Stream sediments analysis for geochemical mapping of Romagna Apennines (Northern Italy): monitoring and management tool of environmental resources at various scales

Geochemical mapping is a valuable tool for the control of territory that can be used not only in the identification of mineral resources and geological, agricultural and forestry studies but also in the monitoring of natural resources by giving solutions to environmental and economic problems. Stream sediments are widely used in the sampling campaigns carried out by the world's governments and research groups for their characteristics of broad representativeness of rocks and soils, for ease of sampling and for the possibility to conduct very detailed sampling In this context, the environmental role of stream sediments provides a good basis for the implementation of environmental management measures, in fact the composition of river sediments is an important factor in understanding the complex dynamics that develop within catchment basins therefore they represent a critical environmental compartment: they can persistently incorporate pollutants after a process of contamination and release into the biosphere if the environmental conditions change. It is essential to determine whether the concentrations of certain elements, in particular heavy metals, can be the result of natural erosion of rocks containing high concentrations of specific elements or are generated as residues of human activities related to a certain study area. This PhD thesis aims to extract from an extensive database on stream sediments of the Romagna rivers the widest spectrum of informations. The study involved low and high order stream in the mountain and hilly area, but also the sediments of the floodplain area, where intensive agriculture is active. The geochemical signals recorded by the stream sediments will be interpreted in order to reconstruct the natural variability related to bedrock and soil contribution, the effects of the river dynamics, the anomalous sites, and with the calculation of background values be able to evaluate their level of degradation and predict the environmental risk.

Authoring tools and management information systems: study of a generalizable architecture

The need to effectively manage the documentation covering the entire production process, from the concept phase right through to market realise, constitutes a key issue in the creation of a successful and highly competitive product. For almost forty years the most commonly used strategies to achieve this have followed Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) guidelines. Translated into information management systems at the end of the '90s, this methodology is now widely used by companies operating all over the world in many different sectors. PLM systems and editor programs are the two principal types of software applications used by companies for their process aotomation. Editor programs allow to store in documents the information related to the production chain, while the PLM system stores and shares this information so that it can be used within the company and made it available to partners. Different software tools, which capture and store documents and information automatically in the PLM system, have been developed in recent years. One of them is the ''DirectPLM'' application, which has been developed by the Italian company ''Focus PLM''. It is designed to ensure interoperability between many editors and the Aras Innovator PLM system. In this dissertation we present ''DirectPLM2'', a new version of the previous software application DirectPLM. It has been designed and developed as prototype during the internship by Focus PLM. Its new implementation separates the abstract logic of business from the real commands implementation, previously strongly dependent on Aras Innovator. Thanks to its new design, Focus PLM can easily develop different versions of DirectPLM2, each one devised for a specific PLM system. In fact, the company can focus the development effort only on a specific set of software components which provides specialized functions interacting with that particular PLM system. This allows shorter Time-To-Market and gives the company a significant competitive advantage.

Local environmental knowledge: a key input for the sustainable development of Andean mountain communities

Local knowledge is crucial to both human development and environmental conservation. This is especially the case in mountain regions, where a combination of remoteness, harsh climatic conditions, rich cultural heritage, and high biological diversity has led to the development of complex local environmental knowledge systems. In the Andes for instance, rural populations mainly rely on their own environmental knowledge to ensure their food security and health. Recent studies conducted within Quechua communities in Peru and Bolivia showed that this knowledge was both persistent and dynamic, and that it responded to socio-economic and environmental changes through cultural resistance and adaptation. As this paper argues, combining local knowledge and so-called scientific knowledge – especially in development projects – can lead to innovative solutions to the socio-environmental challenges facing mountain communities in our globalized world. Based on experiences from the Andes, this paper will provide concrete recommendations to policymakers and practitioners for integrating local knowledge into development and natural resource management initiatives.

