Comparative Analysis of ELV Recycling Policies in the European Union, Japan and China: Analiza porównawcza regulacji dotyczących recyklingu ELV w Unii Europejskiej, Japonii i Chinach

This research aims at revealing the current status of the End-of-Life Vehicle (ELV) recycling systems in the European Union (EU), Japan and China which are known to have big vehicle manufacturers. The purpose of this research is to clarify their characteristics and issues, such as existing ELV recycling policy, limitations of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) and environmental problems caused by secondhand car export. Japanese ELV recycling system will be analyzed as a specific example. Automakers’ effort to improve ELV recycling rate and the potential influence on recycling policy from large secondhand car export and Next-Generation Vehicle’s (NGV) popularization in Japan will be discussed and generalized. In addition, interview investigation for vehicle makers and government agencies has been conducted to have a comparative analysis of stakeholders’ (mainly automakers) attitude towards current ELV recycling law and future plans which can support Next-Generation Vehicle recycling well, as well as cross-border environmental/international resources recycling problems caused by secondhand car export

Uncovering the novel characteristics of Asian honey bee, Apis cerana, by whole genome sequencing

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited.Abstract Background The honey bee is an important model system for increasing understanding of molecular and neural mechanisms underlying social behaviors relevant to the agricultural industry and basic science. The western honey bee, Apis mellifera, has served as a model species, and its genome sequence has been published. In contrast, the genome of the Asian honey bee, Apis cerana, has not yet been sequenced. A. cerana has been raised in Asian countries for thousands of years and has brought considerable economic benefits to the apicultural industry. A cerana has divergent biological traits compared to A. mellifera and it has played a key role in maintaining biodiversity in eastern and southern Asia. Here we report the first whole genome sequence of A. cerana. Results Using de novo assembly methods, we produced a 238 Mbp draft of the A. cerana genome and generated 10,651 genes. A.cerana-specific genes were analyzed to better understand the novel characteristics of this honey bee species. Seventy-two percent of the A. cerana-specific genes had more than one GO term, and 1,696 enzymes were categorized into 125 pathways. Genes involved in chemoreception and immunity were carefully identified and compared to those from other sequenced insect models. These included 10 gustatory receptors, 119 odorant receptors, 10 ionotropic receptors, and 160 immune-related genes. Conclusions This first report of the whole genome sequence of A. cerana provides resources for comparative sociogenomics, especially in the field of social insect communication. These important tools will contribute to a better understanding of the complex behaviors and natural biology of the Asian honey bee and to anticipate its future evolutionary trajectory

Life-Cycle Assessment on Nickel-Metal Hydride Battery in Hybrid Vehicles: Comparison between Regenerated and New Battery: Ocena cyklu życia akumulatora niklowo-wodorkowego w pojazdach hybrydowych: porównanie akumulatora regenerowanego i nowego

To reduce air pollution and avoid petroleum exhaustion problem, many advanced countries, especially Japan installed Hybrid Vehicles (HV). As the use of HV popularizes around the world, there will be a huge amount of End-of-Life HV in the near future, and the proper treatment of these End-of-Life HVs, especially the waste NiMH (Nickel-Metal Hydride) batteries, will become a serious problem. Currently, the recycling of NiMH battery is gaining substantial attention. However, instead of recycling waste NiMH batteries directly, regenerating and reusing a used NiMH battery for a secondhand HV will largely reduce waste battery generation and demand for new NiMH battery. However, the environmental impact of regenerating and reusing a waste NiMH battery was not clear and has not been compared with the situation when using a brand-new NiMH battery. The purpose of this research is to compare the environmental performance (CO2 emission) of regenerated NiMH battery and brand-new NiMH battery in an HV from their production to usage stage and to discuss the validity of using a regenerated NiMH in Japan and in other countries using the Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach. This research analyzed the composition of a NiMH battery and the CO2 emission during the manufacture, transportation, regeneration and usage process of a NiMH battery. The data used in this research was collected from reports and data published by the government of Japan, vehicle makers and previous studies. Original field survey and interview research on battery regeneration operators were also performed. The result showed that there is not a big difference in environmental effect. Moreover, by doing so, a huge amount of resource will be saved from battery manufacturing process while reducing waste generation. It is recommended that waste NiMH battery should be regenerated and reused in HV instead of being recycled directly in the future

