5,338 research outputs found
Species composition and seasonal capture rates of terrestrial amphipods in a lowland and highland forest in Tasmania
Composition of the amphipod fauna and seasonal changes in captures in pitfall traps were compared at a lowland forest in northeastern Tasmania and three sites in highland forest in central Tasmania. The number of species at the highland sites (five) was greater than for the lowland area (two), possibly due to the greater development of the litter habitat and the moister, more humid conditions at the highland sites. Capture rates were correlated with temperature, but not rainfall, at both the lowland and highland areas. However, minium temperature was most significant for the highland sites, and maximum temperature was most significant at the lowland area. Captures at the highland sites were proportionally greater in autumn and lower in summer and showed a peak in October which was not present at the lowland area. Capture rates are most likely influenced by both activity levels and population size, as determined by seasonal reproductive patterns. It is, therefore, possible that the differences in the seasonality of captures at the highland and lowland areas may be related to different patterns of reproductive activity at the different altitudes
Better energy indicators for sustainable development
The UN Sustainable Development Goal 7 aims to deliver affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all. Tracking progress towards the targets under this goal can spur better energy statistics and data gathering capacity, and will require new indicators that also consider the interplay with other goals
Structural Change for a Post-Growth Economy: Investigating the Relationship between Embodied Energy Intensity and Labour Productivity
Post-growth economists propose structural changes towards labour-intensive services, such as care or education, to make our economy more sustainable by providing meaningful work and reducing the environmentally damaging production of material goods. Our study investigates the assumption underlying such proposals. Using a multi-regional input-output model we compare the embodied energy intensity and embodied labour productivity across economic sectors in the UK and Germany between 1995 and 2011. We identify five labour-intensive service sectors, which combine low embodied energy intensity with low growth in embodied labour productivity. However, despite their lower embodied energy intensities, our results indicate that large structural changes towards these sectors would only lead to small reductions in energy footprints. Our results also suggest that labour-intensive service sectors in the UK have been characterised by higher rates of price inflation than other sectors. This supports suggestions from the literature that labour-intensive services face challenges from increasing relative prices and costs. We do not find similar results for Germany, which is the result of low overall growth in embodied labour productivity and prices. This highlights that structural change is closely associated with economic growth, which raises the question of how structural changes can be achieved in a non-growing economy
Exploring acceptance of decentralised energy storage at household and neighbourhood scales: A UK survey
Effective deployment of Distributed Energy Storage (DES) will depend in part on public attitudes and acceptance at both community and household levels. Here, we present the results of an exploratory survey to understand prospective public acceptance of DES technologies at household and community level in the UK (N = 949). The research design draws on previous qualitative technology acceptance work that was undertaken to inform the survey. We show that while the level of awareness of DES among the UK public is still very low, initial evaluation of information on domestic and neighbourhood battery storage is positive and evokes positive feelings that are significant predictors of positive attitudes. Moreover, the UK public has strong expectations about the technology, its benefits and its management. In particular, the results point to a bounded and place-based role for altruism: that people are more likely to accept energy storage facilities in their neighbourhood if they are for the benefit of that same neighbourhood. The results help us to understand public expectations of the technologies and the institutions relevant to decentralised energy design and deployment by commercial and public sector actors, as well as having implications for policy design and communication strategies
Future pathways for energy networks: A review of international experiences in high income countries
Energy networks are the systems of pipes and wires by which different energy vectors are transported from where they are produced to where they are needed. As such, these networks are central to facilitating countries’ moves away from a reliance on fossil fuels to a system based around the efficient use of renewable and other low carbon forms of energy. In this review we highlight the challenges facing energy networks from this transition in a sample of key high income countries. We identify the technical and other innovations being implemented to meet these challenges and describe some of the new policy and regulatory developments that are incentivising the required changes. We then review evidence from the literature about the benefits of moving to a more integrated approach based on the concept of a Multi-Vector Energy Network (MVEN). Under this approach the different networks are planned and operated together to achieve greater functionality and performance than simply the sum of the individual networks. We find that most studies identify a range of benefits from an MVEN approach, but that these findings are based on model simulations. Further work is therefore needed to verify whether the benefits can be realised in practice and to identify how any risks can be mitigated
Assessing the Evidence for Context-Sensitive Effectiveness and Safety of Patient Safety Practices: Developing Criteria (Prepared under Contract No. HHSA-290-2009-10001C).
