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Genuine Savings (GS), also known as ‘net adjusted savings’, is a composite indicator of the sustainability of economic development. Genuine Savings reflects year-on-year changes in the total wealth or capital of a country, including net investment in produced capita, investment in human capital, depletion of natural resources, and damage caused by pollution. A negative Genuine Savings rate suggests that the stock of national wealth is declining and that future utility must be less than current utility, indicating that economic development is non-sustainable (Hamilton and Clemens, 1999). We make use of data over a 150 year period to examine the relationship between Genuine Savings and a number of indicators of well-being over time, and compare the relative changes in human, produced, and components of natural capital over the period. Overall, we find that the magnitude of genuine savings is positively related to changes in future consumption, with some evidence of a cointegrating relationship. However, the relationships between genuine savings and infant mortality or average heights are less clear.

This timely book critically examines the role played by international, regional and national legal frameworks in holding corporations operating in the natural resource sector accountable for human rights violations in the Global South, probing the effectiveness of the mechanisms available to aggrieved communities in pursuit of effective remedies and socio-ecological justice. The book brings together influential scholars from across the world addressing topical and relevant themes concerning the integration of business & human rights standards for better governance of natural resources and the transition towards net zero societies, especially in the context of extractive and multinational companies operating in the Global South. It also considers the application and implementation of transnational and domestic legal remedies for holding corporations accountable with references to case studies in natural resources governance in selected countries and regions, in particular Africa, Asia and Latin America. The book reviews proposals for an enforceable legal framework on the liability of corporations for human rights abuses and environmental damage, taking account of the existing initiatives such as the OECD Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises, the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, UN’s Draft Business & Human Rights Treaty and the European Commission’s 2022 proposal for a Directive on Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence. The book is essential reading for academics and students working or researching in the fields of business law, human rights and natural resources law; as well as corporate and human rights lawyers and practitioners litigating in the energy and natural resources sectors.

Attempts by governments and NGOs to provide modern solutions to the management of local water resources, and to alleviate the hazards of flooding, often create unforeseen problems adversely affecting future water resources and leading to increased vulnerability to crises. The book outlines the need to develop an integrative approach. The Hydro-hazardscape concept draws upon the landscape school within cultural geography to make a case for awarding centrality to hazards in social life, that parallels the esthetic view in the landscape tradition. The approach furthermore, makes a case for apprehending power differentials inherent in social life by being attentive to the dissonance and conflict between the analytical view of hazardous environments by the powerful and technocrats and lived experience of those environments by the vulnerable populations. It is argued that by adopting the approach that is attentive to the multiple values of water in the communities affected, can one hope for any measure of success. Examples from South Asia, Central America, the Caucasus and the USA, illustrate how the approach will help achieve long-term sustainability in a future filled with climate change.

Electricity distribution networks are commonly subject to supply interruptions and outages caused by faults. This dissertation focuses on medium voltage distribution networks, which typically consist of primary substations having multiple feeders along which secondary substations are located. When a permanent fault occurs on a segment (the part linking two consecutive secondary substations) of a distribution feeder, the faulted segment needs to be identified and isolated. Identifying the faulted segment can be realized through fault passage indicators. This is a straightforward task when the fault type is a short circuit, as these types of faults involve large currents. However, faulted segment identification for earth faults in non-effectively grounded medium voltage distribution networks has remained a challenge as the earth fault current in those networks is typically relatively small. Therefore, the main objective of this dissertation was to develop novel methods for locating single-phase earth faults in medium voltage distribution networks and validating them through simulations and real system measurements. After comprehensive review of state-of-the-art approaches presented in the literature, the dissertation proposes innovative methods for earth fault passage indication aimed at non-effectively grounded urban or rural distribution networks with radial feeders. The proposed methods are underpinned by a theoretical analysis based on the symmetrical components of the currents on a distribution feeder under an earth fault condition. The comparison of the sequence currents collected from various measuring points on the network forms the backbone of the methods. For practical implementation, current measurements need to be transferred to a central location for processing and decision making, but this can be done without accurate time synchronization. The proposed methods were developed and verified through simulations and empirical data. This work is a product of close collaboration between academia and ...

Wind turbines are a proven source of clean energy with wind power energy harvesting technologies supplying about 3% of global electricity consumption. However there is an increasing demand on maintenance and operational improvements since turbines have been plagued with downtime problems of major components e.g. gearboxes and generators, especially with offshore turbines which are difficult to access. Reliability Centric Maintenance (RCM) is a way of capturing the potential causes of downtime and poor performance by preventing failures and having a proactive approach to operations and maintenance (O&M). However, for a large fleet of turbines, adopting the RCM approach becomes difficult due to the complexities that arise as a result of the interactions between individual elements that make up the system in the product lifecycle. This paper discusses how a systems thinking approach can be used to identify the relevant aspects and possible interactions between the RCM approach and wind turbine gearboxes and also how the gaps that exist within the system can be closed so as to add value to business. The outcome of the paper is a proposal for applying a systems approach to wind turbine gearbox operation and maintenance, optimising the asset value adding contribution at minimal total cost to the operator.

The reduction of carbon dioxide emissions is a choice that all should follow to combat climate change. Climate change causes problems such as global warming and meetings on these problems conclude that nations must integrate the Kyoto protocol commitments along with a reduction in greenhouse gases. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of climate change on water and environmental resources for the Kvarken Archipelago area. In the region, the sea level rise and river water runoff increase cause flooding and erosion. Measures such as dams and wetlands have to be installed for controlling these effects. Moreover, the use of renewable energy to replace non-renewable energy sources is one-step forward to combatting climate change. ‘Demonstrative energy’ is an important way of showing the usage of renewable energy. The Merten Talo or Havets Hus which is a part of the archipelago and Nature 2000 area will be a research site for the University of Vaasa. Paradoxically, climate change effects could even be used to our advantage, where for example, warm water could be used as a heat source, offering benefit to all sides by combatting and adapting to climate change. A microclimate is a set of meteorological parameters that characterize a localized area. The microclimates found in the Merten Talo area could be used as a tool to study climate change effects. The other area addressed was the land uplift. Land uplift is faster than the sea level inclination in the site, and in the Vaasa region, land uplift is on average 8.77±0.30 mm/yr. All in all, promoting sustainability and adapting to the effects of climate change is important, not only generally, but for the area in particular. ; fi=vertaisarvioimaton|en=nonPeerReviewed|