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Sustainability, Volume 7, Issue 11

2015 November - 68 articles

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Articles (68)

  • Article
  • Open Access
361 Citations
53,453 Views
25 Pages

The Effectiveness of Education for Sustainable Development

  • Jelle Boeve-de Pauw,
  • Niklas Gericke,
  • Daniel Olsson and
  • Teresa Berglund

24 November 2015

Perhaps the most important issue in our time is how to sustain our planet’s resources, while developing wealth and well-being for a growing population. This monumental task has been defined in the concept of sustainable development (SD). During the l...

  • Article
  • Open Access
22 Citations
12,841 Views
36 Pages

24 November 2015

This paper examines the spatial and temporal trajectories of Seattle’s industrial land use restructuring and the shifting riskscape in Seattle, WA, a commonly recognized urban model of sustainability. Drawing on the perspective of sustainability as a...

  • Essay
  • Open Access
28 Citations
8,855 Views
18 Pages

24 November 2015

This position paper defines and substantiates the relevance of educational sciences as design elements of socially sustainable development in economics and society. Therefore, a theoretical-normative link of the fields of social sustainability, socia...

  • Case Report
  • Open Access
74 Citations
9,572 Views
13 Pages

24 November 2015

The theory on the carbon footprint of agriculture can systematically evaluate the carbon emissions caused by artificial factors from the agricultural production process, which is the theoretical basis for constructing low-carbon agriculture and has i...

  • Article
  • Open Access
139 Citations
12,845 Views
19 Pages

23 November 2015

This study discusses the influences of green absorptive capacity, green dynamic capacities, and green service innovation on firm performance. In order to fill the research gap, this study proposes the concept of green service innovation. The results...

  • Article
  • Open Access
25 Citations
6,749 Views
20 Pages

23 November 2015

As the main feature of land use planning, land use allocation (LUA) optimization is an important means of creating a balance between the land-use supply and demand in a region and promoting the sustainable utilization of land resources. In essence, L...

  • Article
  • Open Access
34 Citations
9,211 Views
22 Pages

Landscape Pattern Changes in Response to Transhumance Abandonment on Mountain Vermio (North Greece)

  • Anna Sidiropoulou,
  • Maria Karatassiou,
  • Georgia Galidaki and
  • Paraskevi Sklavou

23 November 2015

Transhumance, the seasonal movement of herds between highlands and lowlands following precise, repeated routes, is a common practice in many Mediterranean regions. This livestock movement exploits natural vegetation in both winter and summer pastures...

  • Article
  • Open Access
39 Citations
7,194 Views
22 Pages

Evaluation of Tourism Water Capacity in Agricultural Heritage Sites

  • Mi Tian,
  • Qingwen Min,
  • Fei Lun,
  • Zheng Yuan,
  • Anthony M. Fuller,
  • Lun Yang,
  • Yongxun Zhang and
  • Jie Zhou

20 November 2015

Agricultural heritage sites have been gaining popularity as tourism destinations. The arrival of large numbers of tourists, however, has created serious challenges to these vulnerable ecosystems. In particular, water resources are facing tremendous p...

  • Article
  • Open Access
66 Citations
6,911 Views
21 Pages

20 November 2015

Remanufacturing can bring considerable economic and environmental benefits such as cost saving, conservation of energy and resources, and reduction of emissions. With the increasing awareness of sustainable manufacturing, remanufacturing gradually...

  • Article
  • Open Access
83 Citations
13,344 Views
17 Pages

Human-Environment System Knowledge: A Correlate of Pro-Environmental Behavior

  • Pablo Díaz-Siefer,
  • Alexander Neaman,
  • Eduardo Salgado,
  • Juan L. Celis-Diez and
  • Siegmar Otto

20 November 2015

An effective program of environmental education requires the identification of the knowledge that must be imparted. This paper compares the effects of human-environment system knowledge (i.e., knowledge related to environmental problems caused by hum...

