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This article presents a Finnish social design study that focuses on consumer perspectives and future expectations related to bio-based products and brands. The qualitative regional study addresses the global concern associated with sustainability of the bioeconomy. Because a gap in research was identified from the regional consumer perspective, the article presents a case study that was held with 50 consumers in Finland. The main research method was qualitative online focus group discussions, with an objective to gain an understanding of consumer behavior, motivations, concerns, and intentions related to bio-based products and brands. The results are presented according to the sustainability framework, which was constructed around four topics: (1) consumer awareness, (2) illustrated examples and their consumer acceptance, (3) consumption habits, and (4) future consumption behavior. The main findings indicate that Finnish consumers were extremely wellinformed on the bio-based concept, and they trusted domestic regional brands the most. Throughout the research, Nordic consumers highlighted the role of companies and urged sensible science-based communication on the sustainability aspects. Finally, the results led to consider how the valuesensitive consumer insights may be utilized by proposing prominent impact assessment methods for decision-making in both the business and consumer sectors.

This article presents a Finnish social design study that focuses on consumer perspectives and future expectations related to bio-based products and brands. The qualitative regional study addresses the global concern associated with sustainability of the bioeconomy. Because a gap in research was identified from the regional consumer perspective, the article presents a case study that was held with 50 consumers in Finland. The main research method was qualitative online focus group discussions, with an objective to gain an understanding of consumer behavior, motivations, concerns, and intentions related to bio-based products and brands. The results are presented according to the sustainability framework, which was constructed around four topics: (1) consumer awareness, (2) illustrated examples and their consumer acceptance, (3) consumption habits, and (4) futureconsumption behavior. The main findings indicate that Finnish consumers were extremely well informed on the bio-based concept, and they trusted domestic regional brands the most. Throughout the research, Nordic consumers highlighted the role of companies and urged sensible science-based communication on the sustainability aspects. Finally, the results led to consider how the valuesensitive consumer insights may be utilized by proposing prominent impact assessment methods for decision-making in both the business and consumer sectors.

This thesis focuses on the life cycle assessment (LCA) of wood energy in domestic wood heating appliances in the Grand Est region. The study considers the stages of logging, transport (to the production industries and to the customers), production and combustion. The functional unit is one ton of green wood. Carcinogenic, non-carcinogenic, respiratory and climate change impacts are assessed using the IMPACT 2002+ Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) method. First, combustion was carried out in efficient installations. Then, the emissions from the totality of the domestic wood heating installations in the region were studied. A thorough analysis of the pellet production stage and a sensitivity study of the transport stage were performed. Finally, the focus was on LCIA methods: the IMPACT 2002+ and Recipe 2016 methods were compared. The results showed that the impacts as well as the elements considered and their hierarchical classification differ in the two methods., Cette thèse porte sur l’analyse de cycle de vie (ACV) du bois énergie dans les installations de chauffage domestique au bois dans la région Grand Est. L’étude considère les étapes d’exploitation forestière, de transport (vers les industries de production et vers les clients), de production et de combustion. L’unité fonctionnelle est la tonne de bois vert. Les impacts cancérigènes, non cancérigènes, respiratoires et le changement climatique sont évalués selon la méthode d’analyse d’impact de cycle de vie (AICV) IMPACT 2002+.D’abord, la combustion s’est effectuée dans des installations performantes. Puis, les émissions provenant de la totalité des installations de chauffage domestique au bois dans la région ont été étudiées. Une analyse approfondie de l’étape de production des granulés et une étude de sensibilité de l’étape de transport ont été réalisées. Une attention a porté sur les méthodes d’AICV : les méthodes IMPACT 2002+ et Recipe 2016 ont été comparées. Les résultats ont montré que les impacts ainsi que les éléments considérés et leur hiérarchisation diffèrent dans les deux méthodes.

