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Explains the extent to which environmental sanctions conflict with the free trade regime and examines characteristics of sanctions processes instigated for the purpose of environmental protection.

846 865 178 ; S ; [EN] Environmental performance is becoming increasingly important to organizational decision-making boards. As with other organizations, Higher Education Institutions concerned with environmental performance require tools to help develop appropriate policies and programs. Key Performance Indicators are typically a component of economic and financial decision-making. Defining Key Performance Indicators for relevant environmental aspects of an institution can be seen as a step toward integrating environmental issues into overall management. In this paper, a methodology is proposed to define environmental Key Performance Indicators for Higher Education Institutions with a robust Environmental Management System (International Organization for Standardization (ISO) certified or Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS) verified), and this methodology is coupled with a validation system based on meta-performance evaluation indicators. The proposal is based on the relative significance of various environmental aspects and the degree of operational control that an organization has over each aspect. The methodology is developed to be easy to applied, minimum time and resource consumption) and integrate in an existent Environmental Management System. It starts with a standard procedure to define the organization allowing its application to any type of Higher Education Institution. Additionally, a list of over 140 environmental indicators, described and classified, is offered. An environmental unit, Escuela Politecnica Superior de Alcoy (EPSA), of Universitat Politecnica de Valencia, EMAS verified, is used as a case study. From the study, seven Key Performance Indicators are defined, and three of these are fully assessed. Energy consumption, waste management treatment, and greenhouse gas emissions are the key elements of these three indicators. Institutions with robust Environmental Management Systems have significant advantages in identifying relevant environmental aspects and defining goals to begin ...

Nanotechnology promises to transform the materials of everyday life, leading to smaller and more powerful computers, more durable plastics and fabrics, cheap and effective water purification systems, more efficient solar panels and storage batteries, and medical devices capable of tracking down and killing cancer cells or treating neurological diseases. Policy analysts predict a radical change in the industrial sector; at present, the U.S. government spends nearly 2 billion annually on nanotechnology research and development. Yet the nanotechnology revolution is not straightforward. Enthusiasm.

The importance of Greener Public Purchasing, GPP, has increasingly been recognised by those who work to promote sustainable development. In the communication on Integrated Product Policy, IPP, the EU Commission encourages Member States to draw up publicly available action plans to green their public procurement. The Nordic Council of Ministers has stressed the importance of GPP in the strategy for sustainable development and has initiated co-ordination efforts so that public buyers in all the Nordic countries can benefit from each other's experience. The aim of this study was to develop a method to measure the environmental soundness of public procurement and to produce information on the kind of environmental criteria that are used for different product groups. The study also focused on the situation of greener public procurement in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, more specifically, on the larger public purchases, which are governed by directives. The results showed that public purchasers seek to consider environmental aspects quite often. However, attention needs to be paid to how relevant product-specific environmental aspects are defined and the criteria formulated.

[SPA] El suelo es un recurso afectado por fuentes de contaminación que lo pueden convertir en un recurso contaminado. El contenido en metales pesados del suelo es uno de los criterios empleados para la estimación de la calidad ambiental del suelo, siendo necesario, el establecimiento de niveles de fondo en los metales y sus correspondientes niveles genéricos de referencia. El suelo tiene unos valores naturales de presencia de determinados elementos traza, metales, que son los valores de fondo, que generan un riesgo admisible. Pero cuando ese riesgo se convierte en inadmisible, se han de establecer otros valores. Estos valores serían los niveles genéricos de referencia del suelo, y son los valores que nos indicarán si estamos ante un suelo potencialmente contaminado, o contaminado. Los "elementos traza" aparecen mayoritariamente en los residuos mineros relativos a las industrias extractivas. Estos materiales ya sean residuos, recursos o subproductos reciben, por lo general, el tratamiento de residuos inertes, cuando en realidad deberían ser tratados como residuos peligrosos. El presente estudio critica las disposiciones normativas que regulan los residuos y suelos propios de los distritos de minería metálica, con la finalidad de proponer mejoras normativas que permitan la adecuación de la legislación aplicable a los nuevos conocimientos científico-técnicos. [ENG] Soil is a resource affected by sources of pollution that can become contaminated resource. The heavy metal content of the soil is one of the criteria for estimating the environmental quality of the soil, being necessary to establish background levels in metals and their corresponding levels generics de reference. The floor has natural presence values of certain trace elements, metals, which are the background values, which generate an acceptable risk. But when that risk becomes unacceptable, they have to set other values. These values would be the generic reference levels of soil, and are the values that will tell us if this is a potentially contaminated or contaminated soil. The "trace elements" appear mostly in mining waste relating to extractive industries. These materials either waste resources or byproducts are, in general, the treatment of inert waste, when they should be treated as hazardous waste. This study criticizes the regulatory provisions governing waste and soils own metal mining districts, in order to propose improvements regulations that facilitate adjustment of the legislation applicable to new scientific and technical knowledge. ; Agradecer al equipo del TAIDA el poder formar parte de este grupo de doctorado.

Environmental aspect of the logistics has recently important. Governments around the world are under pressure because of the world public opinion and forced to take some measures regarding the protection of the environment. Nowadays, technology is developing faster than ever. Advent of the disruptive Technologies causes the business processes to be redesigned. In the context of increasing environmental problems, it is expected that the implementation of some of these technologies in Logistics processes would have some positive effects. In this study, disruptive technologies with positive environmental effects were examined and their possible results were evaluated.