bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Preparation of Molecularly Imprinted Microspheres as Biomimetic Recognition Material for In Situ Adsorption and Selective Chemiluminescence Determination of Bisphenol A
Authors: Xiong Yan , Wang Qing , Duan Ming , Xu Jing , Chen Jie , Fang Shenwen
Published: July 2018

Bisphenol A (BPA) is an endocrine disrupter in environments which can induce abnormal differentiation of reproductive organs by interfering with the action of endogenous gonadal steroid hormones. In this work, the bisphenol A (BPA) molecularly-imprinted microspheres (MIMS) were prepared and used as biomimetic recognition material for in situ adsorption and selective chemiluminescence (CL) determination of BPA. Through non-covalent interaction, the BPA-MIMS was successfully prepared by Pickering emulsion polymerization using a BPA template, 4-vinylpyridine (4-VP) monomer, ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA) cross-linker, and a SiO2 dispersion agent. The characterization of scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy-disperse spectroscopy (EDS) showed that the obtained MIMS possessed a regular spherical shape and narrow diameter distribution (25–30 μm). The binding experiment indicated BPA could be adsorbed in situ on the MIMS-packing cell with an apparent maximum amount Qmax of 677.3 μg g−1. Then BPA could be selectively detected by its sensitive inhibition effect on the CL reaction between luminol and periodate (KIO4), and the inhibition mechanism was discussed to reveal the CL reaction process. The CL intensity was linear to BPA concentrations in two ranges, respectively from 0.5 to 1.5 μg mL−1 with a detection limit of 8.0 ng mL−1 (3σ), and from 1.5 to 15 μg mL−1 with a limit of detection (LOD) of 80 ng mL−1 (3σ). The BPA-MIPMS showed excellent selectivity for BPA adsorption and the proposed CL method has been successfully applied to BPA determination in environmental water samples.
Synthesis of Benzene Tetracarboxamide Polyamine and Its Effect on Epoxy Resin Properties
Authors: Yu Seoyoon , Lee Wonjoo , Seo Bongkuk , Lim Chung-Sun
Published: July 2018

Epoxy resins have found various industrial applications in high-performance thermosetting resins, high-performance composites, electronic-packaging materials, adhesives, protective coatings, etc., due to their outstanding performance, including high toughness, high-temperature performance, chemical and environmental resistance, versatile processability and adhesive properties. However, cured epoxy resins are very brittle, which limits their applications. In this work, we attempted to enhance the toughness of cured epoxy resins by introducing benzene tetracarboxamide polyamine (BTCP), synthesized from pyromellitic dianhydride (PMDA) and diamines in N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP) solvent. During this reaction, increased viscosity and formation of amic acid could be confirmed. The chemical reactions were monitored and evidenced using 1H-NMR spectroscopy, FT-IR spectroscopy, water gel-phase chromatography (GPC) analysis, amine value determination and acid value determination. We also studied the effect of additives on thermomechanical properties using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), dynamical mechanical analysis (DMA), thermomechanical analysis (TMA) and by measuring mechanical properties. The BTCP-containing epoxy resin exhibited high mechanical strength and adhesion strength proportional to the amount of BTCP. Furthermore, field-emission scanning electron microscopy images were obtained for examining the cross-sectional morphology changes of the epoxy resin specimens with varying amounts of BTCP.
Study of Temperature Fields and Heavy Metal Content in the Ash and Flue Gas Produced by the Combustion of Briquettes Coming from Paper and Cardboard Waste
Authors: Ibrahim Harouna Gado , Ouiminga Salifou K. , Yonli Arsène , Sanogo Oumar , Daho Tizane , Koulidiati Jean
Published: July 2018

The present study focused on the combustion of four types of briquettes made from paper and cardboard waste produced in Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso). Rotary and tubular kilns were used to study the combustion. The combustion mean temperatures, nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium (NPK) content in the ash and heavy metals content in the ash and the flue gas were analyzed. The combustion steady phase mean temperatures ranged from 950 °C to 750 °C were obtained according to briquettes type. The temperature favored the transfer of the heavy metal in the flue gas comparatively to the ash mainly for Hg, Cd and Pb. The Pb, Hg and Mn content in flue gas and the ash are higher than their content in the parent wood used for paper production due to the additive during the manufacturing process. The results showed a high content of heavy metal in flue gas produced by combustion of briquette made with office paper and in the ash for the briquette made of corrugated cardboard. Furthermore, the low heavy metal contain in the ash allow their use for soil amendment. However, ash contained a low proportion of NPK (less than 2%) which does not allow their usage as fertilizer alone.
Integrating Airborne Hyperspectral, Topographic, and Soil Data for Estimating Pasture Quality Using Recursive Feature Elimination with Random Forest Regression
Authors: Pullanagari Rajasheker R. , Kereszturi Gabor , Yule Ian
Published: July 2018

