Assessment of regional trade and virtual water flows in China

The success of China's economic development has left deep marks on resource availability and quality. Some regions in China are relatively poor with regards to water resources. This problem is exacerbated by economic growth. Flourishing trade activities on both domestic and international levels have resulted in significant amounts of water withdrawal and water pollution. Hence the goal of this paper is to evaluate the current inter-regional trade structure and its effects on water consumption and pollution via ‘virtual water flows’. Virtual water is the water embedded in products and used in the whole production chain, and that is traded between regions or exported to other countries. For this assessment of trade flows and effects on water resources, we have developed an extended regional input–output model for eight hydro-economic regions in China to account for virtual water flows between North and South China. The findings show that the current trade structure in China is not very favorable with regards to water resource allocation and efficiency. North China as a water scarce region virtually exports about 5% of its total available freshwater resources while accepting large amounts of wastewater for other regions' consumption. By contrast, South China a region with abundant water resources is virtually importing water from other regions while their imports are creating waste water polluting other regions' hydro-ecosystems

The environmental effect of car-free housing: A case in Vienna

A case-control study of the car-free model housing project in Vienna was conducted to evaluate whether people living in this settlement have more [`]sustainable lifestyles' than people living in comparable buildings in Vienna. Another aim was to identify the lifestyle characteristics and household activities which significantly influence the environmental impact of the residents of the car-free housing project and a control group. The control group, referred to as the reference settlement, was chosen from a nearby building complex, with similar characteristics, but without the car-free feature. Household consumption patterns were estimated based on interviews in combination with data from the Austrian consumer expenditure survey and the national accounts. The evaluation of household environmental impacts uses emissions estimates from the Austrian national accounting matrices including environmental accounts and data from life-cycle assessments. Households from the car-free settlement have substantially lower environmental impacts in the categories of ground transportation and energy use; their CO2 emissions of these two categories are less than 50% of those living in the reference settlement. The households in the car-free settlement have somewhat higher emissions in the categories air transport, nutrition, and [`]other' consumption, reflecting the higher income per-capita. As a result, the CO2 emissions are only slightly lower than in the reference settlement, but the emissions intensity is 20% lower. Both household groups have significantly lower environmental impacts than the Austrian average reflecting less car use and cleaner heating energy in Vienna

Managing Pediatric Atopic Dermatitis in the Allergy Clinic: Use of an Eczema Action Plan to Improve Caregiver Understanding and Self-Efficacy, A Pilot Study

Eczema, or atopic dermatitis, is a complex and chronic condition that affects approximately 10% of children throughout the United States (Brown et al., 2018). The American Academy of Allergy Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) (2017) estimates the average cost of eczema management for each patient is approximately $3,302 per year. The complex nature of atopic dermatitis indicates a need for individualized treatment plans. Research has shown that standardized patient teaching, written education materials, and Eczema Action Plans (EAP) reinforce patient teaching, parental understanding, and improve quality of life. This evidence-based practice (EBP) project introduces the use of a written Eczema Action Plan, using the template created by the American Academy of Dermatology (AAD), for patients less than 18 years of age at multiple private allergy clinics in California and Washington. The EAP provides written instruction for how to cleanse and moisturize skin when symptoms are controlled and during a flare, what medications should be used during a mild and moderate flare, and what symptoms should prompt the patient to follow up with their allergist. The implemented clinical intervention included providing an individualized EAP, in addition to standardized written education materials about eczema and its treatment compiled into one handout from the National Institute of Health (NIH) and the AAAAI to the parent or caregiver of the pediatric patient. Patient outcomes were measured using the University of Nottingham’s validated Patient Oriented Eczema Measure (POEM) form and parental outcomes were measured using Parental Self-Efficacy Care Index (PAESCI) survey at the introduction of the EAP and again at 6-9-weeks post-intervention. Of the 24 participants enrolled, 20 completed the study. Patient ages ranged from 9 months to 17 years. PAESCI scores increased from an average of 47/70 pre-intervention to 60.9/70 post-EAP use, indicating increased caregiver self-efficacy. POEM scores decreased from an average of 8.65/28 pre-EAP to 4.1/28 post-EAP, indicating a reduction in eczema severity. At the time of receiving the EAP, parents had an average understanding of 8.9/10. This increased to an average understanding of a 9.65/10 after using the EAP for 6-9 weeks, indicating increased understanding after use. Benefits of EAPs along with written education materials include reduction of patient costs on office visits and medications due to flares, improved medication adherence, improved patient and caregiver understanding, and improved patient quality of life. Use of an EAP within an allergy clinic can also allow for better continuity of care between the patient’s primary care providers and their allergists

