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The Wind Projects are based around ideas about materialization. They are an attempt at combining factors related to textiles, such as patterns, structure, materials and body with abstract ideas about movement, change, unpredictability and interrelated relationships between materials, environments objects and actions. / Program: Master in Textile Design

Methods for estimating productivity and costs, and dependent equipment selection process, have needed to be increasingly reliable. Estimated productivity and costs must be as accurate as possible in reflecting actual productivity and costs experienced by mining operations to accommodate the long-term trend for diminishing commodity prices, For loading and hauling equipment operating in open pit mines, some of the interrelated estimating criteria have been investigated for better understanding; and, consequently, more reliable estimates of production and costs, also more effective equipment selection process. Analysis recognizes many of the interrelated criteria as random variables that can most effectively be reviewed, analyzed and compared in terms of statistical mathematical parameters. Emphasized throughout is the need for management of the cyclical loading and hauling system using conventional shovels/excavators/loaders and mining trucks to sustain an acceptable “rhythm” for best practice productivity and most-competitive unit-production costs. Outcomes of the research include an understanding that variability of attributes needs to be contained within acceptable limits. Attributes investigated include truck payloads, bucket loads, loader cycle time, truck loading time and truck cycle time. Selection of “ultra-class” mining trucks (≥ 290 -tonne payload) and suitable loading equipment is for specialist mining applications only. Where local operating environment and cost factors favourably supplement diminishing cost-benefits of truck scale, ultra-class trucks may be justified. Bigger is not always better – only where bigger can be shown to be better by reasons in addition to the modest cost benefits of ultra-class equipment. Truck over-loading may, to a moderate degree, increase productivity, but only at increased unit cost. / From a unit-cost perspective it is better to under-load than overload mining trucks. Where unit production cost is more important than absolute productivity, under-trucking is favoured compared with over-trucking loading equipment. Bunching of mining trucks manifests as a queuing effect – a loss of effective truck hours. To offset the queuing effect, required productivity needs to be adjusted to anticipate “bunching inefficiency”. The “basic number of trucks” delivered by deterministic estimating must provide for bunching inefficiency before application of simulation applications or stochastic analysis is used to determine the necessary number of trucks in the fleet. In difficult digging conditions it is more important to retain truck operating rhythm than to focus on achieving target payload by indiscriminately adding loader passes. Where trucks are waiting to load, operational tempo should be restored by sacrificing one or more passes. Trucks should preferably be loaded by not more than the nominal (modal) number plus one pass. The research has: • Identified and investigated attributes that affect the dispersion of truck payloads, bucket loads, bucket-cycle time, loading time and truck-cycle time. • The outcomes of the research indicate a need to correlate drilling and blasting quality control and truck payload dispersion. Further research can be expected to determine the interrelationship between accuracy of drilling and blasting attributes including accuracy of hole location and direction. • Preliminary investigations indicate a relationship between drill-and-blast attributes through blasting quality control to bucket design, dimensions and shape; also discharge characteristics that affect bucket cycle time that needs further research.

Reports and consultative documents published at national level since about 1980 have indicated that British Industry must look to modern technology and also educate and train its workers on a 'broad base', with an 'integrated' approach. Traditionally, and still very much the mode of operation, teaching has been confined within subject boundaries. A research group was established by Professor Bajpai consisting of the author, Mr Rod Bond (Burleigh Community College, Loughborough) and a few others working overseas to investigate a teaching strategy based on an interrelated approach to teaching mathematics. Measurement was chosen as the first topic of investigation using this approach which then formed the basis for further research undertaken by the two research workers of the group whose work is reported in the form of two theses. This thesis aims to show that mathematics is naturally related to science and technology in industrial practice and that when taught in an interrelated way it would be more interesting and have more relevance to real applications in technology-based employment at craft and technician levels. To help establish the case experiments carried out by the author are referred to; these include a few case studies, a questionnaire survey and results analysed from more than five hundred basic mathematics tests. The various kinds of mathematics taught in further education are described and compared with mathematics in a practical context as seen from a case study within an engineering training school. Next a survey of mathematics at work shows that, like the training school, there is a task associated with the mathematics which is also related to science or technology or both. Another case study in the pharmaceutical industry lends further support to the way mathematics is used in industry. Much of the mathematics also seems to be basic and used in association with measurement and a particular task. It was decided by the research group that a tape/slide programme on measurement for students and educators should be developed by the author and tested in different situations. Teaching modules on relevant mathematical topics based on the interrelated approach were constructed for students with strong support from industry in the form of materials and advice. Testing of these modules, in their original and revised forms after feedback, is described. These trials were also carried out in other establishments. Modules based upon the interrelated approach developed by the author formed a basis for promoting the underlying philosophy behind this approach. These were presented to educators in in-service training and staff development programmes in the north western region of the UK with success. Observations and conclusions drawn clearly indicate that this type of method makes mathematics more interesting and relevant for students of different abilities and backgrounds. Finally pointers are given in the thesis as to the wider use and promotion of this approach for teaching mathematics in further education.