Assessing social impacts of various products, services and human activities has achieved an increasing interest worldwide. The nature of sustainability of biobased industries from a social point of view is how and to what extent they are perceived by society, and how various societies take advantages from such activities. However, an important issue is that social factors are not usually easy to be quantitatively analyzed and although the social impacts might be very remarkable, especially at the local scale, they have been not possible to be investigated in the majority of impact evaluations in the past. Despite the existence of many different methodologies towards Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA) to address social impacts of various businesses and industries, most of them impartially address social performances of an industry. The aim of this paper is to highlight the main criteria that need to be taken into account in SLCA approaches for identifying the social indicators and impacts of biobased industries that is a timely topic worldwide toward climate change mitigation goals. Accordingly, considering the general approach of SLCA and particularly its inventory analysis phase for impact categories and indicator determinations, the paper provides an overview of the existing guidelines and frameworks for identifying social indicators and impact categories associated with bio-industries. In conclusion, main impact categories and indicators formulated in the existing frameworks applied to biobased industries are demonstrated as a basic set of applicable elements of social dimensions in evaluating bio-industries’ sustainability when conducting SLCAs. The state of the art for this study mainly includes leading journal articles, international reports and conference papers up to and including 2016 on SLCA in biobased industries. According to the reviewed frameworks in this study, quantitative, midpoint and site-specific data are the main elements taken into account when collecting the data for biobased product social impact assessment. This study also reveals that although SLCA is in its early steps of development and despite in numerous cases, conducting a comprehensive SLCA is not yet feasible, it has been considered to have substantially promising methodological attributes that can help policymakers and other stakeholders to quantify and assess sustainability of bio-industries from the social perspective. Recommendations for further research work concerning SLCA in bio-industries are also presented.

Considering its potential impacts on development, biobased industries require to be assessed according to the positive and negative effects they can bring to the society. Typically, the implications of biobased industries are considered in terms of economic, environmental and technical indices while social factors are usually neglected in the majority of impact assessments. This is mainly due to the fact that social issues are not easy to be quantitatively analyzed, measured and monitored. Indeed, the following issues need to be addressed: (i) how the social dimension is understood from different stakeholders’ perspective; (ii) how the social pillar can be properly integrated into sustainability evaluation methodologies which are mainly focused on environmental performance and (techno)-economic assessments of biobased industries. This review paper aims to answer these questions firstly through identifying the main social impacts and indicators of the biobased industries at local level in order to find an answer for the second question by analyzing and comparing the current methodologies for assessing social impacts in bioindustries. These methods mainly include Social Impact Assessment (SIA), Socio-economic Impacts Assessment (SEIA) and Social Life Cycle Analysis (SLCA). The latter, although is in its early steps of development, has been considered to have substantially promising methodological attributes for bioindustries’ social sustainability assessment. Although ongoing research tackles the incorporation of the environmental dimension into extended techno-economic assessments, no integration of the social pillar into such assessments has been made. Given that, this review focuses on the social dimension for integrated sustainability assessments of biobased industries to assess the main social impacts resulting from each operation or from the bioenergy sector. The current review focuses on the importance of social sustainability indicators and evaluation techniques. By discussing the methodologies for evaluating social impacts, a systemic methodology for assessing and integrating the social dimension into the sustainability assessments of bioindustries is developed, considering the four main iterative steps of an SLCA framework and three useful SLCA-based approaches including Product Social Impact Assessment; Prosuite and the UNEP SETAC Guidelines for SLCA of Products. It is concluded that the term systemic analysis implies that the whole approach needs the capacity to understand different subsystems and relations between them. Accordingly, the systemic assessment of biobased technologies should simultaneously include technological, economic, social and environmental dimensions. The result of this study identifies social impacts in the bioeconomy and particularly highlight the importance of considering social issues in biobased industries’ design and innovation.

