Tourism and hospitality sector electricity use: evidences from 12 EU countries

At the Paris Conference of the Parties (COP21) in 2015, 195 countries agreed to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change. Along this line, the EU is committed to a 40% reduction in their domestic greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. This new target represents a significant progression beyond its existing 20% emission reduction commitment by 2020. Thus, greater efforts will be needed affecting all productive sectors in order to reduce CO2 emissions and energy consumption. In order to reach this ambitious target, new measures affecting all economic sectors would be needed. This paper focuses on the tourism sector. This aim of this study is to investigate the relationships between tourist overnight stays and the hospitality sector electricity consumption. These relationships are studied for 12 EU countries during the period 2005-2012, accordingly with the available data. With this aim, econometric panel data techniques are used in order to estimate an electricity consumption function for the hospitality sector which depends on tourism, income, price and climate variables. The Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis is also tested. An Energy-tourism Kuznets Curve would show that increasing earnings from tourism will bring about reduced electricity consumption from a threshold point, which could be related to the fact that more earnings could imply undertaking more energy efficiency measures

El capital turístico en España y su influencia en el crecimiento económico

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La II República, la Guerra Civil y la Autarquía (1931-1951). Dos décadas de estancamiento en el sector turístico español.

Durante el periodo comprendido entre 1931 y 1951, España experimentó importantes cambios políticos que dieron lugar a tres etapas claramente delimitadas: la II República, la Guerra Civil y la Autarquía. En ellas se alternaron dos sistemas políticos claramente enfrentados que incluso llegaron a ser coetáneos durante la contienda nacional. En este trabajo, nos centramos en el desarrollo de las políticas turísticas aplicadas durante esos años, las cuales estuvieron marcadas fundamentalmente por la carencia de infraestructuras turísticas y escasas partidas presupuestarias, a pesar de ser el turismo una actividad que ya venía suscitando interés político desde principios del siglo XX.La metodología de análisis aplicada en este trabajo difiere de la que se ha venido utilizando para explicar la historia del turismo en España. Tradicionalmente, los estudios sobre la evolución en España de las actividades turísticas, las políticas que las regulan y sus efectos económicos, han estado ligados, más bien, al análisis de los períodos políticos que los económicos, es decir, la Monarquía de Alfonso XIII, la II República, el Franquismo y la Democracia (Moreno, 2010; Pellerejo, 2005; Velasco, 2008). Nuestro propósito es analizar el sector del turismo en España durante los 20 años comprendidos entre 1931 y 1951 a partir del estudio de esas tres grandes etapas, para mostrar sus avances o estancamientos, teniendo en cuenta dos aspectos fundamentales: la articulación legal del sector, así como los principales protagonistas que impulsaron las políticas turísticas durante esas etapas, tales como Carlos Esplá o Luis Bolín

How do macroeconomics’ students assess the use of digital learning resources? A post-pandemic analysis.

This study analyses student assessment outcomes on three types of Digital Learning Resources created for online teaching of Macroeconomics during the Covid-19 pandemic: digital teaching notes, digital PowerPoint presentations and short videos of complex graphics. Results indicate that all Digital Learning Resources offered to the students are positively assessed in terms of quality, use intensity, utility and general assessment. Digital notes are significantly the most highly rated, which seems to indicate a preference for traditional learning resources. Additionally, our analysis shows that the intensity of Internet use and study time constitute significant factors in explaining the students' higher perception of the teaching notes, compared to the other learning resources. Student gender is not a significant factor to explain the students’ assessments.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Analysis of the Demand of Dark Tourism: A Case Study in Córdoba (Spain)

Visiting places where death is present, either due to a natural tragedy, war, the Holocaust, etc., or because there is the presence of a non-visible entity or paranormal phenomenon, is increasingly more accepted in modern times. It has become a kind of tourism that has grown in demand, though it remains a minority. The city of Cordoba, in the south of Spain, is swarming with houses and places where legends have endured over centuries as a consequence of the coexistence of three cultures – Jewish, Christian and Arab. In turn, popular culture considers these places as having a characteristic “charm” due to the phenomena that happen there. This work analyses the profile of dark tourism tourists, particularly in two sub-segments - that of ghosts and of cemeteries - as well as the existing offer. The aim is to design and improve a quality tourist product that is adapted to the requirements of the demand

Deciphering Master Gene Regulators and Associated Networks of Human Mesenchymal Stromal Cells.

