In the Middle Ages, the Muslims introduced communal water management in the Iberian Peninsula. Some irrigation systems of medieval origin are still in operation in the mountainous areas of Southern ...Spain. Snowmelt runoff is diverted during spring from high-altitude streams into contoured recharge ditches that convey the water to areas of high infiltration (shallow aquifers). This regulates and delays discharge into the main river, from which downstream flow is diverted, during late spring and summer, to irrigation ditches that supply terraces and fields on river plains. The Busquístar irrigation ditch and its irrigation scheme comprise one of these ancient systems.
1) To characterize the Busquístar system, its water source and regulation, its water users' association, its multi-functionality, and its quality as a nature-based solution for water security. 2) To review the irrigation efficiency concept applied to the restoration of ancient irrigation systems, taking into account their ecosystem services.
i) Semi-structured interviews with stakeholders to evaluate irrigation system operation and perceptions of multi-functionality; ii) field surveys for description of the irrigation ditch and its riparian flora; iii) satellite imagery for quantifying riparian vegetation; iv) water balance for irrigation efficiency computation.
Crop production is the main function of the Busquístar irrigation scheme but additional ecosystem services are creation of landscape and biodiversity. Eight riparian plant communities were distinguished along the irrigation ditch. The discharge measured at its head on 23 July and 3 September 2017 represented 14 and 50% of the mean river flow in July and September, respectively. The flow measured at the first bifurcation of the ditch was about half that at the head, revealing the proportion filtered along its 6470-m long conveyance reach. The remaining flow was then diverted to 4 branches along the 3140-m long distribution reach proportionally to the irrigable area in each branch. Return flows and irrigation efficiency were estimated for the two measuring dates considering riparian and crop evapotranspiration. The estimated efficiency was highly dependent on which water uses were considered beneficial and on the scale of analysis, field, entire system or watershed.
The study revealed the integrated approach behind the traditional water management in these ancient systems. The article proposes a review of the irrigation efficiency concept that allows reconciling the character of a nature-based solution with the current restoration of the system, responding to the needs of the emerging export horticulture in the area.
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•Irrigation systems of medieval origin are still in operation in Spain.•Ancient irrigation systems provide ecosystem services in addition to agricultural production.•The functionalities and efficiency of an ancient irrigation scheme in Southern Spain were characterized.•The usual concept of irrigation efficiency can be misleading in the restoration of ancient irrigation systems.•The irrigation efficiency concept was revised to reconcile efficiency gains of social and environmental nature.
Treatment of wounds of different aetiologies constitutes a major part of the total health care budget. It is estimated that 1·5–2 million people in Europe suffer from acute or chronic wounds. These ...wounds are managed both in hospitals and in community care. The patients suffering from these wounds report physical, mental and social consequences of their wounds and the care of them. It is often believed that the use of wound dressings per se is the major cost driver in wound management, whereas in fact, nursing time and hospital costs are together responsible for around 80–85% of the total cost. Healing time, frequency of dressing change and complications are three important cost drivers. However, with the use of modern, advanced technology for more rapid wound healing, all these cost drivers can be substantially reduced. A basic understanding of the terminology and principles of Health Economics in relation to wound management might therefore be of interest.
•DFT method was employed to study properties of X2BAgCl6 (X = K, Rb, and Cs, B = Sc, Y) HDP’s.•Band strucutre of X2BAgCl6 (X = K, Rb, Cs, and B = Sc, Y) represents the semiconducting nature.•The ...light absorption coefficients of the spectrum exhibited UV-spectrum in comparison with the K2ScCuCl6 and K2YCuCl6.•The SLME-values calculated using JARVIS (Joint Automated Repository for Various Integrated Simulations).•The findings indicate that these double perovskite materials have considerable promise in optical devices.
Double perovskites have been found highly stable and suitable for the renewable applications. Predicitng new materials is essential for the continus supply for novel devices. In this work, new halide double perovskites (HDP) X2BAgCl6 (where X = K, Rb, Cs, and B = Sc, Y) have been predicted for the heat and light conversion devices. The negative formation energies ΔEf calculated describes the thermodynamic stability, which supports the existence of the cubic phase of the HDP’s. The elastic properties of these compounds gives better explaination about the ductile nature, mechanical stability and anisotropic aspects. The band gaps for X2BAgCl6 (where X = K, Rb, Cs, and B = Sc, Y) are 3.60, 4.87, 3.69, 4.87, 3.56, and 4.88 eV respectively. The spectral characteristics exhibited their appropriateness for high frequency devices due to their highest absorption in the UV range in comparison to K2ScCuCl6 and K2YCuCl6. These compounds’ reflectivities are low when examined within the specified energy range as comparison to K2ScCuCl6 and K2YCuCl6. Due to their low reflectivities, they are very transparent to incoming photons, which is compatible with their bandgap in comparison with the K2ScCuCl6 and K2YCuCl6. The SLME (%) versus thickness (µm) were calculated by using JARVIS (Joint Automated Repository for Various Integrated Simulations). The calculated figure of merit ZT values for each compound were 0.42, 0.39, 0.39, 0.40, 0.40, and 0.38, respectively as compared to Cs2ScTICl6. These materials exhibits high potential for the high frequency optical and high temperature thermal conversion applications.