Outsourcing or efficiency? Investigating the decline in final energy consumption in the UK productive sectors
Over the past two decades reductions in the final energy consumption of the productive sectors (industry, public administration, commercial services and agriculture), have made important contributions to overall reductions in UK final energy consumption. This study investigates the drivers of the reductions in final energy consumption in the UK productive sectors between 1997 and 2013 using a decomposition analysis that incorporates two novel approaches. Firstly, it uses results from a multi-regional input-output model to investigate how much of the structural change in the economy has been driven by outsourcing production overseas. Secondly, it utilises energy conversion chain analysis to determine how much increases in the conversion efficiency from final energy to useful exergy have contributed to improvements in final energy intensity. In aggregate all energy savings from structural change are attributed to outsourcing. Improvements in the conversion efficiency produced savings of a similar size. However energy savings from both factors have stalled since 2009. Improvements in useful exergy intensity, the useful exergy used per unit of monetary output, provided the biggest share of energy savings, but these savings are concentrated in a few sectors and rarely lead to absolute reductions in final energy use. All of this suggests that a return to the rates of energy reduction seen between 2001 and 2009 should not be taken for granted and that active policy interventions might be required to achieve further reductions
Decarbonisation strategies in industry: going beyond clusters
An effective and just industrial transition is necessary both to mitigate climate change and protect jobs, and as a precursor to enable other sectors to decarbonise. Activity is at an early stage and examples of successful sector-wide interventions to decarbonise industry do not yet exist. Governments of industrialised countries are beginning to develop policy and provide funding to support deployment of carbon capture and low-carbon hydrogen infrastructures into high-emitting industrial clusters, but options for sites outside of clusters, denoted here as ‘dispersed sites’, are also required. This paper takes a mixed methods approach to provide the first analysis of the issues facing dispersed industrial sites on their route to decarbonisation and to suggest solutions to the challenges they face. Using the UK as a case study, it first characterises dispersed sites in terms of location, emissions released, sectors involved, and size of companies affected. It then shows how these features mean that simply expanding the geographical scope of the present UK decarbonisation strategy, which focuses on the provision of carbon capture and low-carbon hydrogen, would face a number of challenges and so will need to be broadened to include a wider range of abatement options and other considerations to meet the needs of dispersed sites. While the solutions for each place will be different, these are likely to include some combination of the expansion of shared infrastructure, the development of local zero-carbon hubs, research into a wider range of novel abatement technologies and facilitating local participation in energy planning. The paper concludes with a discussion of remaining knowledge gaps before outlining how its findings might apply to industrial decarbonisation strategies in other countries
The relationship between galaxy and dark matter halo size from z ∼ 3 to the present
We explore empirical constraints on the statistical relationship between the radial size of galaxies and the radius of their host dark matter haloes from z similar to 0.1-3 using the Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) and Cosmic Assembly Near Infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey (CANDELS) surveys. We map dark matter halo mass to galaxy stellar mass using relationships from abundance matching, applied to the Bolshoi-Planck dissipationless N-body simulation. We define SRHR equivalent to r(e)/R-h as the ratio of galaxy radius to halo virial radius, and SRHR lambda equivalent to r(e)/(lambda R-h) as the ratio of galaxy radius to halo spin parameter times halo radius. At z similar to 0.1, we find an average value of SRHR similar or equal to 0.018 and SRHR. similar or equal to 0.5 with very little dependence on stellar mass. Stellar radius-halo radius (SRHR) and SRHR lambda have a weak dependence on cosmic time since z similar to 3. SRHR shows a mild decrease over cosmic time for low-mass galaxies, but increases slightly or does not evolve formoremassive galaxies. We find hints that at high redshift (z similar to 2-3), SRHR. is lower for more massive galaxies, while it shows no significant dependence on stellar mass at z less than or similar to 0.5. We find that for both the GAMA and CANDELS samples, at all redshifts from z similar to 0.1-3, the observed conditional size distribution in stellar mass bins is remarkably similar to the conditional distribution of lambda R-h. We discuss the physical interpretation and implications of these results
Seeded optical parametric generation in CdSiP2 pumped by a nanosecond pulsed, MHz repetition rate Raman fiber amplifier at 1.24 µm
We report a CdSiP2 (CSP) based seeded optical parametric generator (OPG), emitting sub-nanosecond duration, 3 MHz repetition rate, wavelength tunable mid-infrared (MIR) light at 4.2-4.6 μm. We generate up to 0.25 W at 4.2 μm with a total pump conversion efficiency of 42%. The OPG is pumped by a 1.24 μm Raman fiber amplifier system. This is the first demonstration of pumping CSP with a Raman fiber source in this region, and we show that Raman fiber sources in the near-infrared (NIR) are ideal pump sources for non-critically phasematched (NCPM) CSP devices. Pumping CSP at 1.24 μm permits the use of NCPM whilst decreasing the negative effects of both two-photon absorption and linear absorption losses, when compared to conventional 1 μm pumping. This offers a potential advantage for MIR power scaling of CSP parametric devices due to a reduced thermal load in the crystal from residual pump absorption. The OPG is seeded with a continuous-wave fiber supercontinuum source emitting radiation in the 1.7 μm region, to lower the threshold pump intensity required for efficient conversion. NCPM and temperature tuning of the crystal allow for simple wavelength tuning of the idler radiation. We report on laser damage induced by elevated crystal temperatures, which we propose is linked to the decrease in CSP bandgap energy with increasing temperature
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