Massivbau in Zeiten von Klimawandel und Ressourcenverknappung – Herausforderungen und Lösungsansätze/Concrete construction in times of climate change and resource shortage – challenges and solutions

Klimawandel und Ressourcenverknappung sind die wesentlichen Herausforderungen unserer Zeit, denen sich auch der Massivbau stellen muss. In diesem Beitrag werden zunächst die Herausforderungen wie die stetige Zunahme der verwendeten Betonmenge, Treibhausgasemissionen und Ressourceneffizienz bei der Herstellung von Beton und die wachsende Baunachfrage in den Blick genommen. Mit Bezug zur Struktur des deutschen Bauwesens werden die stagnierende Arbeitsproduktivität als Indikator für ineffiziente Prozesse, das fragmentierte, wenig digitalisierte Planen und Bauen und das kleinteilige, kaum ganzheitlich betrachtete Vorgehen analysiert. Ausgehend von den Herausforderungen und der Analyse der Rahmenbedingungen werden erste Lösungsansätze aufgezeigt: die Planungsoptimierung auf Grundlage digitaler Bauwerksmodelle, die Erhöhung der Effizienz von Betonbauteilen sowie die verlängerte Nutzung von Bestandsbauwerken. Ziel ist es, Beispiele für notwendige Veränderungen aufzuzeigen, ohne den Anspruch auf ein vollständiges oder abschließendes Bild für den klimafreundlichen und ressourceneffizienten Massivbau zu haben.

Sick Leave Characteristics Among Nurses of a Referral Hospital During COVID-19 Pandemic

Hospital-related infections have been widely reported during the Covid-19 outbreak that exposes healthcare professionals to at greater risk of infection. This cross-sectional study was designed to evaluate the frequency of absenteeism in hospital staff during the first and second months of the Covid-19 pandemic, from 26 February until 19 April 2020. Occupational data and sickness absenteeism characteristics were collected from the records of the nursing management department. 304 (17.8%) had sick leave due to coronavirus or corona-like symptoms. Nurses and then nursing aid workers constituted the categories with more frequency of sick leave. The more median days of sick leave were observed among supervisors and midwives. About 80% of participants had typical symptoms of Coronavirus. In conclusion, the median days of sick leave due to coronavirus were not as high as we thought. This could be due to human resource shortage and insufficient knowledge regarding return-to-work guidelines in the early phase of this pandemic.

The substitution of agrobased society for industrial society: A perspective of transforming societies

Since the Industrial Revolution, a new era has arisen as the Anthropocene, in which human actions have become the main driver of global ecological crises outside the stable environmental state of the Holocene. During the Holocene, environmental change occurred naturally and Earth’s regulatory capacity maintained the conditions that enabled human development. By contrast, oil-dependent industrial society has exerted ecological crises. Agrobased society, in which almost all demands of human can be supported by agriculture, might be the ultimate solution industrial society facing ecological crises, in which there is a paradigm shift from the general and unlimited economic growth pursued by virtue of oil dependence to agrobased growth. The substitution of agrobased society for industrial society is an evolutionary result of Negation, it is a negation of materialized industrial society. The core feature of agriculture is to use organisms as production objects and rely on life processes to achieve production goals. The substitution of agrobased society for industrial society is the precondition for a sustainable carbon cycle, breaking through resource shortage, alleviating the environmental pressure of economic development. Meanwhile, it is feasible for the substitution of an agro-based society for an industrial society associated with the development of bio technologies and environmental awareness.

