Gasificación de biomasa con astillas de madera.

[ES]Este proyecto tiene como objetivo generar energía eléctrica y térmica para un conjunto de viviendas aisladas, sin acceso a la red eléctrica, con una potencia requerida de 12KW. Se pretende plantear una solución que satisfaga las necesidades básicas de auto-abastecimiento de una forma económicamente rentable. Para comenzar, por un lado de cara al objetivo 20/20/20 se realizará un acercamiento a la utilización de las energías renovables como fuente de energía, disminuyendo así el impacto ambiental. Por otro lado, se plantearán diferentes alternativas para la generación de energía eléctrica y térmica, finalmente haciendo hincapié en el estudio de una planta de gasificación de biomasa mediante astillas de madera. De modo que, a lo largo de este documento se analizarán los principios y fundamentos necesarios para el diseño de una planta de generación eléctrica mediante gasificación de biomasa. Para ello se estudiarán los diferentes modelos de gasificadores existentes, el desarrollo del proceso de gasificación con sus respectivas etapas y la limpieza y adaptación del gas obtenido antes de introducirlo en el MACI. Se realizará una descripción de la planta junto al dimensionamiento tanto del almacenamiento de la materia prima como el de los equipos a instalar. Finalmente, para valorar si se trata de un proyecto viable. Se realizará el estudio económico analizando el presupuesto y análisis de rentabilidad. Asimismo, se plantearán los diferentes riesgos a los que puede exponerse una instalación como esta.

Establecimientos de habitación al aire libre. Los fondos de cabaña de morfología tumular: características, proceso de formación y cronología

[ES] En este artículo se describen una serie de estructuras de tipo tumular, que si aparentemente pudieran recordar a las estructuras funerarias clásicas se alejan de éstas por su morfología, composición, funcionalidad y cronología. Los trabajos de prospección realizados durante los últimos años en la Sierra de Aralar (Gipuzkoa) han permitido localizar medio centenar de estas estructuras tumulares, así como abrir nuevos campos de investigación en torno a la vivienda temporal de los grupos pastoriles en las zonas de montaña.

Energy retrofits in social housing. Analysis of its thermal behaviour.

468 p.

O hospício como morada: capturas e resistências nas práticas de cuidado em saúde mental

Esta pesquisa é disparada a partir do encontro da pesquisadora com as chamadas moradias dentro de hospitais psiquiátricos no Estado do Rio de Janeiro. No seio da reforma psiquiátrica e da instalação de uma rede de assistência substitutiva ao hospício, ocorrem transformações também no interior deste último: humanizam-se as práticas, retirando de cena o eletrochoque, a lobotomia, a camisa-de-força, fazendo documentos como CPF, RG e etc. Contudo, a edificação manicomial permanece de pé com os seus grandes pavilhões, alguns agora travestidos em moradias, que tanto podem operacionalizar uma passagem de dentro para fora dos muros como perpetuar o hospício. O texto indaga por que motivo, a partir de um certo momento, inaugura-se um novo modo de organização em saúde mental, em que a antiga centralidade hospitalar se fragmenta em moradias internas e se difundem os novos serviços, ditos abertos, para em seguida afirmar que a construção de uma rede substitutiva não assegura, definitivamente, o fim da relação manicomial. Com o suporte teórico de Foucault e Deleuze, propõe uma discussão acerca da biopolítica da espécie humana, da coexistência de tecnologias disciplinares e regulamentadoras e da inauguração, na sociedade de controle, de um exercício de poder difuso, a céu-aberto, dispensando a coação física e a instituição da reclusão. O texto, entretanto, não se deixa abater por essas análises, mantendo suas apostas numa Reforma Psiquiátrica que propõe como um campo de disputas, de embates cotidianos. É então que a temática do cuidado entra em cena. Para tanto, faz-se uma releitura do período helenístico-romano através dos olhos de Foucault. O Cuidado de Si é apresentado ao leitor para, em seguida, ser estabelecido um contraponto entre o mesmo e o modo de ser sujeito moderno e cristão, com exercícios de renúncia a si e práticas de sacrifício, que em muito se assemelham à maneira como os trabalhadores vêm atuando, hoje, no campo da saúde mental. O texto procura dar pistas e visibilizar as resistências presentes em meio às tantas capturas postas em análise. Trata-se de uma experimentação de práticas de liberdade que se atualizem na operação de cuidado.

