Sustainability Governance and the Sociomateriality of Social Media: Lessons from Megaprojects

There is a need for effective governance of environmental, economic, and social sustainability in the modern age. This paper discusses the most neglected social sustainability dimension considering the case of megaprojects as they are large scale displacements and disruptions. The multiple and conflicting interests of different stakeholders make social sustainability very challenging in the context of megaprojects. Social media is used for different purposes and encompasses multiple affordances from a sociomateriality perspective. From the dimensions of power perspective, this paper conceptualizes how social media can be leveraged for alternative governance. The persuading, framing, and hegemonizing uses of social media for implementing negotiated interests, identifying with existing interests, and influencing existing interests respectively are discussed. Following this, the role of organizing in social media to give continuity and consistency to discourses is discussed. It is highlighted that for leveraging the full affordances of social media, the interest group’s representing environmental, economic, or social dimensions need to organize themselves through social media pages

Stakeholder Management Strategies in Infrastructure Megaprojects – A Dimensions of Power Perspective

Infrastructure megaprojects involve managing external stakeholders with diverse interests. The existing governance mechanisms such as contracts and conformance to standards are not possible with these external stakeholders as they are not accountable to the project. There are records of underperformance of megaprojects as they fail to manage the stakeholders who exist across a permeable boundary. While there are instances of various strategies used by the project team in managing these external stakeholders, the relation between strategies and stakeholder category is still unexplored. We argue that the dimensions of power framework can help make sense of the strategies in practice by the project team. Hence, using the case study of a metro rail project in India, we firstly categorize the external stakeholders into stakeholders in land acquisition and stakeholders in existing services. We then unearth the strategies devised by the project team in managing these external stakeholders. The strategies identified from the case are: 1) use of persuasion, 2) coordination by deputation, 3) give and take behavior, 4) enabling design flexibility, and 5) extra work for stakeholders. We then use the dimensions of power framework to explain these strategies and understand the resources available with the project team such as recruitment discretion, government backing and fund discretion. Finally, we explore the link between project team strategies and stakeholder categories. It is observed that the ‘give and take’ strategy works with legal landholders in land acquisition and ‘extra work for stakeholders’ works with stakeholders in existing services who are affected during construction. ‘Enabling design flexibility’ works for all stakeholders who express concern over the proposed design. ‘Coordination by deputation’ works with all government employees across all the categories of external stakeholders

Star formation around mid-infrared bubble N37: Evidence of cloud-cloud collision

We have performed a multi-wavelength analysis of a mid-infrared (MIR) bubble N37 and its surrounding environment. The selected 15$' \times$15$'$ area around the bubble contains two molecular clouds (N37 cloud; V$_{lsr}\sim$37-43 km s$^{-1}$, and C25.29+0.31; V$_{lsr}\sim$43-48 km s$^{-1}$) along the line of sight. A total of seven OB stars are identified towards the bubble N37 using photometric criteria, and two of them are spectroscopically confirmed as O9V and B0V stars. Spectro-photometric distances of these two sources confirm their physical association with the bubble. The O9V star is appeared to be the primary ionizing source of the region, which is also in agreement with the desired Lyman continuum flux analysis estimated from the 20 cm data. The presence of the expanding HII region is revealed in the N37 cloud which could be responsible for the MIR bubble. Using the $^{13}$CO line data and photometric data, several cold molecular condensations as well as clusters of young stellar objects (YSOs) are identified in the N37 cloud, revealing ongoing star formation (SF) activities. However, the analysis of ages of YSOs and the dynamical age of the HII region do not support the origin of SF due to the influence of OB stars. The position-velocity analysis of $^{13}$CO data reveals that two molecular clouds are inter-connected by a bridge-like structure, favoring the onset of a cloud-cloud collision process. The SF activities (i.e. the formation of YSOs clusters and OB stars) in the N37 cloud are possibly influenced by the cloud-cloud collision.Comment: 18 pages, 13 figures, 2 tables, Accepted for publication in the Ap

