Thesis (M.S.), Wellness Management--University of Central Oklahoma, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 51-56).

A planned development of the electricity supply system in the Maltese Islands is presented. The purpose of this project was to develop techniques for electricity supply system planning and design and to apply these techniques to a study of the development of the Maltese electricity supply system.

No description available.

This thesis examines the issue of young people and alcohol consumption in order to understand their behaviour and experiences in Thailand. Alcohol consumption is socially accepted as a pleasurable activity in many countries world-wide. Alcohol consumption among young people in Thailand has been affected by the spread of western culture, which has encouraged an acceptance of drinking alcohol as being fashionable and as a means of promoting social relationships. This study aimed to gain detailed knowledge of the alcohol consumption behaviour of secondary school students in Petchaburi Province, Thailand, using a survey and participatory action research to understand the perspectives of a variety of stakeholders in one community towards young people’s behaviour and alcohol consumption. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were adopted in order to explore and interpret students’ and stakeholders’ perspectives. The survey was the first phase of the research and used a questionnaire to identify the characteristics and problems of the alcohol consumption behaviour of 845 secondary school students aged 15-19 sampled from one school in each of the eight districts of Petchaburi Province. Logistic regression was used to select one school for conducting Participatory Action Research (PAR) in one community “C” in phase two of the research. An ecological approach was applied for capturing a variety of perspectives, at the intrapersonal, interpersonal, institutional, community, and public policy level using focus groups and in-depth interviews with eight students, eight parents, three health professionals, two teachers, one community leader, one policeman and one Buddhist monk. The study findings demonstrated that alcohol consumption among young people was common. The data showed that 45.9% of participants had had an alcoholic drink in the previous thirty days. Students usually drank on Fridays and Saturdays with their gangs. All or almost all of their close friends were reported as having an alcoholic drink. Most students were affected by peer pressure, some students copied their family members’ drinking behaviour, and some of them were influenced by fashion, community culture and advertising. Moreover, students who drank alcohol demonstrated the negative consequences of drinking. Drinking at an early age was defined by all stakeholders in the selected Community C as unpleasant and intolerable behaviour. Students started to develop strategies in order to access alcohol. Moreover, alcohol was readily available due to the lack of restrictions being enforced in community shops by government policy, alongside inconsistent enforcement of the Alcohol Act. The development of prevention strategies was recommended for action at all levels. This includes within families, in schools, and within affected communities through the introduction of policies such as the restriction of alcohol sales and advertising, and by raising awareness among young people and their communities. Finally, Buddhist practices were discussed as a key element in the development of an intervention programme to reduce the problematic drinking behaviour of young people.

Public concern about energy-related environmental damage has put pressure on governments to enhance abatement policies. This has in turn led to increasing demands for information about and analysis of expected and optimal levels of environmental quality, and the means of influencing these levels. Energy demand modelling can act as a valuable tool in the production of this information, particularly where it relates to future levels of environmental quality and to how policy intervention can alter constraints facing consumers in order to achieve desired levels. The thesis focuses on two features of energy demand analysis. First, major developments in dynamic econometrics, and in particular the cointegration approach, have enabled energy demand modellers to incorporate long run equilibrating relationships between energy use and its main determinants, such as economic activity and relative prices, within a dynamic framework. Second, the existence of a diverse market for energy both in terms of the fuels used and the users suggests that energy demand should be analysed at a disaggregated level. The purpose of this thesis is to examine whether disaggregated dynamic energy demand modelling can provide additional valuable information for the formulation of environmental policy. The core of the thesis takes the form of six separate papers: three review papers link dynamic energy demand modelling with environmental policy and three case study papers use disaggregated dynamic energy demand modelling to examine aspects of future United Kingdom energy-related environmental quality and how it can be altered through changing the constraints facing consumers. While theory and traditional econometrics have provided useful information about energy consumption behaviour, the introduction of the cointegration approach and the error correction model are enabling economists to estimate more reliably the long run relationships between energy demand and its main determinants, and the gradual adjustment of consumers towards equilibrium consumption levels after a disequilibrating disturbance. This new information is giving a greater understanding of how to achieve desired future environmental quality levels. The heterogeneous nature of energy use, both in terms of the fuels used and their users, indicates that the accuracy of elasticity estimates and, thus, the quality of information they can provide for environmental policy might be improved through the disaggregation of dynamic energy demand modelling. Employing the cointegration approach and sectoral and fuel specific error correction models to generate estimates of income, three separate papers provide evidence in support of this argument. Individually, these papers provide information about sectoral and fuel specific elasticities, about how residential users alter their behaviour as economic constraints change and about how certain car users alter their fuel consumption patterns when provided with adverse environmental publicity about fuels. Together, these papers suggest that there exists considerable variation in income and real price elasticities between sectors and fuels, and that using the estimates generated by such disaggregated dynamic models will provide greater accuracy than aggregated and static models. These variations are of particular importance to environmental policy makers because of the difference in environmental impact associated with different fuels. The thesis, therefore, finds that, by generating more detailed and reliable elasticity estimates, disaggregated dynamic energy demand models provide new and valuable insights for the formulation of environmental policy. It concludes that disaggregated dynamic energy demand modelling will form an increasing share of the models used for environmental forecasts and policy analysis - although the overall interest in this area of research may shift as levels of certain energy-related environmental indicators improve (eg carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides) and others worsen (eg volatile organic compounds and PM10). The thesis suggests that considerable refinements in energy demand modelling can be made, both in the methods used and in the focus of empirical studies, which will lead to further improvements in the formulation of environmental policy.

