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This master thesis aims to examine the relationship between energy consumption and economic growth and between energy consumption and greenhouse emissions for the EU countries, using a panel time series data from 1996 to 2012 within a multivariate framework for 26 EU countries. The energies are composed from oil consumption, natural gas consumptions, and renewable energies including the biomass as a distinct part. To do that, Unit Root Tests, cointegration test, Pairwise Granger causality tests, and Error Correction Model are employed to find out the type of the causal relationship. The main results to denote are that, there is in the short run, a positive unidirectional causal relationship running from oil consumption to economic growth. We can as well denote a positive bidirectional causal relationship between renewable energies and economic growth and between greenhouse emissions and economic growth. However, there is an unexpected negative bidirectional causal relationship between biomass consumption and gas consumption. From the greenhouse emissions perspective, we can see in the short run, a negative bidirectional causal relationship between greenhouse emissions and renewable energies, and a positive unidirectional causal relationship running from both oil consumption and biomass consumption...

Textile dyeing and finishing industry uses dryers/tenters for drying and heat-setting fabrics. A very large fraction of the heating value of the fuel consumed in the burner ends up as waste in the dryer exhaust. An initial calculation showed that up to 90% of the energy consumed in the tenter is wasted. Therefore, quantifying the energy waste and determining drying characteristics are vitally important to optimizing the tenter and dryer operations. This research developed a portable off-line gas chromatography-based characterization system to assess the excess energy consumption. For low-demanding heat-setting situations, energy savings can be realized quickly. On the other hand, there are demanding situations where fabric drying represents the production bottleneck. The drying rate may be governed either by the rate of heat transport or by the rate of moisture transport. A mathematical model is being developed that incorporates both these processes. The model parameters are being obtained from bench-scale dryer studies in the laboratories. The model will be validated using production scale data. This will enable one to predict optimization dryer operation strategies.

The objective of this study is to explore possible factors affecting college students¡¦ preference for fair trade coffee. The investigated factors included four of the values listed in Sheth, Newman and Gross's (1991a) theory of consumption values, as well as price, convenience (of buying fair trade coffee), and demographic variables. The values were functional value, social value, emotional value, and epistemic value. This study further divided emotional value into caring value and mood value; the formal reflected caring about farmers, child labor and the environment/ecology, and the latter focused on the possibility of having a good mood from consuming fair trade coffee. A convenience sample of 198 college students studying in Kaohsiung who often drank coffee were interviewed. Results from regression analysis suggest that college students would be more intended to buy fair trade coffee if they believed it had high caring value or high mood value. Furthermore, respondents spending less than 200 NTD per month on coffee were less intended to buy fair trade coffee than those spending between 200 NTD and 499 NTD per month on coffee were. Finally, functional value, social value, epistemic value, prices, and convenience¡Xall assessed by respondents' perceptions¡Xdid not have significant impact on the respondents¡¦ preference for fair trade coffee. Based on these findings, several recommendations were made to the government, schools, and organizations interested in promoting fair trade coffee.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 1973. / Typewritten.

published_or_final_version / Economics / Master / Master of Arts

Includes bibliographical references (leaves 289-319). / xxiv, 378 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Explores the link between cultural, social and individual factors and the structure and content of food perceptions. The aims of the thesis were to investigate the content of taste and nutrition perceptions within Korea and Australia and to assess how shared these perceptions were using Q-methodology. Within-country differences between younger and older males and females were examined and the relationships of food perceptions to food use explored. / Thesis (Ph.D.(Sc.))--Adelaide University, Dept. of Psychology, 2001

This thesis includes three essays on topics related to the predictability of market returns. I investigate i) the predictability of market returns from an adjusted version of cay ratio (cayadj), ii) the explanatory power of a conditional version of the consumption-CAPM which uses predictor variables to scale the pricing kernel, and iii) whether information about future market returns can be extracted from a large set of commodity data. The first essay studies the predictive ability of cayadj . In Campbell and Mankiw (1989), the consumption-wealth ratio is represented as a linear function of expected market returns and consumption growth. Lettau and Ludvigson (2001) build their study on Campbell and Mankiw (1989) and estimate the ratio cay as a proxy for the consumption-wealth ratio, assuming that the fluctuation in expected consumption growth is constant. I argue that the variation in expected consumption growth should be taken into consideration and propose adjusting the cay ratio by the estimates of expected consumption growth. After making the adjustment, I find that the predictabilities of market returns, particularly at annual, bi-annual, and tri-annual horizons, are greatly improved. The significant predictive ability of cayadj still holds in out-of-sample forecasts. The second essay examines the performance of a conditional version of the consumption-CAPM, where conditioning variables are used to scale the pricing kernel. I find that incorporating the conditioning information into the standard consumption-CAPM greatly improves the performance in asset pricing tests, particularly when using cayadj as the conditioning variable. Moreover, the performance of conditional consumption-CAPM is as good as the ultimate consumption risk model (Parker and Julliard, 2005) which measures the consumption risk over several quarters. Further tests show that the factors of conditional consumption-CAPM drive out the consumption risk measured over several quarters. The third essay evaluates the ability of lagged commodity returns to forecast market returns. In order to exploit the predictive information from a relatively large amount of commodity returns, I apply the partial-least-squares (PLS) method pioneered by Kelly and Pruitt (2013). I find that the commodity returns measured over previous twelve months show strong predictive power in monthly and three-month forecasts, in-sample and out-of-sample. The findings are robust to controlling for risk factors such as momentum, Fama-French three factors and industry returns previously identified to be significant predictors of market returns (Hong, Torous and Valkanov, 2007).