Legal Aspects which Implement Good Practice Measures in the Management of Construction and Demolition Waste

The construction industry, one of the most important ones in the development of a country, generates unavoidable impacts on the environment. The social demand towards greater respect for the environment is a high and general outcry. Therefore, the construction industry needs to reduce the impact it produces. Proper waste management is not enough; we must take a further step in environmental management, where new measures need to be introduced for the prevention at source, such as good practices to promote recycling. Following the amendment of the legal frame applicable to Construction and Demolition Waste (C&D waste), important developments have been incorporated in European and International laws, aiming to promote the culture of reusing and recycling. This change of mindset, that is progressively taking place in society, is allowing for the consideration of C&D waste no longer as an unusable waste, but as a reusable material. The main objective of the work presented in this paper is to enhance C&D waste management systems through the development of preventive measures during the construction process. These measures concern all the agents intervening in the construction process as only the personal implication of all of them can ensure an efficient management of the C&D waste generated. Finally, a model based on preventive measures achieves organizational cohesion between the different stages of the construction process, as well as promoting the conservation of raw materials through the use and waste minimization. All of these in order to achieve a C&D waste management system, whose primary goal is zero waste generation

Decarbonization of toll plazas: impact assessment of toll collection system management

Transport climate change impacts have become a worldwide concern. The use of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) could contribute to a more effective use of resources in toll road networks. Management of toll plazas is central to the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, as it is there that bottlenecks and congestion occur. This study focuses on management strategies aimed at reducing climate change impacts of toll plazas by managing toll collection systems. These strategies are based on the use of different collection system technologies – Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) and Open Road Tolling (ORT) – and on queue management. The carbon footprint of various toll plazas is determined by a proposed integrated methodology which estimates the carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of the different operational stages at toll plazas (deceleration, service time, acceleration, and queuing) for the different toll collection systems. To validate the methodology, two main-line toll plazas of a Spanish toll highway were evaluated. The findings reveal that the application of new technologies to toll collection systems is an effective management strategy from an environmental point of view. The case studies revealed that ORT systems lead to savings of up to 70% of CO2 emissions at toll plazas, while ETC systems save 20% comparing to the manual ones. Furthermore, queue management can offer a 16% emissions savings when queue time is reduced by 116 seconds. The integrated methodology provides an efficient environmental management tool for toll plazas. The use of new technologies is the future of the decarbonization of toll plazas.

Evaluating sustainability and food security of peasant farming systems in Mesoamerican highlands

