‘Food Miles’: Britain’s Transition from Rail to Road-based Food Distribution, 1919-1975

Britain’s railways were essential for the development of the British economy throughout the nineteenth century; however, by 1919 their seemingly unassailable position as goods carriers was about to be eroded by the lorry. The railway strike of September 1919 had presented traders with an opportunity to observe the capabilities of road haulage, but there is no study which focuses on the process of modal shift in goods distribution from the trader’s perspective. This thesis therefore marks an important departure from the existing literature by placing goods transport into its working context. The importance of food as an everyday essential commodity adds a further dimension to the status of goods transport within Britain’s supply chain, particularly when the fragility of food products means that minimising the impact of distance, time and spoilage before consumption is vital in ensuring effective and practical logistical solutions. These are considered in a series of four case studies on specific food commodities and retail distribution, which also hypothesise that the modal shift from rail to road reflected the changing character of transport demand between 1919 and 1975. Consequently, this thesis explores the notion that the centre of governance over the supply chain transferred between food producers, manufacturers, government and chain retailer, thereby driving changes in transport technology and practice. This thesis uses archival material to provide a qualitative study into the food industry’s relationship with transport where the case studies incorporate supply chain analyses to permit an exploration of how changes in structure might have influenced the modal shift from rail to road distribution. It subsequently discusses how and when the emergence of mass-consumerism, as well as the intensification of the chain retailer’s quest for competitive advantage, effected a permanent change in the balance of food logistics in Britain before 1975

Odds and ends of atmospheric mercury in Europe and over the North Atlantic Ocean: temporal trends of 25 years of measurements

The global monitoring plan of the Minamata Convention on Mercury was established to generate long-term data necessary for evaluating the effectiveness of regulatory measures at a global scale. After 25 years of monitoring (since 1995), Mace Head is one of the atmospheric monitoring stations with the longest mercury record and has produced sufficient data for the analysis of temporal trends of total gaseous mercury (TGM) in Europe and the North Atlantic. Using concentration-weighted trajectories for atmospheric mercury measured at Mace Head as well as another five locations in Europe, Amderma, Andoya, Villum, Waldhof and Zeppelin, we identify the regional probabilistic source contribution factor and its changes for the period of 1996 to 2019. Temporal trends indicate that concentrations of mercury in the atmosphere in Europe and the North Atlantic have declined significantly over the past 25 years at a non-monotonic rate averaging 0.03 ng m(-3) yr(-1). Concentrations of TGM at remote marine sites were shown to be affected by continental long-range transport, and evaluation of reanalysis back trajectories displays a significant decrease in TGM in continental air masses from Europe in the last 2 decades. In addition, using the relationship between mercury and other atmospheric trace gases that could serve as a source signature, we perform factorization regression analysis, based on positive rotatable factorization to solve probabilistic mass functions. We reconstructed atmospheric mercury concentration and assessed the contribution of the major natural and anthropogenic sources. The results reveal that the observed downward trend in the atmospheric mercury is mainly associated with a factor with a high load of long-lived anthropogenic species

Carbon monoxide measurements at Mace Head, Ireland

The North Atlantic Ocean is bordered by continents which may each, under the influence of seasonal weather patterns, act as sources of natural and anthropogenic trace gas and particulate species. Photochemically active species such as carbon monoxide (CO) react to form ozone (O3), a species of critical importance in global climate change. CO is sparingly soluble in water, and the relatively long lifetime of CO in the troposphere makes this species an ideal tracer of air masses with origin over land. We have measured CO using a nondispersive infrared gas filter correlation analyzer at Mace Head on the west coast of Ireland nearly continuously since August 9, 1991. Measurements of CO were acquired at 20-sec resolution and recorded as 60-sec averages. Daily, monthly, and diurnal variation data characteristics of CO mixing ratios observed at this site are reported. Depending on source regions of air parcels passing over this site, 60-min concentrations of CO range from clean air values of approximately 90 ppbv to values in excess of 300 ppbv. Data characterizing the correlation between 60-min CO and O3 mixing ratio data observed at this site are reported also

Thiopentone sedation for sedation of acutely agitated, violent, intoxicated patients: Evaluation of 2 cases

Two cases of violent, drug-intoxicated patients who presented considerable problems in management, and were resistant to standard sedative agents, are described. Effective and safe sedation, without the need for full anaesthesia and endotracheal intubation, was achieved using titrated doses of thiopentone. The merits of selecting this agent in these circumstances are discussed