This research tested a conceptual model predicting the propensity to engage in two distinct forms of conspicuous consumption (bandwagon and snob consumption) that was developed by Kastanakis and Balabanis (2014) in a collectivistic Iranian context. This study found that this conceptual model was more successful in accounting for the variance in bandwagon consumption (i.e., conformity seeking conspicuous luxury consumption) than snob consumption (i.e., uniqueness seeking conspicuous luxury consumption) in the Iranian context. In addition to status seeking, it was found that consumer susceptibility to normative influence (CSNI) and consumer need for uniqueness (CNFU) mediates the influence of self-concept on bandwagon consumption. This finding suggests that the relationship between snob consumption and CNFU may differ in the Iranian context. Results also show that the relationships between CSNI, unpopular counter choice conformity (a sub-construct of CNFU) and status seeking with bandwagon consumption were all negatively moderated by consumer knowledge for fashion luxury goods. These findings extend the original conspicuous consumption model and provide some insight for the development of marketing strategies in Iran.

Wong, Jefferson See. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 143-151). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / LIST OF FIGURES --- p.i / LIST OF TABLES --- p.iv / Chapter CHAPTER ONE --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- Research Background --- p.1 / Chapter 1.3 --- Study Area --- p.8 / Chapter 1.3.1 --- Geographical setting --- p.8 / Chapter 1.3.2 --- Climate --- p.9 / Chapter 1.3.3 --- Water demand and supply in Hong Kong --- p.10 / Chapter 1.4 --- Objectives of the Study --- p.16 / Chapter 1.5 --- Significance of the Study --- p.16 / Chapter 1.6 --- Outline of Thesis --- p.17 / Chapter CHAPTER TWO --- LITERATURE REVIEW --- p.18 / Chapter 2.1 --- Introduction --- p.18 / Chapter 2.2 --- Concept of Urban Water Consumption / Water Use --- p.19 / Chapter 2.3 --- Urban Water Consumption Patterns --- p.19 / Chapter 2.4 --- Factors Influencing Urban Water Consumption --- p.22 / Chapter 2.5 --- Model Formulation of Urban Water Consumption --- p.29 / Chapter 2.6 --- Methods of Forecasting Urban Water Consumption --- p.37 / Chapter 2.7 --- Conclusion --- p.42 / Chapter CHAPTER THREE --- DATA AND METHODOLOGY --- p.44 / Chapter 3.1 --- Introduction --- p.44 / Chapter 3.2 --- Water Consumption and Climatic Data --- p.44 / Chapter 3.3 --- Modeling Framework and Procedure --- p.49 / Chapter 3.4 --- Base Water Use --- p.52 / Chapter 3.4.1 --- Long-term trend --- p.52 / Chapter 3.5 --- Seasonal Water Use --- p.53 / Chapter 3.5.1 --- Seasonal cycle --- p.54 / Chapter 3.5.2 --- Climatic effect --- p.58 / Chapter 3.6 --- Calendrical Water Use --- p.61 / Chapter 3.6.1 --- Day-of-the-week effect --- p.62 / Chapter 3.6.2 --- Holiday effect --- p.63 / Chapter 3.6.3 --- Persistence component --- p.64 / Chapter 3.7 --- Summary --- p.65 / Chapter CHAPTER FOUR --- RESULTS AND DISCUSSION --- p.67 / Chapter 4.1 --- Introduction --- p.67 / Chapter 4.2 --- Model Fitting and Parameterization --- p.68 / Chapter 4.3 --- Long-term Trend in Base Water Use --- p.69 / Chapter 4.4 --- Seasonal Water Use --- p.76 / Chapter 4.4.1 --- Seasonal cycle --- p.76 / Chapter 4.4.2 --- Climatic effect --- p.81 / Chapter 4.5 --- Calendrical Water Use --- p.86 / Chapter 4.5.1 --- Day-of-the-week effect --- p.86 / Chapter 4.5.2 --- Holiday effect --- p.90 / Chapter 4.5.3 --- Persistence component --- p.98 / Chapter 4.6 --- Evaluation of Model Performance --- p.112 / Chapter 4.7 --- Relative Contribution of Various Components of Water Consumption --- p.128 / Chapter CHAPTER FIVE --- CONCLUSION --- p.136 / Chapter 5.1 --- Introduction --- p.136 / Chapter 5.2 --- Summary of Findings --- p.137 / Chapter 5.3 --- Limitations of the Study --- p.141 / Chapter 5.4 --- Recommendations for Future Studies --- p.142 / REFERENCE LIST --- p.143