| 1. |
- Cano-Viktorsson, Carlos, 1977-
(författare)
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From Vision to Transition : Exploring the Potential for Public Information Services to Facilitate Sustainable Urban Transport
- 2014
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Background: Policy initiatives to promote sustainable travel through the use of Internet based public information systems have increased during the last decade. Stockholm, in being one of the first cities in Europe to implement an Internet based service for facilitating sustainable travel is believed to be a good candidate for an analysis of key issues for developing sustainable travel planning services to the public.Aim: This thesis investigates the past development of two Stockholm based public information systems and their services in order to draw lessons on how to better provide for a public information service geared towards facilitating environmentally sustainable travel planning through information and communications technology. The overall goal of the thesis is to contribute to an understanding on how to better design and manage current and future attempts at facilitating sustainable travel planning services based on historical case studies.Approach: The thesis draws ideas from the concept of organizational responsiveness – an organization’s ability to listen, understand and respond to demands put to it by its internal and external stakeholders – in order to depict how well or not the two public information systems and their owners have adapted to established norms and values of their surroundings.Results: Overall, the findings from the historical case studies suggest that organizations attempting to provide sustainable travel planning to the public need to design and manage their systems in such a way that it responds to shifting demands on how to provide for information. Implementing and embedding new technologies involves complex processes of change both at the micro level – for users and practitioners of the service – and at the meso level for the involved public service organizations themselves. This condition requires a contextualist framework to analyze and understand organizational, contextual and cultural issues involved in the adoption of new technologies and procedures.Conclusions: The thesis concludes with a discussion on how the findings from the historical case studies may provide lessons for both current and future attempts at providing public information systems geared towards facilitating environmentally sustainable travel planning to the public. Historical examples and issues concerning collective intelligence and peer to peer based forms of designing, producing and supervising public information services identified throughout the study are looked upon and discussed in terms of their possible role in increasing the potential for public information services to facilitate sustainable urban transport.
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| 2. |
- Kramers, Anna, 1961-
(författare)
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Contribution of ICT to Climate Targets of Cities : Exploring the potential of Information and Communication Technologies in reducing emissions and energy use from buildings and travel
- 2012
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis examines how ICT solutions can assist in lowering energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from buildings and travel in order to help cities meet their climate targets. It also provides an overview of relevant research intended to furnish new knowledge about the issues involved and to find solutions to social problems.The first part of the thesis provides an analysis and compilation of critical system boundaries that need to be used for cities to set targets for energy use and GHG emissions. The climate targets of cities are dependent on setting system boundaries and establishing methods of calculations for monitoring whether the targets have been achieved. Today, there is no official standard for how the system boundaries must be set or what calculation methodologies to apply to evaluate the climate targets. Four main categories of system boundaries were identified: the temporal scope, the object of target setting, the unit of target setting, and the target range (e.g. consumer-producer and lifecycle perspective). Eight European cities were examined in relation to how they set climate targets. The examination showed that awareness of what is included in the targets is limited and that there is a need for standardised and consistent protocols and methods of setting climate targets for cities.In the second part of the thesis, leading Advanced Traveller Information Systems (ATIS) and their functionalities were investigated. The relationship between individual decisions on different travel modes and functionalities of ATIS was investigated through a systematic investigation of the functionality of nine ATIS, mainly from Sweden, Germany, UK and USA. This allowed decisions that could lead to lower energy use and emissions of GHG to be identified. It also resulted in a proposal on requirements for new and improved functionality that could support a reduction in energy use and GHG emissions and a shift to renewable energy sources if implemented in next-generation ATIS.In the third part of the thesis, ICT applications that can be used to reduce energy use and GHG emissions of buildings within the already built environment were identified. In addition, a brief analysis was made of how different actors such as the tenant, the building owner and the energy provider can reduce energy usage in buildings by means of ICT solutions.
