Climate Assessment Tool Research Articles

Effects of a behavior-based safety observation program: Promoting safe behaviors and safety climate at work.

Behavior-based safety (BBS) programs promote coworkers observing and correcting each other's at-risk behaviors on site; the idea behind BBS programs is to create a cultural shift in a company where it is acceptable for coworkers to stop anyone, at any time, from working in an unsafe manner. The main objective of this study is to examine the impacts of a BBS observation program in the construction industry. The subject, an electrical contracting company, implemented the BBS program in January 2019. This study utilized multiple data sources: the company's incident data, BBS program report data, and surveys, including the Safety Climate Assessment Tool for Small Contractors. A total of 3,891 at-risk behaviors from the BBS reports, including 600 comments, and 141 survey responses were analyzed. The most frequently reported at-risk behavior was the line of fire, and the at-risk behaviors were often observed when workers conducted tasks, such as running or pulling wires, installing devices, and installing lights. The overall perception of safety climate was high, and the respondents reported that the safety climate had improved since the adoption of the BBS program. Overall, implementing the BBS program benefited in cultivating the company's collective safety climate. As a result of the BBS program, the company implemented better communication strategies for their safety meetings on the most frequently reported at-risk behaviors, replacing safety gears with higher quality ones, and redesigning online safety training to better reflect the identified tasks that were associated with more at-risk behaviors.

Effect of Engine Design Parameters on the Climate Impact of Aircraft: A Case Study Based on Short-Medium Range Mission

The climate impact of aviation is considerably different from that of other transport modes. The turbofan engine’s efficiency can be increased by increasing the Operating Pressure Ratio (OPR), bypass ratio (BPR) and Turbine Inlet Temperature (TIT), thereby reducing CO2 and H2O emissions. However, this may have an adverse effect on the secondary emissions, such as NOx, soot, etc. Taking a holistic view in evaluating the climate impact of engine development trends considering all the climate forcers is imperative for design trends in the future. This research investigates the impact of some key engine design parameters on climate. The emission changes due to design variations in the CFM56-5B are estimated using in-house engine performance and emission prediction tools. Accordingly, the changes in the species’ Average Temperature Response for 100 years (ATR100) are analyzed using a climate assessment tool, AirClim. The results show that the overall climate impact increases by 40% when increasing OPR from 25 to 40. Meanwhile, the Twin Annular Premixed Swirler (TAPS-II) combustor reduces the total ATR100 drastically, in the range of 52–58%, due to lean combustion.

Relationship between authentic leadership, transformational leadership and innovative work behavior: mediating role of innovation climate

Objectives. This study aimed to demonstrate the effect of transformational and authentic leadership characteristics of healthcare managers on employees’ innovative work behavior and the mediating role of innovation climate. Methods. The study was conducted in 19 hospitals in Turkey and 263 managers participated. The data were collected using the transformational leadership questionnaire, the authentic leadership questionnaire, the innovative climate assessment tool and the innovative work behavior scale. Path analysis was performed to demonstrate the relationship between the variables. Results. When transformational and authentic leadership were put into the model separately through innovation climate, transformational leadership had an effect of 0.39 units (0.22 units direct, 0.17 units indirect) and authentic leadership had a 0.44-unit effect (0.29 units direct, 0.15 units indirect) on innovative work behavior. When transformational and authentic leadership were put together in the model, the total (direct and indirect) effect of them increased to 0.52 units. In this case, the effect of authentic leadership characteristics of health managers on innovative work behavior of their followers (0.42 units) was greater than the effect of transformational leadership characteristics (0.10 units). Conclusions. Although both types of leadership affect innovative work behavior, authentic leadership was more effective than transformational leadership.

Developing a Safety Climate Assessment Tool for Omani Construction Industry

One of the methods which could improve the safety performance of construction organizations is the safety climate approach which is helpful to know the existing maturity level of the safety climate and to develop plans to achieve the required level of maturity. Most of the existing safety climate tools were developed considering different industries in developed countries while construction was based only on few tools. Construction projects in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member countries are at a peak. This article, therefore, attempts to develop a safety climate assessment tool for the Omani construction industry. A mixed research method consisting of systematic review (N = 32), structured questionnaire (N = 102) and email interview (N = 19) was adopted in this research. An assessment tool that has seven factors and 62 simple questions that the participants have to answer on a Likert scale of 1 to 5 is finally developed.