  • Article
  • Open Access
33 Citations
7,324 Views
26 Pages

20 November 2015

Building and construction sectors are significant contributors to the global economy, but their energy consumption necessitates greater commitment to sustainable developments. There is therefore a growing demand for green innovation in the form of cl...

  • Article
  • Open Access
6 Citations
7,625 Views
15 Pages

20 November 2015

Since the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA) highlighted the importance of ecosystem services for human well-being, the payments for such services have increasingly been drawing the attention of governments, the private sector and academia. Noneth...

  • Article
  • Open Access
14 Citations
8,441 Views
23 Pages

20 November 2015

To consistently produce high quality products, a quality management system, such as the ISO9001, 2000 or TS 16949 must be practically implemented. One core instrument of the TS16949 MSA (Measurement System Analysis) is to rank the capability of a mea...

  • Concept Paper
  • Open Access
27 Citations
12,249 Views
23 Pages

Expanding Red Clover (Trifolium pratense) Usage in the Corn–Soy–Wheat Rotation

  • Sara L. Wyngaarden,
  • Amélie C.M. Gaudin,
  • William Deen and
  • Ralph C. Martin

20 November 2015

A common agronomic recommendation is under-seeding red clover to wheat in the corn–soy–wheat rotation. As a leguminous cover crop, red clover boosts agro-ecological resilience and productivity through nitrogen fixation, as well as non-nitrogen-relate...

  • Article
  • Open Access
188 Citations
15,404 Views
23 Pages

Estimating the Impact of Urbanization on Air Quality in China Using Spatial Regression Models

  • Chuanglin Fang,
  • Haimeng Liu,
  • Guangdong Li,
  • Dongqi Sun and
  • Zhuang Miao

20 November 2015

Urban air pollution is one of the most visible environmental problems to have accompanied China’s rapid urbanization. Based on emission inventory data from 2014, gathered from 289 cities, we used Global and Local Moran’s I to measure the spatial auto...

  • Article
  • Open Access
35 Citations
13,673 Views
24 Pages

Out of the Dark: Establishing a Large-Scale Field Experiment to Assess the Effects of Artificial Light at Night on Species and Food Webs

  • Stephanie I. J. Holzhauer,
  • Steffen Franke,
  • Christopher C. M. Kyba,
  • Alessandro Manfrin,
  • Reinhard Klenke,
  • Christian C. Voigt,
  • Daniel Lewanzik,
  • Martin Oehlert,
  • Michael T. Monaghan and
  • Franz Hölker
  • + 5 authors

20 November 2015

Artificial light at night (ALAN) is one of the most obvious hallmarks of human presence in an ecosystem. The rapidly increasing use of artificial light has fundamentally transformed nightscapes throughout most of the globe, although little is known a...

  • Article
  • Open Access
50 Citations
10,038 Views
15 Pages

20 November 2015

With the continued growth of protected areas (PAs) in China in terms of the number, coverage and varieties of protected objects, how to efficiently manage the protected areas to ensure both resource protection and environmental protection has become...

  • Editorial
  • Open Access
36 Citations
26,496 Views
7 Pages

Sustainability in Fashion Business Operations

  • Tsan-Ming Choi and
  • Yongjian Li

19 November 2015

Under the global trend of sustainability, many companies selling fashion products have to reshape their operational strategies. Over the past few years, we have witnessed many fashion companies going green by re-engineering their business processes a...

  • Article
  • Open Access
52 Citations
13,249 Views
20 Pages

19 November 2015

How to effectively implement environmental management practices and supply chain integration to enhance technological innovation performance has become crucial in both research and practice. Based on resource-based view (RBV) theory, a theoretical mo...

  • Article
  • Open Access
97 Citations
11,920 Views
22 Pages

19 November 2015

The thermodynamic performance of a regenerative organic Rankine cycle that utilizes low temperature heat sources to facilitate the selection of proper organic working fluids is simulated. Thermodynamic models are used to investigate thermodynamic par...

