The façade retrofit market faces some key barriers: the selection of performance criteria and the reliability of the performance data. On the demand side, the problem is approached from an investment perspective which creates "split incentives" between the stakeholders who pay for the investment and those who benefit from it. On the supply side, there is an inherent complexity in modeling these options because of the incomplete knowledge of the physical and cost parameters involved in the performance evaluation. The thermal comfort of the building occupant is an important component of the retrofit performance assessment. This research attempts to fill a gap in the approach to façade retrofit decision by 1) quantifying uncertainties in these three dimensions of performance, 2) incorporating new financing models available in the retrofit market, 3) considering the target and risk attitude of the decision maker. The methodology proposed in this research integrates key indicators for delivery process, environmental performance, and investment performance. The purpose is to provide a methodological framework for performance evaluation. A residential case study is conducted to test the proposed framework. Three retrofit scenarios including the financing structure are examined. Each façade retrofit scenario is then evaluated based on the level of confidence to meet or exceed a specific target improvement for the Net Present Value and the risk to fall below a minimum improvement threshold. The case study results confirm that risk must be considered for more reliable façade retrofit decision-making. Research findings point to further research needed to expand the understanding of the interdependencies among uncertain parameters.

Les circuits FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays) sont devenus des acteurs importants dans le domaine du traitement numérique qui a été dominé auparavant par les microprocesseurs et les circuits intégrés spéci ques. Le plus grand dé pour les FPGAs aujourd'hui est de présenter un bon compromis entre une grande souplesse et de bonnes performances (vitesse, surface et consommation). La combinaison de trois facteurs dé nit les caractéristiques d'un circuit FPGA: la qualité de l'architecture, la qualité des outils CAO de con guration et la conception électrique du FPGA. L'objet de cette thèse est l'exploration de nouvelles architectures et de structures d'interconnexion qui pourront améliorer les performances de ces circuits. En effet, les ressources d'interconnexion occupent 90% de la surface totale et occasionnent 60% de la consommation électrique. Les architectures étudiées présentent des structures matricielles et arborescentes. Les principaux résultats sont les suivants: Au départ nous explorons différentes topologies arborescentes et nous comparons leurs surfaces à celles des architectures matricielles. Pour cela, nous développons une plateforme d'outils logiciels permettant d'implanter différents circuits logiques sur l'architecture cible. En se basant sur cette étude expérimentale, nous dé nissons une nouvelle architecture arborescente. Nous montrons, en nous appuyant sur un modèle d'estimation de surface, que cette architecture permet de réduire la surface totale de 56% par rapport à une architecture matricielle. Ceci est dû essentiellement à une meilleure utilisation des ressources d'interconnexion. Nous explorons les effets des différents paramètres de l'architecture proposée: le coef cient de Rent, la taille des groupes logiques et le nombre d'entrées par bloc logique. Ceci permet de régler l'architecture pour l'adapter à des domaines d'applications qui ont des contraintes spéci ques en terme de surface, vitesse et consommation. En n, nous proposons une architecture qui rassemble les avantages des structures arborescentes et matricielles. Nous uni ons les deux structures en construisant des groupes de blocs logiques qui ont localement un réseau d'interconnexion arborescent et qui sont connectés entre eux via un réseau matriciel. Nous montrons que l'architecture obtenue présente un bon compromis entre l'évolutivité de la vue physique et la densité de la surface.

The CEO bonus of banking companies has become a hot media topic around the world accelerated by the recent financial crisis of 2007-2008 where the excessive pay and risk-taking in the banking sector were recognized. This has raised public concerns around executive remuneration and the transparency of the companies. According to the regulations, the bonus of the CEO is indexed to the firm´s performance. However, the compensation of many CEO’s has been paid out during the financial crisis although the firms have lost money. This has consequently led to rigorous regulations of the financial institutions with the attempt to ensure long-term focus and consider outstanding risk through variable remuneration payments.   Although the remuneration, and specifically annual bonus, has caught a lot of attention by the public and the media, it has been mostly overlooked by regulatory authorities and academics up until today. This research represents the first attempt to examine the disclosure and transparency of CEO annual bonus plans of twenty leading EU banks through the employment of in-depth and descriptive approach.. The purpose of this study is to explore the issue of CEO annual bonus plan with respect to the disclosure of the information provided in the banking companies’ financial reports of 2011. The level of transparency of the companies are scrutinized and measured accordingly to five bonus features, which may contribute to the transparency of annual bonus plans. The bonus plan is regarded as transparent if the majority of the following bonus criteria are fulfilled by the companies; (1) the application of simple targets through a single performance condition; (2) the application of published targets accessible to shareholders; (3) the disclosure of methods applied in order for shareholders and other stakeholders to determine whether the given performance target(s) has been fulfilled; (4) bonus payments in form of cash; (5) the disclosure of annual bonus cap.   The findings of this study show that a significant part of the banks can be considered as non-transparent due to the failure of fulfilling the given bonus plan features, meaning that the issue of disclosure and transparency of annual bonus plans should raise concern for shareholders and regulators, both on the EU-level and nationally. This study evidently shows that the level of information disclosed as to bonus plans of CEO various tremendously between the countries and sometimes also between the companies in the same country, which indicate the issue of disclosure and transparency of annual bonus plans need to be enhanced through regulations.

