<p> Bangladesh has experienced significant energy shortfalls in the electrical grid since at least 2005 and the majority of people living outside urban areas do not have access to electricity. Solar energy is an attractive form of supplemental electrical energy. One approach to implementing solar electric energy systems in Bangladesh is the Solar Home System (SHS), an off grid Photovoltaic (PV) solar energy system. With over 3 million solar home systems already installed, it is an increasingly important component of rural energy. The SHS as it currently exists only enables limited loads, such as lights and televisions, is relatively expensive and has some significant technical issues. </p><p> This research study attempts to explore how distributed PV can be improved, using Bangladesh as a case study. Literature is reviewed to determine interactions and elements of distributed PV systems. A quantitative Social, Technological, Economic, Environmental and Political (STEEP) index is developed. A software program called <i>poplar</i> is developed to evaluate the existing Solar Home System using the proposed STEEP index. This is compared to an alternative topology incorporating distributed energy storage elements into loads to provide flexibility and scalability in system usage and reliability. The developed model simulation indicates that implementing distributed energy storage elements allows reduction of PV module and storage size. While there is significant uncertainty in the cost and environmental impact of the power electronics, this smaller sizing is correlated with total reduction in system price and environmental impact. The conclusion to this study is that the current SHS configuration may be better optimized by incorporating distributed energy storage into the loads.</p>

Restauranteurs' use of Styrofoam take-out containers was evaluated using an intervention package containing informational components, a written commitment, and an incentive system. A decrease in the use of Styrofoam take-out materials was observed with 4 of 6 restaurants. Across all participants, we observed a 15.7% increase in alternative containers and a 15.7% decrease in Styrofoam containers. Overall, a decreased use of Styrofoam take-out containers was observed with restaurateurs who were able to identify suitable alternative products.

This paper looks into the contagion dynamics of sovereign credit rating changes with regards to bond yields in the period before and during the sovereign debt crisis in Europe. Our sample included European Union member countries, as well as a Eurozone subsample and a subsample excluding highly indebted countries. Events and outlooks from all three major rating agencies were considered. Our findings for the pre-crisis period are consistent with existing research, indicating an increase in borrowing costs by approximately five basis points in the case of a one-notch negative event, and insignificant effects in the case of positive events. During the crisis period, we observed a reversal of this effect, associating negative ratings with lower spreads on the entire sample. However, the effect was no longer significant when highly indebted countries were excluded from the sample, indicating that this effect may be tied to overly negative expectations. Lastly, we investigated the persistence of results, with only full-sample crisis period data displaying persistent effects. JEL Classification F01, F34, F42 Keywords credit rating, sovereign debt, default, debt crisis, European debt, sustainability Author's e-mail martin1703@gmail.com Supervisor's e-mail schneider.ondrej@gmail.com

<p> Forest certification plays an important role in the forest products industry in Mississippi. Approximately 17% of the state&rsquo;s 19 million acres of forest land is certified under one of three major systems in the United States. More than two million acres are certified under Sustainable Forestry Initiative, more than one million acres are certified under American Tree Farm System and over 150,000 acres are certified under Forest Stewardship Council. </p><p> The goal of forest certification is sustainable use of all forest resources, from timber to clean water to recreation. This goal can only be achieved if nonindustrial private forest landowners, loggers, and forestry professionals all agree on the concepts each system espouses. </p><p> This project surveyed nonindustrial private landowners in Mississippi, members of the Mississippi Loggers Association, and members of the Mississippi Sustainable Forestry Initiative Implementation Committee, to test their levels of agreement on 12 different Likert Scales or sets of statements representing specific underlying concepts of forest certification. </p><p> The three groups generally agreed on most aspects of forest certification. There were some significant differences between the groups based on the distribution of responses, however the scale averages never differed by more than 0.7 indicating that while the differences were significant, overall they were still fairly close in their understanding of certification concepts. </p><p> There were a large number of non-industrial private landowners who were not aware of forest certification. This result has not changed since the last landowner study that was conducted in Mississippi regarding forest certification, almost 10 years ago.</p>

