ESTIMATING THE COST OF GREENING OF SHORTSEA VESSELS AND THE MARKET POTENTIAL OF GREEN RETROFIT

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
O Schinas

Shortsea shipping (SSS) has attracted the interest of re-searchers and policy-makers as a viable transport alternative against mainly road haulage. Despite policy initiatives, SSS has not increased its market share nor attracted fresh interest in the market, so the fleet is ageing. Lately, due to the de-carbonization effort of the maritime industry and generally of greening the economy, SSS becomes an interesting trans-port alternative that deserves further research. This work focuses on the cost of decarbonising the global SSS fleet with a parallel interest on the EU fleet. This cost estimation is based on recent publications, and considers ships expected to be ordered and demolished; for the existing fleet the cost of retrofitting with greening technology is also estimated. Based on reasonable assumptions, the potential market of wind-assisted technologies is estimated too. This work is an outcome of the WASP Interreg project.

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luca Cassetta ◽  
Pedro Rodrigues ◽  
Toni Andreu ◽  
Bruno Botta ◽  
Sven Brandau ◽  
...  

Cancer has been for many years the second leading cause of mortality right after cardiovascular diseases, representing 25% of all the deaths reported yearly and this tendency is expected to increase. Although the recent public health emergency caused by COVID-19 pandemic diverted much of the attention of policy makers, the public opinion and even researchers from other important, economical relevant and deadly diseases, cancer still remains as one of the major healthcare issues. Moreover, recent studies revealed the negative effects of COVID-19 pandemic on the increase of avoidable cancer-related deaths. It is then the perfect time to bring back the spotlight onto the topic of cancer. The aim of this paper is to share the outcomes of the workshop organized by the COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) Association, bringing together sixty participants representing a broad variety of stakeholders, to discuss a holistic approach on how to beat cancer by 2030. The conclusions of this workshop are highly relevant for the community and are supporting the work being undertaken by the EU Mission Board on Cancer. This report lays down the main conclusions and recommendations agreed by the workshop participants, focusing on different aspects such as better stakeholder collaboration, citizen education, innovative therapies, and patient-centric care.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 2675
Author(s):  
Elena Jianu ◽  
Ramona Pîrvu ◽  
Gheorghe Axinte ◽  
Ovidiu Toma ◽  
Andrei Valentin Cojocaru ◽  
...  

Reducing inequalities for EU citizens and promoting upward convergence is one of the priorities on the agenda of the European Commission and, certainly, inequality will be a very important public policy issue for years to come. Through this research we aim to investigate EU labor market inequalities, reflected by the specific indicators proposed for Goal 8 assumed by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, based on cluster analysis for all the 27 Member States. The research results showed encouraging results from the perspective of convergence in the EU labor market, but also revealed a number of analyzed variable effects that manifested regional inequalities that were generated in the medium and long term. Based on the observations made, we want to provide information for policy-makers, business practitioners, and academics so as to constitute solid ground for identifying good practices and proposing to implement policies aimed at reducing existing inequalities and supporting sustainable development.


Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (12) ◽  
pp. 3432
Author(s):  
McKenzie Thomas ◽  
Kimberly L. Jensen ◽  
Dayton M. Lambert ◽  
Burton C. English ◽  
Christopher D. Clark ◽  
...  

Biochar is a co-product of advanced biofuels production from feedstocks including food, agricultural, wood wastes, or dedicated energy crops. Markets for soil amendments using biochar are emerging, but little is known about consumer preferences and willingness to pay (WTP) for these products or the depth of the products’ market potential for this product. This research provides WTP estimates for potting mix amended with 25% biochar, conditioned on consumer demographics and attitudes about product information labeling. Data were collected with an online survey of 577 Tennessee home gardeners. WTP was elicited through a referendum contingent valuation. Consumer WTP for an 8.81 L bag of 25% biochar potting mix is $8.52; a premium of $3.53 over conventional potting mix. Demographics and attitudes toward biofuels and the environment influence WTP. Biochar amounts demanded are projected for the study area’s potential market. Optimal prices, profits, and market shares are estimated across different marginal costs of producing biochar potting mix.