Accurate and efficient monitoring of pasture quality on hill country farm systems is crucial for pasture management and optimizing production. Hyperspectral imaging is a promising tool for mapping a wide range of biophysical and biochemical properties of vegetation from leaf to canopy scale. In this study, the potential of high spatial resolution and airborne hyperspectral imaging for predicting crude protein (CP) and metabolizable energy (ME) in heterogeneous hill country farm was investigated. Regression models were developed between measured pasture quality values and hyperspectral data using random forest regression (RF). The results proved that pasture quality could be predicted with hyperspectral data alone; however, accuracy was improved after combining the hyperspectral data with environmental data (elevation, slope angle, slope aspect, and soil type) where the prediction accuracy for CP was R2CV (cross-validated coefficient of determination) = 0.70, RMSECV (cross-validated root mean square error) = 2.06%, RPDCV (cross-validated ratio to prediction deviation) = 1.82 and ME: R2CV = 0.75, RMSECV = 0.65 MJ/kg DM, RPDCV = 2.11. Interestingly, the accuracy was further out-performed by considering important hyperspectral and environmental variables using RF combined with recursive feature elimination (RFE) (CP: R2CV = 0.80, RMSECV = 1.68%, RPDCV = 2.23; ME: R2CV = 0.78, RMSECV = 0.61 MJ/kg DM, RPDCV = 2.19). Similar performance trends were noticed with validation data. Utilizing the best model, spatial pasture quality maps were created across the farm. Overall, this study showed the potential of airborne hyperspectral data for producing accurate pasture quality maps, which will help farm managers to optimize decisions to improve environmental and economic benefits.
The Salinity Retrieval Algorithms for the NASA Aquarius Version 5 and SMAP Version 3 Releases
Authors: Meissner Thomas , Wentz Frank J. , Le Vine David M.
Published: July 2018

The Aquarius end-of-mission (Version 5) salinity data set was released in December 2017. This article gives a comprehensive overview of the main steps of the Level 2 salinity retrieval algorithm. In particular, we will discuss the corrections for wind induced surface roughness, atmospheric oxygen absorption, reflected galactic radiation and side-lobe intrusion from land surfaces. Most of these corrections have undergone major updates from previous versions, which has helped mitigating temporal and zonal biases. Our article also discusses the ocean target calibration for Aquarius Version 5. We show how formal error estimates for the Aquarius retrievals can be obtained by perturbing the input to the algorithm. The performance of the Aquarius Version 5 salinity retrievals is evaluated against salinity measurements from the ARGO network and the HYCOM model. When stratified as function of sea surface temperature or sea surface wind speed, the difference between Aquarius Version 5 and ARGO is within ±0.1 psu. The estimated global RMS uncertainty for monthly 100 km averages is 0.128 psu for the Aquarius Version 5 retrievals. Finally, we show how the Aquarius Version 5 salinity retrieval algorithm is adapted to retrieve salinity from the Soil-Moisture Active Passion (SMAP) mission.
Mouthwitch: A Novel Head Mount Type Hands-Free Input Device that Uses the Movement of the Temple to Control a Camera
Authors: Taniguchi Kazuhiro , Nishikawa Atsushi
Published: July 2018

We have developed an interface (mouthwitch) for a head-mounted type camera with which pictures can be taken with a head-mounted camera, hands-free, simply by “opening your mouth continuously for approximately one second and then closing it again”. This mouthwitch uses a sensor equipped with an LED and photo transistor on the temple to optically measure the changes in the form of the temple that occur when the mouth is opened and closed. Eight test subjects (males and females aged between 21 and 44 years old) performed evaluation tests using this mouthwitch when resting, speaking, chewing, walking, and running. The results showed that all test subjects were able to open and close the mouth, and the measurement results pertaining to the temple shape changes that occurred at this time were highly reproducible. Additionally, the average value for accuracy obtained for the eight test subjects through the verification tests was 100% when resting, chewing, or walking, and 99.8% when speaking or running. Similarly, the average values for precision were 100% for all items, and the average values for recall were 100% when resting or chewing, 98.8% when speaking, 97.5% when walking, and 87.5% when running.
Wireless Chipless System for Humidity Sensing
Authors: Salmerón José F. , Albrecht Andreas , Kaffah Silmi , Becherer Markus , Lugli Paolo , Rivadeneyra Almudena
Published: July 2018

This work describes a fully wireless sensory system where a chipless strategy is followed in the sensor part. Alternatively, to characterize only the sensing element, we present the response of the reader antenna when the sensing element is placed in its vicinity: changes in the parameter of interest are seen by the reader through inductive coupling, varying its frequency response. The sensing part consists of a LC circuit manufactured by printing techniques on a flexible substrate, whose electrical permittivity shows dependence with the moisture content. The measurement distance show significant differences in the frequency response: a change of 700 kHz is observed when the measurement is performed directly on the wireless chipless sensor between 20% and 80%RH, while this variation in frequency is reduced more than three times when measuring at the reader antenna with 5 mm distance between elements. Furthermore, we demonstrate the importance of the separation between reader and sensor to get a reliable measuring system.
Optimal Camera Pose and Placement Configuration for Maximum Field-of-View Video Stitching
Authors: Watras Alex J. , Kim Jae-Jun , Liu Hewei , Hu Yu Hen , Jiang Hongrui
Published: July 2018

