Applying the concept of environmental consciousness, there has been developed an ecobarometer to measure regularly environmental attitudes and ecological behavior across different domains. Using the General Ecological Behavior (GEB) scale of Kaiser (1998a) for cross-cultural applications, searches for potentially effective contextual influences appear promising for the adoption of certain political actions such as legislation and financial incentives from one socio-cultural context to another one. Therefore an ecobarometer, which takes the GEB scale as a generally applicable measure of ecological behavior, should be effective across different countries. The GEB scale takes differential behavior difficulties into account that are most likely caused by contextual influences.
New strategies and solutions for ecoefficient energy use and material cycles, both technological and non-technological, will not only influence the ecological and the economic environment, but also the social environment. If the potential social impacts of such strategies and solutions are ignored, their successful implementation may be prevented by a lack of general public acceptance. Therefore new methods using transdisciplinary approaches are needed to take the social dimension into account for decision-making and planning. Analysis of general political and social conditions, lifestyles and patterns of consumption behaviour by employing methods of em-pirical social research have given evidence for two case-studies within waste management. In a second step, sets of indicators and criteria for social sustainability have been established. Originating from these indicators and criteria, methods and tools for the quantitative assessment of the social dimension of sustainability of new technologies and products have been developed, and can be combined with tools for the assessment of the ecological (LCA) and economic dimension of sustainability. This assessment will function as a quality control, and ensure that the innovative technologies and products/services meet social requirements and find general public acceptance for their implementation and transformation into practice. In order to include social compatibility in planning processes, a tool similar to the environmental impact assessment is being developed: The Social Compatibility Analysis (SCA). In contrast to the subjective approach where methods of the empirical social sciences are used to estimate the acceptance of those directly affected, the method proposed here is based on a set of objective evaluation criteria (e.g. discrimination, education & training, impact on inhabited areas, income distribution, information / communication, participation, transparency, risks for the population). Using the ABC-method known from business administration different priorities are assigned to the chosen criteria and to the identified partial aspects of the object of assessment respectively. The results achieved in this way reflect the subjective assessment of the user, or the consensus of a user group. The tool is therefore suitable for use in participatory processes such as acceptance dialogues as means of visualizing different evaluations and standpoints of various interest groups, thus providing a common basis for discussion and solution finding. Application of the SCA-tool in two different case-studies (planning of a waste incineration plant, conception of sewage treatment plants) within the Swiss waste management have given evidence on: SCA is a particularly valuable tool when the social dimension of a project is concerned, when the clarification of differing stakeholder assessments is needed or when sets of solutions are to be negotiated. From the legal point of view a distinction must be made between a test of social compatibility, and the participatory possibilities with which the public can advise or definitively decide on specific issues.
To be sustainable, life styles will have to adapt to low energy use (European Commission 2009), an effort which needs to be supported by energy efficiency programmes as well. Energy efficiency means providing the same benefit (output) with less energy input. This can be achieved by adoption of existing, more efficient technologies and energy system solutions or by an optimized matching of energy supply and demand. To foster application of these technologies and behaviours in households, administrations and companies, it requires incentives such as taxes, grants or on-site advice by experts. The initiators of such energy efficiency programmes are diverse: national or regional administrations or institutions, but also energy service companies (ESCO) or financial service companies. How do these programmes work, who is addressed by whom and what are innovative models of such programs? Our desk research about energy efficiency programs in selected OECD-countries analyses target groups, governance mechanisms, factors of success and shows innovative programmes of the different initiators mentioned above. Working together with other institutions for the setup and operation of an energy efficiency programme is important. According to our findings, this could be done better, especially from the national initiator's side. Architects and construction companies are rarely appealed by any of the initiators and facility owners and maintenance staff only by ESCOs. In general ESCOs very often have programmes, which are a combination of governance mechanisms, which would probably be effective in programmes of national and regional institutions as well.
Sustainability cannot be achieved without the support of people both knowledgeable and motivated, primarily through education and awareness, to modify behaviour and lifestyles, and to press for change by government and business. In previous UN Conferences there was unanimous agreement that education is "critical for promoting sustainable development and increasing the capacity of the people to address environment and development issues". In this paper we will propose contents for sustainability modules that should be well integrated into the curricula of education within Universities of Applied Sciences.
Independent of technological feasibility and environmental soundness, humans are the most crucial factor in establishing sustainable behavior and new technologies. In democratic systems the people, finally, make the decisions. Therefore, solutions must be socially acceptable and compatible. Dialogue between the various stakeholders is essential for finding the proper regional solution. Various case studies presented in Chapter 7 offer insight into the methodology of mediation and the development of a new assessment tool for evaluating social acceptance. This book presents current and past developments in waste management. Modern and new technologies for waste treatment and the recycling and recovery of materials from wastes are discussed.