Environmental consultants are in a unique position to address the practical aspects of a working definition of “adverse environmental impact” (AEI) within Section 316(b) of the Clean Water Act. In our work with the electric utility industry, attorneys, and regulatory agencies, we have encountered numerous and sometimes conflicting interpretations as to what constitutes AEI. In our over 30 years of experience, we have applied most of the approaches suggested for addressing this issue, including biostatistical methods, trend analysis, time series methods, conditional mortality rate models, stock-recruitment models, equivalent adult models, and ecosystem models. In our experience, the paradigm most helpful in bringing about agreement among stakeholders is to (1) create a model of operating scenarios, (2) use empirical data from on-site studies to parameterize the model, (3) convert losses by life stage to equivalent adult losses, (4) convert equivalent adult losses to economic value, and (5) compare scenarios on an economic basis.

Section 316(b) of the Clean Water Act requires that cooling-water intake structures (CWIS) use Best Technology Available (BTA) to minimize adverse environmental impacts (AEI). The U.S. EPA has not defined AEI, and there is no clear consensus regarding its definition. Nonetheless, operational definitions are necessary to evaluate design alternatives and to measure the success of mitigative measures. Rather than having to develop measures of aquatic health that are highly site-specific, controversial, and often unlikely to elicit agreement from all sides of the environmental “fence”, it may be more productive to use existing ecological assessment tools. Aquatic Life Uses (ALU) already provide a regulatory framework to assess the quality (health) of the aquatic community in various habitats (e.g., warmwater habitat, exceptional warmwater habitat). Attainment of the ALU indicates that further point source controls are unnecessary, whereas nonattainment indicates that those pollutants or stressors causing the nonattainment must be reduced. A similar approach for existing water intakes is recommended. That is, attainment of the designated ALU will be taken as an indication that there is no AEI. Although attainment of the ALU may not be a foolproof indicator of a lack of AEI, this approach seems more reasonable that using scarce monetary resources to fix problems that likely do not exist, or having both regulators and the regulated community expend their resources debating whether various observed biological responses do or do not constitute AEI.

Tez (Yüksek Lisans) -- İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi, Fen Bilimleri Enstitüsü, 2014, Thesis (M.Sc.) -- İstanbul Technical University, Institute of Science and Technology, 2014, Çalışmanın konusu, büyük ulaşım projelerinin oluşturduğu etkiler ve bu etkilerin ölçülme yöntemlerinin incelenmesidir. Çalışmada, ulaşım projelerinin önemi ve ulaşım projelerinin kısa dönemli ve uzun dönemli olmak üzere oluşturduğu etkiler, çeşitli kaynaklardan örneklerle açıklanmıştır. Ulaşım projeleri, ekonomik, ekolojik ve sosyal açıdan birçok etki oluşturduğu için, etki değerlendirmelerinde incelenecek kriterlerin belirlenmesi karmaşık bir işlemdir. Çalışmada, gözden kaçabilecek noktaların en aza indirilmesi ve ulaşım projelerinde şeffaflık ve hesap verebilirlik ilkelerinin sağlanması için yabancı ülkelerde uygulanan çeşitli gösterge setlerinden örnekler verilerek, bir proje öncesinde ele alınması gereken faktörler bu şekilde anlatılmıştır. Çalışmada, ulaşım projelerinin etkileri örnek incelemesi üzerinden gösterge analiz yöntemi ile açıklanmıştır. Ulaşım projeleri sebebiyle oluşan etkiler, proje alanına yakınlık veya geçen süre gibi çeşitli etkenlerle değişiklik göstermektedir. Oluşan etkilerin tesir büyüklüğü açısından karşılaştırılabilmesi ve uzun vadede oluşacak etkilerin de ele alınabilmesi için çalışmada 'dolaylı etki analizi' ele alınarak, ulaşım projelerinin oluşturduğu