Building useful, web-based educational assessment tools for students, with students: a demonstration with the school climate walkthrough

ABSTRACT Practical educational assessment tools for adolescents champion student voice, use technology to enhance engagement, highlight discrepancies in school experience, and provide actionable feedback. We report a series of studies that detail an iterative process for developing a new school climate assessment tool: (1) item generation that centres student voice, (2) the design of a web-based app, (3) item revisions informed by student and educator feedback, and (4) the identification and confirmation of the underlying factor structure of the assessment tool. The resulting School Climate Walkthrough provides scores on nine dimensions of school climate and 73 additional observational items. The web-based application produces instantaneous reports that display systemic differences in how various student demographic groups experience school. This process can guide future research in building the next generation of educational assessments for adolescents and disrupting harmful or exclusionary school practices.

Pictorial Phenomena Depicting the Family Climate of Deaf/Hard of Hearing Children and Their Hearing Families.

This mixed method study (Explanatory Design – the Participant Selection Model) investigated the use of joint drawing (the Family Squiggle) as a family climate assessment tool for hearing families who have a deaf/hard of hearing (D/HH) child. The goal was to evaluate the possibilities of applying a quantitative approach to characterize the pictorial phenomena produced by hearing families who have a D/HH child and then apply qualitative research approaches to better understand the meaning of these phenomena. Twenty-eight hearing families (parents and child) whose child was diagnosed as D/HH and used hearing devices (hearing aids and implant) were recruited along with 16 families with a hearing child of a similar age enrolled in a mainstream school. The sessions involved a joint drawing followed by a family interview. In the quantitative stage, pictorial phenomena for which there was a significant association between the phenomena and the group of families were defined. These were: (1) the number of dominant images, (2) images occupying less than a quarter of the page, (3) images with accentuated outlines, (4) moderate colorfulness with four to five colors in each drawing, (5) minimal representation of the face, (6) concrete rather than creative titles, (7) muting of conflictual themes, and (8) images reminiscent of hearing devices (hearing aids and implant). In the qualitative phase, interviews were conducted with the hearing families with a D/HH child to better understand the meaning of these pictorial phenomena. The findings suggest that each of these phenomena represent the preoccupation of the family with D/HH, capture a certain aspect of family dynamics, and together provide a broader and deeper picture of the family climate and the interactions between the children’s family and hearing. This assessment tool may thus be utilized when verbal tools cannot be easily applied.

Designing soil quality and climate assessment tool for sustainable production of signalgrass (Brachiaria brizantha) silvopasture system in mountain ecosystems

Evironmental indicators are the elements required to plan sustainable forest management practices. This assessment was carried out based on indicators that are sensitive to management and changes in the soil, climate, and associated functions. This study aims at determining soil quality and climate that affect the production of signalgrass silvopasture system in mountain ecosystems. The survey-based study was conducted during dry and wet seasons in 2017-2018. We used stratified random sampling method. Stratification was based on site (agroforestry phase) and environment (season and year). Site nested on environment. Agroforestry phases consisted of initial phase (<50% of the shade intensity of the sun), intermediate phase (50-70% of the shade intensity of the sun), and advanced phase (>70% of the shade intensity of the sun). Seasons were divided into two, dry season (rainfall < 60 mm.month-1) and wet season (rainfall > 100 mm.month-1) and years were limited from 2017 to 2018. The observation was conducted on 30 environmental parameters and signalgrass productions. The data was analyzed using linear mixed models, analysis of variance (ANOVA), structural equation modelling (SEM), and stepwise regression. The study results indicate that the highest signalgrass production at the initial agroforestry phase was 4.50 tons.ha-1. There is a very significant decrease in signalgrass production at the intermediate agroforestry phase by 36.64 % and at the advanced agroforestry phase by 280.80 %, compared to the initial agroforestry phase. The signalgrass production was increased very significantly influenced by the increase in cation exchange capacity (CEC), soil organic carbon (SOC), air temperature (Tair), and wind speed (U2). In addition, it was also significantly influenced by available nitrate (NO3-). Signalgrass production can be improved by the assessment tools by improving CEC, NO3-, SOC, U2 , and Tair with routine organic matters application and annual pruning.

