Ambitious Levels Research Articles

How to implement the 2023 IMO GHG strategy? Insights on the importance of combining policy instruments and on the role of uncertainty

In its 2023 strategy for reducing GHG emissions from ships, the International Maritime Organization aims for the uptake of zero or near-zero GHG emissions technologies, fuels or energy to represent at least 5 %, striving for 10 %, of the energy used by 2030. Measures proposed to reach this target combine two kinds of policy instruments: an emission intensity standard and GHG emissions pricing. Proposals vary in terms of the design of the pricing scheme and the subsequent uncertainty that would affect the price signal. This paper assesses the extent to which emissions pricing effectively complements a more restrictive standard on the intensity of GHG emissions to boost transition to low-carbon vessels. Attention is paid to the role of the volatility of the price signal of GHG emissions and fuels prices. For this purpose, the paper applies a multiple real options model to the decision to renew a ship under various sources of uncertainty. Simulations carried out based on a case study show that the price signal effectively complements the more restrictive standard but that the decarbonization objectives are only achieved with a quite ambitious level of pricing. The role of the volatility of the price signal of GHG emissions appears negligible compared to other sources of volatility.

Evaluation of STEM-Aligned Teaching Practices for Gifted Mathematics Teachers

<b>Background:</b> The STEM education system has garnered significant interest due to its innovative approach in creating a multidisciplinary and integrated knowledge structure that connects science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, and allows students to apply scientific knowledge in a comprehensive and holistic manner. Consequently, evaluating the teaching methods of teachers in accordance with STEM standards is critical. This assessment should take into account various educational objectives, including cognitive, skill-based, and emotional aspects.<br /> <b>Purpose:</b> This study aimed to evaluate the creative teaching practices of mathematics teachers for gifted students according to STEM standards.<br /> <b>Method:</b> The study applied the descriptive analytical method and developed a rating scale for evaluating creative teaching practices based on STEM standards, verifying the psychometric properties in several ways. The study sample consisted of 64 teachers of mathematics for gifted students.<br /> <b>Results:</b> The results showed that the degree of application of creative teaching practices by the teachers of gifted students according to STEM standards was at the moderate level in three domains: planning, implementation, and assessment.<br /> <b>Conclusions: </b>Despite the importance of achieving integration for STEM, the actual teaching practices of teachers of the gifted according to these standards were generally average and did not reach acceptable and ambitious levels.

Emerging Perspectives on Diverse Nature-Oriented Sustainability Strategies

Increasing levels of nature-oriented sustainability strategies (NOSSs) are being recognized as offering solutions to combat climate change at scale, both through transformative infrastructure and autonomous technology innovations. This paper presents a synopsis of the mainstream literature covering the emerging trends from the last two decades across two broad trajectories of NOSS initiatives—“nature-inspired” (NI)- and “nature-based solution” (NBS)-oriented approaches. The specific scopes of these two approaches have been categorized into disciplinary fields, highlighting their peculiarities and commonalities, followed by an appreciation of their evolutionary trends based on the literature abundance over three distinct time-horizons—pre 2000, 2000–2010, and 2011–2021. We find ambitious levels of sustainability-led developments are driving NOSS initiatives beyond 2010; in particular, the increased level of NI approaches in the field of chemical processing, material structure, and renewable energy. Likewise, there has been rapid growth in NBS approaches in the last decade from a systems perspective, reducing the level of grey infrastructure by offering sustainable alternatives to the ecologically destructive technologies. However, we identify some crucial red herrings to the main-streaming of NOSSs as a ‘true sustainability solution’, such as the inherent challenges in their scaling-up, operation and management, and in ensuring ecologically and culturally adaptive interventions across different global contexts.