etkiler kapsamlı bir şekilde ele alınmaya çalışılmıştır. Çalışmada sosyal etkiler ve çevresel etkiler iki ayrı başlık altında ele alınarak; projelerin oluşturduğu etkiler ve bu doğrultuda uygulanması gereken değerlendirme unsurları ele alınmıştır. Ulaşım projelerinde oluşan uzun dönemli etkiler, tahmin edilmesi daha güç olmasından ve kentsel alanların şekillenmesinde büyük önem taşımasından ötürü ayrıntılı bir şekilde incelenerek dolaylı etki analizinde izlenmesi gereken adımlar anlatılmış; Washington'da uygulanan bir doğrudan, dolaylı ve kümülatif etki değerlendirmesi durum çalışması incelenmiştir. Çalışmada ulaşım projelerinin etkilerinin incelenmesi amacıyla yapımına 29 Mayıs 2013 tarihinde başlanan Üçüncü Köprü Projesi ele alınmıştır. Üçüncü Köprü'nün ayaklarının bulunduğu Garipçe ve Poyrazköy, demografik ve ekolojik açılardan incelenmiş; Garipçe ve Poyrazköy halkı ve muhtarları ile görüşmeler yapılmış; bu iki alanda fenomenolojik görüşme, etnografik gözlem ve anket tekniği uygulanmıştır. Buradan elde edilen sonuçlar, Birinci ve İkinci Boğaz Köprüleri'nin kentsel yayılıma etkileri; Beykoz Belediyesi, Sarıyer Belediyesi, Boğaziçi İmar Müdürlüğü, Sarıyer Orman Müdürlüğü'nden alınan verilerle birleştirilerek, dolaylı etki analizinin kalitatif basamağı uygulanmıştır. Bu şekilde Üçüncü Köprü Projesi'nin İstanbul için oluşturacağı etkiler belirlenmeye çalışılmıştır., The topic of this thesis is the evaluation of the short and long term impacts of large scale transportation projects especially in the context of the 3rd Bridge Project in İstanbul. Transportation projects have economic, ecological and social impacts; therefore, it is a complex task to define the criteria that will be used for impact assessment. In this thesis, the importance of transportation projects has been analyzed and explained using various resources. The indicators sets in transportation projects were used to avoid overlooking the relevant issues and to create transparency and accountability; therefore, in this thesis, selections from these sets are used to explain the factors that should be taken into consideration for the project in the preliminary stages. Indicators selected for the ‘‘Indicators Analysis Method’’ were chosen from the environmental and sustainable development indicators by OECD, UN, Victoria Transport Policy Institute and SUTRA (Sustainable Urban Transportation). In the study, several qualitative and quantitative tools were used to address the transportation effects in a comprehensive way. The initial research process steps were: forming the study content, identifying the study area, doing the preliminary work about the effects of transportation projects. After the preliminary work was completed; research about the formal sources and worldwide standards, the fieldwork, integration of qualitative and quantitative outputs and the data analysis were conducted. The problem was stated as "big transportation projects’ adverse effects on the environment and the social structure" and the hypothesis was determined as "The Third Bridge Project could create reasonable foreseeable significant effects on ecological and other natural resources and social structures in the whole city, specifically on the axis of Garipçe and Poyrazköy where the pillars of the bridge stood." The qualitative data of the thesis is gathered from the comparative case analysis from the first and second Bosphorus Bridges’ impacts, phenomenological meetings, ethnographic observation and household surveys and interviews with governors of Garipçe and Poyrazköy. The quantitative data of the thesis gathered from the ‘‘Indicators Analysis Approach’’ and ‘‘Trend Extrapolation – Build-Out/ Carrying Capacity Analysis from some authorized organizations in İstanbul Metropolitan Region’’. Transportation systems have been shaped according to the infrastructure, demographic properties, politics, land uses, economic conditions etc. and have impacts related to livability and quality of life. Construction