•Future decarbonisation of the UK Iron and Steel sector have been evaluated.•The improvement potential of different technological interventions were assessed.•2050 ‘technology roadmaps’ were also ...developed for various alternative scenarios.•Best practice technologies will prompt short-term energy and CO2 emissions savings.•Radical process technology innovations are likely to be available in the longer term.
The opportunities and challenges to reducing industrial energy demand and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the iron & steel sector are evaluated with a focus is on the situation in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK), although the lessons learned are applicable across much of the industrialised world. It is the largest industrial sector in the UK in terms of energy demand and ‘greenhouse gas’ (GHG) emissions, and accounts for some 26% of GHG emissions from British industry. Current Best Available Technologies (BAT) will lead to short-term energy and CO2 emissions savings in iron & steel processing, but the prospects for the commercial exploitation of innovative technologies by mid-21st century are far more speculative. The attainment of significant falls in carbon emissions over the period to 2050 will depend critically on the adoption of a small number of key technologies e.g., energy efficiency techniques, fuel switching towards bioenergy, and carbon capture and storage (CCS), alongside the decarbonisation of national electricity supply. The blast furnace is the most efficient energy conversion process in the sector, but also the largest energy user and consequently a priority target for energy demand reduction. Many existing technologies could reduce a significant proportion of process energy loss, e.g., heat recovery at the coke ovens, sinter plant, and electric arc furnace, and further heat and gas recovery from the basic oxygen furnace. The uptake of key BAT technologies for hot-rolling could reduce sector primary energy by 18% and GHG emissions by 12%. Further potential may be available for blast furnace operation by optimising chemical transfer to minimise blast furnace gas (BFG) production. Nevertheless, there are a number of non-technological barriers to the take-up of such technologies going forward. Other radical process technological innovations (such as the ‘electrowinning’ or so-called HISARNA process) are likely to be available in the longer term.
Dental disease is largely preventable. Many older adults, however, experience poor oral health. National data for older adults show racial/ethnic and income disparities in untreated dental disease ...and oral health-related quality of life. Persons reporting poor versus good health also report lower oral health-related quality of life. On the basis of these findings, suggested public health priorities include better integrating oral health into medical care, implementing community programs to promote healthy behaviors and improve access to preventive services, developing a comprehensive strategy to address the oral health needs of the homebound and long-term-care residents, and assessing the feasibility of ensuring a safety net that covers preventive and basic restorative services to eliminate pain and infection.
We report the electron transfer (ET) self-exchange rate constants (k 11) for a pair of CuII/I complexes utilizing dpaR (dpa = dipicolylaniline, R = OMe, SMe) ligands assessed by NMR line broadening ...experiments. These ligands afford copper complexes that are conformationally dynamic in one oxidation state. With R = OMe, the CuI complex is dynamic, while with R = SMe, the CuII complex is dynamic. Both complexes exhibit unexpectedly large k 11 values of 2.48(6) × 105 and 2.21(9) × 106 M–1 s–1 for CuCl(dpaOMe)+/0 and CuCl(dpaSMe)+/0, respectively. Among the fastest reported molecular copper coordination complexes to date, that of CuCl(dpaSMe)+/0 exceeds all others by an order of magnitude and compares only with those observed in type 1 blue copper proteins. The dynamicity of these complexes establishes pre-steady-state conformational equilibria that minimize the inner-sphere reorganization energies to 0.71 and 0.62 eV for R = OMe and SMe, respectively. In contrast to the emphasis on rigidity in the formulation of entatic states applied to blue copper proteins, the success of these two systems highlights the relevance of conformational dynamicity in mediating rapid ET.
Routine screening for chronic kidney disease (CKD) could enable timely interventions to slow down disease progression, but currently there are no clinical guidelines for screening. We aim to evaluate ...the cost-effectiveness of screening for CKD using a novel analytical tool based on a cumulative sum statistic of estimated glomerular filtration rate (CUSUMGFR).