Managing Project Community in Infrastructure Megaprojects

Developing countries, such as India, look towards massive investments in infrastructure megaprojects to achieve their development goals quickly. However, megaprojects are plagued with failures and inefficiencies often due to the project’s inability to handle external stakeholders such as project community. Project communities are the end users of the project, are most inconvenienced by the project, and they hold significant potential to stop the project by asking a democratically elected government to do so. In this context, we seek to understand how a metro rail megaproject in India manages their project community through visible and invisible strategies using an in-depth case study. The organizational power theories of the dimensions of power theory and the circuit of power theory are used to explain these strategies. The research draws on data from 30 semi-structured interviews with the project team and five years of social media data comprising 640 Tweets. A Grounded theory method is used to find the visible, invisible strategies and their relation between each other. The results show that invisible strategies depend on visible strategies by relying on the adaptations made for the community and the visible strategies depend on the invisible strategies by relying on the changed preferences of the project community. The findings have contributions to theory and practice of managing project community in infrastructure megaprojects

Systems Thinking Using SSM and TRIZ for Stakeholder Engagement in Infrastructure Megaprojects

Infrastructure megaprojects straddle multiple stakeholder boundaries who have an interest in the project and are affected by the project. Multiple papers in the literature stress the need for holistic approaches to stakeholder engagement, as existing approaches only address the concerns of the noisy stakeholders. This research proposes an innovative approach in which Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) is used for understanding stakeholder concerns, complemented by the use of Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ) for identifying innovative solutions to address conflicting stakeholder goals. The researchers simulated the stakeholder engagement of the Coimbatore metro rail project, in India, through a workshop setting in a classroom to check the feasibility of this approach for stakeholder engagement. The 15 participants of the workshop were divided into four groups representing different stakeholders of the project. Data was collected through participant observations by the authors and oral feedback from the participants. The results show that while SSM helped to capture the concerns and goals of each stakeholder, TRIZ helped to identify and dissolve conflicts among these goals through innovative solutions. The theoretical, practical and pedagogical contributions are highlighted

Microgrid cost optimization: a case study on Abu Dhabi

This paper presents a microgrid cost optimization study specifically focused on the United Arab Emirates (UAE) based on the Genetic and Ant-Bee Colony algorithms. The main objective of the paper is to identify size and amount of power supply sources in Microgrids that result in minimum cost. Specific parameters pertaining to the UAE were employed within the new objective function and constraints. Two different scenarios were tested, and their results have been discussed. During this study, it was evident that solar-PV systems were the second most cost-effective way to reduce cost of microgrids preceded by micro-turbines

A multi-wavelength study of star formation activity in the S235 complex

We have carried out an extensive multi-wavelength study to investigate the star formation process in the S235 complex. The S235 complex has a sphere-like shell appearance at wavelengths longer than 2 $\mu$m and harbors an O9.5V type star approximately at its center. Near-infrared extinction map traces eight subregions (having A$_{V}$ $>$ 8 mag), and five of them appear to be distributed in an almost regularly spaced manner along the sphere-like shell surrounding the ionized emission. This picture is also supported by the integrated $^{12}$CO and $^{13}$CO intensity maps and by Bolocam 1.1 mm continuum emission. The position-velocity analysis of CO reveals an almost semi-ring like structure, suggesting an expanding H\,{\sc ii} region. We find that the Bolocam clump masses increase as we move away from the location of the ionizing star. This correlation is seen only for those clumps which are distributed near the edges of the shell. Photometric analysis reveals 435 young stellar objects (YSOs), 59\% of which are found in clusters. Six subregions (including five located near the edges of the shell) are very well correlated with the dust clumps, CO gas, and YSOs. The average values of Mach numbers derived using NH$_{3}$ data for three (East~1, East~2, and Central~E) out of these six subregions are 2.9, 2.3, and 2.9, indicating these subregions are supersonic. The molecular outflows are detected in these three subregions, further confirming the on-going star formation activity. Together, all these results are interpreted as observational evidence of positive feedback of a massive star.Comment: 28 pages, 15 figures, 3 tables, Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journa

Kinetics of Decomposition of Nitramine Propellant by Differential Scanning Calorimetry

The paper describes an experimental procedure for the determination of overall kinetic parameters for the exothermic decomposition reaction of nitramine propellant. The kinetic parameters can be obtained through the use of differential thermal analysis (DTA), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) or thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) methods. The procedure is applicable to reactions whose behaviour can be described by the Arrhenius equation and the general rate law. In the present work, DSC technique has been used for the evaluation of Arrehenius activation parameters and specific rate constants for thermal decomposition of a typical nitramine propellant. The kinetic parameters were computed by Ozawa and Kissinger methods for comparison. The activation energy value obtained from the Ozawa method is refined by an iteration procedure using Doyle approximation for the Arrhenius temperature integral p(x)