Linked-Object Dynamic Offloading (LODO) for the Cooperation of Data and Tasks on Edge Computing Environment

With the evolution of the Internet of Things (IoT), edge computing technology is using to process data rapidly increasing from various IoT devices efficiently. Edge computing offloading reduces data processing time and bandwidth usage by processing data in real-time on the device where the data is generating or on a nearby server. Previous studies have proposed offloading between IoT devices through local-edge collaboration from resource-constrained edge servers. However, they did not consider nearby edge servers in the same layer with computing resources. Consequently, quality of service (QoS) degrade due to restricted resources of edge computing and higher execution latency due to congestion. To handle offloaded tasks in a rapidly changing dynamic environment, finding an optimal target server is still challenging. Therefore, a new cooperative offloading method to control edge computing resources is needed to allocate limited resources between distributed edges efficiently. This paper suggests the LODO (linked-object dynamic offloading) algorithm that provides an ideal balance between edges by considering the ready state or running state. LODO algorithm carries out tasks in the list in the order of high correlation between data and tasks through linked objects. Furthermore, dynamic offloading considers the running status of all cooperative terminals and decides to schedule task distribution. That can decrease the average delayed time and average power consumption of terminals. In addition, the resource shortage problem can settle by reducing task processing using its distributions.

Model for construction project delay occurrence (PDO)

Extensive research work was conducted in relation with evaluating and ranking delay causes in construction projects, but limited research was performed to discuss the delay issue in theory. This paper discusses the theoretical basis for how delay occurs and propagates during project construction. A set of suggested assumptions were proposed to build a theoretical model for delay occurrence. These assumptions were driven from the analysis of construction project environment, and the concept of project implementation. The construction delay occurrence (PDO) model assumes that some of the root delay causes can convert by themselves and/or other triggers toward direct delay causes. Contractor management deficiency, project contract and procurement strategy, and contractor financial problems are examples of the root delay causes, which have significant influence on project delay and resource availability. The model assumes that construction resources unavailability is the underpinning driver for project delay. Graphical presentation of the PDO model is used to illustrate how delay is generated, propagated during the project life, and converted to be a real and physical delay. Interview questionnaires were used to verify the model bases. This is followed by statistical analysis to ascertain the model assumptions and Delphi technique to confirm questionnaire results. The correlation factors for the two rounds of questionnaires showed that there is a great enhancement for respondents’ answers regarding the effect of resource shortage on root delay causes. The study shows that the proposed set of root delay causes and their effect on project delay and their influence on resource availability were statistically accepted. The study results can be used as a basis for assessing root delay causes and predicting the prone of a project to delay before it starts.

Calculation model for the amount of tradable water rights based on water shortage risk evaluation

A scientific measurement of the amount of tradable water rights forms the premise for reaching an agreement in water rights trading. However, the existing measurement methods, based on water saving potential, still have problems caused by large computation workload and difficult-to-control errors. Conflicts also easily emerge between transferor and transferee during the execution of transaction agreements. This paper proposes a new method for measuring tradable water rights from the perspective of an assessment of the risk of water shortage for the transferor. The following describes the basic idea: An index system is established for the assessment of the water shortage risk of the transferor to identify water shortage risk categories. The impact of the water rights transaction volume on the transferor’s water shortage risk category is analyzed under different incoming water frequencies. The transferor’s water shortage risk threshold is set and a simulated annealing algorithm is designed to calculate the theoretical value of tradable water rights. The following summarizes the innovation of the proposed method: The water resource shortage risk evaluation index of the transferor is constructed based on water resource endowment, water supply, water demand, and water ecological environment of the transferor; then, a risk classification evaluation model of water resource shortage is established and a measurement method of tradable water rights is introduced. Comprehensive analysis of a case analysis of Helan County in the Ningxia Autonomous Region, China, shows that the recommended value of tradable water rights of Helan County is 40 million m3. Various methods are used to calculate the weights of evaluation indexes, which are compared to the measured results of tradable water rights; moreover, the sensitivity of the results is analyzed. The obtained results show that the use of water-saving potential to measure the amount of tradable water rights is feasible.