Pathways for deep decarbonization of the Brazilian iron and steel industry

Steel production is one of the major sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Brazil is one of the largest steel producers in the world and its main energy sources for steel production are coal, electricity, and charcoal. The latter shows a peculiarity of Brazil in relation to other countries: the use of biomass. This study has developed an optimization bottom-up model describing the steel industry to explore pathways for the decarbonization of the Brazilian steel industry. The model minimizes the mitigation costs, considering a set of measures (energy efficiency technologies and innovative production routes), constrained by the availability of raw materials and the diffusion of new technologies. In addition, the model stands out by incorporating crucial elements for a circular bioeconomy strategy: scrap and biomass supply, as well biomass-based production technologies. We developed four scenarios: business-as-usual (BAU) and three mitigation scenarios aligned with different GHG mitigation goals in 2050: 0% (no emission increase scenario – NIS); 42% (sustainable development scenario – SDS) and 88% (deep sustainable development scenario – SDS+). Results show that GHG mitigation in the short term can be achieved by the adoption of well known technologies (energy efficiency, charcoal-based BF-BOF, and EAF) at negative mitigation costs (between −35.3 and - 1.5 $/tCO2e). Innovative routes play a key role in reaching emission goals but increase the mitigation costs until 2050 (between 23.4 and 43.4 $/tCO2e). Smelting reduction with charcoal is present in all scenarios, reaching up to 24% of steel production in 2050 (SDS+). Direct reduction (DR) is applied to reach more ambitious levels of GHG mitigation in SDS and SDS+. In SDS, DR with natural gas is implemented in 2029, reaching its higher share of production in 2050 (21%). In SDS + natural gas has a transition role. It starts to be used in DR in 2025, increasing until 2043, when hydrogen begins to replace it. By 2050, charcoal becomes the main energy source in all decarbonization scenarios. The results and insights provided by this study can help policymakers towards decarbonization.

Psychologie der Überzeugung

Abstract The article focuses on the role of psychological topics in the efforts of persuasion. Even Aristoteles mentioned psychology as an important part of rhetoric, but the research results of social psychology has been neglected during the adaption of rhetoric in the modern age. Introducing topics of this field, the article discusses exemplarily ways that lead to conviction, and that have been explored and described by different psychologist, with a special focus on Robert Cialdini’s „weapons of influence“ in his Psychology of Persuasion. The integration of the insights of social psychologists could lead to a new coalescence of the rhetorica docens and the rhetorica utens, helping to raise practical rhetoric on a more ambitious level.

An Evaluation of Influence of Historical Sites in Promotion of Archaeotourism in Bungoma County, Kenya, 1964 - 2021

Various studies attest that historical sites can be utilized in the promotion of Archaeotourism, generation of revenue for investment in social and economic activities improving the quality of life for citizens of any nation. However, the ability of any country to tap revenue from Archaeotourism activities depends on: The attractiveness of historical sites, Measures put in place to promote awareness of the existence of such historical sites, and The state of the environment to support the security and comfort of the potential tourists Bungoma County is among the Countries endowed with historical sites that may be harnessed to promote the generation of revenue from Archaeotourism. Kenya's economic blueprint, dubbed Vision 2030, envisages a Country with high-quality life for its citizen through marked socio-economic development at a growth rate above 10 percent by 2012 and to be exceeded or maintained thereafter. Such an ambitious level of economic development demands tapping of financial resources from all possible sources for the purpose of investment. This study aimed to establish how Bungoma County generated revenue from Archaeotourism activities. The study was guided by Resource Dependence Theory and Expectancy Theory (ET). The study targeted the working class population of local residents, residents living around unmanned historical sites, and the management of Game Parks. Primary and secondary data were used to capture critical information for the study. Primary data was collected through a questionnaire, observation, and interview schedule. The study found that the County has good roads and security-critical attributes for the enhancement of attractiveness of a tourism destination. However, poor publicity and hotel facilities were critical barriers to the exploitation of the potentiality of the tourism sector. As such, despite the existence of historical sites, there was little revenue generated for investment in socio-economic activities. The study recommends scaling up awareness about the tourism potential of the County and putting up quality hotels to boost the image of Bungoma County as a potential target tourism destination.

The Importance of Ocean Science Diplomacy for Ocean Affairs, Global Sustainability, and the UN Decade of Ocean Science

The ocean is highly impacted by human activities, and ambitious levels of science are urgently needed to support decision making in order to achieve sustainability. Due to the high cost and risk associated with ocean exploration and monitoring in time and space, vast areas of the oceanic social ecological system remain under-sampled or unknown. Governments have recognized that no single nation can on its own fill these scientific knowledge gaps, and this has led to a number of agreements to support international scientific collaboration and the exchange of information and capacity. This paper reviews current discussions on ocean science diplomacy, i.e., the intersection of science with international ocean affairs. Ocean science is intrinsically connected with diplomacy in supporting negotiations toward a more sustainable future. Diplomacy supports essential aspects of scientific work such as capacity building, technology and information/knowledge exchange, and access and sharing of research platforms. Ocean science diplomacy underlies the work of many intergovernmental organizations that provide scientific guidance, such as the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC), the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES), and United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). To illustrate how critical science diplomacy is to global ocean affairs, this paper examines examples of the influence of ocean science diplomacy in UNCLOS. Furthermore, this paper discusses the utility of ocean science diplomacy in support of the UN 2030 agenda, and the UN Decade of Ocean Science.

