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Commentary24 February 2023
Ada Rocha and Cláudia Viegas
Food service comprises the production of meals consumed outside the home, including consumers from all age groups and in different sectors, such as schools (from kindergarten to university), public and private companies, the health sector (from
Food service comprises the production of meals consumed outside the home, including consumers from all age groups and in different sectors, such as schools (from kindergarten to university), public and private companies, the health sector (from hospitals to elderly care institutions), military, sports facilities and restaurants (from fine dining to fast-food). Food service units (FSU) achieved importance and responsibility not only for feeding the population but also as an important setting for public health interventions, potentially educating consumers and modulating behaviours through the meals provided. In addition to its socioeconomic impact, the food service industry has a strong environmental impact. More sustainable food service starts with the basics: minimizing environmental impact by reducing carbon footprint. Food service industry is being encouraged to make choices that positively impact the environment. Nevertheless, most of the efforts and research made in the last years have been focused on evaluating and reducing food waste. This article focuses on strategies that could be implemented beyond food waste, and act on changing the food offer towards health and sustainability while promoting consumers’ behaviour change.
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Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 2, Issue 1 (2023), pp. 10–15
122 Views35 Downloads
Short Note10 February 2023
Simone Pettigrew and Leon Booth
Autonomous vehicles will be a key component of the sustainable cities and transport systems of the future. However, there is little data available on effective methods of communicating with the public about these benefits to optimise
Autonomous vehicles will be a key component of the sustainable cities and transport systems of the future. However, there is little data available on effective methods of communicating with the public about these benefits to optimise uptake and achieve their sustainability potential. The aim of this exploratory study was to assess outcomes associated with exposure to various messages communicating proposed benefits of autonomous vehicles. Australians aged 16+ years (n = 1053) responded to two online surveys administered two weeks apart. The instruments included items relating to demographic attributes, driving factors, and attitudes to autonomous vehicles. Respondents were randomised to one of five messages referring to efficient travel time, economic savings, saving lives, mobility for the elderly and disabled, and job opportunities. Messages relating to saving lives and providing mobility for the elderly and disabled performed best, especially in terms of presenting a strong argument (62% agreement) and believability (67% agreement), respectively. The results provide initial evidence that public awareness communications could favourably influence attitudes to autonomous vehicles, potentially enhancing uptake rates to yield corresponding benefits. This information will be of value in countries where the roll-out of autonomous vehicles is a strategic priority to achieve sustainable cities and transport systems.
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Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 2, Issue 1 (2023), pp. 1–9
170 Views40 Downloads
Editorial22 December 2022
Highlights of Sustainability Editorial Office
Reviewers who perform an invaluable service to the scientific community are essential to ensuring the quality of the papers published in the journal Highlights of Sustainability. The editorial team of the journal Highlights of Sustainability would
Reviewers who perform an invaluable service to the scientific community are essential to ensuring the quality of the papers published in the journal Highlights of Sustainability. The editorial team of the journal Highlights of Sustainability would like to take this opportunity to thank the following reviewers for their time and effort in reviewing manuscripts in 2022. Their contribution and support helped a lot to improve the scientific quality of the published articles and enhance the scientific level of the journal.
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Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 1, Issue 4 (2022), pp. 253–254
419 Views87 Downloads
Article21 October 2022
Elena Bulmer, Magali Riera Roca and Julio Blas
Adopting a long-term perspective has helped companies survive in difficult times and overcome economic crises, recessions, and pandemics such as the current COVID-19. At present, the project management approach is changing from more authoritarian management models
Adopting a long-term perspective has helped companies survive in difficult times and overcome economic crises, recessions, and pandemics such as the current COVID-19. At present, the project management approach is changing from more authoritarian management models to frameworks that are based on the management of people and society. This article researches the concept of sustainable leadership in the project management profession. It evaluates the level of sustainable leadership among project managers in Spain using the Avery and Bergsteiner’s (2011) model of bees and locusts as a reference framework (Bee and Locust Sustainable Leadership Model). A qualitative study was carried out based on the analysis of the responses given by sixty-eight project managers in Spain who answered a 52-point ques-tionnaire. The findings yielded interesting results. It was found that in projects considered as temporal organizations, companies tended to employ a mixture of bee and locust’s leadership elements. Respondents recognized the importance of employee training and development, and most considered that it was essential to consider the environment when determining the organization’s commercial objectives. However, based on this study’s findings, the project management profession still has a long way to go as regards the practical implementation of sustainable leadership.