We developed a microsimulation model that captured CKD disease progression, major complications, patients' awareness, and treatment adherence for a nationally representative synthetic cohort of age ≥ 30 years in the United States. In addition to the status quo with no screening, we considered four CUSUMGFR-based universal screening policies by frequency (annual or biennial) and starting age (30 or 60 years), and two targeted annual screening policies for patients with hypertension and diabetes, respectively. For each policy, we evaluated the total discounted disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) and direct health costs over a lifetime horizon and estimated the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER). We further performed one-way and probabilistic sensitivity analyses to assess the impact of parameter uncertainty.
Compared with the status quo, all the CUSUMGFR-based screening policies were cost-effective under the willingness-to-pay (WTP) range of $50,000 -$100,000, with the estimated incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs) ranging from $15,614/DALYs averted to $54,373/DALYs averted. Universal annual screening with starting age of 30 was the non-dominated policy on the cost-effectiveness frontier under the WTP of approximately $25,000. Adding more recent treatment option of sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 (SGLT2) inhibitors to the treatment regimen was found to be cost-saving. Among the most influential model parameters, variation in the CKD progression rate, adherence, and testing cost resulted in the highest variability in model outcomes.
CUSUMGFR-based screening policies for CKD are highly cost-effective in identifying patients at risk of end stage kidney disease in early stages of CKD. Given its simple requirement of a basic blood test, the CUSUMGFR-based screening can be easily incorporated into clinical workflow for disease monitoring and prevention.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
This study finds that investors price firms' greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as a negative component of equity value, and this valuation discount does not differ between firms that voluntarily ...disclose to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and nondisclosing firms. We derive the GHG emissions for nondisclosers from an estimation model that incorporates firm characteristics and industry. The finding that investors view CDP amounts and estimates of emissions as equally value‐relevant suggests that equity values reflect GHG information from channels other than the CDP. An event study of investors' response to emission‐related information in firms' 8‐K filings further supports this finding. Economically, our results suggest that, for the median S&P 500 firm, GHG emissions impose a market‐implied equity discount of $79 per ton, representing about one‐half of 1 percent of market capitalization.
La pertinence de l'information relative aux émissions de gaz à effet de serre pour les investisseurs
Les auteurs constatent que les investisseurs assimilent les émissions de gaz à effet de serre (GES) des sociétés à une composante négative de leur valeur nette, cette décote n'étant pas différente selon que les sociétés fournissent de l'information facultative dans le cadre du Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) ou s'en abstiennent. Les auteurs estiment les émissions de GES des sociétés qui ne communiquent pas cette information à partir d'un modèle incorporant les caractéristiques des sociétés et leur secteur d'activité. L'observation selon laquelle les investisseurs jugent les données du CDP et les estimations relatives aux émissions tout aussi pertinentes en ce qui a trait à la valeur donne à penser que les valeurs nettes des sociétés reflètent l'information relative aux GES provenant d'autres sources que le CDP. Une étude événementielle de la réaction des investisseurs à l'information liée aux émissions touchant les sociétés qui produisent la déclaration 8‐K vient confirmer cette observation. Sur le plan économique, les résultats de l'étude laissent croire que, pour la société médiane du palmarès S&P 500, les émissions de GES infligent une décote implicite du marché de 79 $ la tonne, représentant environ 0,5 pour cent de la capitalisation boursière.
Many communities in the United States are struggling to deal with the negative consequences of illicit opioid use. Effectively addressing this epidemic requires the coordination and support of ...community stakeholders in a change process with common goals and objectives, continuous engagement with individuals with opioid use disorder (OUD) through their treatment and recovery journeys, application of systems engineering principles to drive process change and sustain it, and use of a formal evaluation process to support a learning community that continuously adapts. This review presents strategies to improve OUD treatment and recovery with a focus on engineering approaches grounded in systems thinking.
Many schools and universities have seen a significant increase in the spread of COVID-19. As such, a number of non-pharmaceutical interventions have been proposed including distancing requirements, ...surveillance testing, and updating ventilation systems. Unfortunately, there is limited guidance for which policy or set of policies are most effective for a specific school system. We develop a novel approach to model the spread of SARS-CoV-2 quanta in a closed classroom environment that extends traditional transmission models that assume uniform mixing through air recirculation by including the local spread of quanta from a contagious source. In addition, the behavior of students with respect to guideline compliance was modeled through an agent-based simulation.
