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Broader research efforts and assessments needed to uncover the complex climate effects of regional changes in aerosol emissions
Get PDFA quantitative comparison of different methods for air conditioning energy consumption prediction in residential buildings
No full textAccurate evaluation of energy consumption of air conditioning (AC) is crucial to energy efficiency in residential buildings, while few studies evaluate quantitatively the differences of the currently used methods. This study aimed to assess two common methods for AC energy consumption evaluation, namely, top-down total energy disaggregation and bottom-up energy simulation, through comparing to field measurement. A longitudinal investigation was conducted in residences in Chongqing, a typical city in the Hot Summer and Cold Winter(HSCW) zone. The yearly daily electricity consumption of 18 residences were collected and wireless sensors and smart sockets were used for onsite measurement. The AC energy consumption was obtained by splitting the total electricity consumption and measurements. Moreover, three typical reference buildings were built for predicting the annual AC energy consumption. Results showed that the simulated AC energy consumption was about 2.76 times of the measured value; while it was about 2.89 times for the top-down disaggregation method. Some key factors influencing AC energy consumption (e.g., indoor temperature distribution, opening duration, AC usage frequency) were identified for different methods. The work quantified the limitations of the top-down and bottom-up methods, contributing to the improvement of AC energy consumption evaluation methods and management of heating and cooling energy in residential buildings
Informal procedures, institutional change, and EU decision-making: evaluating the effects of the 1974 Paris summit
Get PDFThe Paris summit of 1974 produced an informal agreement to renounce a previous informal agreement, the famous Luxembourg Compromise of 1966 about qualified majority voting (QMV). The dominant view within existing scholarship is that the Paris summit had no effect because the Luxembourg Compromise and its consensus norm persisted at least into the 1980s: QMV was inoperative before and remained inoperative after. Using quantitative analysis and extensive process tracing, we provide the first systematic empirical test of this conventional view and of the summit’s effects. Although superficially our null finding (no effect) appears to confirm previous accounts, it constitutes further evidence against prevailing “veto culture” narratives and challenges existing theories about informal institutions and institutional change
CT vs COIN? Engaging with civilians in Afghanistan
No full textOne of the principal distinctions between counter-terrorism (CT) and counterinsurgency (COIN) approaches is how to engage with civilians. In the CT
approach, civilians may surround and even support the opponent, but they are not deemed central actors in the conflict. The conflict instead remains
between the terrorists and the CT forces and the aim of the latter is to destroy
the terrorists’ capability, while harming as few civilians as possible. In COIN,
civilians are a central part of the conflict in which, alongside fighting, a
political battle is waged to convince civilians to withdraw their support from
the insurgents. The aim of this chapter is to examine how the attitudes and
engagement with civilians in Afghanistan evolved over the two decades of
fighting, focusing on the ‘Hearts and Minds’ logic and how it has been put into
practice across political, economic, and social programs. The chapter focuses
in particular on programs aimed at convincing Afghan women to support the
ISAF counter-insurgency operation and assumptions made about gender in
these programs. The fundamental question posed is, what have we learned
from this case for future interventions
The impact of the railways on economic development in the county of Berkshire 1830-1900
Get PDFThis thesis examines the impact of the railways upon the business history of the county of Berkshire
during the nineteenth century after 1830. The major towns in the county were Abingdon,
Maidenhead, Newbury, Reading, Wallingford, Wantage, Windsor, and Wokingham.. The county is
located fifty miles from London with the Thames and Kennet valleys providing important transport
passages through the landscape towards Bristol and the west with the already developed canal
networks providing transport links towards the industrial midlands and north.
The years after the arrival of the railways saw considerable change to the business landscape of the
county, although whether this was directly caused by the railways has been found to be doubtful.
The economies of the towns examined in this thesis exhibited very different trends within each
sector of business and even between companies in the same trade. The critical factor in the success
and development of a single business, or indeed a sector, was the ability of companies to take
advantage of the new railway services and the reaction of owners and management to the demands
of Britain’s developing and changing economy through the provision of products and services at a
quality and price point which enabled them to remain competitive, profitable, and successful.
Several factors of significance emerged from the research undertaken which directly challenge two
common assumptions made about the relationship between the economy and the railways in
Victorian Britain. Firstly, the railway has been found not to have been the sole reason for economic
growth. They were only part, albeit an important one, of the development of the British economy. It
has also been found that the situation was highly nuanced with changes found to have been
different between places, and within types of business, and that growth was not necessarily the
result. Secondly it has been found that the rural counties were important to the economy, and that
they did have industry which evolved during the period of railway building. They are thus an
important part of the study of Victorian industrial change, railway development and societal change,
and require further study of other locations
The hidden impact of women on the agri-food sector in England, 1920-1960
Get PDFThis study identifies the ‘typical’ employment barriers women faced within the Agri-Food sector from
1920-1960 in England, along with how they worked within (and around) such barriers to create unique
opportunities to provide localized change through education, social networks, Government policy, and
public opinion. The most prevalent barriers being identified as legal constraints, a miss-match between
education and employment, and public identification of feminine versus masculine spheres of influence.