Between November 2014 and May 2015 saguf board members participated in the Stakeholder Dialogue for Sustainability initiated by the Swiss Federal Council (Bundesrat). The goal of this consultation process was to inform and jointly advance the elaboration of the Federal Council's Sustainable Development Strategy 2016-2019 (Swiss Federal Council 2016) that was adopted in January 2016. This contribution presents and discusses the Stakeholder Dialogue from saguf's point of view. Its aim is to reflect on this experience and on the question of how an academic society dedicated to strengthening environmental research and education as a cornerstone for sustainability can contribute to processes such as the federal Stakeholder Dialogue. We argue that one central contribution is to make the case for an integrative approach to tackling sustainable development issues. This contribution presents and discusses the Stakeholder Dialogue from saguf's point of view. Its aim is to reflect on this experience and on the question of how an academic society dedicated to strengthening environmental research and education as a cornerstone for sustainability can contribute to processes such as the federal Stakeholder Dialogue. We argue that one central contribution is to make the case for an integrative approach to tackling sustainable development issues.
This chapter explores current and forthcoming sustainable development challenges. By comparing the EU Sustainable Development Strategy (European Council, 2006), its related monitoring reports and the "Facing the future: time for the EU to meet global challenges" report (Boden et al., 2010), we can conclude that many future-oriented issues that have been identified thus far cover topics that are well reflected in sustainability indicator systems. Such comparisons can help policy making in terms of developing a better understanding of unsustainable trends and the respective needs for correction or prevention. Our findings also suggest that data collection could be enhanced to better monitor emerging issues that are currently not well covered by indicator systems. Today's sustainability indicator systems offer information on past and present states but provide limited support for understanding future developments. Combining sustainability monitoring with forward looking activities (FLA) could therefore enhance policy support in developing more adaptive and anticipatory approaches to better orient societal change towards sustainable development.
Erschienen im Rahemen des Projekts FUNalpin, Teil des Nationalfondprojektes "NFP48: Landschaften und Lebensräume der Alpen" ; Labelregionen sollen dank einem in diesem Bericht vorgeschlagenen Zertifizierungskonzept eine bevorzugte Berücksichtigung im Rahmen der Regionalpolitik und weiterer Sektoralpolitiken erhalten. Daneben soll das Regions-Label seinen Trägern aber auch Vorteile auf dem Markt bringen. Eine Zertifizierungsstrategie für Labelregionen, die in der Regionalpolitik und in den Sektoralpolitiken berücksichtigt und deren Label wirksam vermarktet wird, könnte die wirtschaftlichen Überlebenschancen von strukturschwachen Randgebieten zukünftig deutlich verbessern.
The long-term energy policy of the Canton of Zurich aims on maintaining respectively enabling a high, but eco-friendly living standard. Until 2050 the CO2 emissions are to be reduced from today approximately 6.0 tonnes per year and person down to 2.2 tonnes. By 2034, all remaining nuclear power plants in Switzerland, some of them among the oldest in Europe, will be taken of the grid (in accordance with the new political decision taken by the Swiss Federal Council in the wake of the Fukushima desaster). The overall target is therefore the transformation of the energy supply from a nuclear and hydropower based to a more sustainable one. Security of supply is often identified as one of the principle challenges in this context. For all these aspects, support and promotion of Innovation beyond R&D is a key relevance as well. The smart city concept is not only multi-dimensional but also future-oriented in tackling energy consumption and CO2 emissions. It follows an urban development strategy whereby focussing on how (Internet-related) technologies enhance the lives of citizens, empowering them for contributing to urban change and realizing their ambitions.
This report is the analysis of Subtask I - Helicopter overview of models, theories, contexts and evaluation metrics. It summarises almost 40 case studies from more than 10 countries. The case studies were provided by our national experts of the 9 participating countries, and other experts from countries that support this Task in-kind. The case studies were based on policies, programmes and pilots, driven from both, the top-down and the bottom-up. They were explicitly or implicitly based on various models of understanding behaviour or theories of change (of behaviour). They were collected from four main domains: transport, building retrofits, SMEs and smart meters, thus encompassing a very wide range of DSM interventions. Some came from government (both national and local), some from the energy industry, some from businesses, some from the third sector and some from researchers. Some have used similar models or similar approaches, but they all encompass a wide variety of themes, contexts and outcomes. There is a lot of shared learning in this report, and there are a lot of great stories.