Environmental threats to children's health in Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific

The Southeast Asia and Western Pacific regions contain half of the world's children and are among the most rapidly industrializing regions of the globe. Environmental threats to children's health are widespread and are multiplying as nations in the area undergo industrial development and pass through the epidemiologic transition. These environmental hazards range from traditional threats such as bacterial contamination of drinking water and wood smoke in poorly ventilated dwellings to more recently introduced chemical threats such as asbestos construction materials; arsenic in groundwater; methyl isocyanate in Bhopal, India; untreated manufacturing wastes released to landfills; chlorinated hydrocarbon and organophosphorous pesticides; and atmospheric lead emissions from the combustion of leaded gasoline. To address these problems, pediatricians, environmental health scientists, and public health workers throughout Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific have begun to build local and national research and prevention programs in children's environmental health. Successes have been achieved as a result of these efforts: A cost-effective system for producing safe drinking water at the village level has been devised in India; many nations have launched aggressive antismoking campaigns; and Thailand, the Philippines, India, and Pakistan have all begun to reduce their use of lead in gasoline, with resultant declines in children's blood lead levels. The International Conference on Environmental Threats to the Health of Children, held in Bangkok, Thailand, in March 2002, brought together more than 300 representatives from 35 countries and organizations to increase awareness on environmental health hazards affecting children in these regions and throughout the world. The conference, a direct result of the Environmental Threats to the Health of Children meeting held in Manila in April 2000, provided participants with the latest scientific data on children's vulnerability to environmental hazards and models for future policy and public health discussions on ways to improve children's health. The Bangkok Statement, a pledge resulting from the conference proceedings, is an important first step in creating a global alliance committed to developing active and innovative national and international networks to promote and protect children's environmental health.

Bottom-up modelling of energy demand and technical energy savings potential in the Irish residential sector

The International Energy Agency has repeatedly identified increased end-use energy efficiency as the quickest, least costly method of green house gas mitigation, most recently in the 2012 World Energy Outlook, and urges all governing bodies to increase efforts to promote energy efficiency policies and technologies. The residential sector is recognised as a major potential source of cost effective energy efficiency gains. Within the EU this relative importance can be seen from a review of the National Energy Efficiency Action Plans (NEEAP) submitted by member states, which in all cases place a large emphasis on the residential sector. This is particularly true for Ireland whose residential sector has historically had higher energy consumption and CO2 emissions than the EU average and whose first NEEAP targeted 44% of the energy savings to be achieved in 2020 from this sector. This thesis develops a bottom-up engineering archetype modelling approach to analyse the Irish residential sector and to estimate the technical energy savings potential of a number of policy measures. First, a model of space and water heating energy demand for new dwellings is built and used to estimate the technical energy savings potential due to the introduction of the 2008 and 2010 changes to part L of the building regulations governing energy efficiency in new dwellings. Next, the author makes use of a valuable new dataset of Building Energy Rating (BER) survey results to first characterise the highly heterogeneous stock of existing dwellings, and then to estimate the technical energy savings potential of an ambitious national retrofit programme targeting up to 1 million residential dwellings. This thesis also presents work carried out by the author as part of a collaboration to produce a bottom-up, multi-sector LEAP model for Ireland. Overall this work highlights the challenges faced in successfully implementing both sets of policy measures. It points to the wide potential range of final savings possible from particular policy measures and the resulting high degree of uncertainty as to whether particular targets will be met and identifies the key factors on which the success of these policies will depend. It makes recommendations on further modelling work and on the improvements necessary in the data available to researchers and policy makers alike in order to develop increasingly sophisticated residential energy demand models and better inform policy.

Three Hundred Years in Annapolis: Phase III Archaeological Investigations of the Anne Arundel County Courthouse Site (18AP63), Annapolis, Maryland

During the summer of 1994, Archaeology in Annapolis conducted archaeological investigations of the city block bounded by Franklin, South and Cathedral Streets in the city of Annapolis. This Phase III excavation was conducted as a means to identify subsurface cultural resources in the impact area associated with the proposed construction of the Anne Arundel County Courthouse addition. This impact area included both the upper and lower parking lots used by Courthouse employees. Investigations were conducted in the form of mechanical trenching and hand excavated units. Excavations in the upper lot area yielded significant information concerning the interior area of the block. Known as Bellis Court, this series of rowhouses was constructed in the late nineteenth century and was used as rental properties by African-Americans. The dwellings remained until the middle of the twentieth century when they were demolished in preparation for the construction of a Courthouse addition. Portions of the foundation of a house owned by William H. Bellis in the 1870s were also exposed in this area. Construction of this house was begun by William Nicholson around 1730 and completed by Daniel Dulany in 1732/33. It was demolished in 1896 by James Munroe, a Trustee for Bellis. Excavations in the upper lot also revealed the remains of a late seventeenth/early eighteenth century wood-lined cellar, believed to be part of the earliest known structure on Lot 58. After an initially rapid deposition of fill around 1828, this cellar was gradually covered with soil throughout the remainder of the nineteenth century. The fill deposit in the cellar feature yielded a mixed assemblage of artifacts that included sherds of early materials such as North Devon gravel-tempered earthenware, North Devon sgraffito and Northem Italian slipware, along with creamware, pearlware and whiteware. In the lower parking lot, numerous artifacts were recovered from yard scatter associated with the houses that at one time fronted along Cathedral Street and were occupied by African- Americans. An assemblage of late seventeenth century/early eighteenth century materials and several slag deposits from an early forge were recovered from this second area of study. The materials associated with the forge, including portions of a crucible, provided evidence of some of the earliest industry in Annapolis. Investigations in both the upper and lower parking lots added to the knowledge of the changing landscape within the project area, including a prevalence of open space in early periods, a surprising survival of impermanent structures, and a gradual regrading and filling of the block with houses and interior courts. Excavations at the Anne Arundel County Courthouse proved this to be a multi-component site, rich in cultural resources from Annapolis' Early Settlement Period through its Modern Period (as specified by Maryland's Comprehensive Historic Preservation Plan (Weissman 1986)). This report provides detailed interpretations of the archaeological findings of these Phase III investigations.

