0.05) greater values for anthropometric characteristics than FU16 and MU14. No significant differences were observed between FU14 and MU14 for any of the anthropometric variables analyzed, or between the two female groups (FU16 vs. FU14). MU16 showed significantly (P&lt;0.05) greater performance in all parameters analyzed than FU16 and MU14. No significant differences were observed between FU14 vs. MU14 or between FU16 vs. FU14. Throwing performance correlated (P&lt;0.05) with almost all anthropometric and fitness parameters evaluated within each group. Male handball players showed greater anthropometric and fitness characteristics in the U16 compared to the U14, whereas no substantial differences were observed in female handball players from U14 to U16. Handball throwing velocity is associated with body and hand dimensions and other physical performance parameters. &nbsp;</p

Identificación de documentos multilingües relacionados mediante algoritmos de clustering de hormigas

RESUMEN: Este artículo presenta una estrategia de representación documental y un algoritmo bioinspirado para realizar procesos de agrupamiento en colecciones multilingües de documentos en las áreas de la economía y la empresa. El enfoque propuesto permite al usuario identificar grupos de documentos económicos relacionados escritos en español o inglés usando técnicas inspiradas en comportamientos de organización y agrupamiento de objetos observados en algunos tipos de hormigas. Para conseguir una representación vectorial de cada documento independiente del idioma, se han utilizado dos recursos lingüísticos: un glosario económico y un tesauro. Cada documento es representado usando cuatro vectores de rasgos: palabras, nombres propios, términos económicos del glosario y descriptores del tesauro. La identificación de los nombres propios y la extracción y lematización de palabras se realizan usando herramientas específicas. El esquema tf-idf es utilizado para medir la importancia de cada rasgo en el documento, y se utiliza una combinación lineal convexa de separaciones angulares de los vectores de rasgos como medida de similitud de documentos. El trabajo muestra resultados experimentales de aplicación del algoritmo propuesto sobre un corpus español-inglés de documentos científicos de áreas económica y de gestión empresarial. Los resultados demuestran la utilidad y efectividad de las técnicas de ant clustering y del esquema de representación propuesto.ABSTRACT: This paper presents a document representation strategy and a bio-inspired algorithm to cluster multilingual collections of documents in the field of economics and business. The proposed approach allows the user to identify groups of related economics documents written in Spanish and English using techniques inspired on clustering and sorting behaviours observed in some types of ants. In order to obtain a language independent vector representation of each document two multilingual resources are used: an economic glossary and a thesaurus. Each document is represented using four feature vectors: words, proper names, economic terms in the glossary and thesaurus descriptors. The proper name identification, word extraction and lemmatization are performed using specific tools. The tf-idf scheme is used to measure the importance of each feature in the document, and a convex linear combination of angular separations between feature vectors is used as similarity measure of documents. The paper shows experimental results of the application of the proposed algorithm in a Spanish-English corpus of research papers in economics and management areas. The results demonstrate the usefulness and effectiveness of the ant clustering algorithm and the proposed representation scheme.This work has been partially supported by SistIngAlfa project, ref: ALFA II-0321-FA of the European Union and Project Ref. TIN2006-13615 of the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science

Influencia de la carrera a pie sobre el hábito tabáquico

ObjetivoInvestigar si la carrera a pie influye sobre el hábito tabáquico.DiseñoEstudio de casos y controles, con emparejamiento 1:1. Observación longitudinal retrospectiva.EmplazamientoAtención primaria. Ciudad de Toledo.ParticipantesCasos: 48 corredores voluntarios sanos de 47 ± 7,8 años de edad. Controles: 48 sujetos sanos, emparejados por sexo y año de nacimiento, elegidos al azar entre la población adscrita al medico investigador.Mediciones principalesHábito tabáquico y gramos semanales de alcohol mediante cuestionario, peso, talla, presión arterial y frecuencia cardíaca de reposo. Se obtuvieron las odds ratio (OR) de las proporciones de sujetos que fumaban o habían fumado alguna vez, de los que seguían fumando y de las probabilidades de abandono del tabaco de cada grupo.ResultadosLa OR de la proporción de sujetos que fumaban o habían fumado entre los grupos de corredores (54,2%) y controles (70,9%) era de 0,486 (intervalo de confianza [IC] del 95%, 0,205-1,149; χ2=2,8; p=0,093). La OR para continuación del hábito entre los grupos de corredores (8,4%) y controles (41,7%) era de 0,127 (IC del 95%, 0,035-0,456; χ2=14,0; p=0,0002). En el grupo de corredores había abandonado el tabaco el 45,8% y en el de controles, el 31,2% (OR=7,85; IC del 95%, 1,89-32,52; χ2=11,8; p=0,0007). El 50% de los corredores que fumaban lo había dejado desde que comenzó a correr y el 76,9% de éstos lo había dejado justo en el momento de comenzar a correr.ConclusionesHay una asociación negativa entre carrera a pie y tabaco. Si un fumador decide comenzar a correr regularmente, tiene muchas probabilidades de dejar de fumar y mantenerse así.ObjectiveTo investigate whether running influences smoking habits.DesignStudy of cases and controls, with 1:1 pairing. Retrospective longitudinal observational study.SettingPrimary care City of Toledo, Spain.ParticipantsCases: 48 healthy volunteer runners of 47±7.8 years of age. Controls: 48 healthy subjects, paired by gender and year of birth, chosen at random from the medical list assigned to the medical researcher.Principal measurementsSmoking habits and alcohol consumption in grams per week using a questionnaire, weight, height, blood pressure, and heart rate at rest. The odds ratio (OR) was obtained on the proportion of subjects who smoked or smoked at some time, those who continued smoking and the probabilities of giving up tobacco in each group.ResultsThe OR of the proportion of subjects who smoked or had smoked between the groups of runners (54.2%) and controls (70.9%) was 0.486 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.205-1.149; χ2=2.8; P=.093). The OR for continuing the habit between groups of runners (8.4%) and controls (41.7%) was 0.127 (95% CI, 0.035-0.456; χ2=14.0; P=.0002). In the group of runners, 45.8% had stopped smoking, as well as 31.2% of the controls (OR=7.85; 95% CI, 1.89-32.52; χ2=11.8; P=.0007); 50% of the runners who smoked had given it up since starting to run and 76.9% of these had given it up just at the time of starting to run.ConclusionsThere is a negative association between running and tobacco. If a smoker decides to run regularly he/she has high probabilities of giving up smoking and continue to do so

Education and Power: Teacher's Repression in the Teacher Training Colleges (Spain, 1936-1942)

This paper begins with a review of the literature on Francoist teacher’s purge. It suggested us that the Teacher Training Schools could have suffered a stronger control, especially if we consider their role in the educational system. Therefore, we shall now focus on this professional purge related to these teachers, that is to say, teachers who will have in their hands the ideology of the future primary teachers. We are looking for the personal file of each teacher and we have the first results after the Boletín Oficial del Estado, BOE (Official State Gazette) where all the resolutions were supposed to be published. The impact of this process on the teacher’s staff was very powerful. This survey tends to contribute to the development of a national overview of the teachers’ purge, including all kind of teachers. We can draw the tentative conclusion that primary teacher’s educators suffered a stronger repression, although there are significant differences when variables like gender and professional standing are taken into account.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech. Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (MICINN), Proyecto EDU2010-19255