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| 3. |
- Dawkins, Elena, 1984-
(författare)
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Sustainable consumption for policymakers: measuring, learning and acting
- 2019
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Current patterns and levels of consumption are a key driver of unsustainable resource use and pollution, which contributes to global environmental degradation. Rapid reductions in environmental pressures are required to avoid irreversible loss of fragile ecosystems and social and economic crises. Consumption must become sustainable. Governments have an essential role to play in delivering this. The aim of this thesis is to examine three aspects of the policymaking process on sustainable consumption – measuring, learning and acting – and the links between them. Each aspect has a linked objective.Measuring: Assess existing and novel techniques for calculating the environmental pressures of consumption that enable government to measure and monitor a country’s progress towards sustainable consumptionLearning: Determine whether – and, if so, how – consumption-based indicators might better support policymaker learning on sustainable consumptionActing: Identify ways in which governments can enhance their actions to support sustainable consumptionThe research is presented in six papers and organised in three parts: one for each objective. Parts 1 and 2 investigate current and future opportunities for policymakers to measure the environmental pressures linked to their country’s consumption, what these mean for achieving sustainable consumption and whether consumption-based indicators support learning about sustainable consumption. These parts are based on the Swedish experience of sustainable consumption. Part 3 examines various sustainable consumption interventions and what these could mean for government action in the future. This part draws on examples from several countries. Qualitative and quantitative methods are used to answer these questions. These comprise systematic review and mapping, macro-environment economic modelling and analysis, interviews, workshops and focus groups.The results provide a number of insights. First, novel consumption-based measurements for Sweden highlight the scale of the challenge involved in achieving sustainable consumption and the importance of increasing the policy applicability of indicators. Second, while indicators provide some learning for policymakers, their contribution to changing existing practices and navigating political or institutional barriers is limited. The learning potential of indicators is constrained by institutional environments. Instead, learning must be structured and enabled by institutions. Third, with regard to the actions studied, increased government involvement appears a necessary and, to some actors, desirable option. Nonetheless, a number of barriers to and enabling factors for policy action to promote sustainable consumption must be considered. In terms of the connections between the three elements of measuring, learning and acting, what might first appear to be a linear relationship is in reality far more complex. Measurement does not necessarily lead to learning – and learning is not always followed by action. Policymakers act without the level of knowledge they would like while indicators remain unused and, in some cases, are even rejected. Learning comes from practitioners’ involvement in action, as well as research into the actions themselves, the problem and solutions. Understanding government efforts on measuring, learning and action to promote sustainable consumption offers insights into how these multiple factors might contribute, separately and together, to more sustainable consumption.
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| 4. |
- Umair, Shakila, 1979-
(författare)
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Informal Electronic Waste Recycling in Pakistan
- 2015
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The aim of this thesis was to study governance aspects of informal electronic waste recycling and to provide better knowledge of the business in terms of structure, stakeholders, governance aspects and social impacts.The thesis consists of a cover essay and two papers appended at the end of the thesis. The cover essay summarizes the papers and puts them in context. The objective of Paper I is to study the business of informal electronic waste recycling in Pakistan and highlight its governance issues. Paper II assesses the social impacts of this business using UNEP-SETAC Guidelines.The thesis examines these specific questions: Q1) What is the current situation of informal e-waste recycling in Pakistan? Q2) Who are the important stakeholders and what are their roles in this business? Q3) What are the governance issues enabling this informal business? Q4) What are the social impacts for individuals and society arising from this business?Paper I presents the international and local e-waste flows, business structure, the stakeholders involved and the existing governance issues of the business. It shows weak enforcement of legislation, the complexities emerging with numerous stakeholders, the profitability of informal recycling, little concern for the health damaging exposure for workers from poorest and most vulnerable people in society, and the lack of awareness of the hazards involved results in several governance issues. The paper also highlights how this business lacks characteristics of good governance, which makes it a challenge to control this business.Paper II assesses the social impacts of informal e-waste recycling in Pakistan using UNEP/SETAC guidelines for conducting a Social Lifecycle Analysis (SLCA). It showed that this business has positive impacts relating to societal issues and individual/family economics, and in the economic development of Pakistan but otherwise most impacts were negative. The findings of Paper II fill an important data gap and can be integrated with data on other stages of ICT product lifecycle to produce a full SLCA of such products.