At present, the main cost items associated with cement manufacture are due to the fuel and the electric energy consumed. Reducing the fuel cost can be achieved either by reducing the specific consumption or by using lower grade cheap fuels in the process. One of the simplest and most important methods of reducing the specific consumption is the flame control, which, in addition to saving energy also results in better quality product and steadier kiln operation. By changing the process from wet to suspension preheater dry system, the industry can reduce its fuel consumption up to 50%. Application of precalcining system to these dry process suspension kilns can even further improve the heat transfer conditions in the kiln and the preheater. Precalcining can be achieved either by introducing some proportion of the total heat input into the riser duct connecting the kiln to the preheater or by adding another stage of separate calciner chamber. The advantages obtained by precalcining are several, some of the important ones being increase in production capacity for a given kiln unit, improved kiln lining life, steadier operation, better heat transfer conditions in suspension state for the decarbonation of the material, and the possibility of utilizing lower grade fuels in the secondary firing unit in the calciners. In order to achieve the aim of energy saving, it is essential to have a very good understanding and investigation of the aerodynamics of the furnace, and the effects of the modifications introduced to the system for energy saving purposes, like auxiliary burners. Modelling techniques prove to be very useful in such cases. In this present work, the technique of physical modelling has been chosen and the acid/alkali mixing method has been applied for flow visualization. By comparing the model results concerning the length and behaviour of the flame under different kiln operating conditions with the results of the experiments carried out on the prototype itself by earlier workers, the reliability of the technique and its usefulness in flame studies have been proved. By applying the same technique and flow visualization methods to a 1 :40th scale down geometric model of a suspension preheater kiln with auxiliary firing arrangement, the optimum operating conditions for such systems in case of secondary firing have been determined. It has been established that for the auxiliary firing systems in four-stage cyclone preheaters with combustion air being supplied through the kiln, the proportion of the fuel supplied at the back-end of the kiln in the riser duct should not exceed 30% of the total heat input, the optimum value being 27%. In designing auxiliary burners for such systems, it has also been found that the stream to jet velocity ratios (p) should be in the range 0.62 < p < 0.83 for burners 30&deg; inclined to the horizontal, and 0.41 < p < 0.49 for the burners perpendicular to the stream flow in the riser duct for purpose of having an axisymmetric flame in the riser duct.

No description available.

A pesquisa se propõe a investigar o modo como mulheres acima de 20 anos e de diferentes faixas etárias constroem singularização por meio de consumo de moda. A base teórica foi constituída a partir de autores pós-­‐estruturalistas como Bauman, o qual indica o conceito de individualização. Também compõem a base teórica -­‐ Lipovetsky, Guattari e Rolnik, Maffesoli, Canclini, Svendsen, Miranda e outros que operam com os conceitos de moda e consumo. A perspectiva metodológica adotada foi de entrevistas em profundidade através de roteiro semiestruturado, com seis mulheres com laços de parentesco (três pares de mães e filhas), afim de entender os processos de consumo, apropriações de vestuário e uso de acessórios de moda, bem como a interferência na construção de processos de singularização. Os resultados da pesquisa apontaram para a existência desses processos em todas as mulheres entrevistadas e também para interferências geradas pelos laços de parentesco em cada par. A singularização se dá na composição entre consumo e conservação superdimencionando as possibilidades de uso numa mistura de expressão coletiva com assinatura própria. É um processo que remete à autonomia e que é constituído de avanços e retrocessos, está atrelado à mudanças que estão associadas não só ao amadurecimento, mas especialmente, diferentes formas de interpretação dos fatos nas quais se originam também o comportamento por meio do consumo de moda e suas derivações. / This work aims to investigate how women of different age groups and over 20 years build singularization through fashion consumption. The theoretical basis for the singularization concept was established upon post-­‐structuralist authors like Bauman, while the fashion and consumption concepts came from Lipovetsky, Guattari and Rolnik, Maffesoli, Canclini, Svendsen, Miranda and others authors. The methodological approach adopted in this research was in-­‐depth semi-­‐structured interviews, with six women with family ties (three pairs of mothers and daugthers), in order to understand the consumption processes, clothing appropriation and the use of fashion accessories, as well as the interference in the construction of singularization processes. The survey results point to the existence of these processes in all interviewed women and also to interference generated by parentage in each pair. The singularity occurs in the composition of consumption and conservation overestimating the possibilities of using a mix of collective expression with its own signature. It is a process that leads to autonomy and which consists of advances and setbacks, it's linked to changes that are associated with not only to the mature process, but specially to different interpretations of the events in which had also origin the behavior through fashion consumption and its derivations.

The widescale use of combined heat and power with district heating will have a significant effect upon the quantities of primary and secondary fuels used in the United Kingdom. A new methodology for investigating the complex technological interactions between supplies and demands for fuels is developed, and the effect of sample CHP/dh scenarios calculated. Particular attention is paid to electricity generation to determine the impact of CHP/dh upon the operation of the merit order.

Domestic energy consumption is a multifaceted phenomenon which is dependent on both the social and technical characteristics of domestic households. In this thesis it is argued that such a phenomenon is best understood using an integrated approach, combining both the physical and social theories of energy use. Such an integrated approach is developed with the use of systems theory and focuses on the interaction between the physical and social aspects of the household. This integrated approach is used to analyse UK and US domestic energy consumption patterns and is compared with a purely physical and a purely social analysis. These analyses also highlight the inadequacies of the physical or social approach and demonstrates the difficulty involved in trying to consider both in a single integrated analysis.