An optimal camera placement problem is investigated. The objective is to maximize the area of the field of view (FoV) of a stitched video obtained by stitching video streams from an array of cameras. The positions and poses of these cameras are restricted to a given set of selections. The camera array is designed to be placed inside the abdomen to support minimally invasive laparoscopic surgery. Hence, a few non-traditional requirements/constraints are imposed: Adjacent views are required to overlap to support image registration for seamless video stitching. The resulting effective FoV should be a contiguous region without any holes and should be a convex polygon. With these requirements, traditional camera placement algorithms cannot be directly applied to solve this problem. In this work, we show the complexity of this problem grows exponentially as a function of the problem size, and then present a greedy polynomial time heuristic solution that approximates well to the globally optimal solution. We present a new approach to directly evaluate the combined coverage area (area of FoV) as the union of a set of quadrilaterals. We also propose a graph-based approach to ensure the stitching requirement (overlap between adjacent views) is satisfied. We present a method to find a convex polygon with maximum area from a given polygon. Several design examples show that the proposed algorithm can achieve larger FoV area while using much less computing time.
A Non-Destructive System Based on Electrical Tomography and Machine Learning to Analyze the Moisture of Buildings
Authors: Rymarczyk Tomasz , Kłosowski Grzegorz , Kozłowski Edward
Published: July 2018

This article presents the results of research on a new method of spatial analysis of walls and buildings moisture. Due to the fact that destructive methods are not suitable for historical buildings of great architectural significance, a non-destructive method based on electrical tomography has been adopted. A hybrid tomograph with special sensors was developed for the measurements. This device enables the acquisition of data, which are then reconstructed by appropriately developed methods enabling spatial analysis of wet buildings. Special electrodes that ensure good contact with the surface of porous building materials such as bricks and cement were introduced. During the research, a group of algorithms enabling supervised machine learning was analyzed. They have been used in the process of converting input electrical values into conductance depicted by the output image pixels. The conductance values of individual pixels of the output vector made it possible to obtain images of the interior of building walls as both flat intersections (2D) and spatial (3D) images. The presented group of algorithms has a high application value. The main advantages of the new methods are: high accuracy of imaging, low costs, high processing speed, ease of application to walls of various thickness and irregular surface. By comparing the results of tomographic reconstructions, the most efficient algorithms were identified.
Polypyrrole/Agarose Hydrogel-Based Bladder Volume Sensor with a Resistor Ladder Structure
Authors: Kim Mi Kyung , Lee Sungwoo , Yoon Inug , Kook Geon , Jung Yeon Su , Bawazir Sarah S. M. , Stefanini Cesare , Lee Hyunjoo J.
Published: July 2018

Chronic monitoring of bladder activity and urine volume is essential for patients suffering from urinary dysfunctions. However, due to the anatomy and dynamics of the bladder, chronic and precise monitoring of bladder activity remains a challenge. Here, we propose a new sensing mechanism that measures the bladder volume using a resistive ladder network with contact switches. Instead of measuring the impedance between the electrode continuously, the proposed sensor provides a digitized output (‘on’ or ‘off’) when the bladder volume reaches a certain threshold value. We present simple proof-of-concept sensors which compare the discrete-mode operation to the continuous-mode operation. In addition, by using multiple pairs of this contact-mode switch in a resistor ladder structure, we demonstrate monitoring of the bladder volume in four discrete steps using an idealized balloon and an ex vivo pig’s bladder. We implemented the resistive ladder network using a conductive polypyrrole/agarose hydrogel composite which exhibits a Young’s modulus comparable to that of the bladder wall. Compared to the continuous-mode operation, the proposed sensing mechanism is less susceptible to drift due to material degradation and environmental factors.
Patterns, Costs, and Implications of Police Abuse to Citizens’ Rights in the Republic of Zimbabwe
Authors: Mugari Ishmael , Obioha Emeka E.
Published: July 2018

The Police play a key role in maintaining law and order and safeguarding the security of the nation and its citizens. To enable them to discharge their constitutional mandate, they are entrusted with powers such as the power to arrest, detain, search, and to use force. However, police officers have often abused these powers with serious consequences on the image and operations of the organisation. The media is often inundated with news on unlawful arrests, arbitrary search and seizure, unlawful methods of investigations, and the excessive use of force. It is without a doubt that these incidences of abuse of powers and functions by the police come at a price. This study, a survey conducted with 91 respondents (83 members of public and 8 police officers) in 2 policing districts in Zimbabwe reveals wanton violation of human rights, police brutality, and the abuse of power which have resulted in both social and economic costs to the Police service and government of Zimbabwe through Civil suits against the police. Among other issues, training and decisiveness in dealing with the implicated police officers were viewed as the most effective ways for dealing with police abuse of power.
Influence of Rice Straw Fibers on Concrete Strength and Drying Shrinkage
Authors: Ataie Feraidon
Published: July 2018