A Bibliometric Research on Next-Generation Vehicles Using CiteSpace

Next-generation vehicles (NGVs), which mainly refers to hybrid vehicles (HVs), plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHVs), electric vehicles (EVs), fuel-cell vehicles (FCVs), and clean diesel vehicles (CDVs), are becoming more and more popular as the potential answer to decreasing fossil fuel consumption and CO2 emission from traffic sectors. Although the research on NGVs started in the 1990s, a systematic observation or summarization of the research on NGVs has not been performed yet. Thus, the current status, characteristics, latest trends, and issues of the research on NGVs have not been clarified yet. This research analyzed the research on NGVs recorded in the Web of Science published between 1990 to 2020 using CiteSpace, from a macro perspective. The results show that HVs and EVs are the crucial research objects in comparison with FCVs and CDVs. The research on NGVs was mainly performed by countries that own large vehicle makers or markets. However, it is noticeable that many developing countries have also started to study NGVs, which proves that NGVs have become popular globally. On the other hand, the research topics and categories of NGV study have always had a strong bias in favor of their function and technology development. Since NGVs have been sold for years in many countries already, there will be a considerable number of waste NGVs generated in the future, and so, future research should focus on recycling policies and/or recycling technology for NGVs to guarantee their sustainable development

Development Strategies and Policy Trends of the Next-Generation Vehicles Battery: Focusing on the International Comparison of China, Japan and South Korea

In recent years, with the rapid spread of next-generation vehicles (NGVs), China, Japan, and South Korea (CJK) have been leading the development of vehicle batteries. As development strategies and policy trends of NGVs battery are changing in CJK, the competition among battery manufacturers is expected to become more intense in the future. However, there are few international comparative studies on the development policy, production, and sales of NGV batteries in CJK. Based on the review and investigation of the technical development, policy trends, and the world market share of vehicle batteries in CJK, this study spots trends in the features of development strategies and policies of NGV batteries in CJK, and further inspects the interrelationships in these three countries comprehensively. The result shows that CJK have different focuses on the development of NGVs battery technology and policymaking. It is predicted that in the future competition of the vehicle battery market, Japan is likely to be far surpassed by China and South Korea. Based on grasping the development strategies and policy trends of vehicle batteries in CJK, this study plays an important role in the academic research and policymaking of the production, sales, regeneration, and resource recycling of the NGVs and vehicle batteries

Analysis of the Efficiency of Various Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment’s Collection Routes: A Case Study Focusing on Collection Route for Waste Mobile Phones in the Tohoku Area of Japan

Each year, more than 5 million Waste Mobile Phones (WMP) is generated in Japan. Since WMPs contain many rare metals and precious metals, it is essential to collect and recycle high-value metal resources from them effectively. Although multiple stakeholders have already developed WMP collection routes, these WMP collection routes’ current status is unclear. Furthermore, some WMP collection routes can only collect a small number of WMP, and so, their resource efficiency is low. This research aims to clarify each WMP collection route’s characteristics and evaluate their resource efficiency by conducting interview research on related stakeholders and the WMP dismantle experiment. The result shows that local government, authorized recyclers, and telecom carriers are the major stakeholders in collecting WMPs in Japan. To improve the WMP collection rate in cities with high population densities, using the local government’s collection route and installing an authorized recycler’s collection station is considered to be more effective. In cities with low population densities, the collection stations built by authorized recyclers are sufficient. The collection stations can also improve recycling behavior by offering points. Furthermore, the telecom carriers are encouraged to participate in the WMP collection business, but they should figure out a way to monitor the flow route of secondhand phones they exported and prompt the proper recycling of exported phones

Addressing the Problem of Poverty through an International Cooperation Project: The Case Study of Agriculture Development by JICA in Cameroon

In this era of globalization, with social problems extending across social and geographical boundaries, partnerships between governments and international organizations are key to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Agriculture is essential to reducing poverty in Cameroon. Since 2002, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has contributed to agricultural development through various projects in Cameroon. However, research has not been conducted to determine the contributions of agricultural development to poverty reduction. The aim of this study is to outline current agricultural problems and international cooperation projects in Cameroon. A social inquiry involving the collection of qualitative and quantitative data was conducted to assess whether agricultural projects have contributed to increasing income and alleviating other multidimensional indicators of poverty amongst the beneficiaries. In this paper, we provide useful recommendations with respect to solving the problem of poverty and achieving the SDGs. The analysis revealed that agriculture projects have significantly contributed to an increase in income, wellbeing and standard of living of the project beneficiaries. African countries, such as Cameroon, need to address poverty by improving the agricultural sector because these nations cannot currently maintain a stable crop production. International cooperation in the agricultural sector can help to increase crop yields, incomes and quality of life