Accelerating innovation in the social housing sector in UK

The UK government has been promoting innovation in the construction sector to improve the sustainability of the built environment. It has the potential and strength in developing construction research in design and engineering, but the impact of these processes seems to be slow in reaching the residential sector. While funding remains a major constraint research show that a number of detrimental issues including; organisation, risk, mind sets of the stakeholders, planning constraints,reluctance to accept change and the unexploited markets are major contributing factors. Most of these barriers can be overcome with research, development and information and knowledge transfer techniques. Educating all stakeholders can act as an accelerator for innovation. Given the large stock of existing dwellings, the situation is compounded, by issues related to climate change, to the point that this problem can no longer be ignored and requires an urgent response from all sectors involved. This paper attempts to highlight some of the key issues that are important in accelerating innovation in the housing sector. It briefly looks at the process of innovation in housing and presents lessons learnt from two research projects. The drivers and barriers and the role played by the government are examined in relation to the housing context.

The practice of home in old Cairo: Towards socio-spatial models of sustainable living

The article investigates the practice of home as an everyday system for sustainable living in Old Cairo. The idea of home in this historic urban space has long involved fluid socio-spatial associations and made efficient use of space-activity-time dynamics. As in the past, a individual’s sense of home may here extend beyond or shrink within the physical boundaries of a particular house, as spatial settings are produced and consumed according to time of day, gender association, or special events. The article argues that architects working in this context must understand the dynamics of this complex traditional system if they are to develop locally informed, genuine designs that build on everyday spatial practices. Work by the architect Salah Zaki Said and by the Historic Cities Program of the Aga Khan Trust for Culture is described to illustrate the potential of such engagement, especially as it contrasts to more abstract architectural proposals.

Nostalgically Man dwells on this Earth: Objects and domestic space in The Royal Tenenbaums and The Darjeeling Ltd

The films of Wes Anderson feature a peculiar attention to the representation of dwellings in relation to narrative development, filmic style and characters' identities. As is true of clothing, in Anderson's cinema homes with their architecture, furniture and objects strongly contribute to a nostalgic dislocation of the characters from contemporary time. Considering the house as the prime locus of identity and the core of the patriarchal family, the family home is often depicted by Anderson as the last physical trace left by the absent father; a utopian place that the characters aim to rebuild or to recall through its objectification. This paper aims to analyse the (re)construction of the family home in The Royal Tenenbaums, and will investigate its absence and surrogates in The Darjeeling Ltd.

Residential consumption of gas and electricity in the U.S.: The role of prices and income

We study the residential demand for electricity and gas, working with nationwide household-level data that cover recent years, namely 1997-2007. Our dataset is a mixed panel/multi-year cross-sections of dwellings/households in the 50 largest metropolitan areas in the United States as of 2008. We estimate static and dynamic models of electricity and gas demand. We find strong household response to energy prices, both in the short and long term. From the static models, we get estimates of the own price elasticity of electricity demand in the -0.860 to -0.667 range, while the own price elasticity of gas demand is -0.693 to -0.566. These results are robust to a variety of checks. Contrary to earlier literature (Metcalf and Hassett, 1999; Reiss and White, 2005), we find no evidence of significantly different elasticities across households with electric and gas heat. The price elasticity of electricity demand declines with income, but the magnitude of this effect is small. These results are in sharp contrast to much of the literature on residential energy consumption in the United States, and with the figures used in current government agency practice. Our results suggest that there might be greater potential for policies which affect energy price than may have been previously appreciated. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

An archaeological approach to the development of the late medieval peasant house

Archaeological excavation has provided an alternative source of evidence for the development of the late medieval peasant house. It is argued that whilst there was a significant change in building techniques in the decades around 1200 with the adoption of ground-set timbers, the most important factor which led to the survival of houses was a fall in real wages during the thirteenth century. This encouraged peasants to repair existing buildings, rather than replace them with new ones. Alternative traditions of building are also investigated. Stone construction was adopted in a number of areas of England, but in spite of the durability of the material, few medieval peasant buildings of this type have survived in use because of the failure to use lime mortar. Decisions about whether to invest in a building’s renovation will depend on the capital initially expended upon it. This interpretation is considered against the data from the fifteenth century and found to conform satisfactorily. Its implications are considered for the period between 1200 and 1350. Data collected from archaeological excavations combined with the results of dendrochronology on a growing number of closely dated standing buildings suggest that there was a significant ‘cull’ of houses in the period after 1350 as new dwellings were constructed.