Fibers have been used in construction materials for centuries. This study investigated the impact of the addition of rice straw fibers (RSF) on the compressive and flexural strengths of concrete, drying shrinkage, and on the heat of cement hydration. RSF was saturated before being added to concrete. Addition of RSF in concrete reduced concrete strength, increased concrete drying shrinkage, and increased the induction period of cement hydration. It was suggested that water squeezed out of RSF during mixing and sample consolidation increased effective water-to-cement ratios (w/c) and resulted in reduction of concrete strength and increase of concrete drying shrinkage. The increase of retardation time was attributed to leaching of organic and inorganic compounds out of RSF into the pore solution. It was shown that samples containing washed RSF did not have noticeable improvement in compressive strength over samples containing unwashed (as received) RSF. However, samples containing washed RSF had lower drying shrinkage and shorter induction period compared to those containing unwashed RSF.
Vehicles Allocation for Fruit Distribution Considering CO2 Emissions and Decisions on Subcontracting
Authors: Tordecilla-Madera Rafael , Polo Andrés , Cañón Adrián
Published: July 2018

An important problem in rural-area supply chains is how to transport the harvested fruit to urban areas. Low- and medium-capacity vehicles are used in Colombia to carry out this activity. Operating them comes with an inherent cost and generates carbon emissions. Normally, minimizing operating costs and minimizing carbon emissions are conflicting objectives to allocate such vehicles efficiently in any of the supply chain echelons. We designed a multi-objective mixed-integer programming model to address this problem and solved it via the ε-constraint method. It includes decisions mainly about quantities of fruit to transport and store, types of vehicles to allocate according to their capacities, CO2 emission levels of these vehicles, and subcontracting on the collection process. The main results show two schedules for allocating the vehicles, showing minimum and maximum CO2 emissions. Minimum CO2 emissions scheme require subcontracting and the maximum CO2 scheme does not. Then, a Pareto frontier shows that CO2 emissions level are inversely proportional to total management cost for different scenarios in which fruit supply was modified.
Gaps and Research Demand for Sustainability Certification and Standardisation in a Sustainable Bio-Based Economy in the EU
Authors: Majer Stefan , Wurster Simone , Moosmann David , Ladu Luana , Sumfleth Beike , Thrän Daniela
Published: July 2018

The concept of the bio-based economy has gained increasing attention and importance in recent years. It is seen as a chance to reduce the dependency on fossil resources while securing a sustainable supply of energy, water, and raw materials, and furthermore preserving soils, climate and the environment. The intended transformation is characterized by economic, environmental and social challenges and opportunities, and it is understood as a social transition process towards a sustainable, bio-based and nature-oriented economy. This process requires general mechanisms to establish and monitor safeguards for a sustainable development of the bio-based economy on a national and EU level. Sustainability certification and standardisation of bio-based products can help to manage biogenic resources and their derived products in a sustainable manner. In this paper, we have analysed the current status of sustainability certification and standardisation in the bio-based economy by conducting comprehensive desktop research, which was complemented by a series of expert interviews. The analysis revealed an impressive amount of existing certification frameworks, criteria, indicators and applicable standards. However, relevant gaps relating to existing criteria sets, the practical implementation of criteria in certification processes, the legislative framework, end-of-life processes, as well as necessary standardisation activities, were identified which require further research and development to improve sustainability certification and standardisation for a growing bio-based economy.
An Innovative Approach to Determining High-Risk Nodes in a Complex Urban Rail Transit Station: A Perspective of Promoting Urban Sustainability
Authors: Xu Hui , Jiao Liudan , Chen Shulin , Deng Milan , Shen Ningxin
Published: July 2018

Public safety presents high importance in urban sustainable development. Transportation safety is a significant section in public safety. Over the last couple of decades, as a sustainable means of public transportation, urban rail transit presents a rapid development in China. Increasing initiatives and practices have been engaged with views to facilitating people’s travel and intensive utilizing land resources. Echoing this, rail transit stations with multi-floor structure have been built and show structure complexity. Due to this complexity, there is a need to focus on risk management for the stations to guarantee operation safety. Accordingly, this research introduces an innovative approach to identify high-risk nodes in the complex rail transit stations. The high-risk nodes are determined according to two aspects, which are the key nodes of the station and presenting large passenger volumes. Complex network analysis and field investigation were adopted in this study. The Lianglukou rail transit station in Chongqing, China was selected for case study. The research results in this study indicate that (1) in platform floors, stairs/escalators are almost high-risk nodes; (2) columns and metal fences that have been determined as high-risk nodes are located near stairs/escalators; (3) in concourse floor, the determined high-risk nodes present relative high degree centrality and low betweenness centrality compared with nodes in platform floor. The obtained high-risk nodes are helpful for the management firms to develop risk mitigation measures and re-allocate their resources to create a safe environment for passengers in the stations. The guarantee for the rail transit station operation safety plays an important role in enhancing urban sustainability.
Microplastics Shedding from Textiles—Developing Analytical Method for Measurement of Shed Material Representing Release during Domestic Washing
Authors: Jönsson Christina , Levenstam Arturin Oscar , Hanning Anne-Charlotte , Landin Rebecka , Holmström Emma , Roos Sandra
Published: July 2018