This thesis addresses the factors which lead the Russian government to increase natural gas prices for Ukraine in 2006. Through the use of methodological individualism, an explanation which links system, state, and individual levels of analysis is constructed. The system level variables concerned include global energy prices and the increasing importance of Turkmen natural gas to Russia and other regional gas consumers. State level variables, include changes in Russia’s patrimonial society (changing source of rents, increased authoritarianism); and increasing state control over Russia’s natural gas industry. Changes in these conditioning factors influence individuals’ beliefs about their preferred source of rents, and the nature of their rent seeking and distributing. The resulting actions bring about variations in Russia’s natural gas price for Ukraine. This framework is tested over three time periods (1995-1999, 2000-2004, 2004-2008) selected based on the nature of the conditioning variables over those years. Evidence from these case studies suggests that the above mentioned factors played a large role in the Russian government’s decision. Further, it is concluded that methodological individualism offers a way to bring together system, state, and individual levels of analysis when explaining this event, and perhaps other events in international politics.

This thesis addresses the factors which lead the Russian government to increase natural gas prices for Ukraine in 2006. Through the use of methodological individualism, an explanation which links system, state, and individual levels of analysis is constructed. The system level variables concerned include global energy prices and the increasing importance of Turkmen natural gas to Russia and other regional gas consumers. State level variables, include changes in Russia’s patrimonial society (changing source of rents, increased authoritarianism); and increasing state control over Russia’s natural gas industry. Changes in these conditioning factors influence individuals’ beliefs about their preferred source of rents, and the nature of their rent seeking and distributing. The resulting actions bring about variations in Russia’s natural gas price for Ukraine. This framework is tested over three time periods (1995-1999, 2000-2004, 2004-2008) selected based on the nature of the conditioning variables over those years. Evidence from these case studies suggests that the above mentioned factors played a large role in the Russian government’s decision. Further, it is concluded that methodological individualism offers a way to bring together system, state, and individual levels of analysis when explaining this event, and perhaps other events in international politics.

This thesis analyzes the inherent informal political relations embedded in urban planning process in the city of Ankara between 1985 and 2005. It has been argued that, urban planning process is -by nature- a political process and micro level political interactions in urban political sphere can be observed by looking at it. The urban planning process, as a political process interacts with existing political mobilization mechanisms and their spatial reflections. Such an interaction may cause emergence of informal political networks interested in derivation of urban land rent. The emergence, sustenance and persistence of these networks are related with the opportunities and legitimization potential of urban planning process. For the verification of hypothesis of the research the city of Ankara was taken as the subject of case study. A methodology consisting of a two phase research is devised to analyze the nature and the dynamics of these networks In the first phase a conventional statistical analysis the research universe consisting of all the all urban development plans and modifications realized in Ankara between 1985 and 2005 was realized. Then, in the second phase based on the patterns explored in the research universe, a specific example of urban planning process was chosen, which represents the patterns of the research universe. This example, &Ccedil / ayyolu 907 Parcel, then subjected to social network analysis. The results of the research has shown that, when the structure of the local political structure changes altogether as a result of for example local elections, the structure of existing informal political networks and the way they exploit urban land rent changes. In these periods the number of urban development plans and urban development plan modifications increase, while the size of the area covered by these plans tends to decrease and mostly confined to prospective areas in central business district and residential areas. Yet, by the time passes, new and diverse political relations are established congruent with the existing political mobilization mechanisms. This time, although the number of plans decreases, the size of the area covered by plans increase and mostly, vacant land in the fringe of the urban macro form become the target of these networks. Although these networks involve a hierarchy in it, extensive brokerage and patron client relations sustain them.

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近年來，台灣許多縣市的住宅價格不斷高漲，身為政經重鎮之台北市首當其衝，於2008~2009年金融海嘯時期，政府為維持經濟發展而全面將遺產及贈與稅調降為單一稅率10% 後尤然。以產品價值而言，此波上漲很可能來自於「逢低買進，逢高賣出」之投資心理造成。由於不動產最終用途為使用，當真實需求者無力負擔時將導致房市泡沫，更因房市的經濟佔額高，進而可能引發經濟泡沫。為檢視台北市住宅價格的合理性，鑒於出租住宅需求者動機單純，本文以租價關係探討台北市住宅價格是否已有偏離實際使用需求之現象；且是否因未來的住宅價格在預期之引導下，使房價似遵循著過去價格的成長而逐步提高，有不效率之現象。實證結果顯示，台北市住宅價格與租金間已然背離，在金融海嘯過後種種非理性現象更為嚴重，導致房價有偏離其合理結構之虞，成交總價越高的住宅、偏離情況越為明顯，而存在泡沫化危機。 / In recent years, the housing market has been awash with funds. The phenomenon resulted in domestic housing prices in Taipei rising year by year, especially after the Subprime mortgage crisis. From the viewpoint of economics, the price is decided by supply and demand. However, with regard to the value of product, this rising of housing price probably comes from the artificial demand. In other words, this kind of demand is just like "buy low and sell high". In addition, real estate is a special commodity, except as an investment good, it is also a necessary consumption good. Furthermore, real estate is expense, making housing the biggest item among households’ assets. Once housing price is too high and the actual demanders cannot burden with; that is likely to trigger a market bubble, which caused the imbalance of trade market. According to the aforementioned, this study will observe whether the housing price has deviated from the fundamentals in Taipei City. Since the demand of rent is only for living, we probing into the relationship between housing price and rent in order to observe the rationality of housing price; and if the future housing price in the anticipated guided, the price seems to follow the historical trend, and the higher the housing price of an area, the more significant. The empirical results show that, the housing price seems to prevail in unreasonable investment in Taipei City, which may lead into a bubble crisis.

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration

published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management