Thesis (MBA)--Stellenbosch University, 2011. / The world as we know it is in a warming cycle. The rate of warming is being exacerbated by human activity; more specifically, the burning of fossil fuels to power expanding economies. Awareness that something must be done before a catastrophic point of no return is reached, has become more urgent. Before any strategies can be developed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the levels must be accurately measured to provide a benchmark and to determine reduction targets. The determination of an organisation’s carbon footprint is thus the starting point of the whole process. When the carbon footprint is known, various strategies can be implemented to reduce the carbon footprint. South Africa is classified as a developing country and is not required to comply with greenhouse gas reduction targets under the Kyoto Protocol. This may change at any time in the future and it is therefore necessary to be ready when targets become compulsory. The general public is not knowledgeable about global warming. All of these factors need to change to provide impetus to reduction strategies. The South African Police Service (SAPS) is one of the largest government departments and is situated in nearly every town in South Africa. The SAPS is thus in a position to provide leadership in government and in communities on issues like global warming. The carbon footprint of the SAPS has been calculated as prescribed by the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (2011). As a service organisation, the SAPS does not have industrial processes that may be the source of large quantities of greenhouse gases. In this research study, Scope 1 and scope 2 emissions were calculated and possible mitigation options are proposed. A survey conducted among a specific target group has indicated a general understanding of the concept of climate change. The respondents have difficulty in establishing a connection between climate change and increased crime levels. Behavioural change and education are necessary to promote a culture of energy efficiency and a reduction of greenhouse gases. Leadership is seen as an inhibiting factor, as top management does not consider global warming to be an influencing factor on crime levels. Government must provide strong leadership and formulate climate change strategies. Funding can be generated with carbon tax and emissions trading. On departmental level the energy efficiency of buildings can be improved and alternative fuels for vehicles be used.

<p>Modern food production is a complex, globalized system in which what we eat and how it is produced are increasingly disconnected. This thesis examines some of the ways in which global trade has changed the mix of inputs to food and feed, and how this affects food security and our perceptions of sustainability. One useful indicator of the ecological impact of trade in food and feed products is the Appropriated Ecosystem Areas (ArEAs), which estimates the terrestrial and aquatic areas needed to produce all the inputs to particular products.</p><p>The method is introduced in Paper I and used to calculate and track changes in imported subsidies to Swedish agriculture over the period 1962-1994. In 1994, Swedish consumers needed agricultural areas outside their national borders to satisfy more than a third of their food consumption needs. The method is then applied to Swedish meat production in Paper II to show that the term “Made in Sweden” is often a misnomer. In 1999, almost 80% of manufactured feed for Swedish pigs, cattle and chickens was dependent on imported inputs, mainly from Europe, Southeast Asia and South America. Paper III examines ecosystem subsidies to intensive aquaculture in two nations: shrimp production in Thailand and salmon production in Norway. In both countries, aquaculture was shown to rely increasingly on imported subsidies. The rapid expansion of aquaculture turned these countries from fishmeal net exporters to fishmeal net importers, increasingly using inputs from the Southeastern Pacific Ocean.</p><p>As the examined agricultural and aquacultural production systems became globalized, levels of dependence on other nations’ ecosystems, the number of external supply sources, and the distance to these sources steadily increased. Dependence on other nations is not problematic, as long as we are able to acknowledge these links and sustainably manage resources both at home and abroad. However, ecosystem subsidies are seldom recognized or made explicit in national policy or economic accounts. Economic systems are generally not designed to receive feedbacks when the status of remote ecosystems changes, much less to respond in an ecologically sensitive manner. Papers IV and V discuss the problem of “masking” of the true environmental costs of production for trade. One of our conclusions is that, while the ArEAs approach is a useful tool for illuminating environmentally-based subsidies in the policy arena, it does not reflect all of the costs. Current agricultural and aquacultural production methods have generated substantial increases in production levels, but if policy continues to support the focus on yield and production increases alone, taking the work of ecosystems for granted, vulnerability can result. Thus, a challenge is to develop a set of complementary tools that can be used in economic accounting at national and international scales that address ecosystem support and performance.</p><p>We conclude that future resilience in food production systems will require more explicit links between consumers and the work of supporting ecosystems, locally and in other regions of the world, and that food security planning will require active management of the capacity of all involved ecosystems to sustain food production.</p>