Classifying #MeToo Hash-tagged Tweets by Semantics to Understand the Extent of Sexual Harassment

This thesis contains a program that will process tweets from Twitter that use the hashtag "#MeToo" and categorize them by their relevance to the movement, their stance on the movement, and the type of sexual harassment expressed (if applicable). Being able to work with a narrowed set of tweets belonging to a specific category creates the capacity to do more in-depth research and analysis, exploring Twitter as a special platform for discussing these sensitive topics and showing that this online space for expressing personal experiences has delivered unprecedented potential avenues of study. This thesis also contains research into additional solutions towards addressing sexual harassment online, exploring the needs of society through the results to a questionnaire that was administered to university students asking for opinions on how sexual harassment is addressed on social media as well as through a literature review of current obstacles for victims

A new and integrated hydro-economic accounting and analytical framework for water resources: A case study for North China

Water is a critical issue in China for a variety of reasons. China is poor of water resources with 2300 m3 of per capita availability, which is less than of the world average. This is exacerbated by regional differences; e.g. North China's water availability is only about 271 m3 of per capita value, which is only of the world's average. Furthermore, pollution contributes to water scarcity and is a major source for diseases, particularly for the poor. The Ministry of Hydrology [1997. China's Regional Water Bullets. Water Resource and Hydro-power Publishing House, Beijing, China] reports that about 65–80% of rivers in North China no longer support any economic activities. Previous studies have emphasized the amount of water withdrawn but rarely take water quality into consideration. The quality of the return flows usually changes; the water quality being lower than the water flows that entered the production process initially. It is especially important to measure the impacts of wastewater to the hydro-ecosystem. Thus, water consumption should not only account for the amount of water inputs but also the amount of water contaminated in the hydro-ecosystem by the discharged wastewater. In this paper we present a new accounting and analytical approach based on economic input–output modelling combined with a mass balanced hydrological model that links interactions in the economic system with interactions in the hydrological system. We thus follow the tradition of integrated economic–ecologic input–output modelling. Our hydro-economic accounting framework and analysis tool allows tracking water consumption on the input side, water pollution leaving the economic system and water flows passing through the hydrological system thus enabling us to deal with water resources of different qualities. Following this method, the results illustrate that North China requires 96% of its annual available water, including both water inputs for the economy and contaminated water that is ineligible for any uses

APOE polymorphism and its effect on plasma C-reactive protein levels in a large general population sample

The literature on association between apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene variations and plasma levels of C-reactive protein (CRP) remains inconsistent, mainly due to low statistical power of previous studies. To clarify this question, we analysed data from large population sample of randomly selected individuals from 7 Czech towns (2886 males and 3344 females, the HAPIEE study). In both males and females, the lowest levels of plasma hsCRP were observed in the carriers of the APOE ε4ε4 and ε4ε3 genotypes. The median (inter-quartile range, IQR) concentration of hsCRP in carriers of the most common APOE ε3ε3 genotype (two thirds of participants) was 1.13 (IQR 0.56; 2.33) mg/l in men and 1.23 (IQR 0.61; 2.65) mg/l in women, compared with 0.72 (IQR 0.61; 0.86) mg/l in male and 0.72 (IQR 0.61-0.85) mg/l in female carriers of APOE ε4ε3/ε4ε4 genotypes; the differences were statistically significant (p<0.001). The association between APOE and CRP was not materially affected by adjustment for age, sex, history of cardiovascular disease or cardiovascular risk factors. This study, the largest to date, provides robust evidence of an association between plasma hsCRP and the APOE genotype, an association not explained by history of cardiovascular disease nor its risk factors