Atlantic Ocean science diplomacy in action: the pole-to-pole All Atlantic Ocean Research Alliance

The ocean provides important ecosystem services to society, but its health is in crisis due to the impacts of human activities. Ocean sustainability requires ambitious levels of scientific evidence to support governance and management of human activities that impact the ocean. However, due to the size, complexity and connectivity of the ocean, monitoring and data collection presupposes high investments, and nations need to cooperate to deliver the ambitious, costly science that is required to inform decisions. Here, we highlight the role that ocean science diplomacy plays in facilitating the science needed to support ocean governance and management from domestic, regional to international scales in the Atlantic region via the All Atlantic Ocean Research Alliance. This Alliance is supported by the Galway Statement (2013), the South–South Framework for Scientific and Technical Cooperation in the South and Tropical Atlantic and the Southern Oceans (2017), and the Belém Statement (2017). We discuss the national and international interests that drove the processes of negotiating these agreements, as well as their challenges to date. We also discuss the potential future of the All Atlantic Alliance, as well as its significance in emerging global initiatives such as the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021–2030).

جياوازى فاكتەرەكان وكاريگەرى لە سەر گۆڕانكارييە سياسيەكانى توركيا ١٩٤٦- ١٩٦٠ توێژينەوەيەكى مێژووييە

This study is a modest attempt to shed light on the political changes in Turkey after the Second World War، on the margins of the role and influence of the internal and external factors، and at the same time, it is a comparative study between these two factors and the extent of their impact on political changes and their results. The political، social and economic developments that took place after the Second World War in Turkey had a suitable basis for applying this historical equation. In fact, the political changes that occurred in Turkey from this historical stage were more influenced by external factors compared to internal factors، and from this standpoint, this study tries to prove that، which was a major reason in order not to form a democratic political system in the past، bypassing the political parties. Its political activity is open-minded. From this point of view، the second half of the fourth and fifth decade of the last century was the political system in Turkey is not democratic from a practical point of view، because the political reality is not of an ambitious level. Democracy with others، even the political parties did not reach the level of accepting opposition parties with a democratic self.

Mind the climate policy gaps: climate change public policy and reality in Portugal, Spain and Morocco

The IPCC 1.5 °C report argues for a 50% cut of global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. Dangerous gaps lie between what is required to reach the 1.5 °C objective, what governments have pledged and what is happening in reality. Here, we develop ‘climate policy gap’ graphics for Portugal, Spain and Morocco to help reveal this divide and quantify the under-reaction between diagnosis and action, through layers of political intended and unintended miscommunication, insufficient action and the power of the fossil fuels industries. The climate policy gaps for the three nations reveal overshoots on even the most ambitious levels of emissions reductions pledged when compared with trajectories compatible with 1.5 °C or even 2 °C limits. This research suggests that there is a built-in feature of under-reaction in climate policy, which staves off any emission pathways compatible with stopping a temperature rise above 1.5 °C by 2100. It shows that the climate policy gap is a political and methodological tool that reveals systemic shortcomings of government climate action. Its visibility identifies benchmarks and sectors that should be activated to close these gaps in response to the growing popular demands for climate justice.

Substantial emission reductions from Chinese power plants after the introduction of ultra-low emissions standards

In 2014, China introduced an ultra-low emissions (ULE) standards policy for renovating coal-fired power-generating units to limit SO2, NOx and particulate matter (PM) emissions to 35, 50 and 10 mg m−3, respectively. The ULE standard policy had ambitious levels (surpassing those of all other countries) and implementation timeline. We estimate emission reductions associated with the ULE policy by constructing a nationwide, unit-level, hourly-frequency emissions dataset using data from a continuous emissions monitoring systems network covering 96–98% of Chinese thermal power capacity during 2014–2017. We find that between 2014 and 2017 China’s annual power emissions of SO2, NOx and PM dropped by 65%, 60% and 72%, respectively. Our estimated emissions using actual monitoring data are 18–92% below other recent estimates. We detail the technologies used to meet the ULE standards and the determinants of compliance, underscoring the importance of ex post evaluation and providing insights for other countries wishing to reduce their power emissions. In 2014 China proposed an ultra-low emissions policy for coal-fired power plants to reduce emissions. Using comprehensive nationwide stack emissions monitoring data, Tang et al. show reductions in excess of 60% for SO2, NOx and particulate matter emissions since 2014, even as power generation overall increased.