Ce mémoire en recherche création débute par un récit poétique rédigé par fragments et intitulé Ma mère est une porte. Ce texte met en abyme les ruines afin de démontrer leur lien de contiguïté avec l’absence, l’empreinte, la mémoire et la mort. D’ailleurs, leur aspect ruiniforme rappelle le fragment, ce qui permet d’appuyer l’esthétique formelle de l’œuvre. La deuxième partie intitulée Approche génétique : un monument à la mémoire des disparus emportés par le temps de l’écriture, propose une réflexion sur l’imaginaire des ruines en lien avec les archives littéraires et la mémoire. Divisé en trois sections, cet essai pose un regard inquiet sur l’avenir de l’objet d’étude de la critique génétique, soit le manuscrit moderne. Depuis l’avènement de l’informatique et du traitement de texte, que conserverons-nous de la mémoire scripturale et du processus d’écriture de l’écrivain de demain? / This M.A. Thesis combining research and creative writing is divided in two parts: a poetic narrative and an essay. Ma mère est une porte is structured in fragments and contains the mise en abyme of ruins in order to demonstrate that they closely relate to the ideas of absence, genetic footprint, memory and death. Ruins suggest fragments, thus the narrative’s esthetical form. The second part, Approche génétique : un monument à la mémoire des disparus emportés par le temps de l’écriture, is an essay reflecting on the metaphorical link between manuscript, ruins, archives and memory. Divided in three sections, it posits that new technology will cause modern manuscripts to disappear and the methodology behind genesis of text’s to evolve. Moreover, this will change how creative writing’s memory is preserved, hence affecting our cultural heritage.

In this work, I focus on the propagation of environmental issues through sitcom and comparison of the perception of these topics by Czech and Dutch audiences. I report on the results of focus group research of the American show The Big Bang Theory (2007-2019), from which artefacts were pre-selected with the assistance of thematic analysis. These findings suggest different perception of the environmental contents included in the researched series, the same as the varying perception of hypothetical promotion of the environmental issues in the future series. Generally speaking, the global sample perceives the promotion of environmental issues in popular media positively, though the degree and the form of the accepted usage of these topics vary. Czech audiences perceive the topics more negatively than the Dutch audience, showing a lower sensitivity threshold for a possible attack on their own opinions and identity. The most significant differences were observed in the perception of the concept of nature, the person interested in the environment, and the individual impact on the improvement/deterioration of the environment. A suitable tool for communicating environmental issues in the sitcom is corrective irony (allowing to emphasize the contrast between environmental awareness and personal actions to...

This dissertation is based on the conceptual framework of social metabolism and it applies methods of Material and Energy Flow Analysis and Ecological Footprint. It studies interactions between human activities and natural environment in Czech/Czechoslovak territory from the historical perspective (after the division of Czechoslovakia for Czechia and Slovakia together). The term of social metabolism is a metaphor inspired by biology. Society or human economy similarly to a living organism which extracts materials from the earth, processes biophysical materials to maintain itself and emits its wastes back. So the economic system functions in an analogy to a living organism and those processes are called "social" or "industrial" metabolism. This dissertation comprises seven individual empirical studies: (I) An introduction to a research topic covered in following articles. It is based on the work of leading world environmental historian and it interprets selected Czech realities within the context of the world environmental history. (II) The historical series of MEFA indicators together with ecological footprint. (III) An article which applies the ecological footprint method on the ecological farm in comparison to conventional agriculture in the context of more foreign studies on this topic. (IV) An...