<p>Water infrastructure forms a critical sector of our social system and provides goods and services for public health, the natural environment, economic safety, various businesses, and government operations. In the United States (US), drinking water is supplied nationally through one million miles of pipes, most of which were installed in the early to mid-20th century with a life span of 75 to 100 years. Along with this fact, water bills which are rising faster than inflation, result in communities grappling with aging water systems, fewer water resources, and extreme weather. The federal government’s share of capital investment for water infrastructure has fallen from 31% in 1977 to 4% in 2017. Regional and state expenditure has accounted for a much larger share as federal aid for water infrastructure capital needs has declined. This has led to water rates rising to cover the costs of replacing and upgrading water infrastructure in many communities across the country. They are struggling to meet such costs through local rates and fees.</p><p>Over the next 20 years, more than 56 million new users are expected to connect to centralized treatment systems, and $271 billion is needed to meet current and future demands. However, the investment in critical water infrastructure is currently only meeting a fraction of the funding need. In 2019, the total capital spending on water infrastructure at all levels was $48 billion, while investment needs totaled $129 billion, creating an $81 billion gap. As such, the most recent American Society of Civil Engineers’ Infrastructure Report Card assigned a D to the drinking water infrastructure and a D+ to the nation’s wastewater infrastructure. Ineffectual and wasteful investment in the water sector has caused an adverse effect on grades in the infrastructure report card for water infrastructures. Moreover, this may negatively impact water-reliant sectors and water-related infrastructures due to the economic ripple effect.</p><p>This research has developed a data-driven strategic investment decision support system to close the existing water infrastructure investment gap and reduce the vulnerability of aging water infrastructure. The first phase of this study was to determine the causes affecting the grades in the infrastructure report card for drinking water and wastewater infrastructure and contributing to any latent threats and prolonged risks. It uses data-driven approaches based on analysis of existing ineffective improvement methods and recommendations. It attempts to leverage a data-driven supervised statistical learning method to capture the complex relationships between new challenges and the growing demand for water infrastructure needs. The ultimate outcome of this phase is a research approach to minimize water and wastewater vulnerability and close the investment gap to help create a paradigm shift in the current state of practice. Furthermore, improving the resiliency of and increasing investments in the water and wastewater infrastructure will lead to a resilient, efficient, and reliable water future and protect the public health of future generations.</p><p>The second phase of this study was to predict the economic benefits of additional federal support in water infrastructure among interdependent sectors within an economic system to facilitate the federal government’s share of capital investment. It conducts ripple effects analysis, which predicts the effectiveness of water infrastructure capital investment using historical economic data. It explores how federal capital investment in water infrastructure spreads economic benefits within an interdependent system. This phase was conducted at the federal level using the interindustry-macro model that analyzes macroeconomic data, including over 400 sectors. Investments that are coordinated at the federal, state, and local level will help control and stabilize rising water rates across the US.</p><p>The third phase of this study was to conduct a cost-benefit assessment in terms of private, financial, economic, and efficiency considerations using nominal and real terms to maximize the benefit of investing in the water sector and reduce the vulnerability of water infrastructures. In order to measure the costs and benefits of a strategy to maximize the efficiency of limited budgets and resources, this phase conducts a cost-benefit analysis due to the investment costs for rehabilitating and improving water infrastructures using historical economic and financial data. The long-term financial framework, including considerations of deep uncertainties so that decision-makers can understand the benefit of investing assets for an optimal level versus the cost of doing nothing and allowing the asset to run to failure is developed using the cost-benefit assessment.</p><p>Finally, a data-driven strategic investment decision support system that helps governments make water infrastructure development plans and infrastructure investment decisions in the water sector is presented. It can help governments with designing a novel system or modifying existing ineffective assessment methods and recommendations aimed at minimizing the mismatch in the water infrastructure investment gap between current spending levels and funding needs. Furthermore, minimizing the risks of ineffectual and wasteful water sector investment through rehabilitating and improving water infrastructures in a rational manner will lead to improved grades in the infrastructure report card and the resiliency of interrelated infrastructures and sectors.</p>