Estimated infection rates were on average lower using traditional transmission models compared to our approach. Further, we found that although ventilation changes were effective at reducing mean transmission risk, it had much less impact than distancing practices. Duration of the class was an important factor in determining the transmission risk. For the same total number of semester hours for a class, delivering lectures more frequently for shorter durations was preferable to less frequently with longer durations. Finally, as expected, as the contact tracing level increased, more infectious students were identified and removed from the environment and the spread slowed, though there were diminishing returns.
These findings can help provide guidance as to which school-based policies would be most effective at reducing risk and can be used in a cost/comparative effectiveness estimation study given local costs and constraints.
•School and university administrators require policies for classes due to COVID-19.•Traditional disease spread models underestimate the incremental risk of infection.•Agent-based simulation helps assess prevention policies and guideline compliance.•Class schedule, duration, ventilation and distancing affect average risk of infection.•Testing and contact tracing significantly reduce the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection.
•Future decarbonisation of the UK Chemicals sector has been evaluated.•The improvement potential of different technological interventions was assessed.•2050 ‘technology roadmaps’ were also developed ...for various alternative scenarios.•Best practice technologies will prompt short-term energy and CO2 emissions savings.•The prospects for longer-term, ‘disruptive technologies’ are far more speculative.
The opportunities and challenges to reducing industrial energy demand and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the Chemicals sector are evaluated with a focus on the situation in the United Kingdom (UK), although the lessons learned are applicable across much of the industrialised world. This sector can be characterised as being heterogeneous; embracing a diverse range of products (including advanced materials, cleaning fluids, composites, dyes, paints, pharmaceuticals, plastics, and surfactants). It sits on the boundary between energy-intensive (EI) and non-energy-intensive (NEI) industrial sectors. The improvement potential of various technological interventions has been identified in terms of their energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Currently-available best practice technologies (BPTs) will lead to further, short-term energy and CO2 emissions savings in chemicals processing, but the prospects for the commercial exploitation of innovative technologies by mid-21st century are far more speculative. A set of industrial decarbonisation ‘technology roadmaps’ out to the mid-21st Century are also reported, based on various alternative scenarios. These yield low-carbon transition pathways that represent future projections which match short-term and long-term (2050) targets with specific technological solutions to help meet the key energy saving and decarbonisation goals. The roadmaps’ contents were built up on the basis of the improvement potentials associated with various processes employed in the chemicals industry. They help identify the steps needed to be undertaken by developers, policy makers and other stakeholders in order to ensure the decarbonisation of the UK chemicals industry. The attainment of significant falls in carbon emissions over this period will depends critically on the adoption of a small number of key technologies e.g., carbon capture and storage (CCS), energy efficiency techniques, and bioenergy, alongside a decarbonisation of the electricity supply.
Untreated cavities can have far-reaching negative consequences for people's ability to eat, speak, and learn. By adolescence, 27 percent of low-income children in the United States will have ...untreated cavities. School-based sealant programs typically provide dental sealants (a protective coating that adheres to the surface of molars) at little or no cost to students attending schools in areas with low socioeconomic status. These programs have been shown to increase the number of students receiving sealants and to prevent cavities. We analyzed the cost-effectiveness of school sealant programs using data (from school programs in fourteen states between 2013 and 2014) on children's cavity risk, including the effects of untreated cavities on a child's quality of life. We found that providing sealants in school programs to 1,000 children would prevent 485 fillings and 1.59 disability-adjusted life-years. School-based sealant programs saved society money and remained cost-effective across a wide range of reasonable values.
Voluntary disclosure theory predicts that an optimal disclosure decision should produce an overall net benefit for shareholders, and that such net benefit should decrease in public information ...availability. This study supports the predictions of voluntary disclosure theory in the context of climate change. Using voluntary disclosures made through the CSRwire news service, we find that managers’ disclosure decisions involving greenhouse gas emissions produce positive returns to shareholders. This response varies negatively with company size and public information availability. For small companies in a limited public information environment, we find that mean market-adjusted share price increases significantly by 2.32% over days −2 to 2 around the CSR newswire release date. Our sample of disclosing companies received an aggregate market value boost from their CSR news releases of approximately ten billion dollars, independent of differences in public information availability.
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