Governments struggle with achieving their targets (often set in legislation) towards developing low carbon regions in Europe, i.e. smart energy regions. On top of the problem of climate change, concerns for security of supply and 'peak oil' and other resource shortages have added to the urgency of energy conservation. However, it is still thought that we are currently wasting up to 86% of our energy (cf. [1]) and that we will not utilise 2/3 of the energy efficiency potential in our economy by 2035 (cf. [2]). Supporting research in energy efficiency is therefore contributing to the European objectives in resource efficiency (cf. [3]). Today, energy efficiency is promoted under a variety of headings, including climate change mitigation, sustainability, eco-efficiency, conservation or energy self-sufficiency. Within the IEA DSM Task 24 Subtask 1, different programmes, pilots and policies (focussed on achieving better energy conservation, energy efficiency and peak load management) have been analysed in different countries in order to find out if and what behaviour change models or frameworks were used to design, implement and evaluate them, and with what success. Programmes, pilots and policies were also characterised in terms of targeted actors, scope, domain and durability of behaviour, using the framework of [4]. Of special interest is the question if there are models or frameworks which are better suited for certain programmes and energy sectors (this Task is concentrating on building, transport, SMEs and smart metering technology) than others. First outcomes of this analysis, revealing approaches for best practice and some main challenges, will be presented in this paper.
Erworben im Rahmen der Schweizer Nationallizenen (http://www.nationallizenz.ch) ; In this paper, we discuss key issues in harnessing horizon scanning to shape systemic policies, particularly in the light of the foresight exercise 'Facing the future: Time for the EU to meet global challenges' which was carried out for the Bureau of European Policy Advisors. This exercise illustrates how horizon scanning can enable collective sense-making processes which assist in the identification of emerging signals and policy issues; the synthesis of such issues into encompassing clusters; and the interpretation of resulting clusters as an important step towards the coordinated development of joint policy measures. In order to achieve such objectives, horizon scanning can benefit from methods of multi-criteria decision-making and network analysis for prioritizing, clustering and combining issues. Furthermore, these methods provide support for traceability, which in turn contributes to the enhanced transparency and legitimacy of foresight.
There is a clear and growing need for the capacity to anticipate change to be embedded in policy. This is critical not only to be able to respond and adapt to new situations before they occur, but also to shape the future, building upon mutual understanding and common visions to be jointly pursued. For policy responses to address all the pressing current global challenges, especially when these are seen separately from one another, is clearly a demanding task. Institutions face greater complexity and difficulty in providing solutions in due time. In particular, this is true when the policy focus extends beyond the challenges that societies face today, seeking to anticipate future challenges and transform them into opportunities. This is the rationale for the report "Facing the future: time for the EU to meet global challenges" based on a study carried out in the course of 2009 by the Joint Research Centre, Institute for Prospective Technological Studies (JRC-IPTS) for the Bureau of European Policy Advisors (BEPA) of the European Commission. The aim is to provide a comprehensive picture of the main trends ahead and possible future disruptive global challenges, and to examine how the EU could position itself to take an active role in shaping a response to them. The work described in this report brings a fresh perspective, by linking widely accepted quantified trends towards 2025 and beyond with experts' and policy makers' opinions on the likely consequences of these trends and wild cards.
Dieser Leitfaden zur Umsetzung von Smart-City-Initiativen in der Schweiz wurde im Rahmen des Programmes EnergieSchweiz für Gemeinden konzipiert. Das Bundesamt für Energie (BFE) fördert damit die Umsetzung der nationalen Energiepolitik in den Bereichen Energieeffizienz und erneuerbare Energie. Mit dem Programm EnergieSchweiz für Gemeinden unterstützt das BFE gezielt Projekte auf kommunaler Ebene.
Die nachhaltige Entwicklung von Regionen ist einer der Arbeitsschwerpunkte der Zentren Wirtschaftsraum Zürich (Dept. W) und Sozialökologie (Dept. L) der ZHW. Gemeinsam erforschen sie im Projekt FUNalpin des Schweizerischen Nationalfonds SNF, wie die neue Schweizer Regionalpolitik gestaltet werden könnte, damit eine nachhaltige Regionalentwicklung im Alpenraum gefördert wird. Dazu sollen die Veränderungen der ökonomischen Basis alpiner Berggebiete untersucht, Anforderungen und Normen für eine nachhaltige Landschaftsentwicklung erarbeitet und Handlungsmöglichkeiten aufgezeigt werden.