The Safety Climate Assessment Tool (S-CAT): A rubric-based approach to measuring construction safety climate

Introduction: This paper presents the development and validation of a new rubric-based Safety Climate Assessment Tool (S-CAT). The S-CAT gives companies the opportunity to use rubric descriptors, rather than traditional Likert scale responses, to self-assess their level of safety climate maturity and receive a composite score benchmarked against others in the S-CAT database. Method: The S-CAT is composed of 37 separate indicators of 8 safety climate factors identified by construction industry subject matter experts. The eight factors have between three and six indicators each with its own rubric-based response-scale. The scales comprise descriptors for five levels of safety climate maturity ranging from “inattentive” to “exemplary.” Nine hundred and eighty-five respondents working in the construction industry completed the S-CAT via our online safety climate website. We used company recordable incident rates (RIR) to assess the S-CAT's criterion-related validity. Results: Cronbach alphas for each factor ranged from 0.77 to 0.90 and a confirmatory factor analysis supported the hypothesized eight factor structure with a higher-order safety climate factor. Seven of the eight factor scores, as well as the overall S-CAT score, were significantly negatively correlated with RIR. Moreover, a relative weights analysis indicated that a weighted combination of the eight safety climate factors explained 27% of the variance in organizational RIR. Conclusions: These findings provide evidence that the S-CAT is a reliable tool allowing construction companies to self-assess their safety climate along eight different factors. Moreover, the S-CAT was significantly associated with organizational injury rates. Practical applications: We discuss how companies can use the rubric descriptors to strengthen their safety management systems and improve their safety climate maturity.

The Impact of 5S Strategy on the Safety Climate & Productivity at Egyptian Garment Firms (Assembly Plants)

5S is one of the lean manufacturing tools that helps organizations to improve the work environment. The philosophy of 5S interesting on eliminating waste and non-value activity which increases labour efficiency and work area safety. Although many articles stated the significant impact of implementing lean manufacturing in worker environment, non-quantifiable results were reported. In this article, the impact of the 5S event on the safety climate and productivity at the assembly plant of Egyptian garment firms was studied. The sample was divided into two groups based on 5S implementation. The Safety Climate Assessment Tool survey (SCAT) was used in measuring the perceptions of safety on a Likert-scale while three productivity metric was calculated. The result presented that 5S has a significant impact on 7 of 8 topics of safety climate. The management commitment & the priority of safety climate at Egyptian garment firms need to be developed while usage a no-blame approach to persuade people acting safely has to be increased. In the same context, the results assigned that productivity measures influenced by 5S event.

Application of Climate Assessment Tool (CAT) to estimate climate variability impacts on nutrient loading from local watersheds

A vast amount of future climate scenario datasets, created by climate models such as general circulation models (GCMs), have been used in conjunction with watershed models to project future climate variability impact on hydrological processes and water quality. However, these low spatial-temporal resolution datasets are often difficult to downscale spatially and disaggregate temporarily, and they may not be accurate for local watersheds (i.e., state level or smaller watersheds). This study applied the US-EPA (Environmental Protection Agency)’s Climate Assessment Tool (CAT) to create future climate variability scenarios based on historical measured data for local watersheds. As a case demonstration, CAT was employed in conjunction with HSPF (Hydrological Simulation Program-FORTRAN) model to assess the impacts of the potential future extreme rainfall events and air temperature increases upon nitrate-nitrogen (NO3-N) and orthophosphate (PO4) loads in the Lower Yazoo River Watershed (LYRW), a local watershed in Mississippi, USA. Results showed that the 10 and 20% increases in rainfall rate, respectively, increased NO3-N load by 9.1 and 18% and PO4 load by 12 and 24% over a 10-year simulation period. In contrast, simultaneous increases in air temperature by 1.0 °C and rainfall rate by 10% as well as air temperature by 2.0 °C and rainfall rate by 20% increased NO3-N load by 12% and 20%, and PO4 load by 14 and 26%, respectively. A summer extreme rainfall scenario was created if a 10% increase in rainfall rate increased the total volume of rainwater for that summer by 10% or more. When this event occurred, it could increase the monthly loads of NO3-N and PO4, by 31 and 41%, respectively, for that summer. Therefore, the extreme rainfall events had tremendous impacts on the NO3-N and PO4 loads. It is apparent that CAT is a flexible and useful tool to modify historical rainfall and air temperature data to predict climate variability impacts on water quality for local watersheds.