Assessment on the Implementation of 'National Action Plan on Promotion of the Open Government Initiative in Azerbaijan for 2016-2018'

In this monitoring report the status of meeting OGI principles as well as compliance with the commitments in line with the SMART, ambitious level related to the adoption and implementation of Action Plan on Promotion of the Open Government Initiative for 2016-2018 have been studied. It is worth mentioning that the monitoring team has explored various reports, official information on implementation of the commitments as well as monitored the websites of responsible central and local executive bodies responsible. Furthermore, desk research opportunities using internet were used. Additionally, the results describing the overall picture about the implementation of the project have been disclosed, and proposals were submitted. The report outlines the commitments of the Second National Action Plan (NAP) that do not meet the requirements of Specific, Measurable, Relevance and Time-bound criteria during the SMART Assessment. At the same time, the gaps in the public discussion of the draft document in the process of NAP setting, restricted access to online and live discussion, lack of feedbacks, and intentional exclusion of independent NGOs were addressed during preparation of the report.

The impact of strategic transformation on employee productivity

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to provide a strategic commentary on the interconnected areas of corporate strategy and employee performance by illustrating how two organizations adapted and transformed their businesses to the demands of digitalization and new media.Design/methodology/approachA longitudinal analysis (1995-2015) of employee productivity was calculated as operating income per employee for each firm and benchmarked against industry data.FindingsBoth firm’s corporate objectives and strategies were focused on ambitious levels of growth and the opportunities provided by an increasingly digital environment. However, the firms had transformed their businesses in different ways with distinct employee productivity performance outcomes.Practical implicationsThis paper provides case studies of strategic transformation and argues that HR management strategies and practices need to be continually evaluated to assess their employee productivity in an uncertain digital operating environment.Originality/valueThis paper provides a longitudinal analysis of how media firms, Sky Plc and Pearson Plc, adapted, reconfigured and transformed their businesses to meet the demands of an operating environment characterized by inexorable changes in digital technologies. It presents data and conclusions on how the management of “human resources” had delivered different employee productivity outcomes over the long term.

Health and greenhouse gas mitigation benefits of ambitious expansion of cycling, walking, and transit in California.

The purpose of this research was to quantify health co-benefits and carbon reductions of preferred scenarios of California regional transportation plans and alternatives with ambitious levels of active transport. The alternatives were designed to examine the efficacy of independent contributions of walking, bicycling, and transit at levels consistent with the U.S. Surgeon General recommendation for physical activity. Using data from travel and health surveys, vital statistics, collision databases, and outputs from regional and statewide travel models, the Integrated Transport and Health Impacts Model estimated the change in the population disease burden, as measured by deaths and disability adjusted life years (DALYs), due to a shift from a 2010 baseline travel pattern to an alternative. Health pathways modeled were physical activity and road traffic injuries. The preferred scenarios increased statewide active transport from 40.5 to 53.4 min person−1 w−1, which was associated with an annual decrease of 909 deaths and 16,089 DALYs. Sensitivity analyses that accounted for 2040 projected age- and sex-specific population characteristics and cause-specific mortality rates did not appreciably alter the annual change in deaths and DALYs on a population basis. The ambitious, maximal alternatives increased population mean travel duration to 283 min person−1 w−1 for walking, bicycling, or transit and were associated a reduction in deaths and DALYs from 2.5 to 12 times greater than the California preferred scenarios. The alternative with the largest health impact was bicycling 283 min person−1 w−1 which led to 8,543 fewer annual deaths and 194,003 fewer DALYs, despite an increase in bicyclist injuries. With anticipated population growth, no alternative achieved decreases in carbon emissions but bicycling had the greatest potential for slowing their growth. Alternatives that included transit similarly reduced carbon emissions, but with less health benefit. Aggressive expansion of active transport is an efficacious, but underutilized policy option with significant health co-benefits for mitigating greenhouse gases.

Building Renovation: Which Kind of Guidelines could be Proposed for Policy Makers and Professional Owners?

IEA IBC Annex 56 methodology provides the basis for the assessment and evaluation of energy related renovation options of residential building stock, first and foremost with respect to cost, energy use and carbon emissions. Furthermore, it allows also for a broader approach going beyond cost effective reduction of carbon emissions and energy use by taking into account co-benefits achieved in a renovation process. Besides impact indicators for primary energy use, carbon emissions and costs it also provides a methodological framework for integrating at least embodied energy use for renovation measures as part of a lifecycle impact assessment. The methodology and resulting fundamentals for renovation standards have to be applicable to different climatic and country specific situations. The Guideline for policy makers proposed by the Annex 56 gives useful information and suggestions to the drafting of legislative and administrative measures, at the national or local level, for reducing the amount of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions in renovation of residential buildings.The reachable saving targets must be defined in agreement with the actors in the energy market, as the owners and / or the managers of buildings, but policy makers must be aware of their responsibility in defining cost effective levels for nearly zero energy or emissions building renovation, using a life cycle perspective, and the relevance of preparing adequate financial packages to support ambitious levels for building renovation. Furthermore, the Guideline for professional owners shall report outlines key drivers for building retrofit and use and the resulting impacts on energy consumption. This Guideline shall describe building and energy efficiency trends specific to the residential building sectors.