En las últimas décadas, la agricultura sostenible ha sido objeto de gran interés y debate académico, no sólo en términos conceptuales, sino también en términos metodológicos. La persistencia de la inseguridad alimentaria y el deterioro de los recursos naturales en muchas regiones del mundo, ha provocado el surgimiento de numerosas iniciativas centradas en revitalizar la agricultura campesina así como renovadas discusiones sobre el rol que juega la agricultura como motor de desarrollo y principal actividad para alivio de la pobreza. Por ello, cuando hablamos de evaluar sistemas campesinos de montaña, debemos considerar tanto la dimensión alimentaria como las especificidades propias de los sistemas montañosos como base fundamental de la sostenibilidad. Al evaluar la contribución que han hecho alternativas tecnológicas y de manejo en la mejora de la sostenibilidad y la seguridad alimentaria de los sistemas campesinos de montaña en Mesoamérica, surgen tres preguntas de investigación: • ¿Se está evaluando la sostenibilidad de los sistemas campesinos teniendo en cuenta la variabilidad climática, la participación de los agricultores y las dinámicas temporales? • ¿Podemos rescatar tendencias comunes en estos sistemas y extrapolar los resultados a otras zonas? • ¿Son inequívocamente positivas las alternativas propuestas que se han llevado a cabo? En este trabajo se presentan tres evaluaciones de sostenibilidad que tratan de poner de manifiesto cuáles son los retos y oportunidades que enfrentan actualmente los sistemas campesinos de montaña. En primer lugar, se evalúan tres sistemas de manejo agrícola bajo dos años meteorológicamente contrastantes. Se determinó que durante el año que experimentó lluvias abundantes y temperaturas moderadas, los sistemas de bajos insumos, basados en el uso de abonos orgánicos y rotación de cultivos, obtuvieron los mejores resultados en indicadores ecológicos y similares resultados en los económicos y sociales que el sistema de altos insumos químicos. En el segundo año, con heladas tempranas y sequía invernal, la productividad se redujo para todos los sistemas pero los sistemas más diversificados (en variedades de maíz y/o siembra de otros cultivos) pudieron resistir mejor los contratiempos climáticos. En segundo lugar, se evalúa el grado de conocimiento (percepción) campesino para determinar los factores claves que determinan la sostenibilidad de sus sistemas y su seguridad alimentaria. Se determinó que los principales puntos críticos identificados por los campesinos (tamaño de parcela y pendiente del terreno) afectan de forma significativa a cuestiones de índole económica, pero no son capaces de explicar los desequilibrios alimenticios existentes. Realizando un análisis comparativo entre comunidades que presentaban buenos y malos resultados en cuanto a aporte energético y proteico, se determinó que la seguridad alimentaria estaba relacionada con la sostenibilidad de los sistemas y que concretamente estaba ligada a los atributos de equidad y autonomía. Otro resultado destacable fue que las comunidades más marginales y con mayor dificultad de acceso mostraron mayores niveles de inseguridad alimentaria, pero la variabilidad intergrupal fue muy alta. Eso demuestra que la seguridad alimentaria y nutricional forma parte de un complejo sistema de estrategias de autoabastecimiento ligada a la idiosincrasia misma de cada uno de los hogares. En tercer lugar, se evaluó el desempeño de las escuelas de campo de agricultores (ECAs) en la mejora de la sostenibilidad y la seguridad alimentaria de un sistema campesino de montaña. Para ver el efecto del impacto de estas metodologías a largo plazo, se estudiaron tres comunidades donde se habían implementado ECAs hace 8, 5 y 3 años. Encontramos que el impacto fue progresivo ya que fue la comunidad más antigua la que mejores valores obtuvo. El impacto de las ECAs fue rápido y persistente en los indicadores relacionados con la participación, el acceso a servicios básicos y la conservación de los recursos naturales. El estudio demostró un claro potencial de las ECAs en la mejora general de la sostenibilidad y la seguridad alimentaria de estos sistemas, sin embargo se observó una relación directa entre el aumento de producción agrícola y el uso de insumos externos, lo que puede suponer un punto crítico para los ideales sostenibles. ABSTRACT During the last decades, sustainable agriculture has been the subject of considerable academic interest and debate, not only in conceptual terms, but also in methodological ones. The persistence of high levels of environmental degradation and food insecurity in many regions has led to new initiatives focused on revitalizing peasant agriculture and renewed discussions of the role of sustainable agriculture as an engine for development, environmental conservation and poverty alleviation. Therefore, to assess mountain farming systems, we must consider food dimension and taking into account the specificities of the mountain systems as the foundation of sustainability. When evaluating contribution of technological and management alternative proposals in achieving sustainability and food security for peasant farming systems in Mesoamerican highlands, three research questions arise: • Is sustainability of peasant-farming systems being evaluated taking into account climate variability, participation of farmers and temporal dynamics? • Can we rescue common trends in these systems and extrapolate the results to other areas? • What alternative proposals that have been conducted are unequivocally positives? In this document, we present three evaluations of sustainability that try to highlight the challenges and opportunities that currently face mountain farming systems in Mesoamerica. First, we evaluate the sustainability of three agricultural management systems in two contrasting weather years. We determined that during the first year that exposed heavy rains and moderate temperatures, low-input systems, which are based on the use of organic fertilizers and crop rotation, provided better results in terms of ecological indicators and equal results in terms of economic and social indicators than those achieved using a high chemical input system. In the second year, which featured early frosts and a winter drought, productivity declined in all systems; however, the most diversified systems (in terms of the maize varieties grown and the sowing of other crops) more successfully resisted these climatic adversities. Second, we evaluate the farmers’ perception to determine the key drivers for achieving their sustainability and food and nutritional security. We determined that the key factors identified by farmers (landholding size and slope of cropland) exerted significant impacts on economic disparities but did not explain the malnutrition levels. We compared two contrasting hamlets according to their energy and protein supply, one namely Limón Timoté (LT), which did not present food problems and Limón Peña Blanca (LP), which did exhibit food insecurity. The results showed that FNS is linked to sustainability, and it is primarily related to the sustainability attributes of self-reliance and equity. Although the more marginated and inaccessible community exhibited more food insecurity, food and nutritional security depend upon a complex array of self-sufficiency strategies that remain linked to individual household idiosyncrasies. Third, we evaluated the impact of farmer field schools for improving the sustainability and food security of peasant mountain systems. In order to appreciate the long-term impact, we studied three communities where FFSs were implemented eight, five and three years ago, respectively. We found that FFSs have a gradual impact, as the community that first implemented FFSs scores highest. The impact of FFSs was broad and long-lasting for indicators related to participation, access to basic services and conservation of natural resources. This study demonstrates the potential of FFSs, but more attention will have to be paid to critical indicators in order to scale up their potential in the future. We observed a direct relationship between the increase in agricultural production and the use of external inputs, which is a critical point for sustainable ideals.