Quantitative study of food safety climate in Belgian food processing companies in view of their organizational characteristics

The impact of organizational characteristics on food safety management systems is already intensively studied. Recently, scientific research goes beyond the managerial and technical aspects of the food safety management system, incorporating the impact of human behavior by exploring the food safety climate in food companies. In this study the food safety climate in the Belgian food processing industry was investigated and correlations between food safety climate and organizational (general and quality-related) characteristics of food processing companies were assessed. Additionally, the factorial validity of the applied food safety climate assessment tool was investigated, using exploratory factor analysis. Data were gathered through an online survey. Overall, the food safety climate was perceived to be on a good level for most of the 136 responding companies. Companies with multiple sites in Belgium appeared to perceive the food safety climate better than one-site companies. Food companies providing more than one training session per year appeared to perceive their food safety climate significantly better than companies providing less training (p < .001). For the other organizational characteristics investigated (such as company size, sector, presence of quality department, time spent on quality control, certification, available budget for maintaining the FSMS) no significant correlations with the food safety climate could be proven. Exploratory factor analysis revealed the existence of 4 underlying factors: factor 1 mainly dealing with ‘leadership related’ indicators, factor 2 with ‘resources related’ indicators, factor 3 with ‘communication related’ indicators and factor 4 is a mix of mainly ‘risk awareness related’ indicators and some ‘commitment related’ indicators.

Integrating multimedia models to assess nitrogen losses from the Mississippi River basin to the Gulf of Mexico.

This study describes and implements an integrated, multimedia, process-based system-level approach to estimating nitrogen (N) fate and transport in large river basins. The modeling system includes the following components: (1) Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ),(2) Weather Research and Forecasting Model (WRF), (3) Environmental Policy Integrated Climate (EPIC), and (4) Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT). The previously developed Fertilizer Emission Scenario Tool for CMAQ (FEST-C), an advanced user interface, integrated EPIC with the WRF model and CMAQ. The FEST-C system, driven by process-based WRF weather simulations, includes atmospheric N additions to agricultural cropland and agricultural cropland contributions to ammonia emissions. This study focuses on integrating the watershed hydrology and water quality model with FEST-C system so that a full multimedia assessment on water quality in large river basins to address impacts of fertilization, meteorology, and atmospheric N deposition on water quality can be achieved. Objectives of this paper are to describe how to expand the previous effort by integrating the SWAT model with the FEST-C (CMAQ/WRF/EPIC) modeling system, as well as to demonstrate application of the Integrated Modeling System (IMS) to the Mississippi River basin (MRB) to simulate streamflow and dissolved N loadings to the Gulf of Mexico (GOM). IMS simulation results generally agree with US Geological Survey (USGS) observations/estimations; the annual simulated streamflow is 218.9 mm and USGS observation is 211.1 mm and the annual simulated dissolved N is 2.1 kg ha−1 and the USGS estimation is 2.8 kg ha−1. Integrating SWAT with the CMAQ/WRF/EPIC modeling system allows for its use within large river basins without losing EPIC’s more detailed biogeochemistry processes, which will strengthen the assessment of impacts of future climate scenarios, regulatory and voluntary programs for N oxide air emissions, and land use and land management on N transport and transformation in large river basins.