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| 5. |
- Börjesson Rivera, Miriam, 1978-
(författare)
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Practice makes perfect? : Sustainable practices with ICT and daily travel
- 2015
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The thesis shows how practice theory can be applied in different ways when exploring how daily life can be supported to become more environmentally sustainable. Ultimately the thesis aims to contribute to new knowledge on how to design policies and interventions that aim at facilitating environmentally sustainable practices. This thesis argues that practice theory is useful in the field of sustainability research since it offers as point of departure a perspective on human everyday life which decentres focus from individual behaviour and instead looks at how social practices are constructed by integrating and combining material, bodily and mental elements.The thesis discusses the following questions: i) How can the role of ICT in everyday life be conceptualized from a practice perspective?, ii) How can practice theory be used in order to describe and assess second order environmental effects? and iii) What are the key considerations from a practice perspective when designing social/physical interventions for sustainable mobility?The papers in this thesis all use practice theory as point of departure but with different outcomes. Practice theory is thus used conceptually, methodologically and analytically. The main conclusions of the thesis are: Changes in practices due to ICT usage will inevitably have environmental impacts, both negative and positive, and for policy-makers it is imperative to take this into consideration when planning for the future and actively support and facilitate sustainable social practices. Looking at changes in practices due to new ICT usage can be one way to include second order effects in environmental assessments, in this way contributing to a discussion of potential environmental impacts from implementing a new product, application or service.Interventions, such as a cargo bike pool or restrictive work travel policies, have the potential to change existing practices. However, the potential of these changes, depend on a variety of different factors which are more or less difficult to influence for the individual practitioner such as work location, time schedules, availability of transportation means and modes. Further, it is difficult to foresee exactly how such changes will look and if they sustain in the long run. Finally, it is not necessarily so that an intervention will have the desired outcome that was intended, the outcome might be something else, consequently this means that interventions need to be analysed and assessed from other perspectives, one being a practice perspective.
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| 6. |
- Börjesson Rivera, Miriam, 1978-
(författare)
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What is a sustainable everyday life? : Exploring and assessing the sustainability of everyday travel, sharing and ICT.
- 2018
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In a world where the general trend is unsustainable consumption patterns, can sustainable everyday life be enabled? This thesis sought to expand the knowledge base for policies and measures for sustainability, based on the assumption that consumption can be viewed as the outcome of practices in which people engage in their day-to-day life. The thesis addressed the overall aim by examining the following questions: How can information and communication technology (ICT) practices contribute to sustainable everyday practices? How can sharing practices, ICT-based and other, contribute to sustainable everyday practices? and How can travel practices, ICT-based and other, contribute to sustainable everyday practices?Empirical and conceptual studies revealed that ICT has become a fundamental and integral part of everyday practices and that digitalisation is a tangible material companion with implications for sustainability. ICT changes practices in ways that can be both positive and negative from a sustainability perspective. These second-order effects need to be addressed early when developing ICT solutions/services.ICT has also contributed to development of the sharing economy, by making sharing easier and scalable. However, although some sharing practices can contribute to overall sustainability, others could display a high potential and risk, simultaneously. It is therefore important to identify and mitigate negative effects and exploit the full potential of sustainable sharing activities from a policy perspective.Everyday travel is the outcome of people’s social practices. Travel practices are therefore ultimately interlocked with other practices and spatially and temporally structured. It can thus be quite difficult for city dwellers, although not impossible, to fit in new ways of carrying out everyday city travel rather than existing travel practices. New travel practices should be viewed as complementary if there are no other enabling factors at play, such as convenience, pricing, policies and/or infrastructural changes. If some form of policy and/or infrastructural change is introduced, it is possible to change travel patterns and ultimately reduce travel. Here too, ICT could enable changes in travel practices, e.g. through mediated meetings or vehicle sharing. However, for sustainable everyday travel to become widespread, urban planning issues are important. Policy documents and environmental targets can be used proactively to legitimise new policies that enable more sustainable travel practices.This thesis shows that everyday practices, in a relatively affluent European urban context, contribute greatly to environmental impacts. Hence, how everyday practices are structured, or could be re-structured, is critical for sustainable development. Practices shape, and are shaped, by their socio-material context. This requires an overall, holistic approach, as offered by practice theory and actor-network theory. A holistic approach is crucial from a sustainability policy perspective, as it enables measures that target some, or all, of the different elements (material, meaning, skills) that constitute practice. It may also be crucial for policies addressing temporal and spatial aspects that structure practices, e.g. societal schedules and people’s homes in relation to their workplace. This presents an opportunity that policymakers could further explore and exploit.