O desenvolvimento sustentável e a própria sobrevivência da humanidade dependem da compatibilização da demanda por recursos energéticos com as limitações ambientais e necessidades humanas. Dessa maneira, torna-se fundamental compreender e mensurar a sustentabilidade energética. Para tanto, esse trabalho vale-se de princípios da economia ecológica e do planejamento integrado de recursos para identificar e analisar os fatores que afetam a sustentabilidade energética de um dado sistema. A partir desses fatores são definidos indicadores de sustentabilidade, os quais compõem uma metodologia concebida para avaliar o grau de sustentabilidade da produção de energia. Tal metodologia é testada em um estudo de caso da matriz elétrica paulista, a qual mostrou um nível próximo da sustentabilidade, mas com a necessidade de aprimoramentos. Por fim, são feitas reflexões sobre a robustez, a flexibilidade e as limitações da metodologia proposta, assim como recomendações para ajustes da composição da matriz estudada com o propósito de torná-la mais sustentável. / Sustainable development and the very survival of humanity depends on the compatibility of the demand for energy resources with environmental constraints and human needs. Thus, it is essential to understand and define metrics for energy sustainability. For that reason, this work draws on principles of ecological economics and integrated resource planning to identify and analyze the factors affecting energy sustainability of a given system. From these factors are defined sustainability indicators, which are the foundations for a methodology designed to assess the degree of sustainability of energy production. The methodology is tested on a case study of the electricity matrix of the State of Sao Paulo, which is close to a sustainable level even though requiring improvements in some aspects. Finally, reflections on the sturdiness, flexibility and limitations of the proposed methodology, as well as recommendations for adjustments in the composition of the case study matrix in order to make it more sustainable are made.

O presente trabalho apresenta uma proposta metodológica para se determinar a pegada hídrica ecotoxicológica (PHE) de produtos em uma perspectiva de ACV, dentro de uma abordagem crítica sobre o método. Cenários são construídos na forma de um estudo piloto de aplicação da metodologia para o etanol hidratado produzido por uma determinada Usina no Brasil e utilizado como combustível em carros a álcool ou carros flex. O trabalho também sugere que a PHE ou WEF (water ecotoxicity footprint ), na forma de um indicador, sirva de parâmetro tanto para o setor produtivo quanto para o mercado consumidor dentro do processo de tomada de decisão . O setor produtivo poderá utilizar o citado indicador dentro de um programa de metas de redução do nível de ecotoxicidade aquática de seu produto enquanto que, para o consumidor final, o conhecimento da PHE na forma de selo informativo servirá de alavanca rumo à evolução sustentável de nossa civilização que usará o seu poder de escolha na hora de adquirir determinado produto. Dentro da perspectiva de ACV, foram estudadas e inseridas formas de avaliação de impacto, no ponto médio, a nível local e regional com o uso de ferramentas de georeferenciamento. Na intenção de facilitar o uso da ACV no Brasil, o estudo estabelece parâmetros que tornam viável a obtenção de um indicador passível de comparação. Políticas Públicas poderão ser formadas com a possibilidade de incentivar a identificação e mitigação da ecotoxicidade aquática ao longo da cadeia de suprimentos do setor produtivo.. / This work presents a methodology to determine water ecotoxicity footprint of products in a perspective of LCA within a critical approach to the method. Scenarios are constructed in the form of a pilot study of application of the methodology for hydrous ethanol produced by a given plant in Brazil and used as fuel in flex cars. The work also suggests that the water ecotoxicity footprint, as an indicator, can be used as a parameter for both: the productive sector as well as for theend consumer within the decision-making process. The productive sector can use the cited indicator in a program targeting for reduction in aquatic ecotoxicity of your product while for the end consumer, knowledge of water ecotoxicity footprint in the form of a informative stamp will leverage towards sustainable development of our civilization that uses the power of choice when purchasing a product. From the perspective of LCA, were studied and included forms of impact assessment, at the midpoint, in local and regional level with the use of geo-referencing tools. With the intention of facilitating the use of LCA in Brazil, this study establishes criteria that make possible the comparison . Public policies can be formed with the possibility of encouraging the identification and mitigation of aquatic ecotoxicity along the supply chain of the productive sector..