A research report submitted In partial fulfilment of the degree of Masters of Commerce in Accounting, School of Accountancy, 2015 / This study is concerned with the adoption of materiality as a key reporting principle in the integrated report. This study investigates how preparers are determining which information is material and ought to be included in their integrated reports. The influence of logics is observed through an investigation of the different conceptualisations of the materiality concept by the preparers of integrated reports. Qualitative data was gathered from interviews with preparers of integrated reports in South Africa. The data was analysed using a grounded theory approach and the interplay between old and new logics that are shaping materiality in integrated reporting was identified. The findings of this research indicate that there are three groups of preparers each embodying different logics. The compliance preparers view integrated reporting as a compliance exercise. The stakeholder-aware preparers are aware that the integrated report should communicate with a wide variety of stakeholders and the interpretive preparer uses the integrated report not only to communicate to stakeholders but to identify weaknesses with in the entity. The findings also indicate that there are variations in practices and understandings of materiality and reveal differing organisational priorities which highlight the extent to which materiality is a social and behavioural phenomenon. The research adds to the limited body of corporate governance research drawing on an interpretive epistemology to explore recent reporting developments in a South African context the findings of this study will be relevant for the current debate about materiality in the integrated report, especially given the emergence of integrated corporate report. Keywords: King 3, GRI, Sustainable reporting, South Africa, Materiality, Institutional Logics, Integrated report. / MT2017

The advent of accelerated global warming and volatile climate change has prompted the need for a better understanding of what factors and policies might contribute to mitigate these events as well as increase the resilience of communities. Transit systems’ effectiveness and efficiency in increasingly disperse, car-dependent, and poly-centric urban agglomerations is one such factor, including the search for strategies to increase transit patronage and decrease car-dependence. Improving access to rapid-transit systems is one key area as it has the potential to expand the system’s influence beyond station’s immediate pedestrian service areas into larger and less developed suburban areas, and/or serve more disperse employment. Precedent studies and most on-board surveys have focused on a variety of access modes to reach rapid-transit services, including automobile, walking, and bicycle. Bus access, despite representing on average a non-trivial 19.3% of all access trips at national level, more than 30% at some large poly-centric cities in the U.S., and close to 50% of access trips for some rapid-transit lines (out-sizing the share of pedestrian access) has not received as much attention as other access modes. Predictive models for bus access mode report notably lower explanatory power as compared to other modes and the account of bus access events is often conflated with that of walk access in many technical reports and surveys for reasons yet to be understood. Ignoring, overlooking and/or misrepresenting this mode of access may lead to misunderstanding of multi-modal transit travel behavior and its spatial extent, possibly misguiding planners and policy-makers’ decision-making and resulting in system-wide ineffectiveness and/or inefficiency. This investigation documents bus access share for one exemplary case study and clarifies built-environment and bus networks’ influence on rapid-transit patronage within descriptive and inferential quantitative methodologies. This study seeks to answer two guiding research questions: 1- How important are bus networks to rapid-transit ridership in large, dispersed, poly-centric metropolitan regions in the U.S.? and 2- Do land-use and built-environment attributes around feeder bus-stops influence rapid-transit boardings? Because of diverse geographical scales and service levels experienced by a rider on a chained bus / rapid-transit trip this study focuses on two distinct yet linked geographies for analysis: 1-rapid-transit station; and 2- bus-stop. Research design is based on a single-case study in the United States (Los Angeles metropolitan multi-modal transit system). The first study focuses on quantifying the share of bus access trips at station-level and gaging its influence on total boardings within a multivariate generalized regression framework. Several socio-economic, service-level, built-environment, and network attributes are taken into consideration as informed by travel behavior theory and literature review. A strong positive association between bus network’s service and connectivity levels with rapid-transit station boardings registers high statistical confidence levels with boardings across all specified models. The mutual dependence of rapid-transit and bus networks evinced in the case of Los Angeles argues for a full multi-modal transit planning and operations paradigm for advancing a more effective, equitable, and sustainable transit system if it is to compete with ubiquitous automobile travel and its underpinning policy, fiscal, infrastructural, and cultural support. For Los Angeles, rapid-transit bus access represents an estimated 33.5% of all access events at a system-wide level, 20% - 49% at line-level, and a notably wider range at station-level (0% - 86%). The second study in this investigation focuses in assessing bus-stop pedestrian service areas built-environment and land-use attributes’ potential influence on rapid-transit station boardings, whilst controlling for both known and hypothesized control factors at bus-stop and station-level. By simultaneously focusing on bus-stop level attributes and higher-level rapid-transit stations’ attributes this part of the investigation fills a gap in the extant land-use / travel-behavior literature that more often focuses on pedestrian service areas adjacent to rapid-transit stations and ignores those around feeder bus-stops. Results evince a highly significant statistical relationship between bus-stop service area built-environment characteristics and the number of boardings associated with access trips to rapid-transit stations. However, the absolute effect relative to bus service levels and to automobile availability is notably smaller. Taken together as a multi-scalar study of bus and rapid-transit network interactions this investigation points to the importance of bus / rapid-transit network connectivity and service integration for maintaining and increasing rapid-transit patronage and the potential of synergistic contributions of built-environment interventions at feeder bus stops that seek to improve walkability and shorter walking distances. As a general conclusion, Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority and its associated MPO policy emphasis on TOD development as a strategy to increase transit ridership is limited. A more comprehensive policy approach based on ‘integrated public transportation’ and a more extensive station access policy that incorporates improvements around feeder bus stops, not only around stations, is the recommended course. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Urban and Regional Planning in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester 2018. / June 19, 2018. / built-environment, bus, multimodal, rapid-transit access, sustainable, transit / Includes bibliographical references. / Jeffrey Brown, Professor Directing Dissertation; Mark Horner, University Representative; Michael Duncan, Committee Member; John Felkner, Committee Member.

