This master thesis project was initiated in connection to the research project “Green Production Systems”, which is being conducted at Mälardalen University with involvement of academics and Swedish automotive and manufacturing industries. This thesis is prepared in guidance of “Development of guidelines for environmental value improvement and cost decrease” work package and the work package associated “Lean and Green Production Systems” master thesis proposal (see Appendix I). The aim of the thesis is to provide the work package with an international aspect under the given master thesis proposal scoping. The main objective of this thesis has been to contribute to a further understanding of how approaches to lean and green can be used to develop competitive production systems. A theoretical frame of reference has been presented in order to provide the research with a theoretical foundation. Further, empirical studies of four companies from China and Turkey have been carried out to investigate how companies perceive and work with their production systems in terms of applications of lean and green approaches. The empirical studies also aimed at identifying good examples of current practices that the companies achieved within the area.

On the Canadian prairies, organic production generally includes the use of annual green manure (GrM) crops, which are terminated using tillage to add nutrients and organic matter to the soil. However, in a GrM plough-down year, farmers face loss of income. As an alternative to growing traditional GrM crops, legumes can be grown alone or intercropped with cereals and harvested as green feed forage (GF) for use on-farm or for sale to other producers without depleting soil nitrogen (N) for the subsequent crop. We hypothesized that the GF system would have similar biomass, and N yield, and ultimately would return N into the soil. Furthermore, by intercropping a legume with a cereal, biological N2-fixation will be enhanced in the legume.<p> Field experiments, conducted over two years, were established at Vonda and Delisle, Saskatchewan, Canada. The experiment was conducted using a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with 16 treatments and four replicates in which field pea (<i>Pisum sativum</i> cv 40-10 silage pea), oat (<i>Avena sativa</i> L.cv AC Morgan), and triticale (X <i>Triticosecale</i> Wittmack cv Pika) were grown alone or in combination and managed as GrM or GF. Wheat and tillage fallow served as cropped and uncropped controls, respectively. The tillage fallow-control system was tilled twice in the growing season using a small tractor disc. The intercropped oat was seeded at three densities (50, 100, and 150 plants m-2) to determine whether increasing cereal density stimulated N2-fixation in the field pea.<p> The GrM system was sampled and incorporated (when the field pea was at full bloom) two weeks earlier than the GF system. Consequently, at both sites, all treatments in the GF system consistently yielded more dry matter and accumulated more N than treatments in the GrM system. At the Delisle site, where percent nitrogen derived from the atmosphere (%Ndfa) was compared, increasing cereal density did not increase N2-fixation in both management systems. However, pea in the GF system accumulated more than twice the amount of N (kg ha-1) from fixation as compared to pea in the GrM system, presumably because of the longer growth period.<p> Wheat grown following the GrM treatments produced more biomass and accumulated more N than wheat following the GF treatments. Wheat grown after the monoculture field pea as a GrM had greater yield than all treatments. As well, the GrM system returned more N to the soil than did the GF system. The extra two weeks of growth in the GF system resulted in the extraction of significant amounts of nutrients and probably moisture from the soil, which adversely affected yield and nutrient composition of the following wheat crop.<p> Although organic farmers may lose income in the plough-down year, on a longterm soil sustainability basis, the GrM system is a better option than the GF system as it returns nutrients to the soil, thus providing improved plant biomass, and N accumulation of subsequent crops. However, organic farmers growing GF for hay may benefit from the increased productivity of this system on a short-term basis. Thus, farmers pursuing GF options may need to adopt other means of sustaining soil productivity on a longer term. The tilled fallow-control system resulted in high amounts of biomass and N accumulation by the subsequent wheat crop, probably due to the fact that there were no nutrients taken up in the previous year and moisture was conserved in these treatments. However, this system may have less long-term benefits compared to the GrM regime, as no nutrients are returned through ploughing down a crop.

The research question how green marketing is used as a competitive advantage was answered by the analysis of the multiple case-study of two organizations of the boardsports industry, Jade and Notox. The comparison between theories and interviews revealed that, by doing green branding, having eco-labels, and implementing the five I’s, Jade and Notox are differentiating. This differentiation provides them a competitive advantage. In addition, Jade and Notox innovate in green materials and processes which, coupled with eco-labels, maintain the differentiation and generate a sustainable advantage.