and the operation of the transportation projects have environmental, economic, socio cultural and health effects which can be divided into short term and long term impacts. Indirect Effects Analysis process was explained based on the report of National Cooperative Highway Research Program; "Desk Reference for Estimating the Indirect Effects of Proposed Transportation Projects" as a guidance document due to lack of adequate research in the field of direct and indirect impact assessments in Turkey. And the social analysis process in transportation projects was explained based on The World Bank’s research; "Social Analysis in Transportation Projects: Guidelines for Incorporating Social Dimensions into Bank-Supported Projects." These two studies were used as guiding reference tools for the Istanbul 3rd Bridge Project’s impacts assessment and for further studies. In this thesis, the impacts of transportation projects were explained through indicators analysis approach. Indirect effects analysis consists of both social and environmental issues; therefore, the social and environmental impacts are covered under two different headings. The short term effects of the transportation projects and the criteria for their evaluation are identified. The longer term effects are harder to estimate and they have a higher significance on the transformation of urban spaces, therefore, a greater emphasis has been placed on the long term impacts, supported by an exemplary case study of Indirect and Cumulative Effects Assessment, SR 502 Corridor Widening Project, that has been implemented in Washington. The construction for the Istanbul 3rd Bridge Project started on May 29 in 2013 without an impact assessment study. The case study consists of the research of the 3rd Bridge Project in order to determine and evaluate the effects of transportation projects. The 3rd Bridge is situated between Garipçe and Poyrazköy; so the two residences have a rather intertwined connection with the bridge. Therefore, these locales were analyzed demographically and ecologically. Interviews were conducted with the residents and the governors of the two towns. In addition to the interviews, techniques such as phenomenological meetings, ethnographic observation and surveys have been used. The results obtained from these locales, integrated with the urban expansion data of the First and Second Bridges and the data obtained from the Municipalities of Beykoz and Sarıyer, Boğaziçi İmar Müdürlüğü (Boğaziçi Directorate of Public Works) and Sarıyer Orman Müdürlüğü (Sarıyer Directorate of Forestry), form the qualitative step of the Indirect Effects Analysis. This case study serves as an important tool to assess and estimate the potential impacts of the 3rd Bridge Project on the city of İstanbul. Findings for the thesis - "Ecological and Social Effects in Transportation Projects: A Review of The Istanbul 3rd Bridge Project" - are, The Third Bridge Project will increase the urbanization on the northern side of Istanbul where most sensitive habitats are found. The various ecosystems and the ecosystem services in the northern forests are at the risk of roadkills, habitat loss and fragmentation, disturbance, degradation of species and wildlife. Water basins, and natural, cultural and archeological conservation areas are under threat by the Third Bridge construction and the induced growth effects. The social structure on the routes of Third Bridge has the possibility of change due to involuntary resettlement. With the encroachment alteration and induced growth effects, these residences can change into gated communities. This study provides an understanding of multidimensional structure of transportation projects and a guide reference for the environmental and social impact assessment steps in transportation projects. This study aims to fill a void in the field of direct, indirect and cumulative impact assessment studies in Turkey and construct a basic framework for further studies., Yüksek Lisans, M.Sc.