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| 7. |
- Gunnarsson-Östling, Ulrika, 1977-
(författare)
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Just Sustainable Futures : Gender and Environmental Justice Considerations in Planning
- 2011
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis contributes and deepens knowledge on long-term planning for sustainable development through exploring environmental justice and gender discourses in planning and futures studies. It also suggests ways of working with those issues. Environmental justice is explored through discussions with planners in Stockholm, Sweden, and through looking at images of future Stockholm and the environmental justice implications of these. These studies show how environmental justice issues can be manifested in a Swedish urban context and discuss how sustainable development and environmental justice can be increased, operationalised and politicised in planning. One key contribution of the thesis is in identifying the need to address procedural and outcomes values in both planning and futures studies. Gender discourses are explored through analysing papers published in the journal Futures and through an examination of Swedish Regional Growth Programmes. The feminist criticism of futures studies mainly relates to the field being male-dominated and male-biased, which means that the future is seen as already colonised by men, that futures studies generally do not work with feminist issues or issues of particular relevance for women, and that they often lack a critical and reflexive perspective. There is therefore a call for feminist futures as a contrast to hegemonic male and Western technology-orientated futures. The case of the Swedish Regional Growth Programmes shows that gender inequality is often viewed as a problem of unequal rights and possibilities. This liberal view on gender equality has made it rather easy for gender equality advocates to voice demands, e.g. for the inclusion of both women and men in decision-making processes, but the traditional male norm is not challenged. If a different response is required, other ways of describing the problem of gender inequalities must be facilitated. One way to open up different ways of describing the problem and to describe desirable futures could be the use of scenarios. Planning for just, sustainable futures means acknowledging process values, but also content (giving nature a voice!). It also means politicising planning. There are a number of desirable futures, and when this is clarified the political content of planning is revealed. These different images of the future can be evaluated in terms of environmental justice, gender perspective or any specific environmental aspect, e.g. biodiversity, which indicates that different futures are differently good for nature and/or different societal groups.
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| 8. |
- Kramers, Anna, 1961-
(författare)
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Smart Cities and Climate Targets : Reducing cities' energy use with ICT and travel information
- 2014
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis examines use of ICT in helping to reduce energy use in cities, thereby contributing to sustainable development and achievement of cities’ climate targets. It explores how targets can be developed in a consistent and transparent way, how to identify the main ICT ‘hotspots’ as regards reducing citizens’ energy use and how they can be included in city planning. Implementation of mobility management principles and climate targets was tested in two existing solutions, a traveller information system and a flexible work hub solution.Four key methodological considerations when setting climate targets for cities were identified. These concerned decisions on: target setting object, temporal scope, units and target range. A tool was developed for identifying promising ICT hotspots. The tool can also be used to monitor implementation of ICT solutions and the associated technological and socio-technical difficulties. In a case study in Greater Stockholm, the ICT hotspots identified were intelligent building heating systems, intelligent transport system and potential transformation of the physical environment (buildings and roads) enabled by ICT solutions.Two aspects of planning identified as crucial for successful implementation of energy saving ICT solutions were studied in detail: i) Timing of ICT-related decisions in the planning process; and ii) the actor networks needed to implement the ICT solutions and their management. There are few decision points in the current planning process, so the municipality as property owner and its decision-making process are of crucial importance. Two collaborative approaches to govern, network governance and coordination through meta-governance as a way of indirect steering, are proposed.An investigation of nine traveller information systems and a case study in Stockholm of flexible work hub solutions revealed that mobility management approaches to reduce transport demand and encourage environmentally friendly transport modes are poorly reflected in the implementation. To support mobility management approaches, traveller information systems should primarily offer, or be integrated with, other solutions that support the choices “no travel” and “shorter journey”. Flexible work hubs should be located in local nodes closer to people’s homes.The main conclusions from this work were that ICT solutions can be modified to support achievement of cities’ climate targets and that climate targets must be defined using transparent methodology that clarifies the target content, ensuring that the most promising energy saving ICT solutions are implemented.