Safety Climate: Measurements, Cultural Causes, and Climate Strength

As the leading indicator of safety-related outcomes, safety climate has been extensively studied since 1980. Nevertheless, there are some emerging issues of safety climate requiring our attention. Reporting the results of two meta-analyses and two large data collection efforts in the construction and health care industries, this symposium addresses key emerging issues in safety climate research and advances our theoretical understanding of safety climate. Specifically, the first two presentations will address optimal strategies to measure safety climate (i.e., universal versus industry-specific safety climate measures; rubric-based safety climate assessment tool). Then, the third presentation will advance our understanding of safety climate by meta-analytically examining the influence of cultural values on safety climate. Finally, the last presentation will examine the impact of safety climate and safety climate strength on safety motivation.

Estimating impact of rainfall change on hydrological processes in Jianfengling rainforest watershed, China using BASINS-HSPF-CAT modeling system

Climate change over the past several decades has resulted in shifting rainfall pattern and modifying rainfall intensity, which has exacerbated hydrological processes and added the uncertainty and instability to these processes. This study ascertained impacts of potential future rainfall change on hydrological processes at the Jianfengling (JFL) tropical mountain rainforest watershed in Hainan Island, China using the BASINS (Better Assessment Science Integrating Point and Nonpoint Sources)-HSPF (Hydrological Simulation Program-FORTRAN)-CAT (Climate Assessment Tool) modeling system. The HSPF model was calibrated and validated with available measured data prior to its applications. Three simulation scenarios were then performed to gain a better understanding of the impacts of different rainfall rates and storm intensities on stream discharge, surface water runoff from forest land, and water outflow from the JFL watershed outlet. Results showed that a 10% increase in rainfall rate could result in 1.3 times increase in stream discharge, surface runoff, and water outflow. A potential future wet climate could have profound impacts on hydrological processes at the JFL watershed, whereas a potential future dry climate could result less impacts on stream discharge, surface runoff, and water outflow at the same watershed. Our simulation further revealed that climate change driven by extreme rain storms had greater impacts on annual surface runoff than on annual stream discharge. The coupled CAT-HSPF model is a useful tool to modify historical rainfall data for projecting future rainfall variation impacts on forest hydrological processes due to climate change. This approach would be able to extend to other regions around the world.

An urban climate assessment and management tool for combined heat and air quality judgements at neighbourhood scales

Meteorology and air quality are key aspects for city life and urban metabolism. Both aspects build upon urban and natural processes, involve stocks and flows of heat and pollution, with in the end consequences for stocks and flows concerning other urban entities and processes such as human outdoor activities, leisure, transport modes, as well as for urban design and planning. During hot summer days cities experience an urban heat island effect mainly at the start of the evening and at night. As a result inhabitants might be subject to a reduced human thermal comfort. Hot summer days often also coincide with relatively poor air quality conditions. Both short-term effects are known to increase the mortality rates, and it is challenging to distinguish their impacts on health effects. Moreover, climate change scenarios indicate an enhancement of future heat wave frequency and intensity and a further deterioration of human thermal comfort. These issues raise the need and the urgency for city adaptation, but an integrated method for the assessment is still missing. Effective city adaptation is hampered by the complexity of the urban climate (induced by both meteorology and urban morphological characteristics) and its potential health risks, combined with the complex spatial interaction of stakeholders and economical functions. To warn the general public, and to effectively perform urban planning interventions, straightforward environmental indicators are required. Indicators have been developed for the individual aspects before, but indices that combine both air quality and urban heat are rather scarce (Rainham and Smoyer-Tomic, 2003). This study develops a novel metric that combines the impact of thermal comfort and air quality by accounting for the relative health risk for both aspects. A straightforward quantification method for this metric has been developed to provide an objective, rational assessment. The application of this new Urban Climate assessment tool is then applied to a case study for a heat wave in the Northwestern Europe, and applied for a sample intervention in the city center of Ghent (Belgium).

Creating a culture for radical innovation in a small mature business

This article describes an approach in organizational development to develop an innovation culture for radical product development in a small mature engineering company. The research took place in a business based in the United Kingdom that designed and manufactured instrumentation and specialized packing machines. An initial study within the company’s new product development team identified key aspects that influenced a radical innovation culture. Nine key themes were found to be pertinent, following an iterative process with the development team. These themes were triangulated using the established Organization Culture Assessment Instrument and the Creative Climate Assessment Tool. A third assessment was developed that gauged the development team culture proximity to an ideal position. Seven interventions were developed in conjunction with the company development team, senior managers, the analysis of previous empirical case research and dialogue with UK companies that promote discontinuous innovation. The results of the interventions were evaluated 4 years after implementation. The culture was re-assessed using the same assessment tools and the changes were identified. The outcomes are described and they indicate the success of the company’s attempt to embed a sustainable radical innovation culture into the product development area.

