Tourism Management and Industrial Ecology: A Theoretical Review

Industrial Ecology (IE) is based on the relation between the natural ecosystem and economic ecosystem. The concept refers to the metaphorical relation between the natural and industrial ecosystems as a model for transforming unsustainable industrial systems. Several tools and strategies are particularly significant for the IE development. In other words, the primary purpose of industrial ecology is to assess and reduce the impact economic activities on the environment. Tourism, as an economic activity, resulting in a full range of environmental impacts, should be treated like any other industry. This paper propose uses a theoretical review focused on IE for to investigate what is the best way to implement industrial ecology in the tourism activities. It seemed interesting to search within the IE concept for a model for the tourism sector, one of the fields with the greatest environmental interaction and economic implications

Il Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment per la valutazione della sostenibilità aziendale

This paper aims to analyze a method of analysis that highlights the results of the evaluation global sustainability, understood as environmental sustainability, but also economic and social, remains today a subject to be fully developed. The application of the related tools for the realization of a model adaptable to strategies and management of sustainability in general and, in particular enterprise, based on Life Cycle Thinking represent the point of departure for the entire developed, which is proposed as the ultimate goal, the analysis of the methodology and instruments through the application to a case stud

Near Field Communication: Technology and Market Trends

Among the different hi-tech content domains, the telecommunications industry is one of the most relevant, in particular for the Italian economy. Moreover, Near Field Communication (NFC) represents an example of innovative production and a technological introduction in the telecommunications context. It has a threefold function: card emulator, peer-to-peer communication and digital content access, and it could be pervasively integrated in many different domains, especially in the mobile payment one. The increasing attention on NFC technology from the academic community has improved an analysis on the changes and the development perspective about mobile payments. It has considered the work done by the GSMA (Global System for Mobile Communications Association) and the NFC Forum in recent years. This study starts from an analysis of the scientific contributions to Near Field Communication and how the main researches on this topic were conceived. Our focus is on the diffusion rates, the adoption rates and the technology life cycle. After that, we analyze the technical-economical elements of NFC. Finally, this work presents the state of art of the improvements to this technology with a deeper focus on NFC technologies applied to the tourism industry. In this way, we have done a case analysis that shows some of the NFC existent applications linked to each stage of the tourism value chain

Implementation of Industry 4.0 technology: New opportunities and challenges for maintenance strategy

Abstract Industry 4.0 is revolutionizing decision-making processes within the manufacturing industry. Maintenance strategies play a crucial role to improve progressively technical performances and economical savings. The introduction of Industry 4.0 technology results in relevant innovations able to condition maintenance policies. Moreover, innovative solutions can be introduced, such as "remote maintenance" and the "self-maintenance". In this paper, we investigate the state-of-the-art of technologies in a "smart factory" with the aim to understand how Industry 4.0 technologies are affecting maintenance policies and to discuss their implication in strategies. We found important trends in maintenance policies, such as "remote maintenance" and the attractive option of the "autonomous maintenance". This study represents the first comprehensive investigation in these research themes, and it desires to produce a broader insight and knowledge of current trends and main difficulties, highlighting critical aspects and disadvantages for the implementation of innovative policies

life cycle assessment of steel produced in an italian integrated steel mill

The purpose of this work is to carry out an accurate and extensive environmental analysis of the steel production occurring in in the largest integrated EU steel mill, located in the city of Taranto in southern Italy. The end goal is that of highlighting the steelworks' main hot spots and identifying potential options for environmental improvement. The development for such an analysis is based on a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of steel production with a cradle to casting plant gate approach that covers the stages from raw material extraction to solid steel slab production. The inventory results have highlighted the large solid waste production, especially in terms of slag, which could be reused in other industries as secondary raw materials. Other reuses, in accordance with the circular economy paradigm, could encompass the energy waste involved in the steelmaking process. The most burdening lifecycle phases are the ones linked to blast furnace and coke oven operations. Specifically, the impact categories are influenced by the energy consumption and also by the toxicity of the emissions associated with the lifecycle of steel production. A detailed analysis of the toxicity impacts indicates that LCA is still not perfectly suitable for toxicity assessments and should be coupled with other more site specific studies in order to understand such aspects fully. Overall, the results represent a first step to understanding the current levels of sustainability of the steelworks, which should be used as a starting point for the development both of pollution control measures and of symbiotic waste reutilization scenarios needed to maintain the competitiveness of the industrial plant