A Contabilidade Financeira busca informações confiáveis que sejam razoavelmente livres de erros, viés e mostrem, fielmente, o que visam representar. A obtenção de valores ambientais com menos viés possíveis, mais acurados e comparáveis poderia, talvez, se constituir em parâmetro para definição de serviços ambientais, ensejar discussões quanto ao tratamento contábil da área do bioma preservado e, também, comercialização de certificado ambiental baseado na preservação do meio ambiente e, de forma geral, servir de subsídios para tomada de decisões empresariais e governamentais. Este trabalho tem por objetivo propor métrica de valoração de Reservas Legais e Áreas de Preservação Permanente em propriedades agrícolas, no seu estado natural, puro e ainda livre dos efeitos das ações humanas. A métrica foi desenvolvida com base no método de Custo de Oportunidade (CO), Contabilidade Emergética e Curva Ambiental de Kuznets (CAK). A referida métrica constitui-se da soma do valor do C.O. ao Valor Total do Bioma (VTB). Porém, o valor do C.O. é descontado pelo risco do negócio analisado. O VTB é estimado pela Contabilidade Emergética, sendo considerada a área do hectare preservado, em RL e/ou APP, e a área remanescente do bioma estudado. Então, o VTB é ponderado pela CAK, esta estimada pela variação dos preços da cultura agrícola analisada. Visando sua validação, estimou-se a área preservada em hectares de Reservas Legais e Áreas de Preservação Permanente de cada bioma terrestre brasileiro referente às dez culturas agrícolas que possuem maior área plantada. Das culturas utilizaram-se os dados sobre os valores brutos de produção, a variação dos preços em média nacional e a extensão territorial das unidades federais brasileiras. Utilizaram-se também os dados dos biomas terrestres brasileiros referentes às suas áreas totais e áreas remanescentes preservadas. Informações estas obtidas em consulta ao site do IBGE, IBAMA e Agrolink. Na sequência, foi aplicada a métrica para valorar os biomas preservados em nível nacional e sobre cinco culturas reais de dados coletados de empresas agrícolas. Entre os resultados obtidos com a métrica, o maior valor foi para o bioma Pampas sobre a cultura agrícola de mandioca no ano de 2010 (R$1.754,03) e o menor para o bioma Cerrado sob a cultura de trigo no ano de 2005 (R$ 53,67). A tentativa era expressar os valores, por meio da métrica proposta, que diferentes indivíduos atribuiriam aos biomas e, com isso, estimular a preservação ao viabilizar um mercado que remunere os preservadores. Trata-se de uma proposta inovadora, e os valores podem ser utilizados para auxiliar legisladores a viabilizar a regulamentação das legislações que preveem a concessão de compensações pela prestação de serviços ambientais, além de servirem como instrumentos de gestão ambiental interna às empresas, principalmente, pelo reconhecimento do potencial de benefícios dos recursos sob suas responsabilidades. / The Financial Accounting search reliable information that is reasonably free errors, bias and show, faithfully, what aim at represents. Obtaining environmental values with less bias possible, more accurate and comparable could, perhaps, constitute parameter for defining environmental services, give rise to discussions about the accounting treatment of the biome area preserved and, also, marketing of environmental certificate based on preservation the environment and, in general way, serve as support for business decisions take and government. This work aims to propose metric valuation of Legal Reserves and Permanent Preservation Areas on agricultural properties, in their natural state, pure and yet free from the effects of human actions. The metric was developed based on the method of Opportunity Cost (OC), Accounting Emergy and Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC). The metric constitutes themselves from the sum of the value of O.C. to the Biome Total Value (BTV). However, the value of O.C. is discounted by business risk analyzed. The BTV is estimated by Emergy Accounting, considering the area hectare preserved in RL and / or APP, and the remaining area of the biome studied. So, the VTB is weighted by EKC, estimated by this change in the prices of agricultural crops analyzed. Aiming validation, estimated the preserved area in hectares of Legal Reserves and Permanent Preservation Areas of each terrestrial biome Brazilian referring to the ten crops that have greater acreage. From the cultures used the data on gross production, the price variation in average national and territorial scope of the federal units of Brazil. Were also used data from the Brazilian terrestrial biomes with respect to their total areas and remaining areas preserved. Information they obtained by consulting the IBGE site, IBAMA and Agrolink. Further, we applied the metric to value biomes preserved in national and over five real cultures data collected from agricultural enterprises. Between the results obtained with the metric, the highest value was for the Pampas biome on the cassava crop in 2010 (R $ 1,754.03) and lowest for the Cerrado biome in the wheat crop in 2005 (R $ 53.67). The attempt was to express the values, through the proposed metric, which would assign individuals on different biomes and, thereby, encouraging the preservation by allowing a market to remunerate preservers. This is an innovative proposal, and the values can be used to assist legislators to enable the regulation of the laws that predict the granting compensation the provision of environmental services, besides serving as instruments of internal environmental management firms, mainly, by recognition of the potential benefits of the resources under their responsibility.