  • Article
  • Open Access
26 Citations
9,173 Views
16 Pages

Evaluation of Biomass Yield and Water Treatment in Two Aquaponic Systems Using the Dynamic Root Floating Technique (DRF)

  • Laura Silva,
  • Eucario Gasca-Leyva,
  • Edgardo Escalante,
  • Kevin M. Fitzsimmons and
  • David Valdés Lozano

19 November 2015

The experiment evaluates the food production and water treatment of TAN, NO2–N, NO3–N, and PO43− in two aquaponics systems using the dynamic root floating technique (DRF). A separate recirculation aquaculture system (RAS) was used as a control. Th...

  • Article
  • Open Access
18 Citations
5,902 Views
16 Pages

19 November 2015

This study analyzes Tianjin’s eco-efficiency trends during the period 2001–2013 and reasons for their changes, with the aim of contributing to efforts to ensure the city’s sustainable development. While eco-efficiency of all of the indicators that we...

  • Article
  • Open Access
181 Citations
9,866 Views
17 Pages

18 November 2015

The studies of the kinetics and isotherms adsorption of the Reactive Black 5 (RB5) onto bentonite clay were explored in a batch study in a laboratory. The maximum RB5 adsorption conditions of bentonite clay were optimized such as shaking speed (100...

  • Article
  • Open Access
19 Citations
4,622 Views
25 Pages

18 November 2015

Many large projects held over the last few decades in Europe have been based on the enhancement of community goods as a strategy to put in place sustainable urban regeneration. The inclusive nature of these goods and the social importance of the rela...

  • Article
  • Open Access
13 Citations
8,329 Views
24 Pages

Grain-Size Analysis of Debris Flow Alluvial Fans in Panxi Area along Jinsha River, China

  • Wen Zhang,
  • Qing Wang,
  • Jianping Chen,
  • Huizhong Li,
  • Jinsheng Que and
  • Yuanyuan Kong

18 November 2015

The basic geometric parameters of 236 debris flow catchments were determined by interpreting SPOT5 remote sensing images with a resolution of 2.5 m in a 209 km section along the Jinsha River in the Panxi area, China. A total of 27 large-scale debris...

  • Article
  • Open Access
33 Citations
14,119 Views
19 Pages

Green Transport Balanced Scorecard Model with Analytic Network Process Support

  • David Staš,
  • Radim Lenort,
  • Pavel Wicher and
  • David Holman

18 November 2015

In recent decades, the performance of economic and non-economic activities has required them to be friendly with the environment. Transport is one of the areas having considerable potential within the scope. The main assumption to achieve ambitious g...

  • Article
  • Open Access
14 Citations
9,324 Views
22 Pages

Improving the Environmental Sustainability of Flash Geothermal Power Plants—A Case Study

  • Lorenzo Bruscoli,
  • Daniele Fiaschi,
  • Giampaolo Manfrida and
  • Duccio Tempesti

18 November 2015

The sustainability of geothermal energy production is analyzed with reference to a production plant located in a specific area (Monte Amiata, Italy). Four solutions combining a flash power plant with an Organic Rankine Cycle in a hybrid configuration...

  • Article
  • Open Access
12 Citations
7,178 Views
18 Pages

18 November 2015

The demands of energy consumption have been projected as a key factor that affects an economy at the city, national, and international level. Contributions to total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2012 by various urban sectors include electricity (3...

  • Article
  • Open Access
10 Citations
6,131 Views
23 Pages

Comparing Potential Unstable Sites and Stable Sites on Revegetated Cut-Slopes of Mountainous Terrain in Korea

  • Sung-Ho Kil,
  • Dong Kun Lee,
  • Ho Gul Kim,
  • Nam-Choon Kim,
  • Sangjun Im and
  • Gwan-Soo Park

18 November 2015

This study employs a diverse set of variables to explain slope stabilization on stable versus failure-prone revegetated cut-slopes in Korea. A field survey was conducted at potential unstable sites and stable sites using 23 variables. Through a non-p...