Implementing an Integrated Management System (IMS) at an Aerospace Manufacturing Facility

This project analyzes the challenges, issues, benefits, and lessons learned that several companies experienced while implementing integrated management systems. Based on previous experiences, this paper defines several strategies that an organization should use to increase the probability of implementing an integrated management system (IMS) successfully. Strategies include completing a feasibility analysis, creating a policy, allocating resources, developing objectives, modifying documentation, and creating a continuous monitoring process. Moreover, an organization can reduce potential obstacles by promoting a culture that encourages management commitment and employee participation. Results indicate the implementation of an IMS provides the framework to manage environmental, health, and safety programs effectively. By implementing an IMS, an organization can save time and money, as well as proactively control risk.

Comprehensive Greenhouse Gas Management for the Electric Generating Industry

Climate change is becoming more visible in the political arena. Electric generating companies will likely be impacted by future regulation of climate change related emissions. Even though few climate related programs are mandatory, electric generating companies should begin to implement greenhouse gas management systems. This report includes a review of issues facing the electric generating industry, an examination of current emission management programs, and recommendations for an effective greenhouse gas management framework. An effective greenhouse gas management program allows a company to continually improve their impact on climate change by reducing emissions using the plan, do, check, act process. To ease the reporting burden, companies should apply de minimis exemptions to sources that produce less than 5% of emissions.

Global Positioning Systems technology and its application in environmental programs /

Mode of access: Internet.

Department of Energy programmatic spent nuclear fuel management and Idaho National Engineering Laboratory environmental restoration and waste management programs : record of decision /

"May 30, 1995"--Letter of transmittal.

Greening operations: an investigation of environmental decision making

This PhD thesis belongs to three main knowledge domains: operations management, environmental management, and decision making. Having the automotive industry as the key sector, the investigation was undertaken aiming at deepening the understanding of environmental decision making processes in the operations function. The central research question for this thesis is ?Why and how do manufacturing companies take environmental decisions? This PhD research project used a case study research strategy supplemented by secondary data analysis and the testing and evaluation of a proposed systems thinking model for environmental decision making. Interviews and focus groups were the main methods for data collection. The findings of the thesis show that companies that want to be in the environmental leadership will need to take environmental decisions beyond manufacturing processes. Because the benefits (including financial gain) of non-manufacturing activities are not clear yet the decisions related to product design, supply chain and facilities are fully embedded with complexity, subjectivism, and intrinsic risk. Nevertheless, this is the challenge environmental leaders will face - they may enter in a paradoxical state of their decisions – where although the risk of going greener is high, the risk of not doing it is even higher.