What to expect from a greater geographic dispersion of wind farms? - A risk portfolio approach

The UK, like many other industrialised countries, is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions under the Kyoto Protocol. To achieve this goal the UK is increasingly turning towards wind power as a source of emissions free energy. However, the variable nature of wind power generation makes it an unreliable energy source, especially at higher rates of penetration. Likewise the aim of this paper is to measure the potential reduction in wind power variability that could be realised as a result of geographically dispersing the location of wind farm sites. To achieve this aim wind speed data will be used to simulate two scenarios. The first scenario involves locating a total of 2.7 gigawatts (GW) of wind power capacity in a single location within the UK while the second scenario consists of sharing the same amount of capacity amongst four different locations. A risk portfolio approach as used in financial appraisals is then applied in the second scenario to decide upon the allocation of wind power capacity, amongst the four wind farm sites, that succeeds in minimising overall variability for a given level of wind power generation. The findings of this paper indicate that reductions in the order of 36% in wind power variability are possible as a result of distributing wind power capacity

Consumption-based accounting of U.S. CO2 emissions from 1990 to 2010

To tackle global climate change, it is desirable to reduce CO2 emissions associated with household consumption in particular in developed countries, which tend to have much higher per capita household carbon footprints than less developed countries. Our results show that carbon intensity of different consumption categories in the U.S. varies significantly. The carbon footprint tends to increase with increasing income but at a decreasing rate due to additional income being spent on less carbon intensive consumption items. This general tendency is frequently compensated by higher frequency of international trips and higher housing related carbon emissions (larger houses and more space for consumption items). Our results also show that more than 30% of CO2 emissions associated with household consumption in the U.S. occur outside of the U.S. Given these facts, the design of carbon mitigation policies should take changing household consumption patterns and international trade into account

International Trade, Material Flows and Land Use: Developing a Physical Trade Balance for the European Union

The environmental impacts of globalization and further liberalization of international trade today are on the top of the policy agenda in a number of international organizations. While the trade relations between two countries or regions may be balanced in monetary terms, they may at the same time be characterized by a substantial inequality with regard to the flows of natural resources. Thus some regions may systematically exploit the ecological capacity of other regions by importing resource intensive products and exporting wastes. In the last 10 to 15 years there has been extensive research on material flows mainly on the national level. However, empirical studies on material flows in international trade so far are very limited. In the last few years studies have been presented, which link material flow accounting and input-output analysis (based on monetary input-output tables) for the calculation of indirect material flows through intermediate production. This procedure has also been applied for calculating direct and indirect land appropriation. The compilation of the first physical input-output tables for some western European countries in the 1990s opened new possibilities for linking physical accounting and input-output analysis. Physical input-output analysis has so far been applied only for selected materials in single-country studies. It has neither been used for assessments of material flows in international trade nor for any land-related studies. In this report first steps towards the elaboration of a physical trade balance for the EU-15 are undertaken. Concerning the methodology of input-output analysis, three alternative approaches will be presented and discussed. In the empirical part, a physical trade balance for direct material flows of the EU is presented, disaggregated by world regions as well as product and material groups. In order to assess indirect resource requirements induced by imports and exports, a physical input-output model for the EU-15 is developed, based on physical input-output tables already published. This model is then used for assessing the overall resource requirements for the production of exports from EU-15 to the rest of the world. By applying physical input-output analysis, direct and indirect resource requirements will be calculated concerning both material flows and land appropriation