A review of the historiography of women in the Agri-Food sector and literature surrounding the chosen
case-study social networks (the Women’s Land Army and Women’s Institutes) indicates that the
inclusion of Food and Nutritional Sciences has been relatively ignored, something this study begins to
address. The thesis considers the use of a more inclusive gender critical framework for Mixed Methods
researchers combining material culture analysis, critical gender historical analysis, ethnography, and a
unique cookery book literary discourse analysis to compare the structure and function of the networks,
their relationships with the State, and public perception across time.
The results showed that women’s social networks that worked independently from Government
oversite, yet partnered with the State on specific societal needs, enacted the most employment
opportunities and changes in public opinion during the study period. We also found that such
opportunities were greatest in the Distributive Trades and Food sector, compared to the Agricultural
sector. However, we also found that there is a discrepancy in Government funding of education for
women in the Agri-Food sector, and that historical (and current) promotion of women in higher
education (university degrees) does not corelate to employment trends. Likewise, we found that there is
a higher intergenerational knowledge transference around food and nutrition within social networks
than without, and that such knowledge has dropped drastically over time.
The contribution of women’s social networks in the larger scheme of Agri-Food employment, while
hitherto largely overlooked, we found to be a primary driver for the removal of employment barriers. As
such, from an employment perspective, the promotion of gender critical policies that promote such
networks, especially around workforce development and rural development need to be considered
when designing future Agri-Food sector policies
Hardy and Warner haunting graveyards
Get PDFThe poems of Thomas Hardy and Sylvia Townsend Warner both deploy graveyard-haunting attention to relationships between death as a leveller and as a means for underlining social and cultural inequalities. They each reveal, through allusion, familiarity with Gray’s ‘Elegy’ as a classic instance of how the pastoral can be used both to lament and accommodate such social and political conflicts and contradictions. By revisiting William Empson’s words in Some Versions of Pastoral on Gray’s poem, as well as his views on Hardy as a poet, this article looks at ways in which Warner’s poetry both draws sustenance from that of her great predecessor and employs her own versions of the pastoral to address politically left-leaning concerns. Consideration of Donald Davie’s partisan writings on both Hardy and Warner are then used to focus more precisely what graveyard poems by these two poet-novelists show of feeling for how death and our treatment of the dead reveal the hard outlines of a determinedly unequal culture, and how they address it differently in the formal orderings of their poetry. The article also draws attention to differences of emphasis to be found in Hardy’s pessimistic ameliorism and Warner’s political engagement, as well as underlining shared sympathies for the fates of others they reveal through their graveyard-haunted verse
Conditioning of hybrid variational data assimilation
Get PDFGaussian assumptions for the prior and likelihood can be found by solving a leastsquares
minimization problem . In recent years,we have seen the popularity of hybrid
variational data assimilation methods for Numerical Weather Prediction. In these
methods, the prior error covariance matrix is a weighted sum of a climatological
part and a flow-dependent ensemble part, the latter being rank deficient. The nonlinear
least squares problem of variational data assimilation is solved using iterative
numerical methods, and the condition number of the Hessian is a good proxy for
the convergence behavior of such methods. In this paper, we study the conditioning
of the least squares problem in a hybrid four-dimensional variational data assimilation
(Hybrid 4D-Var) scheme by establishing bounds on the condition number of the
Hessian. In particular, we consider the effect of the ensemble component of the prior
covariance on the conditioning of the system. Numerical experiments show that the
bounds obtained can be useful in predicting the behavior of the true condition number
and the convergence speed of an iterative algorithm
Therapist guided, parent-led Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) for preadolescent children with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD): a non-concurrent multiple baseline case series
Get PDFBackground: Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) including Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) is an effective treatment for preadolescent children with OCD, however, there is a need to increase access to this treatment for affected children. Aims: This study is a preliminary evaluation of the efficacy and acceptability of a brief therapist guided, parent-led CBT intervention for preadolescent children (5- to 12-years-old) with OCD using a non-concurrent multiple baseline approach. Method: Parents of 10 children with OCD were randomly allocated to no-treatment baselines of 3-, 4-, or 5-weeks before receiving 6-to-8- individual treatment sessions with a Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner. Diagnostic measures were completed prior to the baseline, one-week post-treatment, and at a one-month follow-up and parents completed weekly measures of children’s OCD symptoms/impairment. Results: Seventy percent of children were ‘responders’ and/or ‘remitters’ on diagnostic measures at post-treatment, and 60% at the one-month follow-up. At least 50% of children showed reliable improvements on parent-reported OCD symptoms/impairment from pre- to post-treatment, and from pre-treatment to one-month follow-up. Crucially, the intervention was acceptable to parents. Conclusions: Brief therapist guided, parent-led CBT has the potential to be an effective, acceptable, and accessible first-line treatment for preadolescent children with OCD, subject to the findings of further evaluations