life cycle approach a critical review in the tourism sector

The concept of sustainability comes from the scientific literature that defines sustainable the management of a resource if, being known his ability to play, is not exceeded in its exploitation beyond a certain threshold defined critical natural capital [1]. In the past, economic growth has been achieved at the expense of natural resource depletion, without stocks being allowed to regenerate. Ecosystems have been widely degraded and biodiversity has been lost at an unprecedented pace [2,3]. In this sense, the concept of sustainability and development are not compatible with the degradation of heritage and natural resources (non-renewable and potentially exhaustible), but also with concepts mostly related to ethical and social values such as the violation of the human dignity and freedom, with poverty and economic decline and the lack of recognition of the rights and equal opportunities [4,5]. The three basic components of sustainability are therefore: - the ability to generate income and employment for the people's livelihood (economic sustainability) - the ability to generate conditions of human well-being, understood as the territory security, an equal distribution of health and civil rights (social sustainability); - the ability to maintain the same level of quality and reproducibility of natural resources (environmental sustainability

Relazione tra Carbon Footprint e Green Consuming: opportunità o minaccia per il corretto sviluppo?

Il termine Carbon Footprint è diventato noto e molto popolare negli ultimi anni non soltanto nel mondo scientifico. Questa crescente attenzione dell’opinione pubblica verso le problematiche ambientali ha indotto le aziende a porre l’attenzione verso una nuova categoria di consumatori, i cosiddetti “Green Consumer”, e a mettere in atto strategie comunicative della propria sostenibilità. Tra i motivi per cui la Carbon Footprint si è notoriamente diffusa in minor tempo rispetto alle analisi di LCA complete, vi sono la maggiore facilità nel calcolo e la migliore efficacia di comunicazione. L’obiettivo di questa ricerca è di individuare le cause e le conseguenze di eventuali collegamenti nella diffusione della Carbon Footprint e del Green Consuming, evidenziando in un’analisi SWOT i punti di forza e di debolezza del loro legame e ponendo l’accento sulle opportunità e le minacce connesse.The word carbon footprint has become well known and very popular in recent years not only in the world Scientific. This growing public attention to environmental issues has led companies to focus attention toward a new category of consumers, the so-called "Green Consumer, "and implement communication strategies of their own sustainability. Among the reasons why the Carbon Footprint is notoriously widespread in less time compared to the analysis of LCA complete, there are the greater ease in calculation and the best effectiveness of communication. The objective of this research is to identify the causes and the consequences of any links in the spread of the Carbon Footprint and Consuming the Green, highlighting in a SWOT analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of their bond and focusing on the opportunities and threats associated

“Lo sviluppo del marchio Ecolabel Europeo nel settore turistico”

978-88-96412-27-

Sustainability and Resilience Assessment in the Pandemic Emergency

The coronavirus pandemic has affected all production and service sectors. The crisis has led to the increased awareness of the fragility and vulnerability of our societies and our lifestyles. The speed at which it spreads has led first to a change of our behavior and our way of life but at the same time, it has also changed the way we consider our buildings and how we live in them. Considering the new visions aimed at sharing spaces, such as those of work with the coworking spaces or frontal lessons in the classroom, they must now be rethought. In tourism and catering, relations with customers are reviewed and public transport is radically rethought. In this context, the concept of resilience plays a key role. How resistant are we and our environment to crises like COVID-19? What is the significance of resilience in sustainability? Is there a link between the assessment of resilience and life cycle assessment? In this paper is represented a general framework to connect resilience and sustainability assessments

Collaborative Spaces and Coworking as Hybrid Workspaces: Friends or Foes of Learning and Innovation?

The present chapter deals with coworking spaces as hybrid organizations and their impact on learning and innovation. Organizations have been seeking collaborative layouts for decades, and work layouts that could boost creativity and innovation are at the core of several streams of research in the Organization Design discipline. In this perspective, coworking spaces are at the frontier of innovation. On the other hand, the coworking spaces are conditioned by technology evolution and in particular by digital technologies, core in operation and innovation management research field. The emerging of coworking spaces adds even more interest on the subject, and raises interesting questions both from a theoretical and a practical point of view. Coworking spaces are growing worldwide at astonishing rates (4th Global Coworking Survey, 2015, Deskmag). They combine the need to cope with financial restraints with the opportunity of leveraging technological solutions to design workspaces that are coherent with the contemporary megatrends