The topic of shedding of micro-sized polymeric particles, so called microplastics, from textiles has been covered by an increasing number of studies over the past years. However, the methods with which the shedding of microplastics from textiles has been measured so far has shown a large variation. Consequently, the results regarding the amount of shed particles also vary, from 120 to 728,289 particles from similar garments in recent studies. This article presents research enabling for identification of whether the shedding of microplastics from different types of fabric was dependent on construction parameters. As none of the methods in the existing literature could be used for evaluating shedding of microplastics from textiles, a method was developed for this purpose. The resulting final method is described in this paper as well as the work with minimizing the error sources and consequently the standard deviation of the results through selection of material samples, equipment and procedure for sample preparation, washing, filtering the washing water and analyzing the shed microplastics. Comparing the environmental load of different garments, or identifying improvement possibilities in garment construction are two examples of how the method can be utilized.
Impact of Population Aging on Carbon Emission in China: A Panel Data Analysis
Authors: Li Weidong , Qi Xin , Zhao Xiaojun
Published: July 2018

The impact of population structure on carbon emission has always been a key area of research in modern society. In this paper, we propose a new expanded STIRPAT model and panel co-integration method to analyze the relationship between population aging and carbon emission, based on the provincial panel data in China from 1999 to 2014. Empirical results show that there exists a significant inverted U-shaped curve between the population aging and carbon emission. There also exist regional discrepancies, where the impact of the population aging on carbon emission in the eastern region is significantly positive. By contrast, a negative relationship arises in the central and western regions. Finally, several suggestions for low carbon development are provided.
Evaluation of Sustainability Practices in Small and Medium-Sized Manufacturing Enterprises in Southern Brazil
Authors: Schmidt Fabricio Carlos , Zanini Roselaine Ruviaro , Korzenowski André Luis , Schmidt Junior Reno , Xavier do Nascimento Karl Benchimol
Published: July 2018

The purpose of this article is to analyze the performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) manufacturing, aiming to identify the main practices of sustainability, including the values and transparency, internal audience, environment, supplier relationships, customer and/or consumer relationships, and community relationships. In order to develop this research, a questionnaire was applied on the subject in question, through which the companies were classified as to their reality in relation to corporate social responsibility. Based on the analysis, it was observed that five of these companies obtained a score that indicates that the companies have already assimilated the associated concepts and are clear of the necessary commitments for a socially responsible action. However, given the results obtained, it is possible to conclude that there is a need to strengthen the actions to be taken with regard to corporate social responsibility, since no company has positioned itself in excellence. In addition, some suggestions for new research were identified and discussed in the analysis of the results.
Efficiency of Energy Taxes and the Validity of the Residential Electricity Environmental Kuznets Curve in the European Union
Authors: Borozan Djula
Published: July 2018

To achieve the energy targets, energy policy of the European Union (EU) is trying to discourage residential electricity consumption employing different measures but without worsening the quality of life and jeopardizing its economic growth and development at the same time. This paper aims to directly and indirectly explore the effects of energy taxes on household electricity consumption and test the validity of the household electricity environmental Kuznets curve (EEKC) in a multivariate setting and a system generalized method of moments framework for EU member countries in the period 2005–2016. The results reveal that energy taxes influence electricity consumption more efficiently through energy prices than directly and in the long-run. Efficiency of energy taxes can be reinforced by combining changes in energy prices and policy measures that change the electricity consumption behavior patterns. As for the EEKC, the paper corroborates its inverted U-shaped form, assuming thereby at least the same level of policy efforts directed to accomplish the energy targets and household willingness to use goods in an environmentally friendly way.
Exploring the Road to Agricultural Sustainability by Assessing the EU Debt Influencing Factors
Authors: Brad Laura , Popescu Gabriel , Zaharia Alina , Diaconeasa Maria Claudia , Mihai Daniela
Published: July 2018