Purposes: The article aims to describe in compartive view of how the shariah bank faces the global financial crises. Both effinciency and productivity is selected as main variabel to understand the ...main issues.Design/Methodology/Approach: Quantitative with explonatory design, namely DEA, is applied in this research. In practise, various hyphoteses was tested through empirical data.Findings: It can be proved that, there are significance different in effienciency and productivity of shariah bank before and after global crises of finance. To sum up, efficiency of shariah bank decrease extremely after crises. But, conversely, their productivity indicate an increasing in various indicators. In general, in both efficiency and productivity of shariah bank shown a rebalancing in two aspects. With level 99,23% point. Originality/Value: This study contribute new information for that crises can effect significantly to efficiency and productivity of financial industries such as shariah bank.
Halide perovskite solar cells (PSCs) represent a low-cost and high-efficiency solar technology. However, most of the highly efficient PSCs need a noble electrode, such as Au, through thermal ...evaporation. It is reported that a sputtered Au electrode on a PSC could damage the organic hole transport layer (HTL) and the perovskite layer. Here, we report a simple, yet effective sputtered gold nanoparticle decorated carbon electrode to fabricate efficient and stable planar PSCs. The sputtered Au layer on the doctor-bladed coated carbon electrode can be directly applied to the perovskite semicells by mechanical stacking. By optimizing the gold thickness, a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 16.87% was obtained for the composite electrode-based PSC, while the reference device recorded a PCE of 12.38%. The composite electrode-based device demonstrated 96% performance retention after being stored under humid conditions (50–60%) without encapsulation for ∼100 h. This demonstrates a promising pathway toward the commercialization of large-scale manufacturable sputtered electrodes for the PSC solar module.
This research aims to measure the level of technical efficency of Bank Pembiayaan Rakyat Syariah (BPRS) in Jabodetabek Region during the period 2015-2016. This is quantitative reasearch. Data used in ...this research was a secondary data, collected from financial report from Bank Indonesia and Otoritas Jasa Keuangan. The sampling technique that issued in this research was purposive sampling with taking 12 samples of BPRS. Efficiency measurement in this research used non-parametric statistic Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) with the intermediation approach. The results showed that 12 BPRS in Jabodetabek Region during the 2015-2016 period as whole has a fluctuating level of efficiency. Meanwhile, the second phase of testing using Tobit methods shows that internal factor, CAR, has significant impact on BPRS efficiency in Jabodetabek.
This paper analyzes how economic deregulation impacts firm strategies and environmental quality in the electric utility industry. We find evidence that the deregulation introduced to this ...historically staid industry has stimulated environmental differentiation. Differentiation is most likely to appear where its point of uniqueness is valued by customers, and we confirm this relationship in our sample. Specifically, utilities that served customers who exhibited higher levels of environmental sensitivity generated more 'green' power. The tendency for firms to differentiate in this way is lessened if they are relatively more dependent on coal-fired generation or relatively more efficient. Thus, there is evidence that firms sort themselves into either differentiation or low-cost strategies as the competitive realities of a deregulated world unfold. Deregulation and the ensuing environmental differentiation illustrate how utilities exploited formerly unmet customer demand for green power. The result has been greater levels of renewable generation and, hence, a cleaner environment.
Aid coordination is a constant theme of discussion among national and international aid agencies in their search for more effectiveness and efficiency in delivering development assistance. This paper ...seeks to clarify some of the arguments currently made in support of aid coordination, and to precise unavoidable trade-offs born of the existence of political costs. It is anchored in the available literature on aid delivery while focusing on the implementation problems of aid coordination among donor countries. In particular, it deals with: (a) the issue of consistently and collectively handling possible governance failures in recipient countries; and (b) the impact of heterogeneity of donor countries on the effectiveness of aid coordination.
This study adopts a multi-level approach to examine the extent to which state- and household-level factors shape residential energy consumption in the United States, focusing on efficiency ...improvement and affluence. Analyzing the 2009 Residential Energy Consumption Survey, state-level energy efficiency data from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), and other sources, we find that state context significantly influences energy consumption at the household level. Households in states scoring high on energy efficiency consume significantly less residential energy than those in states scoring low on the measure. At the household level, the analysis reveals mixed relationships between investment in energy efficiency technologies and residential energy consumption, as some measures of efficiency technology are negatively related to residential energy consumption, others are positively related to it. In regard to affluence, state-level measures do not emerge as significant predictors of residential energy consumption. At the household level, however, affluence drives residential energy consumption, which, in turn, is a significant driver of carbon dioxide emissions. Our study makes an important contribution to the social scientific literature on energy consumption, illuminating distinct relationships at different levels. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that simultaneously examines the impacts of factors measured at both the household (micro) and state (meso) levels.
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