Design and Fabrication of Remote-Controlled Nursing Vehicle

The need for remote controlled vehicle which has functions like a robot, to ensure proper monitoring of patients, delivering of needed kits and keeping the hospital environment sanitized, even in the absence of human being, is a serious demand in these times of Covid pandemic. We therefore intend to provide a solution by constructing a nursing vehicle which can be used in hospital surroundings. The project involves use of temperature sensor, water pump, microcontroller, Wi-Fi camera and embedded C language program. The project is locally controlled using ESP8266 based embedded system. The nursing vehicle’s movements are controlled using a Wi-Fi controller and monitored with the help of camera which also has voice kit that can be used for interaction between patients and doctors. The MLX90614 IR temperature sensor is also fitted helping in measuring the temperature of patients. This also has a provision for sanitizing the patient or surroundings using the nozzle and pump kit which is an added advantage in this model. This project provides very stable and reliable system and significantly limits the drawbacks faced in hospital environment. The nursing vehicle will facilitate contactless temperature measurement, delivery of supplies to patients suffering from contagious diseases such as Covid and enables communication between a doctor and a patient adhering to social distancing norms. With this system we can tackle the problems of human resource shortage in hospitals and can be used as substitute for nurse.

Development and Evaluation of Palm-based Tibetan Butter Equivalent: Formulation, Rheology, Texture and Microstructure

Palm-based Tibetan butter equivalent was developed and evaluated from formulation, rheology, texture to microstructure. Firstly, the compatibility of palm stearin and palm olein was ascertained. The formulations of palm-based Tibetan butter equivalent were then optimally developed using a combination of palm stearin (37.5%), palm olein (37.5%) and soybean oil (25%). These were found to contain high unsaturated fatty acids and analogous solid fat content (SFC) at varying temperatures. Moreover, the palm-based Tibetan butter equivalent (TBE) showed a shear-thinning behavior, a gel characteristic, good plasticity and comparable texture characteristics (such as hardness, adhesion, cohesiveness and elasticity) to traditional Tibetan butter (TB). Furthermore, as determined by polarized light microscopy (PLM) and confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM), the microstructures also showed a similar structure, thus further indicating that palm oil is a good candidate as a substitute in making Tibetan-style butter. Overall, the palm-based Tibetan butter equivalent was developed by physical technology and could assist in increasing the enjoyable population as well as addressing the challenge of resource shortage, geographical origin and season of production.

Risk Assessment of Water Resources and Energy Security Based on the Cloud Model: A Case Study of China in 2020

With the rapid development of economy and society, China’s demand for water resources and energy is increasing, and the supply situation is becoming increasingly severe. The correlation and binding characteristics between the two have become increasingly prominent, which will become bottlenecks in sustainable economic and social development in the future. In this paper, the Liang–Kleeman method was used to screen the risk factors of water resources and energy security, and then four major risk factors were selected. Based on the cloud model, the water resource and energy security risk assessment models were constructed combined with the predicted values using GM (1,1) and Pearson III curve methods, and the water resource and energy security risks of 30 provinces (cities) in 2020 were quantitatively assessed. The risk assessment results showed that the risk level zoning of water resource shortage with different guarantee rates in most regions has undergone little change, but the spatial distribution was quite different, showing the characteristics of “low in the South and high in the North”. When the guarantee rate changed from P = 25% to P = 95%, the risk level of water shortage in Sichuan, Jiangxi, Hunan, Hainan, Jilin, Ningxia and Nei Monggol significantly increased, and the spatial distribution of energy security risk and water resource shortage risk was obviously inconsistent.

The role of secondary use of building materials in the circular economy

The article considers the role of secondary use of building materials in the circular economy. The paper considers the method of cascading use of wood, used in the practice of European specialists, which allows to increase the period of use of building materials. The author concludes that nowadays the problems of resource shortage and rapid climate change are encouraging society to move towards more sustainable solutions for the construction sector. Wood, as a widely available and naturally grown material, is of particular importance for achieving the environmental goals set by the EU and national authorities. The use of wood in construction has increased in recent decades. However, the use of a secondary method of wood processing in the circular economy is rarely used in practice, although the economic effect of this process is quite high.