Suchergebnisse

The Brexit referendum is a good example of the particular vulnerability of the European project when fighting disinformation. Therefore, EU institutions have developed a series of initiatives throughout 2018 to define a European strategy to counter disinformation that emphasizes the responsibility of social networks in reporting false content. In addition, given the weakness of the European public sphere, the European institutions support the creation of European networks of fact checkers. This strategy implies the denunciation of lies, rather than the promotion of alternative interpretive frames, which authors like Lakoff (2004) consider an error from a framing point of view. Empirically, we demonstrate through an analysis of the main networks of actors on this matter (academics, foundations, think tanks, media, social network platforms and fact checkers) that there is a dispute to define the best way to combat disinformation at the European level.

This comparative research analyses the political discussion through social media of the top list German, French, Italian and Spanish Members of the European Parliament during COVID-19 crisis times. Through content analysis, the article focuses on Twitter behaviours during a pandemic crisis period (March 23 to April 23, 2020). The study that analyses up to 14 (first listed MEPs) Twitter accounts and a total N of 2101 tweets looks at clarifying if the COVID-19 pandemic has promoted or discouraged the growth of a European Public Sphere. The results show that audience involvement depended on certain online conducts of the MEP rather than on his or her constant activity. Those behaviours produced as well that the COVID-19 debate was mostly restricted to the political elite, who neither allow European civil society to take part in the discussion or communicate to the general public with the aim of shaping a European Public Sphere.

El aire es necesario para la vida. Las personas tienen derecho a su uso y disfrute, pero también la obligación de mantenerlo limpio, por ello, al tratarse de aire interior y su trascendencia a las actividades de producción, recreación y restauración, la necesidad es mayor. Con esta premisa, el presente trabajo expone una revisión histórica de la legislación española entre 1972 y 2020; se pone énfasis en tal periodo ya que enmarca el inicio y desarrollo de la preocupación mundial sobre él, también se incluye consideraciones normativas a nivel europeo y mundial. Con ello, se caracteriza al aire interior tipo, las fuentes de su deterioro, es decir, aquellos insumos que permiten determinar su calidad y gestión pública asociada. También se determina que en el periodo de análisis la normativa es abundante para el aire exterior, fuentes de contaminación y políticas de mitigación de la deficiente calidad, no obstante, en materia de aire interior y su calidad en ambientes no industriales apenas se remontan al año 2008. En términos generales, se determina como necesaria la existencia de políticas de gestión del aire interior, pero también la articulación operativa en diferentes niveles de competencia (gobierno, profesional y académica) para garantizar la habitabilidad saludable con visión interdisciplinar. En este punto, extenderse hacia la arquitectura y la construcción provee potentes incisiones en el tema.AbstractAir is necessary for life. People have the right to use and enjoy it, but also the obligation to keep it clean, because as it is indoor air it transcends production, recreation and catering activities. With this award, the present work presents a historical review of Spanish legislation between 1972 and 2020. Emphasis is placed on this period as it marks the beginning and development of world concern about it, and therefore also includes regulatory considerations at European and international level. With this, the research describes the indoor air, the sources of its deterioration, i.e. those inputs that allow the determination of the Indoor Air Quality, and the associated public management. It is also determined that in the analysis period there is an abundance of regulations on outdoor air, sources of pollution and policies to mitigate poor quality, however, in terms of indoor air and its quality associated with non-industrial environments only goes back to 2008. In general terms, it is determined that operational articulation at different levels of competence (government, professional and academic) is necessary to guarantee healthy habitability, but also to discipline. At this point extending to architecture and construction provides powerful insights into the subject.

Applying qualitative historical methods, we examined the consideration and implementation of school closures as a nonpharmaceutical intervention (NPI) in thirty US cities during the spring 2009 wave of the pA(H1N1) influenza pandemic. We gathered and performed close textual readings of official federal, state, and municipal government documents; media coverage; and academic publications. Lastly, we conducted oral history interviews with public health and education officials in our selected cities. We found that several local health departments pursued school closure plans independent of CDC guidance, that uncertainty of action and the rapidly evolving understanding of pA(H1N1) contributed to tension and pushback from the public, that the media and public perception played a significant role in the response to school closure decisions, and that there were some notable instances of interdepartmental communication breakdown. We conclude that health departments should continue to develop and fine-tune their action plans while also working to develop better communication methods with the public, and work more closely with education officials to better understand the complexities involved in closing schools. Lastly, state and local governments should work to resolve lingering issues of legal authority for school closures in times of public health crises.