Evaluating the potential use of direct evaporative cooling in Australia

Greenhouse gas emissions and associated global climate change are a significant and growing concern for the world community. In order to improve building energy efficiency, the use of evaporative cooling systems is attracting growing attention. Using a climate assessment tool, the potential use of direct evaporative coolers over different Australian climates is evaluated. It is found that overall, the potential use of direct evaporative cooling is very significant in Australian climates. Among all the eight capital cities across Australia, except for Darwin, the need of hybrid cooling for other cities is found to be insignificant, and is less than 5% if appropriate air circulation is provided on hot/warm days. It is also found that the potential use of evaporative cooling can be significantly influenced by a change in the applications or design parameters. In Brisbane, it is estimated that with an increase of sensible cooling load from 30W/m2 to 40W/m2 in the conditioned space, the requirement in hours of hybrid cooling can increase significantly, from 4.06% to 14.89%.

Coupling Land Use Change Modeling with Climate Projections to Estimate Seasonal Variability in Runoff from an Urbanizing Catchment Near Cincinnati, Ohio

This research examines the impact of climate and land use change on watershed hydrology. Seasonal variability in mean streamflow discharge, 100-year flood, and 7Q10 low-flow of the East Fork Little Miami River watershed, Ohio was analyzed using simulated land cover change and climate projections for 2030. Future urban growth in the Greater Cincinnati area, Ohio, by the year 2030 was projected using cellular automata. Projected land cover was incorporated into a calibrated BASINS-HSPF model. Downscaled climate projections of seven GCMs based on the assumptions of two IPCC greenhouse gas emissions scenarios were integrated through the BASINS Climate Assessment Tool (CAT). The discrete CAT output was used to specify a seed for a Monte Carlo simulation and derive probability density functions of anticipated seasonal hydrologic responses to account for uncertainty. Sensitivity analysis was conducted for a small catchment in the watershed using the Storm Water Management Model (SWMM) developed U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The results indicated higher probability of exceeding the 100-year flood over the fall and winter months, and a likelihood of decreasing summer low flows.

Development of a climate assessment tool for hybrid air conditioner

Australian climate is highly suitable for using outdoor air for free building cooling. In order to evaluate the suitability of hybrid cooler for specific applications, a pre-design climate assessment tool is developed and presented in this paper. In addition to the consideration of the local climate, comfort zone proposed by ASHRAE handbook and specific design of building and operation of hybrid cooler, possible influence from environmental factors (e.g. air humidity and air velocity), as well as personal factors (e.g. activity level and clothing insulation) on occupant's thermal comfort are also considered in this tool. It is demonstrated that with the input of climatic data for a particular location and the associated design data for a specific application, the developed climate assessment tool is able to not only sort outdoor air conditions into the different process regions but also project them onto the psychrometric chart. It can also be used to estimate the hours for an individual operational mode under various climate conditions and summarize them in a table “Results”.

Validation of an Organizational Communication Climate Assessment Toolkit

Effective communication is critical to providing quality health care and can be affected by a number of modifiable organizational factors. The authors performed a prospective multisite validation study of an organizational communication climate assessment tool in 13 geographically and ethnically diverse health care organizations. Communication climate was measured across 9 discrete domains. Patient and staff surveys with matched items in each domain were developed using a national consensus process, which then underwent psychometric field testing and assessment of domain coherence. The authors found meaningful within-site and between-site performance score variability in all domains. In multivariable models, most communication domains were significant predictors of patient-reported quality of care and trust. The authors conclude that these assessment tools provide a valid empirical assessment of organizational communication climate in 9 domains. Assessment results may be useful to track organizational performance, to benchmark, and to inform tailored quality improvement interventions.