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| 9. |
- Larsson, Markus, 1971-
(författare)
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Towards a Sustainable Food System : Entrepreneurship, Resilience and Agriculture in the Baltic Sea Region
- 2016
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis compares conventional agriculture and Ecological Recycling Agriculture (ERA) in terms of their environmental and socio-economic effects. Environmental effects include greenhouse gas emissions and energy use, but this analysis focuses on nutrient losses. Socio-economic effects include production, costs and benefits at macro, firm and household level. Comparisons were made at regional (Baltic Sea), national (Swedish) and local (community/municipality) level. At regional level, the main challenge is to make agriculture more environmentally friendly and reduce nutrient losses, while maintaining food production. At national level, the challenges are to shift the product mix towards more vegetables and less meat and to address the geographical division between animal and crop production. At local level, the challenge is to achieve sustainable environmental, economic and social rural development. At regional level, the empirical findings were scaled up to create three scenarios. In one scenario, agriculture in Poland and the Baltic States was transformed to resemble the Swedish average structure and resource use, which gave increased nitrogen and phosphorus surplus and substantially increased food production. Two other scenarios in which agriculture in the entire Baltic Sea area converted to ERA gave reductions in nitrogen surplus and eliminated the phosphorus surplus, while food production decreased or remained stable, depending on the strategy chosen. At national level, the environmental effects of different production methods, transport and different food baskets were compared. A household survey was performed to construct an alternative food basket, which was high in vegetables, low in meat and high in locally produced organic food compared with the average Swedish food profile. It was also 24% more expensive. Food basket content was found to be as important as production method in reducing environmental effects. Local production and processing was less important. At local level, an importer and wholesaler of organic fruit and vegetables and a group of environmentally concerned consumers were studied. The business was found to be resilient, i.e. well-suited to adapt to turbulence, and with a history of being innovative.
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| 10. |
- Mulligan, Joseph
(författare)
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People, Climate, and Inclusive Infrastructure : A thesis on design and planning in underserved neighbourhoods
- 2020
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis is concerned with the processes of design and planning of infrastructure in rapidly urbanising cities that can lead to a more just and sustainable trajectory of urban development in the context of a changing climate. The thesis draws on case studies, panel surveys, interviews, and participant-observation of both top-down and bottom-up planning processes for infrastructure development and flood risk management in the context of urban informal areas, with a particular focus on the large informal neighbourhood of Kibera in central Nairobi, Kenya. The research herein employs a transdisciplinary approach to bring together the knowledge and expertise of residents, practitioners, design professionals, and academics in research design and delivery, and in the interpretation of the data and results. The overall aim of the thesis is to generate new understanding on the involvement of citizens and technical experts in the design and planning of urban development initiatives, and in particular for building flood resilience in informal, underserved and under-resourced neighbourhoods. Outputs include: theory development for multi-stakeholder participation in infrastructure planning, the analysis of participatory tools for flood risk management in urban contexts and new evidence on the benefits and limitations of emergent practices in local infrastructure management. Results show how informal areas can be sites for innovation, transition, and integration of infrastructure systems at multiple scales. The data and cases presented show how residents in underserved and under-resourced neighbourhoods have sophisticated knowledge about local climate-threats and have clear priorities for longer term development that should be at the centre of infrastructure and upgrading. This thesis puts forward a model of inclusive infrastructure development that aims to capture the emergent and transformational properties of concerted efforts by resident and civil society groups, alongside routes to scale and replicability, and to provide more viable and responsive development pathways for underserved neighbourhoods.
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