O objetivo deste trabalho é apresentar uma análise dos aspectos regulatórios e de comercialização sob a visão da sustentabilidade, com foco na questão de como a participação crescente das fontes consideradas incentivadas na matriz elétrica brasileira pode proporcionar benefícios energéticos e de redução nas emissões de gases de efeito estufa, contemplando possíveis aperfeiçoamentos regulatórios que possam vir a ser definidos pelas instituições do setor elétrico que detém essa competência. Destaca-se a seqüência de fatos que contribuíram para a ampliação da oferta das fontes alternativas (FA\'s), sublinhando: (i) a criação do Programa de Incentivo às FA\'s (PROINFA); (ii) o regramento para a comercialização de Energia Incentivada; (iii) o Mecanismo de Realocação de Energia (MRE); (iv) facilidades para compra de Geração Distribuída pelas distribuidoras, mitigar o risco de variação de mercado; (v) Leilões de Fontes Alternativas e (vii) Leilões de Energia de Reserva (LER). Nesse âmbito de análise, inclui-se uma aferição de risco de comercialização da Energia Incentivada e de como esse risco pode ser mitigado através de hedge contratual entre fontes incentivadas. Para avaliar e qualificar a sinergia entre energia eólica e da biomassa, que tem perfil de produção complementar às Pequenas Centrais Hidrelétricas (PCH\'s), foram realizadas simulações de análise de complementariedade de geração para identificar a melhor estratégia de contratação de energia, a fim de buscar a máxima receita líquida possível, atendendo restrições de risco. Finalmente, são apresentadas propostas de alterações regulatórias e comerciais que estão sendo discutidas no setor e que ainda não estão aprovadas, porém são consideradas relevantes e impactantes no que diz respeito à energia incentivada, destacando-se a possibilidade de cessão de energia excedente pelos consumidores livres e especiais; a criação de penalidades por alavancagem; a proposta de criação do Comercializador varejista; e dos certificados de energia (CEE\'s). / This work is aiming at to present an analysis of the regulatory aspects and commercialization, under sustainability point of view, focusing with special emphazis the question on how the increasing of incentivized sources participation in the Brazilian energy matrix can provide energy benefits and reduction of greenhouse emissions, considering possible regulatory improvements that may be defined by the adequate institutions of the Brazilian electrical sector (BES). Highlighting the sequence of events that contributed to increase the expansion of alternative sources (FA\'s), it should be worthwhile to stress: (i) the creation of the Incentive Program for FA\'s (PROINFA); (ii) the rules for the commercialization of the Energy with Incentive; (iii) the Energy Reallocation Mechanism (MRE); (iv) facilities for the purchase of Distributed Generation by distributors having the purpose of mitigating the market risk represented by the exposure to the short term market price (Market Cleasing Price); (v) Energy Auctions of Alternative sources (vii) Energy Auctions Reserve (LER). The context of the analysis carried out includes the assessment of commercialization risk affecting FA\'s and how this risk can be mitigated through of \"hedge\" contracts between different FA\'s. To evaluating and qualify the synergy between Wind and biomass plants, which has production with complementary profile to the Small Hydro Power (PCH\'s), simulations were performed to identify the best strategy to energy contracting, considering the objective of maximum profit under riskconstraints. Finally, some proposals of commercial and regulatory changes are presented, being important to emphasize that the quoted proposals are now in a discussion process in the BES, meaning that they are not approved yet. However, it is relevant to consider these news possibilities, as they impact the economic feasibility of incentivized energy, highlighting the possibility of to sell eventual surplus in the short term marketby free consumer; the creation of penalties for leverage; the creation of an agent focused on small free consumers (special consumers) commercialization, and energy certificates (CEE\'s).