European electricity markets ensure the matching between supply and demand at all times. Due to their time-scale operations, the balancing markets are the last resources to achieve so and ensure the grid frequency. The increasing shares of non-dispatchable power capacities intensify the demand for flexibility. District heating systems (DHs) are potential sources of flexibility if interface technologies are in place like CHP or power-to-heat, together with thermal storage. This study assesses the technical potential of DHs to contribute to frequency containment reserves (FCR), automatic and manual frequency restoration reserves (aFRR and mFRR) markets. Through a review of case-studies, we gain insight and derive appropriate assumptions to estimate the potential at country and EU levels. Based on the POTEnCIA Central scenario up to 2050 — a description of the evolution of the EU energy system with the assumption of no further policies introduced beyond 2017 —, we find that the potential is highest for the provision of aFRR, followed by mFRR and FCR. Specifically, the aFRR technical potential is currently 32 GW — 4 times the aFRR contracted in 2019 in the EU — and it only slightly decreases by 2050. Overall, this study highlights the lack of data on current (and future) DHs and their variety in size and composition. A sensitivity analysis is performed by examining different scenarios for DHs deployment. This research emphasizes the large untapped potential to exploit flexibility from DHs, however, the evaluation of the actual potential shall be done on a case-by-case basis.

Abstract. This paper presents a method for attributing regional trends in the frequency of extremely hot days (EHDs) to changes in the frequency of the atmospheric patterns that characterize such extraordinary events. The study is applied to mainland Spain and the Balearic Islands for the extended summers of the period 1958–2008, where significant and positive trends in maximum temperature (Tx) have been reported during the second half of the past century. First, the study area was split into eight regions attending to their different temporal variability of the daily Tx series obtained from the Spain02 gridded data set using a clustering procedure. Second, the large-scale atmospheric situations causing EHDs are defined by circulation types (CTs). The obtainment of the CTs differs from the majority of CT classifications proposed in the literature. It is based on regional series and on a previous characterization of the main atmospheric situations obtained using only some days classified as extremes in the different regions. Three different atmospheric fields (SLP, T850, and Z500) from ECMWF reanalysis and analysis data and combinations of them (SLP–T850, SLP–Z500, and T850–Z500) are used to produce six different CT classifications. Subsequently, links between EHD occurrence in the different regions and CT for all days have been established. Finally, a simple model to relate the trends in EHDs for each region to the changes in the CT frequency appearance has been formulated. Most regions present positive and significant trends in the occurrence of EHDs. The CT classifications using two variables perform better. In particular, SLP–T850 is the best for characterizing the atmospheric situations leading to EHD occurrences for most of the regions. Only a small number of CTs have significant trends in their frequency and are associated with high efficiency causing EHD occurrences in most regions simultaneously, especially in the northern and central regions. Attribution results show that changes in circulation can only explain some part of the regional EHD trends. The percentage of the trend attributable to changes in atmospheric dynamics varies from 15 to 50 %, depends on the region and is sensitive to the selected large-scale variables.

This paper presents a method for attributing regional trends in the frequency of extremely hot days (EHDs) to changes in the frequency of the atmospheric patterns that characterize such extraordinary events. The study is applied to mainland Spain and the Balearic Islands for the extended summers of the period 1958–2008, where significant and positive trends in maximum temperature (Tx) have been reported during the second half of the past century. ; This study was supported by the Spanish government and the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER) through the projects SPEQTRES (CGL2011-29672-C02-02) and REPAIR (CGL2014-59677-R). J. P. Montavez also acknowledges the financial support from Fundacion Seneca (Ref 19640/EE/14).

Chemical, physical, mineralogical and radiological characterization of olive biomass fly ash (OBFA) and bottom ash (OBBA) was main objective to determine their potential use as alkaline activators in the preparation of alkali-activated materials or geopolymers. Water solubility tests showed that they released K and Na ions, affording a high pH and alkaline content. Pastes made with 70 wt% vitreous blast furnace slag (SL) and 30 wt% of OBFA or OBBA yielded alkali-activated materials with 28 days mechanical strength of 33 to 18 MPa. In pastes prepared with 30 wt% OBFA, strength values were comparable to those developed by slag pastes activated with a commercial KOH. However, the pastes made with 70 wt% coal fly ash and 30 wt% OBFA or OBBA proved to be inviable because the pH reached was not high enough to activate the precursor. The radiological calculations of OBFA- and OBBA-SL bearing pastes would conform to European legislation on protection against exposure to ionising radiation, for the activity concentration index (ACI) found in the final product was less than 1 in all cases. The pastes leached primarily K. The presence of elements such as 210Po and 210 Pb at the end of the decay chain in the eluates would not limit the use of biomass ash and slag blends. These findings have confirmed the feasibility of using olive oil biomass ashes as an alternative alkaline activator in blast furnace slag systems to produce alkali-activated materials or geopolymers, with properties that make them apt for use as building materials. ; Funding for the tests conducted in this study was provided by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness under projects BIA2013-47876-C2-1-P and BIA2016-77252-P. ; Peer reviewed