The Influence of Energy Targets and Economic Concerns in Design Strategies for a Residential Nearly-Zero Energy Building

Finding cost-optimal solutions towards nearly-zero energy buildings in accordance with the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) is a challenging task. In order to reach the 20-20-20 targets, EU energy policy has introduced new ambitious levels for the large-scale spread of nearly-zero energy buildings (nZEBs) and the concept of the cost-optimal level, defined as the energy performance level, which leads to the lowest cost during the estimated economic lifecycle of the building. Consequently, building design has begun a challenge involving both energy targets and economic concerns. The aim of this research is to analyze an example building of a new single family house, using the cost-optimal methodology, in order to define how energy and economic aspects influence the preliminary design phase of the project and, in particular, the choice of the performance features of some components of the project itself, such as envelope elements and systems. The impact on energy performances of different configurations for the building envelope and heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems was assessed with the dynamic simulation software EnergyPlus. Finally, the costs of the different design scenarios were estimated, according to the European Standard EN 15459:2007 to establish which of them had the lowest global cost and, consequently, represents the cost-optimal level for the design configurations analyzed. In order to test the stability of the results obtained, different sensitivity analyses were carried out.

Policy Goals for Improved Water Quality in the Baltic Sea: When do the Benefits Outweigh the Costs?

This paper develops and applies a spatially explicit bioeconomic model to study transboundary nutrient pollution of the Baltic Sea. We combine catchment, marine and economic models covering the entire Baltic Sea region to weigh the costs of nutrient abatement and the benefits of improved water quality and solve for the optimal level of water protection. The overall benefits of the Baltic Sea Action Plan, the present convention on nutrient abatement, clearly outweigh the costs. Nevertheless, the total cost could be almost halved if the mix of measures and the regional targets were planned in a spatially cost–effective manner and if the consequent reductions of nitrogen and phosphorus, the two nutrients causing eutrophication, were better balanced. Policy optimizations, however, suggest that the optimal level of nutrient abatement is somewhat lower than the more ambitious level envisaged by the convention. The welfare gains from cost sharing that makes the optimal level of nutrient abatement worthwhile for all littoral countries would be 170 million euros annually.

Hydraulic Hydro Storage System for Self-sufficient Cities

Many modern cities aspire renewable energy self-sufficiency. On a basic level, this can be achieved by producing enough solar and wind power to cover annual electricity demand. On a more ambitious level, the renewable power supply should cover consumption during every hour of the year. This could be reached by storing the energy in a local storage system with sufficient capacity. The Hydraulic Hydro Storage System is a solution to this ambitious level of self-sufficiency. It relies primarily on local resources and has an efficiency of 80%.

Effects of Combined Reading and Question Generation on Reading Fluency and Comprehension of Three Young Adults With Autism and Intellectual Disability

Reread–Adapt and Answer–Comprehend (RAAC) is a reading intervention designed to target fluency and comprehension for students with disabilities. Previous researchers have demonstrated the effectiveness of the intervention for students with learning disabilities. This study extended the research by using the RAAC intervention with three postsecondary students with autism spectrum disorder. In the context of a multiple baseline across participants design, the results can be interpreted to conclude that the RAAC intervention may improve oral reading fluency and comprehension for young adults with autism. Using the linear weekly growth model based on the slope, the authors calculated realistic and ambitious goals. Participants’ fluency gains exceeded the ambitious levels of growth and transferred to unpracticed passages. In addition, all participants correctly answered more factual and inferential comprehension questions during the intervention.

Opening up to a critical review of ambitious energy goals: Perspectives of academics and practitioners in a rural Swiss community

Many researchers and policy makers argue for a radical change in the current energy system. This paper presents a transdisciplinary case study of a rural, developing Swiss community in which a number of alternative, ambitious goals for the energy system were developed and critically reviewed by both academics and practitioners, such as energy consumers, energy industry representatives, and experts. The study shows that in the beginning the community was not ready to discuss energy issues on a detailed and ambitious level; a focus on local community development was more promising a beginning than global goals, such as climate change mitigation. Moreover, there is a need to open up to many different visions and be more explicit about the concrete energy measures needed and their potential consequences. Some visions need stricter planning and are, thus, less robust with respect to implementation and consensus. Finally, we argue that moderate, flexible energy goals will likely meet less resistance in implementation. We claim that similar results can be expected elsewhere and, thus, more general lessons can be learned from this case study.