Thesis advisor: Juliet B. Schor / In an era of increasing awareness about the impacts of everyday consumption on ecological sustainability, this study investigates the factors that influence mothers' selection of household cleaning products. The data for this study are from 28 in-depth interviews with mothers who maintain diverse preferences across a cleaning product profile spectrum. Incorporating the concepts of risk, trust, and convenience, the analysis highlights the ways in which considerations of ecological health in relation to cleaning products influence purchasing decisions of some participants but not others. This study contributes to understandings of how consumer practices shift toward environmental sustainability. / Thesis (MA) — Boston College, 2011. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Sociology.

<p> Floating homes in the Netherlands are presented to consumers as a new sustainable and adaptable technology to climate change. With the rainfall increasing and flood levels rising in the Netherlands, there is a chance that the country can be inhabitable. Many countries throughout the world are adapting sustainable techniques into their public policies to fight off climate change. Sustainable technologies allow for certain countries to move forward with a new market trend in order to keep up with international competition. The Dutch government specifically has a reputation of inertia throughout policy making, but now the Dutch have a new environmentally sustainable technology that has a chance to change the market. That technology is the alternative housing option called a floating home. The combination of a technology marketed as sustainable while surrounding a valued cultural symbol, such as water, is not based on the environmental agenda, but for the public policy makers to gain power over an elite target market by using a specific marketing power.</p><p> With the lack of change throughout the Dutch government and culture, there has to be a question of whether this new technology has been introduced as a chance to develop a new social construct within the targeted elite class. In order to better distinguish this answer, thematic interviews were set up to sort out key themes that would help generalize the true meaning of these floating homes. With key points developed from experts in the field, it helped understand analyzation of specific case studies. The results of both interviews and case studies were then blanketed by a theory based on culture, knowledge, and power. The basis of the conclusion is that the floating homes were not necessarily developed for sustainable use like they were advertised for, but were developed to create profits and societal change to gain governmental power that the Netherlands once lacked.</p><p>

This dissertation focuses on the economics of infrastructure development and public finance. The dissertation is composed of three papers: The first paper analyzes the optimal solutions for supplying electricity to national economies from both domestic as well as distant energy resources using transmission systems that can connect the huge renewable energy resources of Africa. The results point to options for achieving substantial increases in the sustainable energy supply and for improving access to energy across the continent. The second paper models a comparative local and national electricity distribution planning in Senegal by examining the trade-off between access and costs. The third paper uses exogenous variations in rainfall across municipalities in Mali to estimate the causal effect of household income shocks on municipal-level tax revenues. It also exploits a national tax collection incentive policy to measure the impacts of rainfall variation on intergovernmental transfers.