O presente trabalho apresenta uma proposta metodológica para se determinar a pegada hídrica ecotoxicológica (PHE) de produtos em uma perspectiva de ACV, dentro de uma abordagem crítica sobre o método. Cenários são construídos na forma de um estudo piloto de aplicação da metodologia para o etanol hidratado produzido por uma determinada Usina no Brasil e utilizado como combustível em carros a álcool ou carros flex. O trabalho também sugere que a PHE ou WEF (water ecotoxicity footprint ), na forma de um indicador, sirva de parâmetro tanto para o setor produtivo quanto para o mercado consumidor dentro do processo de tomada de decisão . O setor produtivo poderá utilizar o citado indicador dentro de um programa de metas de redução do nível de ecotoxicidade aquática de seu produto enquanto que, para o consumidor final, o conhecimento da PHE na forma de selo informativo servirá de alavanca rumo à evolução sustentável de nossa civilização que usará o seu poder de escolha na hora de adquirir determinado produto. Dentro da perspectiva de ACV, foram estudadas e inseridas formas de avaliação de impacto, no ponto médio, a nível local e regional com o uso de ferramentas de georeferenciamento. Na intenção de facilitar o uso da ACV no Brasil, o estudo estabelece parâmetros que tornam viável a obtenção de um indicador passível de comparação. Políticas Públicas poderão ser formadas com a possibilidade de incentivar a identificação e mitigação da ecotoxicidade aquática ao longo da cadeia de suprimentos do setor produtivo.. / This work presents a methodology to determine water ecotoxicity footprint of products in a perspective of LCA within a critical approach to the method. Scenarios are constructed in the form of a pilot study of application of the methodology for hydrous ethanol produced by a given plant in Brazil and used as fuel in flex cars. The work also suggests that the water ecotoxicity footprint, as an indicator, can be used as a parameter for both: the productive sector as well as for theend consumer within the decision-making process. The productive sector can use the cited indicator in a program targeting for reduction in aquatic ecotoxicity of your product while for the end consumer, knowledge of water ecotoxicity footprint in the form of a informative stamp will leverage towards sustainable development of our civilization that uses the power of choice when purchasing a product. From the perspective of LCA, were studied and included forms of impact assessment, at the midpoint, in local and regional level with the use of geo-referencing tools. With the intention of facilitating the use of LCA in Brazil, this study establishes criteria that make possible the comparison . Public policies can be formed with the possibility of encouraging the identification and mitigation of aquatic ecotoxicity along the supply chain of the productive sector..

O desenvolvimento sustentável e a própria sobrevivência da humanidade dependem da compatibilização da demanda por recursos energéticos com as limitações ambientais e necessidades humanas. Dessa maneira, torna-se fundamental compreender e mensurar a sustentabilidade energética. Para tanto, esse trabalho vale-se de princípios da economia ecológica e do planejamento integrado de recursos para identificar e analisar os fatores que afetam a sustentabilidade energética de um dado sistema. A partir desses fatores são definidos indicadores de sustentabilidade, os quais compõem uma metodologia concebida para avaliar o grau de sustentabilidade da produção de energia. Tal metodologia é testada em um estudo de caso da matriz elétrica paulista, a qual mostrou um nível próximo da sustentabilidade, mas com a necessidade de aprimoramentos. Por fim, são feitas reflexões sobre a robustez, a flexibilidade e as limitações da metodologia proposta, assim como recomendações para ajustes da composição da matriz estudada com o propósito de torná-la mais sustentável. / Sustainable development and the very survival of humanity depends on the compatibility of the demand for energy resources with environmental constraints and human needs. Thus, it is essential to understand and define metrics for energy sustainability. For that reason, this work draws on principles of ecological economics and integrated resource planning to identify and analyze the factors affecting energy sustainability of a given system. From these factors are defined sustainability indicators, which are the foundations for a methodology designed to assess the degree of sustainability of energy production. The methodology is tested on a case study of the electricity matrix of the State of Sao Paulo, which is close to a sustainable level even though requiring improvements in some aspects. Finally, reflections on the sturdiness, flexibility and limitations of the proposed methodology, as well as recommendations for adjustments in the composition of the case study matrix in order to make it more sustainable are made.