The importance of agricultural financing in ensuring food security and safety, jobs, poverty reduction, economic growth and more recently, climate change mitigation, natural resource conservation and sustainable development imposes periodic analysis of the factors which might influence the farmers’ financial situation, in order to improve it. One way of assessing this is to analyze the agricultural debt. In this context, based on previous models, the paper aims to assess the impact of specific factors on the agricultural debt level in the European Union during 2008–2015, as these should be considered in future common agriculture policies as well as in achieving sustainable agriculture. The research was conducted based on econometric techniques, by applying panel models in the Eviews 7.0 software-64 bit version. More than 20 variables were considered in the analysis. Some of the findings suggest that an increase in subsidies as well as the share of cash flow in the total existing capital would determine considerable reductions of the total debt. Decoupled subsidies seem to have a higher impact than coupled subsidies on short term debt, while its value is between the one found for coupled subsidies in the case of long term debt. Large farms/companies, to which decoupled payments are granted, have higher debts on long run and on total debt. The same units, to which coupled subsidies were granted, have smaller short-term debt. In contrast, the increases of labor costs, fixed costs, and crop/livestock costs lead to an increase in the total debt, since the farms require additional financial resources to cover the expanded costs. Also, the results suggest that short-term debts are mainly formed of long-term loans that reached maturity. In this case, the authors support the idea of differentiated financing programs for the agricultural activities because of their peculiarities and reinforced by the need to turn the intensive agriculture into a sustainable and plentiful one.
In Search of Network Sustainability: A Multi-Level Perspective on the Paradox of Cooperation and Competition in Networks
Authors: Austen Agata
Published: July 2018

Although all types of public collaborative networks are aimed towards taking joint actions, relations between partner organizations are not always so explicit. Referring to the dialectic approach, it may be concluded that a number of tensions are identifiable in networks, among them tension between cooperation and competition. Understanding the tensions that exist in inter-organizational networks is vital for a proper comprehension of networks, as continuous efforts to meet multiple, divergent demands should bring about long–term sustainability. To examine the phenomena of cooperation and competition in interorganizational networks, a quantitative study on local partnerships among Social Welfare Centers and other public institutions and non-profit institutions was conducted. Using a multi-level perspective, the research introduces orientation towards both cooperation and competition at different levels of analysis and examines the tensions between them. The results of this research show that there is a mutual influence of orientation towards competition/cooperation, both at the individual level and the network level, and that there is a mutual influence of the reconciliation of the contradictions between orientation towards cooperation and orientation towards competition both at the individual level and the network level.
Research on a Gas Index Reflecting the Sorption Process on Carbon Materials in Coal Mines
Authors: Wojtacha-Rychter Karolina , Smoliński Adam
Published: July 2018

Based on the concentration of gases such as propylene and ethylene in the atmosphere of a mine, it is possible to assess the development of a mine fire. With the increase of coal temperature, an increased emission of these gases has been observed. However, the experiment results presented in this paper prove that the use of propylene and ethylene for the prediction of the spontaneous combustion of coal have some limitations. It was found that during a flow of gas mixture through the sorption column, propylene and ethylene were sorbed on coal. This phenomenon manifests in smaller amounts of gases at the outlet of the sorption column. By comparing the concentration of ethylene to propylene at the inlet of the column, it was concluded that the ratio was usually below 3, whereas the range of the ratio at the end of the column was between 0.6–353. The value of gases ratio changed depending on the type of coal material in the column. The results of this experiment provide useful information that the quantitative relation between ethylene and propylene concentrations may indicate the occurrence of the sorption process on carbon materials in coal seams.
The Optimal Carbon Reduction and Return Strategies under Carbon Tax Policy
Authors: Wang Jia , Huang Xijia
Published: July 2018

Recently, consumers have been increasingly shopping due to the development of e-commerce; thus, many traditional firms producing green products are entering e-commerce platforms to sell products for their survival. In the contexts of online sales and carbon tax policy, firms need to determine an optimal carbon reduction level and online return strategies. To address firms’ decision-making challenges, we consider a firm producing and selling its green products via an e-commerce platform. For optimal online return strategies, we find that if the residual value of the returned product is relatively small, the firm should not offer an online return service; otherwise, the firm should offer this service. Moreover, the results show that carbon tax policy is detrimental to the firm and consumers, while increasing the average customer satisfaction rate of the product benefits the firm and consumers. Interestingly, we find that the platform should reduce its referral fee as the unit carbon tax increases.
Estimation Methods for Soil Mercury Content Using Hyperspectral Remote Sensing
Authors: Zhao Li , Hu Yue-Ming , Zhou Wu , Liu Zhen-Hua , Pan Yu-Chun , Shi Zhou , Wang Lu , Wang Guang-Xing
Published: July 2018