Knowledge assisted data management and retrieval in multimedia database systems

With the proliferation of multimedia data and ever-growing requests for multimedia applications, there is an increasing need for efficient and effective indexing, storage and retrieval of multimedia data, such as graphics, images, animation, video, audio and text. Due to the special characteristics of the multimedia data, the Multimedia Database management Systems (MMDBMSs) have emerged and attracted great research attention in recent years. Though much research effort has been devoted to this area, it is still far from maturity and there exist many open issues. In this dissertation, with the focus of addressing three of the essential challenges in developing the MMDBMS, namely, semantic gap, perception subjectivity and data organization, a systematic and integrated framework is proposed with video database and image database serving as the testbed. In particular, the framework addresses these challenges separately yet coherently from three main aspects of a MMDBMS: multimedia data representation, indexing and retrieval. In terms of multimedia data representation, the key to address the semantic gap issue is to intelligently and automatically model the mid-level representation and/or semi-semantic descriptors besides the extraction of the low-level media features. The data organization challenge is mainly addressed by the aspect of media indexing where various levels of indexing are required to support the diverse query requirements. In particular, the focus of this study is to facilitate the high-level video indexing by proposing a multimodal event mining framework associated with temporal knowledge discovery approaches. With respect to the perception subjectivity issue, advanced techniques are proposed to support users' interaction and to effectively model users' perception from the feedback at both the image-level and object-level.

An integrated multi-agent framework for optimizing time, cost and environmental impact of construction processes

Environmentally conscious construction has received a significant amount of research attention during the last decades. Even though construction literature is rich in studies that emphasize the importance of environmental impact during the construction phase, most of the previous studies failed to combine environmental analysis with other project performance criteria in construction. This is mainly because most of the studies have overlooked the multi-objective nature of construction projects. In order to achieve environmentally conscious construction, multi-objectives and their relationships need to be successfully analyzed in the complex construction environment. The complex construction system is composed of changing project conditions that have an impact on the relationship between time, cost and environmental impact (TCEI) of construction operations. Yet, this impact is still unknown by construction professionals. Studying this impact is vital to fulfill multiple project objectives and achieve environmentally conscious construction. This research proposes an analytical framework to analyze the impact of changing project conditions on the relationship of TCEI. This study includes green house gas (GHG) emissions as an environmental impact category. The methodology utilizes multi-agent systems, multi-objective optimization, analytical network process, and system dynamics tools to study the relationships of TCEI and support decision-making under the influence of project conditions. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is applied to the evaluation of environmental impact in terms of GHG. The mixed method approach allowed for the collection and analysis of qualitative and quantitative data. Structured interviews of professionals in the highway construction field were conducted to gain their perspectives in decision-making under the influence of certain project conditions, while the quantitative data were collected from the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) for highway resurfacing projects. The data collected were used to test the framework. The framework yielded statistically significant results in simulating project conditions and optimizing TCEI. The results showed that the change in project conditions had a significant impact on the TCEI optimal solutions. The correlation between TCEI suggested that they affected each other positively, but in different strengths. The findings of the study will assist contractors to visualize the impact of their decision on the relationship of TCEI.

Adapting the social-ecological system framework for urban stormwater management: the case of green infrastructure adoption

Stormwater management has long been a critical societal and environmental challenge for communities. An increasing number of municipalities are turning to novel approaches such as green infrastructure to develop more sustainable stormwater management systems. However, there is a need to better understand the technological decision-making processes that lead to specific outcomes within urban stormwater governance systems. We used the social-ecological system (SES) framework to build a classification system for identifying significant variables that influence urban stormwater governance decisions related to green infrastructure adoption. To adapt the framework, we relied on findings from observations at national stormwater meetings in combination with a systematic literature review on influential factors related to green infrastructure adoption. We discuss our revisions to the framework that helped us understand the decision by municipal governments to adopt green infrastructure. Remaining research needs and challenges are discussed regarding the development of an urban stormwater SES framework as a classification tool for knowledge accumulation and synthesis.