  • Article
  • Open Access
40 Citations
9,152 Views
27 Pages

Impact of Electric Vehicles as Distributed Energy Storage in Isolated Systems: The Case of Tenerife

  • Alfredo Ramírez Díaz,
  • Francisco J. Ramos-Real,
  • Gustavo A. Marrero and
  • Yannick Perez

17 November 2015

Isolated regions are highly dependent on fossil fuels. The use of endogenous sources and the improvement in energy efficiency in all of the consumption activities are the two main ways to reduce the dependence of petroleum-derived fuels. Tenerife off...

  • Article
  • Open Access
3 Citations
5,408 Views
15 Pages

17 November 2015

This paper presents an iterative confidence interval based parametric refinement approach for questionnaire design improvement in the evaluation of working characteristics in construction enterprises. This refinement approach utilizes the 95% confide...

  • Article
  • Open Access
24 Citations
9,926 Views
16 Pages

Assessment of Passive vs. Active Strategies for a School Building Design

  • Ji Eun Kang,
  • Ki Uhn Ahn,
  • Cheol Soo Park and
  • Thorsten Schuetze

16 November 2015

This paper presents a simulation study to reduce heating and cooling energy demand of a school building in Seoul Metropolitan Area, Korea. The aim of this study was to estimate the impact of passive vs. active approaches on energy savings in building...

  • Article
  • Open Access
31 Citations
9,677 Views
16 Pages

13 November 2015

This study investigated the characteristics of using a cost-effective, amine-modified biochar (BC) derived from chicken manure for removing dimethyl sulfide (DMS) from an aqueous solution. The amine-modified BC showed much higher adsorption of DMS c...

  • Article
  • Open Access
24 Citations
7,832 Views
26 Pages

13 November 2015

Metropolitan Detroit, Michigan, USA is the automobile capital of the world, part of the industrial heartland and Rust Belt, and a major urban area. For over two centuries, the Detroit River was perceived as a working river that supported commerce and...

  • Article
  • Open Access
21 Citations
5,555 Views
20 Pages

Hazard Assessment of Debris Flows in the Reservoir Region of Wudongde Hydropower Station in China

  • Cencen Niu,
  • Qing Wang,
  • Jianping Chen,
  • Wen Zhang,
  • Liming Xu and
  • Ke Wang

13 November 2015

The outbreak of debris flows in a reservoir region can affect the stability of hydropower stations and threaten the lives of the people living downstream of dams. Therefore, determining the hazard degree of debris flows in a reservoir region is of gr...

  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
5,981 Views
17 Pages

13 November 2015

This paper analyzes coal consumption in the 31 provinces and regions of China from 1995 to 2012. Using spatial analysis in Arc geographical information systems (ArcGIS) and the concept of the center of gravity in physics, we explore the regional diff...

  • Article
  • Open Access
22 Citations
8,590 Views
28 Pages

Drought Adaptation in the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, China: Actions, Planning, Pathways and Barriers

  • Jianping Yang,
  • Chunping Tan,
  • Shijin Wang,
  • Shengxia Wang,
  • Yuan Yang and
  • Hongju Chen

12 November 2015

The Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (NX region) of Northwestern China is threatened by increased meteorological drought induced by climate change (CC) and constraints on water supply from the Yellow River. Thus, the NX region is representative of attem...

  • Article
  • Open Access
16 Citations
6,587 Views
21 Pages

11 November 2015

The Korean emissions trading scheme (ETS) has one special characteristic that makes it different from other schemes, such as the EU ETS. While the other schemes consider only direct emissions from fossil fuels, the Korean ETS also regulates indirect...

  • Article
  • Open Access
10 Citations
8,120 Views
26 Pages

11 November 2015

This study proposes a framework for an infrastructure asset management manual containing infrastructure asset management processes and operation techniques, which can be adjusted by different ordering authorities to develop their own manuals. The fol...

  • Article
  • Open Access
35 Citations
8,186 Views
29 Pages

10 November 2015

The sustainability strategy in urban spaces arises from reflecting on how to achieve a more habitable city and is materialized in a series of sustainable transformations aimed at humanizing different environments so that they can be used and enjoyed...