UNIVERSITY OF KALMAR - SWEDEN The institution of Social Science Project: Master Essay 15points Title: Olympic Games – An instrument for Environmental Political Change?   -A case study exploring the Environmental Political views of the Olympic Games – with special focus on the 28th Summer Olympic Games in Beijing.  ABSTRACT                                                               The essay´s aim was to explore the complex political environmental opinions and opportunities to use the Olympic Games as an instrument for environmental political changes, with special focus on the 2008 summer Olympics Games in Beijing.  In the light of two environmental political theories (The Green Business and Critical Ecology Theories)  The International Olympic Committee's (The IOC) third pillar, the environment, the Beijing Olympic Committee 's motto (BOCOG) “Green Olympics” and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO:s) such as Greenpeace and their motto “Green Games” have been reviewed. The aim was to see the organisations aim to use the Beijing Olympics as a tool for environmental political changes.   The study involves six qualitative interviews, one group interview, one written questionnaire and participating observations, during an eight week field study, during the Beijing Olympics in 2008. The conclusion of the study demonstrates that the Olympic Games can be used as important instrument to address the organisations environmental work toward a “Greening” of Olympic cities with firstly technical measures under political control.  The Olympics are also used as an instrument to raise the environmental awareness of the public in Beijing and China. The City of Beijing was seen as a showcase of green standards hopefully to be spread nationally. The “Greening of Olympics” is still though a complex social and scientific matter. Countries and cities have different conditions, knowledge, interests and ambitions. Universal standards are not always universally understood.

Die Glutathionverhältnisse und -verschiebungen zwischen Gliazellen und Ganglienzellen vor und nach oxidativem Stress wurden erstmals im lebenden Zellverband, ex vivo, untersucht. Die Untersuchungen erfolgten an akut isoliertem Retinagewebe vom Meerschweinchen, von welchem Bilder am Laser scanning microscope (LSM) erstellt wurden. Über die Anwendung des in vivo-Fluoreszenzfarbstoffes CellTracker Green wurde dabei dessen Spezifität für Glutathion überprüft und bestätigt.

Abstract In recent years (2011), whether atypicality and global warming affect seriously all species and living environment of mankind. It activated a trend of local caring and environment protection throughout the world, and advocating green living has been one of the fashion affairs. Nevertheless, how can we understand and quantify people¡¦s acceptance of green living? How to design a scale of green living, with which we can apply consumer behavior analysis and the research technique of market segmentation, so that for promoting green living styles to people of all ranks. The current research tried to building up a scale of green living style, with three constructs: green values, cognition of environment protection, and green behavior and habits, in addition to a brief test of knowledge over environment protection. The contents of the questionnaire cover such topics as water resources, global warming, renewable energy sources, international trend in sustainability and related industrial policy, warm chamber effect, carbon emission and the status and policy of environment protection in Taiwan. Office workers and current students in the Kaohsiung metropolitan area were the main participants undertaking the questionnaire survey of the research, with effective sample size of 603 subjects. The research tested the scale¡¦s reliability and validity through factor analysis and verified it¡¦s construct validity with local recognition. After those validation for the scale, the study conducted cluster analysis for market segmentation based on green lifestyle. The main works and findings of the current research including: (1) building a scale of green lifestyle with reliability and validity; (2) discovery of four segments of the green lifestyle in the market; (3) there are different approaches to evaluate the government¡¦s performance of environmental protection; (4) sustainability values and green cognition influence behavior of environmental protection; (5) local recognition positively affect the green index of people; and (6) youth in the society and college students are relatively lacking of sustainability conducts, although they presents in a higher level of the environmental protection knowledge.

The Green factory mark system validated by the Ministry of Economic Affairs will be officially launched in 2012. The assessment of green plants covers not only in the prohibition of harmful substances during the manufacturing process, reduction of unnecessary waste and promotion of environmental protection policies, but also extends to the whole supply chain from raw materials, parts suppliers to proceed with the environmental protection policies, and ultimately helps to achieve the objective of the green supply chain. However, there are no related laws to require part suppliers to adhere to green production plant objective currently in car industry. This study focuses on how customers affect and influence suppliers¡¦ environmental commitment based on its own environmental strategies and environmental performance requirements. The study is mainly from the constructs of customer¡¦s environmental strategy and customer¡¦s environmental performance requirements which includes moderators of contract, evaluation, and encouragement to investgae the relationship with suppliers environmental commitment. The study takes 246 suppliers of Honda Taiwan Motor Co., Ltd as sampling and utilizes Likert five-level scaling method from 1 to 5, from ¡uStrongly disagree¡v¡B¡uDisagree¡v¡B¡uNeither agree nor disagree¡v¡B¡uAgree¡v¡B¡uStrongly agree¡vto confirm hypothesises of the study. According to the results of this study, the predictive factors for improving suppliers¡¦s environmental commitment are customer environmental performance requirements; customer environmental strategy and contract in order. The statistical results are significant. In other words, suppliers will raise its environmental commitment according to its major customers¡¦ environmental performance requirements and environmental strategies. Suppliers also agree that contract restrictions signed with major customers would enhance and raise its environmental commitment. The study takes Honda Taiwan Motor Co., Ltd. as an example trying to see how to raise suppliers¡¦ environmental commitment without any laws reinforcement and expects to set the standard for other companies in Taiwan.