Water is an irreplaceable resource, covering around two thirds of Earth´s surface, although only one percent is available for use. Except from households, other human activities such as agriculture and industries use water. Water use and pollution can make water unavailable to some users and places already exposed for water scarcity are especially vulnerable for such changes. Increased water use and factors such as climate change make water scarcity to a global concern and to protect the environment and humans it will be necessary to manage this problem. The concept of water footprint was introduced in 2002 as a tool to assess impact from freshwater use. Since then, many methods concerning water use and degradation have been developed and today there are several studies made on water footprint. Still, the majority of these studies only include water use. The aim of this study was to evaluate three different methods due to their ability to calculate water footprint for the production of trucks, with the qualification that the methods should consider both water use and emissions. Three methods were applied on two Volvo factories in Sweden, located in Umeå and Gothenburg. Investigations of water flows in background processes were made as a life cycle assessment in Gabi software. The water flows were thereafter assessed with the H2Oe, the Water Footprint Network and the Ecological scarcity method. The results showed that for the factory in Umeå the water footprint values were 2.62 Mm3 H2Oe, 43.08 Mm3 and 354.7 MEP per 30,000 cabins. The variation in units and values indicates that it is complicated to compare water footprints for products calculated with different methods. The study also showed that the H2Oe and the Ecological scarcity method account for the water scarcity situation. A review of the concordance with the new ISO standard for water footprint was made but none of the methods satisfies all criteria for elementary flows. Comparison between processes at the factories showed that a flocculation chemical gives a larger water footprint for the H2Oe and the Ecological scarcity method, while the water footprint for the WFN method and carbon footprint is larger for electricity. This indicates that environmental impact is considered different depending on method and that a process favorable regarding to climate change not necessarily is beneficial for environmental impact in the perspective of water use. Vatten är en ovärderlig resurs som täcker cirka två tredjedelar av jordens yta men där endast en procent är tillgänglig för användning. Människan använder vatten till olika ändamål, förutom i hushåll används vatten bland annat inom jordbruk och industrier. Vattenanvändning och utsläpp av föroreningar kan göra vatten otillgängligt, vilket kan vara extra känsligt i de områden där människor redan lider av vattenbrist. Den ökade vattenanvändningen tillsammans med exempelvis klimatförändringar bidrar till att göra vattenbrist till en global angelägenhet och det kommer att krävas åtgärder för att skydda människor och miljö. År 2002 introducerades begreppet vattenfotavtryck som ett verktyg för att bedöma miljöpåverkan från vattenanvändning. Sedan dess har begreppet utvecklats till att inkludera många olika beräkningsmetoder men många av de befintliga studierna har uteslutit föroreningar och bara fokuserat på vattenkonsumtion. Syftet med denna rapport var att utvärdera tre olika metoder med avseende på deras förmåga att beräkna vattenfotavtryck vid produktion av lastbilar, med villkoret att metoderna ska inkludera både vattenkonsumtion och föroreningar. I studien användes tre metoder för att beräkna vattenfotavtrycket för två Volvo fabriker placerade i Umeå och Göteborg. En livscykelanalys utfördes i livscykelanalysverktyget Gabi, för att kartlägga vattenflöden från bakgrundsprocesser. Därefter värderades vattenflödena med metoderna; H2Oe, WFN och Ecological scarcity. Resultatet för fabriken i Umeå gav för respektive metod ett vattenfotavtryck motsvarande 2,62 Mm3 H2Oe, 43,08 Mm3 respektive 354,7 MEP per 30 000 lastbilshytter. Variationen i enheter och storlek tyder på att det kan vara svårt att jämföra vattenfotavtryck för produkter som beräknats med olika metoder. Studien visade att H2Oe och Ecological scarcity tar hänsyn till vattentillgängligheten i området. En granskning av metodernas överensstämmelse med den nya ISO standarden för vattenfotavtryck gjordes men ingen av metoderna i studien uppfyllde alla kriterier. Av de processer som ingår i fabrikerna visade det sig att vattenfotavtrycket för H2Oe och Ecological scarcity metoden var störst för en fällningskemikalie. För den tredje metoden och koldioxid var avtrycket störst för elektriciteten. Detta tyder på att olika metoder värderar miljöpåverkan olika samt att de processer som anses bättre ur miljösynpunkt för klimatförändringar inte nödvändigtvis behöver vara bäst vid vattenanvändning.

Many impact assessment methods use weighing factors to agregate the different environmental effects into a single score value for the total impact caused by a product life cycle. The introduction of subjectivity in the decision process during product development, by using this kind of weighting factors, should be avoided. A more objective approach uses indicators based on laws of physics, for example the notion exergy. Construction and implementation in Simapro of an exergetic indicator is illustrated in this paper.

Many impact assessment methods use weighing factors to agregate the different environmental effects into a single score value for the total impact caused by a product life cycle. The introduction of subjectivity in the decision process during product development, by using this kind of weighting factors, should be avoided. A more objective approach uses indicators based on laws of physics, for example the notion exergy. Construction and implementation in Simapro of an exergetic indicator is illustrated in this paper.