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A new brewery is founded in Brazil every two days. Yet with climate change, drinking water is increasingly scarce. Previous studies have begun exploring the brewing industry, but an examination of circular economy initiatives in Latin America is lacking, particularly during the COVID era. This study analyzes strategic implications of circular economy initiatives, together with their role in the coevolution of the craft beer sociotechnical system in Brazil from a resource perspective during the COVID pandemic. Using a qualitative methodology based on analytic induction, 11 in-depth semi-structured interviews were carried out with key actors from the craft beer sociotechnical system in Guarapuava. For the content analysis, we triangulated the interviews with an analysis of 74 related documents. We found evidence of circular economy practices and sociotechnical transitions with the simultaneous coevolution of the system actors. Increasing rejection of the linear take–make–waste economy was observed as subject organizations largely adopted a regenerative model reducing operational waste. Hence, entrepreneurial innovation was apparently crucial for resource allocation during the COVID era. This work contributes to further understanding resource configurations in the circular economy, with practical implications for integrating sustainability into strategy, business models, and production.

Intelligent connected vehicles (ICVs) are recognized as a new sustainable transportation mode, which could be promising for reducing crashes. However, the mixed traffic consisting of manually driven vehicles and ICVs may negatively affect road safety due to individual heterogeneity. This study investigated heterogeneity effects on freeway safety-based simulation experiments. Two types of vehicle dynamic models were employed to depict dynamic behaviors of manually driven vehicles and adaptive cruise control (ACC) vehicles (a simplified version of ICVs), respectively. Real vehicle trajectories were utilized to calibrate model parameters based on genetic algorithms. Surrogate safety measures were applied to establish the relationship between vehicle behaviors and longitudinal collision risks. Simulation results indicate that the heterogeneity has negative effects on longitudinal safety. With the higher degree of heterogeneity, longitudinal collision risks are increased. Compared to traffic flow consisting of human drivers only, mixed traffic flow may be more dangerous when the market penetration rate of ACC is low, since the ACC system can be recognized as a new source of individual heterogeneity. Findings of this study show that necessary countermeasures should be developed to improve safety for mixed traffic flow from the perspective of transportation safety planning in the near future.

Kernza® intermediate wheatgrass [IWG; Thinopyrum intermedium (Host) Barkworth & Dewey] is a novel perennial cool-season grass that is being bred for use as a dual-purpose grain and forage crop. The environmental benefits of perennial agriculture have motivated the development of IWG cropping systems and markets for perennial grain food products made with Kernza, but the economic viability and environmental impact of IWG remain uncertain. In this study, we compared three-year cycles of five organic grain production systems: an IWG monoculture, IWG intercropped with medium red clover, a continuous winter wheat monoculture, a wheat–red clover intercrop, and a corn–soybean–spelt rotation. Economic and environmental impacts of each cropping system were assessed using enterprise budgets, energy use, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and emergy indices as indicators. Grain and biomass yields and values for production inputs used in these analyses were obtained from experimental data and management records from two separate field experiments conducted in New York State, USA. Grain yield of IWG averaged 478 kg ha−1 yr−1 over three years, equaling approximately 17% of winter wheat grain yield (2807 kg ha−1 yr−1) over the same period. In contrast, total forage harvested averaged 6438 kg ha−1 yr−1 from the IWG systems, approximately 160% that of the wheat systems (4024 kg ha−1 yr−1). Low grain yield of IWG greatly impacted economic indicators, with break-even farm gate prices for Kernza grain calculated to be 23% greater than the current price of organic winter wheat in New York. Energy use and GHG emissions from the IWG systems were similar to the annual systems when allocated per hectare of production area but were much greater when allocated per kg of grain produced and much lower when allocated per kg of biomass harvested inclusive of hay and straw. Emergy sustainability indices were favorable for the IWG systems due to lower estimated soil erosion and fewer external inputs over the three-year crop cycle. The results show that the sustainability of IWG production is highly dependent on how the hay or straw co-product is used and the extent to which external inputs can be substituted with locally available renewable resources. Integrated crop–livestock systems appear to be a viable scenario for the adoption of IWG as a dual-use perennial grain and forage crop.