Mesenchymal Stromal Cells (MSC) are multipotent cells characterized by self-renewal, multilineage differentiation, and immunomodulatory properties. To obtain a gene regulatory profile of human MSCs, we generated a compendium of more than two hundred cell samples with genome-wide expression data, including a homogeneous set of 93 samples of five related primary cell types: bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BM-MSC), hematopoietic stem cells (HSC), lymphocytes (LYM), fibroblasts (FIB), and osteoblasts (OSTB). All these samples were integrated to generate a regulatory gene network using the algorithm ARACNe (Algorithm for the Reconstruction of Accurate Cellular Networks; based on mutual information), that finds regulons (groups of target genes regulated by transcription factors) and regulators (i.e., transcription factors, TFs). Furtherly, the algorithm VIPER (Algorithm for Virtual Inference of Protein-activity by Enriched Regulon analysis) was used to inference protein activity and to identify the most significant TF regulators, which control the expression profile of the studied cells. Applying these algorithms, a footprint of candidate master regulators of BM-MSCs was defined, including the genes EPAS1, NFE2L1, SNAI2, STAB2, TEAD1, and TULP3, that presented consistent upregulation and hypomethylation in BM-MSCs. These TFs regulate the activation of the genes in the bone marrow MSC lineage and are involved in development, morphogenesis, cell differentiation, regulation of cell adhesion, and cell structure

Tourism capital: Index for the Spanish provinces through confirmatory factor analysis

In this study, a new conception of the relationships between competitiveness, tourism, and economic growth is proposed. The naturally occurring or inherited tourism resources within the territory, together with productive resources and the relationships between them, are the determining elements of the capacity of the economy to grow. The analysis of this new conceptual framework implies the need to assess the productive factors on the one hand, and the tourism capital (TC) on the other, the latter being measured by some kind of indicator that is not affected by the productive factors. In this study, a TC index is developed for the first time in the literature. It is calculated for the Spanish provinces in 2014, by using synthetic indicators constructed from a weighted average of the initially proposed indicators, where the weight of each of these is obtained through a confirmatory factor analysis. The TC index may allow future empirical studies to analyze how tourism affects economic growth, in relation to other productive factors

Spanish palygorskites: geological setting, mineralogical, textural and crystal-chemical characterization

A representative group of palygorskites from the six most important Spanish deposits and six other occurrences were studied comparing their mineralogy, textural features, crystal-chemistry, and surface properties. These palygorskites have different geological origin: (1) sedimentary in large Tertiary continental basins, (2) hydrothermally altered volcanic rocks in the southern Spanish Peninsula, also Tertiary in age; and (3) fault-hosted pure palygorskites. The most common impurities are quartz and carbonates, both calcite and dolomite, but also feldspar, illite, smectite, and sepiolite have been identified. The structural formulae obtained show great variability between samples, as well as with respect to the theoretical formula for palygorskite, as they range from magnesian to aluminous palygorskites. The most common fibre length ranges between 1 and 10 µm but the palygorskites of hydrothermal origin are much longer, with lengths over 10 µm. The shorter fibres give rise to tightened textures, while longer fibres usually generate more open textures. These properties, along with the degree of compaction, condition the porosity of the sample, which in turn influences its surface properties. The specific surface areas obtained range between 30 m2 g−1 and 263 m2 g−1, depending on the impurities content and on the texture and crystal-chemistry; the highest values correspond to Mg-rich palygorskite

Tourism and temperature effects on the electricity consumption of the hospitality sector

Proyecto RTI2018-096725-B-100 financiado por FEDER/Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación y Ministerio de Universidades .The EU has recently presented a strategic long-term vision for a climate-neutral economy by 2050, considering that climate change is a serious concern for Europeans. A great socio-economic transformation is necessary, affecting all economic sectors. On the one hand, the EU considers that is necessary to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, on the other hand, sectors need to adapt to a warming climate. Focusing on the tourism sector, and using panel data referring to 12 Spanish Mediterranean provinces and the 1999-2014 time period, this study tests the tourist stays and temperature effects on the hospitality sector electricity consumption, by estimating extended Energy Environmental Kuznets curves (E-EKC) for the sector. The results show that the E-EKC hypothesis is not supported. Instead, electricity consumption progressively increases as tourism grows. In addition, the results indicate that temperature variables have notable influence over the electricity use, with a positive influence of global warming on electricity consumption. Finally, results also show positive relationships between overnight stays in hotels with higher star ratings and electricity use, while no significant price effects are observed. Electricity saving measures and renewable electricity generation promotion are recommended, especially in the highest energy consuming establishments.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación y Ministerio de Universidades RTI2018-096725-B-100