Author(s):  
Marco Civico

AbstractThe objective of this paper is to develop an simulation model able to test different language education orientations and their consequences for the EU population in terms of linguistic disenfranchisement, that is, the inability of citizens to understand EU documents and parliamentary discussions should their native language(s) no longer be official. I will focus on the impact of linguistic distance and language learning. Ideally, this model would be a tool to help EU policy makers make informed decisions about language practices and education policies, taking into account their consequences in terms of diversity and linguistic disenfranchisement. The model can be used to force agents to make certain choices in terms of language skills acquisition. The user can then go on to compare different scenarios in which language skills are acquired according to different rationales. The idea is that, by forcing agents to adopt certain language learning strategies, the model user can simulate policies promoting the acquisition of language skills and get an idea of their impact. In this way, the model allows not only to sketch various scenarios of the evolution of language skills among EU citizens, but also to estimate the level of disenfranchisement in each of these scenarios.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 3687
Author(s):  
Vincent Smith ◽  
Justus H. H. Wesseler ◽  
David Zilberman

This perspective discusses the impact of political economy on the regulation of modern biotechnology. Modern biotechnology has contributed to sustainable development, but its potential has been underexplored and underutilized. We highlight the importance of the impacts of regulations for investments in modern biotechnology and argue that improvements are possible via international harmonization of approval processes. This development is urgently needed for improving sustainable development. Policy makers in the European Union (EU) in particular are challenged to rethink their approach to regulating modern biotechnology as their decisions have far ranging consequences beyond the boundaries of the EU and they have the power to influence international policies.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (16) ◽  
pp. 7246
Author(s):  
Julius Moritz Berges ◽  
Georg Jacobs ◽  
Sebastian Stein ◽  
Jonathan Sprehe

Locally load-optimized fiber-based composites, the so-called tailored textiles (TT), offer the potential to reduce weight and cost compared to conventional fiber-reinforced plastics (FRP). However, the design of TT has a higher complexity compared to FRP. Current approaches, focusing on solving this complexity for multiple objectives (cost, weight, stiffness), require great effort and calculation time, which makes them unsuitable for serial applications. Therefore, in this paper, an approach for the efficient creation of simplified TT concept designs is presented. By combining simplified models for structural design and cost estimation, the most promising concepts, regarding the cost, weight, and stiffness of TT parts, can be identified. By performing a parameter study, the cost, weight, and stiffness optima of a sample part compared to a conventional FRP component can be determined. The cost and weight were reduced by 30% for the same stiffness. Applying this approach at an early stage of product development reduces the initial complexity of the subsequent detailed engineering design, e.g., by applying methods from the state of the art.


2021 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 3-3
Author(s):  
Ingo Weber

Blockchain is a novel distributed ledger technology. Through its features and smart contract capabilities, a wide range of application areas opened up for blockchain-based innovation [5]. In order to analyse how concrete blockchain systems as well as blockchain applications are used, data must be extracted from these systems. Due to various complexities inherent in blockchain, the question how to interpret such data is non-trivial. Such interpretation should often be shared among parties, e.g., if they collaborate via a blockchain. To this end, we devised an approach codify the interpretation of blockchain data, to extract data from blockchains accordingly, and to output it in suitable formats [1, 2]. This work will be the main topic of the keynote. In addition, application developers and users of blockchain applications may want to estimate the cost of using or operating a blockchain application. In the keynote, I will also discuss our cost estimation method [3, 4]. This method was designed for the Ethereum blockchain platform, where cost also relates to transaction complexity, and therefore also to system throughput.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (15) ◽  
pp. 4173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ramona Pîrvu ◽  
Cristian Drăgan ◽  
Gheorghe Axinte ◽  
Sorin Dinulescu ◽  
Mihaela Lupăncescu ◽  
...  

The impact of implementation of cohesion policy on the sustainable development of EU countries is of great interest and presents a number of actual challenges. This research aims to evaluate the impact and the effects of the cohesion policy among the Member States using hierarchical clustering analysis in order to identify how the selected variables affect the sustainable development adopted models. The variables used in the analysis were selected on the basis of official data provided by the European Commission, SDG Index and Dashboards Reports and the EU Cohesion Monitor. The results of the research have led to the grouping of the 28 Member States in a number of six clusters, identifying performers but also those countries that have a high potential for sustainable development or which require increased attention to be sustained in recovering existing gaps. The results of the study can be a starting point for policy makers and other stakeholders involved in their efforts to support sustainable development through effective and effective policies.


2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 477-487 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katja Biedenkopf

This article argues that European Union (EU) risk regulation of hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) was both a trigger and formative factor in the development of similar Chinese regulation. The attractiveness and global interdependence of the EU market in EEE impelled a response from Chinese policy-makers. Fostering the domestic industry's global competitiveness was one of the driving factors behind Chinese substance restriction regulation. Additionally, symbolic emulation and growing domestic environmental problems related to waste EEE infl uenced the Chinese policy agenda. Chinese substance restriction rules are not, however, a mere copy of EU regulation. The limited domestic capacity of the Chinese economy, administration, and legal structure to adopt policies similar to those of the EU explains, to a large extent, the emergence and partial persistence of differences between EU and Chinese risk regulation. In the course of the implementation and evaluation of Chinese substance restriction regulation, lessons learned from the EU’s experience increasingly contributed to shaping the policy, leading to growing convergence.


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