Sharing facilities with other households offers the most realistic opportunity for access to sanitation for many households in low-income settings. However, questions remain about the safety of shared toilets, including those shared at the household level. This study sought to compare the usage and microbial safety of household-level shared and unshared toilets in a Ghanaian rural district to investigate any association between their microbial safety and sharing status. A semi-structured questionnaire was used to collect data on the user characteristics of the sampled toilets, while common contact surfaces (door handles and toilet seats) were assessed for faecal contamination following standard swab sampling and analytical protocols. The results of the study indicate that sharing toilets affords about 90% more household-level access to sanitation as compared to single-household toilets. Toilet sharing mostly occurred between two households, with a maximum user population of 14 per toilet. Generally, there was a high prevalence of faecal contamination on the door handles and seats of both shared and unshared toilets, but this had no association with the sharing status of the toilets. The median concentration of Escherichia coli (E. coli) on the door handles and seats of shared toilets was 34.3 × 105 and 103.2 × 105 CFU/mL, respectively, as compared to 54.7 × 105 and 125.0 × 105 CFU/mL, respectively, on unshared toilets. In conclusion, the sharing of toilets at the household level nearly doubles access to sanitation at home without necessarily exposing the users to a higher risk of faecal–oral disease transmission.

Improving human well-being is increasingly recognized as essential for movement toward a sustainable and desirable future. Estimates of different aspects of human well-being, such as Gross Domestic Product, or percentage of population with access to electric power, or measuring the distribution of income in society are often fraught with problems. There are few standardized methods of data collection; in addition, the required data is not obtained in a reliable manner and on a repetitive basis in many parts of the world. Consequently, inter-comparability of the data that does exist becomes problematic. Data derived from nighttime satellite imagery has helped develop various globally consistent proxy measures of human well-being at the gridded, sub-national, and national level. We review several ways in which nighttime satellite imagery has been used to measure the human well-being within nations.

This article aims to identify occupations at risk of climate change, and explore their spatial distribution by investigating their spatial concentration and cluster patterns in Korea. In order to identify professions vulnerable to climate change, we used three criteria: (1) exposure to the risks of job activities; (2) sensitivity to work environments; and (3) adaptive capacities based on the socioeconomic conditions of a person’s occupation. We identified 26 vocations as vulnerable, which corresponds to 16.5% of the total number of careers. Then, we used exploratory spatial data analysis (ESDA) techniques to examine the spatial distribution of jobs at risk of climate change effects. Endangered occupations show the extremely uneven spatial distributions across regions, indicating that there is a wide range of values for the proportion of endangered occupations across regions. The regions with high proportions of professions in jeopardy show clear spatial clustering based on the large geographic belt from the southwest to the northeast. Our results suggest that policymakers should consider the specific geographies of vulnerable occupations. The current work provides helpful hints on regional policy coordination to promote a virtuous circle of sustainable regional development.

The ways in which we travel—by what mode, for how long, and for what purpose—can affect our sense of happiness and well-being. This paper assesses the relationships between measures of the sustainability of transportation systems in U.S. metropolitan areas and subjective well-being. Associations between self-reported happiness levels from the Gallup Healthways Well-being Index and commute data were examined for 187 core-based statistical areas (CBSA). We also supplement this quantitative analysis through brief case studies of high- and low-performing happiness cities. Our quantitative results indicate that regions with higher commute mode shares by non-automobile modes generally had higher well-being scores, even when controlling for important economic predictors of happiness. We also find that pro-sustainable transportation policies can have implications for population-wide happiness and well-being. Our case studies indicate that both high and low scoring happiness cities demonstrate a dedicated commitment to improving sustainable transportation infrastructure. Our study suggests that cities that provide incentives for residents to use more sustainable commute modes may offer greater opportunity for happiness than those that do not.