Chapter 1 describes practical theology as a communicative operational science and stresses how important it is that a hermeneutical and narrative approach compliments it. It is shown that pastoral work must be launched from the church community. The premise is that the Enlightenment paradigm causes a reductionistic, individualistic and denominational approach to pastoral work. A holistic, comprehensive and ecologically orientated approach is proposed. Chapter 2 discusses the need for an ecosystemic approach as a metaparadigrn for practical theology in terms of the move away from the Newtonian view of science and the post-modem critiques of a technocratic society. This is supported by developments in systemic family therapy, constructionism and community psychology. Chapter 3 describes an interrelated ecclesiology as a base theory for practical theology and pastoral work with reference to the church's interrelation with society and the need to include an anthropology as part of an ecclesiology. This interrelationship implies that the serving (diakonia) and caring (koinonia) functions of the church should converge, forming a diaconal pastorate. In chapter 4 the secularised modem world-vie\v and the traditional African world-view, both functioning in South Africa, are employed to shed light upon the importance of the concept community for the church's pastoral work. The term community is broadened to include the idea of networking, emphasisingg that community is more than geographical proximity. Chapter 5 is a quantitative investigation. by means of a questionnaire, of the views (ecosystemic/non-ecosystemic) of pastoral workers regarding the church and of pastoral work. Chapter 6 discusses the implications of a community pastoral work approach. Pastoral work has a serving-caring role, but should also function prophetically, to conscientise. sensitise and empower people. The church as a healing community must become the springboard from which pastoral actions can face the challenge of AIDS (chapter 7). This will require the church to shift its paradigm from the reductionist, individualist approach, presently prevalent in society and church pastoral actions, to an all-encompassing. holistic one. / Practical Theology / Th.D. (Practical Theology)

Chapter 1 describes practical theology as a communicative operational science and stresses how important it is that a hermeneutical and narrative approach compliments it. It is shown that pastoral work must be launched from the church community. The premise is that the Enlightenment paradigm causes a reductionistic, individualistic and denominational approach to pastoral work. A holistic, comprehensive and ecologically orientated approach is proposed. Chapter 2 discusses the need for an ecosystemic approach as a metaparadigrn for practical theology in terms of the move away from the Newtonian view of science and the post-modem critiques of a technocratic society. This is supported by developments in systemic family therapy, constructionism and community psychology. Chapter 3 describes an interrelated ecclesiology as a base theory for practical theology and pastoral work with reference to the church's interrelation with society and the need to include an anthropology as part of an ecclesiology. This interrelationship implies that the serving (diakonia) and caring (koinonia) functions of the church should converge, forming a diaconal pastorate. In chapter 4 the secularised modem world-vie\v and the traditional African world-view, both functioning in South Africa, are employed to shed light upon the importance of the concept community for the church's pastoral work. The term community is broadened to include the idea of networking, emphasisingg that community is more than geographical proximity. Chapter 5 is a quantitative investigation. by means of a questionnaire, of the views (ecosystemic/non-ecosystemic) of pastoral workers regarding the church and of pastoral work. Chapter 6 discusses the implications of a community pastoral work approach. Pastoral work has a serving-caring role, but should also function prophetically, to conscientise. sensitise and empower people. The church as a healing community must become the springboard from which pastoral actions can face the challenge of AIDS (chapter 7). This will require the church to shift its paradigm from the reductionist, individualist approach, presently prevalent in society and church pastoral actions, to an all-encompassing. holistic one. / Philosophy, Practical and Systematic Theology / Th.D. (Practical Theology)