Mercury is one of the five most toxic heavy metals to the human body. In order to select a high-precision method for predicting the mercury content in soil using hyperspectral techniques, 75 soil samples were collected in Guangdong Province to obtain the soil mercury content by chemical analysis and hyperspectral data based on an indoor hyperspectral experiment. A multiple linear regression (MLR), a back-propagation neural network (BPNN), and a genetic algorithm optimization of the BPNN (GA-BPNN) were used to establish a relationship between the hyperspectral data and the soil mercury content and to predict the soil mercury content. In addition, the feasibility and modeling effects of the three modeling methods were compared and discussed. The results show that the GA-BPNN provided the best soil mercury prediction model. The modeling R2 is 0.842, the root mean square error (RMSE) is 0.052, and the mean absolute error (MAE) is 0.037; the testing R2 is 0.923, the RMSE is 0.042, and the MAE is 0.033. Thus, the GA-BPNN method is the optimum method to predict soil mercury content and the results provide a scientific basis and technical support for the hyperspectral inversion of the soil mercury content.
From Awe to Ecological Behavior: The Mediating Role of Connectedness to Nature
Authors: Yang Yan , Hu Jing , Jing Fengjie , Nguyen Bang
Published: July 2018

Awe is a self-transcendent emotion that can diminish one’s focus on the self and serves as an important motivator of commitment to social collectives. However, the influence of awe on ecological behavior is not clear. This study examines the relationships between people’s feeling of awe, their connectedness to nature, and ecological behavior. Three experiments tested the effect of awe on ecological behaviors including mediation tests. Compared with participants in the control condition, participants in the awe condition were more inclined to behave ecologically (Study 1 and 2) and reported a higher feeling of connectedness to nature (Study 2). Moreover, the relationship between awe and ecological behavior was mediated by connectedness to nature (Study 3). These findings indicate that awe helps broaden the self-concept by including nature and increase connectedness to nature, which in turn lead to ecological behavior. They also highlight the significance of connectedness in explaining why awe increases ecological behavior.
System Dynamics versus Agent-Based Modeling: A Review of Complexity Simulation in Construction Waste Management
Authors: Ding Zhikun , Gong Wenyan , Li Shenghan , Wu Zezhou
Published: July 2018

The environmental impacts caused by construction waste have attracted increasing attention in recent years. The effective management of construction waste is essential in order to reduce negative environmental influences. Construction waste management (CWM) can be viewed as a complex adaptive system, as it involves not only various factors (e.g., social, economic, and environmental), but also different stakeholders (such as developers, contractors, designers, and governmental departments) simultaneously. System dynamics (SD) and agent-based modeling (ABM) are the two most popular approaches to deal with the complexity in CWM systems. However, the two approaches have their own advantages and drawbacks. The aim of this research is to conduct a comprehensive review and develop a novel model for combining the advantages of both SD and ABM. The research findings revealed that two options can be considered when combining SD with ABM; the two options are discussed.
Why Affordable Clean Energy Is Not Enough. A Capability Perspective on the Sustainable Development Goals
Authors: Hillerbrand Rafaela
Published: July 2018

This paper reflects on criticisms raised in the literature on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These have been criticized as creating a dichotomy between the environment and human beings that fails to address the multiple interconnections between the two. This paper focuses on SDG7—“affordable and clean energy”—and suggests that there is in fact a tripartite distinction between the environment, human beings and technology underlying the SDGs. This distinction, we argue, does not adequately represent the multiple interconnections among the various SDGs and hampers their implementation. We contend that the formulation of SDG7 produces a circular definition of sustainability, a difficulty that is currently resolved at the level of the targets and indicators in a way that regards energy technologies primarily as artifacts. By contrast, the literature on ethical aspects of energy systems largely agrees that energy is a paradigmatic example of a sociotechnical system. We contend that, by not considering this sociotechnical nature, the SDGs run the risk of implicitly defending a certain variant of technological optimism and determinism. We argue that this is disadvantageous to the environment, human well-being and technological development. In line with recent critical evaluations of the SDGs, we argue that these (and other) shortcomings can be addressed by better connecting the SDGs to human well-being. Building on recent literature that expands the scope of the Capability Approach as an alternative measure of well-being so as to include considerations of sustainability, we articulate a framework that allows us to elucidate this connection and thus to take advantage of synergies between human well-being and the environment. On the basis of the Capability Approach, we argue that equating sustainable energy with renewable energy—as is done in the transition from SDG7’s goal to its targets—is indefensible because, as part of the overarching energy systems, energy technologies cannot be classified as simply right or wrong. Rather, the indicators and targets within a framework focused on sustainability need to be (more) context sensitive, meaning that, among other things, they may vary by country and with the available technology.
Households’ Energy Consumption Change in China: A Multi-Regional Perspective
Authors: Zhang Haiyan , Lahr Michael
Published: July 2018