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Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 1, Issue 4 (2022), pp. 224–232
590 Views153 Downloads
Review8 August 2022
Ambe J. Njoh, Ijang B. Ngyah-Etchutambe, Fri C. Soh-Agwetang, Pascar T. Tah, Mah O. Tarke and Fotoh J. Asah
Ensuring access to clean energy for all—Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) #7—remains one of the most elusive SDGs in developing countries. This study reviews efforts to meet this goal in a developing community, namely Esaghem Village, Manyu
Ensuring access to clean energy for all—Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) #7—remains one of the most elusive SDGs in developing countries. This study reviews efforts to meet this goal in a developing community, namely Esaghem Village, Manyu Division in Cameroon. The efforts involved the use of a micro-off-grid solar PV system. The study employed primary data collected in-situ and from the project documents, and secondary data from electronic as well as conventional sources. The review is intended to highlight the impact of political, eco-nomic, social, technological, ecological, cultural and historical (PESTECH) factors on renew-able energy (RE) initiatives in a developing country. These are important but oft-ignored historio-cultural factors in the energy domain. The review reveals how one feature of indigenous African tradition, namely the self-help ethos can be harnessed to improve clean energy access in a developing country. It also showed how factors commonly associated with developing countries such as war, administrative centralization, bureaucratic corruption and ineptitude as well as poverty, thwart RE initiatives. The review underscores the importance of non-technical dimensions of RE projects and holds many lessons for the development, manage-ment and sustainability of such projects in developing countries writ large.
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This article is part of the Special Issue Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 1, Issue 3 (2022), pp. 159–170
559 Views217 Downloads
Article7 July 2022
Ogenis Brilhante and Julia Skinner
This paper uses the IHS Green City Conceptual Framework (IHS-GCCF) to present and discuss the development and application of a tool to measure Environmental Performance (EP) over time applied to ten Asian cities and a method
This paper uses the IHS Green City Conceptual Framework (IHS-GCCF) to present and discuss the development and application of a tool to measure Environmental Performance (EP) over time applied to ten Asian cities and a method using these results to implement a Green City Action Plan (GCAP) applied to the city of Manila. The tool measures EP over time and helps to explain possible factors contributing to the variation of the EPs in the studied time. The GCAP uses the EP results to develop a green city action plan to improve the current EP for a given period. Both tool and method fulfil gaps found in the green city literature, contain innovative approaches, and help cities to measure and plan improvements in their current EP. By applying the EP tool to ten Asian cities in two periods (2007–2009 and 2015–2018), the paper shows that Singapore and Hong Kong had the highest EPs and Bangalore had the lowest. Implementation of water management and climate change strategies are some factors explaining the improvement in Hong Kong’s EP. A strong increase in population size is behind the EP reduction in Bangalore. The Manila GCAP proposes to improve the current EP of the city from 15.43 to 17.41 in twelve years.
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Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 1, Issue 3 (2022), pp. 113–128
708 Views311 Downloads
Article6 May 2022
Marjan Marjanović, Wendy Wuyts, Julie Marin and Joanna Williams
The notion of circularity has gained significant attention from governments of many cities across the world. The approaches to circular cities may range from narrower perspectives that see a circular city as the simple sum of
The notion of circularity has gained significant attention from governments of many cities across the world. The approaches to circular cities may range from narrower perspectives that see a circular city as the simple sum of circular economy initiatives to those more holistic that aim to integrate the whole urban system. Several researchers proposed frameworks that would guide cities to take a holistic perspective. This manuscript selects two frameworks and examines through them whether and to what extent broader and more holistic approaches to circular cities are being developed in practice. First, circularity principles, the scope of circular activities, and the concrete circular actions developed in the case study are read through Williams’s approach to circular resource management. Second, the spatial circularity drivers framework of Marin and De Meulder is used to elucidate different sustainability framings and spatial practices that dominate contemporary conceptualisations of circularity. These two lenses are applied to five municipalities in Alberta (Canada) that have decided to develop strategies for ‘shifting the paradigm’ and transitioning to circular cities in 2018. Our study aims to investigate how holistic their roadmaps to circular cities are, and what changes are necessary to move towards more integrated approaches.
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Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 1, Issue 2 (2022), pp. 65–87
965 Views236 Downloads2 Citations
Review8 March 2022
Hwang Yi and Abhishek Mehrotra
Sustainable buildings tend to maximize power and information rather than efficiency. The multidimensional concepts and tools provided by systems ecology and thermodynamics aid the understanding of building performance and sustainability as part of the global and
Sustainable buildings tend to maximize power and information rather than efficiency. The multidimensional concepts and tools provided by systems ecology and thermodynamics aid the understanding of building performance and sustainability as part of the global and complex thermodynamic phenomena in living systems—energy is not concentrated, but it flows, increasing the flow rate of useful energy. From such an extended macroscopic perspective, this paper addresses holistic eco-systemic criteria of building performance evaluation, focusing on emergy (spelled with an “m”) and information—the two critical indices of extensive and intensive analysis. Emergy aggregates the utmost and upstream energetic impacts, whereas information evaluates the structural pattern of the energy-flow distribution. These indices are theoretically correlated under the principles of ecological energy transformation and are often practically compatible. To clarify the definitions and appropriate scientific contexts of the new indices for environmental building studies, we review information theory, ecological theorems, and a few pioneering studies. Emergy and information have a great potential for advanced environmental building analysis, but building-scale implementation of emergy, information, and system principles remains a scientific challenge. The findings call for further research into the improvement of building-specific emergy/information data and reliable evidence of the analogy between building and open living systems.
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This article is part of the Special Issue Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
Highlights of SustainabilityVolume 1, Issue 1 (2022), pp. 12–40
534 Views231 Downloads