  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
5,907 Views
18 Pages

A Method to Evaluate the Stimulation of a Real World Field of View by Means of a Spectroradiometric Analysis

  • Fabio Nardecchia,
  • Monica Barbalace,
  • Fabio Bisegna,
  • Chiara Burattini,
  • Franco Gugliermetti,
  • Andrea De Lieto Vollaro,
  • Ferdinando Salata and
  • Iacopo Golasi

10 November 2015

Stimulation elicited by a real world field of view is related to the color, the intensity and the direction of the information reaching the eye: different spectral power distributions of light trigger different responses. An evaluation of the stimula...

  • Article
  • Open Access
16 Citations
7,562 Views
32 Pages

6 November 2015

Farmland is the most basic material condition for guaranteeing rural livelihoods and national food security, and exploring management strategies that take both stable rural livelihoods and sustainable farmland use into account has vital significance...

  • Article
  • Open Access
24 Citations
7,317 Views
25 Pages

6 November 2015

Natural deltas can provide human beings with flat and fertile land to be cultivated. It is important to monitor cropland dynamics to provide policy-relevant information for regional sustainable development. This paper utilized Landsat imagery to stud...

  • Article
  • Open Access
5 Citations
5,010 Views
14 Pages

6 November 2015

Entrepreneurship may be regarded as the mechanism of change towards sustainability. Any entrepreneur that seeks to start a new venture in an emerging industry will face resource and time constraints. The question we raise here is how the entrepreneur...

  • Article
  • Open Access
39 Citations
17,329 Views
22 Pages

6 November 2015

The distribution of goods in urban areas, together with private traffic flows, are among the main sources of energy consumption, air pollution and noise. As a consequence, in the 2000s, several EU cities started to implement logistical solutions for...

  • Article
  • Open Access
16 Citations
5,924 Views
22 Pages

Are Australian Universities Making Good Use of ICT for CSR Reporting?

  • Raquel Garde Sánchez,
  • Manuel Pedro Rodríguez Bolívar and
  • Antonio M. López Hernández

6 November 2015

The higher education system in Australia has witnessed various government initiatives that have provided funding to integrate corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues and thus contribute to the training of professionals with a strong sense of eth...

  • Article
  • Open Access
27 Citations
21,430 Views
18 Pages

Carbon Footprint of Tree Nuts Based Consumer Products

  • Roberto Volpe,
  • Simona Messineo,
  • Maurizio Volpe and
  • Antonio Messineo

6 November 2015

This case study shows results of a calculation of carbon footprint (CFP) resulting from the production of nuts added value products for a large consumer market. Nuts consumption is increasing in the world and so is the consumer awareness of the envir...

  • Article
  • Open Access
21 Citations
6,379 Views
17 Pages

5 November 2015

This article gives an overview of the conceptual characteristics of sustainable development by searching the governance-oriented intermediaries. It shows how the new paradigm of green growth evolved through international consensus and how this paradi...

  • Article
  • Open Access
7 Citations
6,970 Views
16 Pages

The Response of Grain Potential Productivity to Land Use Change: A Case Study in Western Jilin, China

  • Fei Li,
  • Shuwen Zhang,
  • Xinliang Xu,
  • Jiuchun Yang,
  • Qing Wang,
  • Kun Bu and
  • Liping Chang

4 November 2015

The impact of land use change on grain potential productivity is one of the most important topics in the research of land use/cover change and its effects. Western Jilin, located on the edge of an ecotone in northern China, and its land use have chan...

  • Article
  • Open Access
110 Citations
16,960 Views
16 Pages

Food Waste in School Catering: An Italian Case Study

  • Luca Falasconi,
  • Matteo Vittuari,
  • Alessandro Politano and
  • Andrea Segrè

4 November 2015

Food losses and waste are currently at the heart of academic debates, civil society initiatives, and political agendas. This paper investigates food waste in school catering services focusing on six schools located in the municipality of Verona (Ital...

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Sustainability - ISSN 2071-1050