Though recycled toilet paper (RTP) is more environmental friendly than toilet paper made of virgin fiber, they are also more expensive. The price difference has made manufacturers hesitate about marketing RTP in shops, because they assume that consumers are reluctant to buy it. However, no research has been done in Taiwan to explore consumers¡¦ willingness to pay (WTP) for RTP. This study is an attempt to do so by the use of two methods: contingent evaluation method (CVM) and conjoint analysis. Both methods were administered through a survey, which had a convenience sample of 192 female Kaohsiung citizens as respondents. Results based on CVM showed that the mean WTP for RTP was NT 151, which was a little higher than the price set by Homemaker¡¦s Union and Foundation¡Xan NGO which was the main channel selling RTP to the domestic sector in Taiwan. This suggests that manufacturers might have underestimated the market for RTP. To check the validities of the CVM and conjoint method, two criteria were measured: the respondents¡¦ past environmental behavior (PEB) and their willingness to make sacrifice for environmental causes (WTP3). The WTP as estimated by CVM, namely WTP1, was significantly related to both of these criteria (rs = .16, .32, ps < .05), showing that the CVM had a certain degree of validity. The importance that respondents attached to the eco-label of RTP was assessed by conjoint analysis. Validity of the importance scores thus obtained, however, was quite low: the correlation between these scores and WTP1, PEB and WTP3 were .05, .12 and .20 respectively, with only the last one significant. Results also suggest that environmental knowledge and health and safety concerns for products were not related to WTP1. Keywords: green consumption, contingent valuation method, conjoint analysis, environmental behavior, eco-label, green mark.

Ceramics can highly withstand the environments of high temperature and serious erosion, it completely substitutes for alloys which reach their specific limitations. Turbine rotor operates in the compressed stage with temperature over thousand Celsius degrees; it must rely on excellent properties of ceramics to elevate the durability and lifetime. To manufacture complex ceramic component before, industry usually uses near net shaping or rapid prototyping (RP) processes. A manufacturing process based on machining green ceramic turbine component is presented here. Initially, formulating a series of machining experiments for green ceramics to verify the idea of thesis, and analyzing the probability of Al2O3 ceramic as a turbine material. Firstly, it needs to check the machinability of green ceramic by face milling. Secondly, point milling the normal plate of green compact and the plate with analogical blade geometry to find a set of usable machining parameters (such as revolution speed, feed rate, step over and cutting depth); meanwhile, addressing machining amendment by observing the final conditions of specific geometric characteristics on workpiece. Finally, try to machining green ceramic turbine successfully applying the above parameters.

This study examines the relationship between environmental sustainability and green schools, seeking to highlight the benefits and determine the Net Present Value (NPV) installing vegetative roofs on all schools in the Atlanta Public Schools District. This study quantifies the costs and benefits of thin-layer, or extensive, green roof systems as they compare to typical flat roofs on Atlanta Public Schools. Quantifiable benefits are detailed and suggestions are made to create the means by which other social benefits may be quantified. The purpose of this thesis is to establish proof to the Atlanta Public Schools District that over a 40 year period there are more benefits associated with installing vegetative roofs on all of their flat roofs than there are costs. While some may argue that greens roof are more costly than traditional roof systems, this study provides evidence that the cumulative benefits over a 40 year life cycle associated with large scale green roof installations, such as on all Atlanta Public Schools, are greater than the initial costs incurred. Factors included in the analysis of benefits were reductions to energy/utility costs, reduced emissions, and avoided best management practices (BMPs). Other considerations include social benefits resulting from the mitigation of storm water runoff, reductions to the urban heat island, productivity level increases (students and teachers), and avoided regulatory fees.