As China’s economy enters the “new normal” phase, its growth model has gradually changed to focus more on domestic consumption. In this paper, we examine regional disparities in households’ total (direct and indirect) energy use in China from 2002 to 2012. Using a structural decomposition approach, we examine how changes in China’s technology, economic structure, urbanization, lifestyle, and interregional trade affect household energy use across different regions. We find that rising income levels contributed most to energy usage. Improved energy efficiency offset the rising effects of heightened household consumption in most regions. Rural-to-urban migration played an important role in enhancing energy use in all regions from 2002 to 2012. Moreover, households started to rely more heavily on interregional trade of final goods and services to meet their consumption demands. Based on this multi-regional and multi-angle study, we provide some regional-specific policies that would help curb household energy demand and promote sustainable consumption in China.
Embedding Diversity in Sustainability Reporting
Authors: Maj Jolanta
Published: July 2018

The relevance of diversity has been recognised by academics and researchers as well as decision-makers. Diversity reporting can be perceived as the first step in addressing inequalities in organisations and potential assistance for the diversity agenda, because it allows measuring diversity and ultimately managing it. However, the recognition of the importance of diversity and diversity reporting does not necessarily contribute to a greater inclusion of diversity into sustainability reporting. The following paper attempts to determine the scope of diversity reporting, the specificity of the collected and disclosed diversity data, as well as the determinants of diversity reporting. For this purpose, a CATI (computer-assisted telephone interview) research was conducted, involving companies indexed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. The results were analysed using the Cramer’s V contingency measure, the Kruskal–Wallis H test and ordinal regression. The results show a substantial difference in the collection of diversity information between organisations that map and that do not map their stakeholders. Furthermore, they show that, when organisations collect diversity data, their specificity is rather high, however this does not translate into an equally high level of diversity disclosure. Furthermore, the paper analyses the possible determinants of diversity disclosure, which do not necessarily overlap with the determinants of sustainability reporting.
Clays of Different Plasticity as Materials for Landfill Liners in Rural Systems of Sustainable Waste Management
Authors: Widomski Marcin Konrad , Stępniewski Witol , Musz-Pomorska Anna
Published: July 2018

This paper presents a study assessing the possible application of seven clay substrates of various particle compositions and plasticity, sampled locally in rural regions, as materials allowing affordable construction of the waste landfill liners, which meet the main principles of sustainability, utilize locally available materials and limit the environmental threats posed by landfill leachate to water, public health and arable land. The researched substrates were tested according to their long-term sealing properties by their saturated hydraulic conductivity after compaction, swelling and shrinkage characteristics and ability to sustain their sealing capability after repeated drying and rewetting. The basic characteristics of soils were determined by the standard methods. Saturated hydraulic conductivity after compaction and after repeated shrinking and swelling were tested in laboratory falling head permeameters. Shrinkage characteristics were based on dimensionless indicators of the geometry and linear extensibility. The obtained results showed that the tested clay substrates were found applicable to construction of compacted clay liner for sustainable waste landfill. The environmental sustainability of a local, rural waste landfill, isolated by compacted earthen liners utilizing local materials is, in our opinion possible, but strongly related to the compaction parameters applied during liner construction for the given clay substrate.
Numerical Study of Dynamic Properties of Fractional Viscoplasticity Model
Authors: Szymczyk Michał , Nowak Marcin , Sumelka Wojciech
Published: July 2018

The fractional viscoplasticity (FV) concept combines the Perzyna type viscoplastic model and fractional calculus. This formulation includes: (i) rate-dependence; (ii) plastic anisotropy; (iii) non-normality; (iv) directional viscosity; (v) implicit/time non-locality; and (vi) explicit/stress-fractional non-locality. This paper presents a comprehensive analysis of the above mentioned FV properties, together with a detailed discussion on a general 3D numerical implementation for the explicit time integration scheme.
Selecting the Optimal Mine Ventilation System via a Decision Making Framework under Hesitant Linguistic Environment
Authors: Liang Weizhang , Zhao Guoyan , Luo Suizhi
Published: July 2018

Ventilation systems are amongst the most essential components of a mine. As the indicators of ventilation systems are in general of ambiguity or uncertainty, the selection of ventilation systems can therefore be regarded as a complex fuzzy decision making problem. In order to solve such problems, a decision making framework based on a new concept, the hesitant linguistic preference relation (HLPR), is constructed. The basic elements in the HLPR are hesitant fuzzy linguistic numbers (HFLNs). At first, new operational laws and aggregation operators of HFLNs are defined to overcome the limitations in existing literature. Subsequently, a novel comparison method based on likelihood is proposed to obtain the order relationship of two HFLNs. Then, a likelihood-based consistency index is introduced to represent the difference between two hesitant linguistic preference relations (HLPRs). It is a new way to express the consistency degree for the reason that the traditional consistency indices are almost exclusively based on distance measures. Meanwhile, a consistency-improving model is suggested to attain acceptable consistent HLPRs. In addition, a method to receive reasonable ranking results from HLPRs with acceptable consistency is presented. At last, this method is used to pick out the best mine ventilation system under uncertain linguistic decision conditions. A comparison and a discussion are conducted to demonstrate the validity of the presented approach. The results show that the proposed method is effective for selecting the optimal mine ventilation system, and provides references for the construction and management of mines.