• Energy Research
• SE close
• AT close
• SDSN Greece close

This paper assesses university sustainability from the perspective of the interested student. A set of questions for a university website analysis is proposed and preliminary results for Swedish universities are presented. The university website analysis intends to emulate a student looking for a university working with sustainable development. University ranking is compared with the results from the sustainability assessment. Results from the study are based on university website analysis of 18 Swedish universities out of a total of 30. Universities are grouped in high ranked, low ranked and benchmark universities. For the majority of the studied universities it was possible to extract the information needed for a sustainability assessment from the website, which indicates that further development of the method is of interest. The average level of performance in the assessment was found to be less than 50% of the maximum of the proposed scale. With Sweden generally being a leading nation in sustainable development the results are below of what could be expected. Ranking, based on the Swedish ranking system does not seem to predict university sustainability performance. The indication is that Gothenburg University, while having further improvement potential, could be considered a benchmark in the Swedish context.

The automated toolkit for assessing environmental and investment attractiveness of a mining region and the results of its application are discussed in the article. This toolkit includes the optimization mathematical model, the algorithms for the interaction between a regional control center and a producer within the territory, as well as the automated software package for their analysis. The use of the optimization mathematical model makes it possible to take into account the maximum economic potential of a producer, which determines, respectively, a mining region’s environment pollution potential. Accounting for environmental risks will allow the control center or other decision makers to identify not only the optimal pattern of eco-economic interaction in the region, but also reflect changes in the environmental and investment climate as a combination of economic potential and involved risks. The model and the algorithms of interaction between a regional control center and a producer, as well as the results of their numerical analysis given in this paper, allow considering this toolkit as an effective decision support tool aimed at improving environmental and investment attractiveness of a mining region by encouraging a producer to use the best available technologies and conserve the natural environment.

Abstract Models of inflow-turbulence noise and turbulent-boundary-layer trailing-edge noise are compared to earlier measurements of a 200-kW vertical axis wind turbine so that conclusions regarding the origin of the aerodynamic noise can be drawn. The measurement campaigns, which aimed at establishing the noise emission value and locating the aerodynamic noise sources with a microphone array, are here both compared to further modified versions of the trailing-edge and inflow-turbulence models respectively. Unlike the case for horizontal axis wind turbine, inflow-turbulence noise is deemed as the prevailing noise mechanism. Reducing the self-induced turbulence could then be an effective way of lowering the noise levels for vertical axis wind turbines. Also, looking at the directivity of the inflow-turbulence noise model which indicate most noise in the cross-wind directions, a deviation from the standard downwind measurement position for measuring noise emission is suggested for the VAWT case.

Abstract This study utilizes a panel data set from 14 European countries over the period 1990–2004 to estimate a dynamic model specification for gasoline demand. Previous studies estimating gasoline consumption per total passenger cars ignore the recent increase in the number of diesel cars in most European countries leading to biased elasticity estimates. We apply several common dynamic panel estimators to our small sample. Results show that specifications neglecting the share of diesel cars overestimate short-run income, price and car ownership elasticities. It appears that the results of standard pooled estimators are more reliable than common IV/GMM estimators applied to our small data set.

Thermal tolerance range, based on temperatures that result in incapacitating effects, influences species' distributions and has been used to predict species' response to increasing temperature. Reproductive performance may also be negatively affected at less extreme temperatures, but such sublethal heat-induced sterility has been relatively ignored in studies addressing the potential effects of, and ability of species' to respond to, predicted climate warming. The few studies examining the link between increased temperature and reproductive performance typically focus on adults, although effects can vary between life history stages. Here we assessed how sublethal heat stress during development impacted subsequent adult fertility and its plasticity, both of which can provide the raw material for evolutionary responses to increased temperature. We quantified phenotypic and genetic variation in fertility of Drosophila melanogaster reared at standardized densities in three temperatures (25, 27, and 29°C) from a set of lines of the Drosophila Genetic Reference Panel (DGRP). We found little phenotypic variation at the two lower temperatures with more variation at the highest temperature and for plasticity. Males were more affected than females. Despite reasonably large broad-sense heritabilities, a genome-wide association study found little evidence for additive genetic variance and no genetic variants were robustly linked with reproductive performance at specific temperatures or for phenotypic plasticity. We compared results on heat-induced male sterility with other DGRP results on relevant fitness traits measured after abiotic stress and found an association between male susceptibility to sterility and male lifespan reduction following oxidative stress. Our results suggest that sublethal stress during development has profound negative consequences on male adult reproduction, but despite phenotypic variation in a population for this response, there is limited evolutionary potential, either through adaptation to a specific developmental temperature or plasticity in response to developmental heat-induced sterility.

AbstractThis article provides useful information for universities offering forestry programs and facing the growing demand for bioeconomy education. An explorative survey on bioeconomy perception among 1400 students enrolled in 29 universities across nine European countries offering forestry programs was performed. The data have been elaborated via descriptive statistics and cluster analysis. Around 70% of respondents have heard about the bioeconomy, mainly through university courses. Students perceive forestry as the most important sector for bioeconomy; however, the extent of perceived importance of forestry varies between countries, most significantly across groups of countries along a North–South European axis. Although differences across bachelor and master programs are less pronounced, they shed light on how bioeconomy is addressed by university programs and the level of student satisfaction with this. These differences and particularities are relevant for potential development routes towards comprehensive bioeconomy curricula at European forestry universities with a forestry focus.