Landslide susceptibility mapping of the Sea to Sky transportation corridor, British Columbia, Canada: comparison of two methods

The Sea to Sky corridor stretches over a distance of 135?km into British Columbia’s Coast Mountains. The corridor has witnessed hundreds of historical and pre-historic landslides. In the last 154?years, 155 landslide events have been reported. The most common types of landslides are rockfalls and debris flows, which are small in volume, but can be quite damaging. These are more abundant in the southern part of the corridor where infrastructure is built close to steep slopes. Two different methods were adapted to create debris flow and rockfall/rock slide susceptibility maps. Both qualitative heuristic and fuzzy logic susceptibility maps showed a similar distribution of susceptibility zones, especially high susceptibility. Correlation of high susceptibility zones with occurrence of historical and mapped geological landslide events was very good. Success rate curves were calculated for extrapolated zones of initiation for debris flow and rockfall/rock slide deposits. Success rate curves were better for debris flow than rockfall/rockslide maps.     

Prospects for the incorporation of cobalt into α-Fe2O3 nanorods during hydrothermal synthesis

A feasibility study on the incorporation of cobalt into α-Fe₂O₃ nanorods (NRs) during hydrothermal synthesis (HS) is presented as a function of FeCl₃ and CoCl₂ concentration, phosphate surfactant concentration and pH value, with samples assessed using X-ray diffractometry, transmission electron microscopy, selected area electron diffraction and energy dispersive X-ray analysis. No evidence was found for the incorporation of cobalt into α-Fe₂O₃ NRs at low pH, whilst synthesis at intermediate and high pH values favoured the formation of CoFe₂O₄ NPs. The critical role of pH value over the precipitation, size and phase purity of the nanostructured reaction products is emphasised. At pH ~2, large, well crystalline α-Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles (NPs) and NRs were grown from FeCl₃ solution in the absence and presence of phosphate, respectively, whilst no evidence was found for Co precipitation or incorporation in α-Fe₂O₃ following HS in the presence of CoCl₂. At pH ~8, smaller α-Fe₂O₃ NPs, as well as Co₃O₄ and CoFe₂O₄ NPs were synthesised from FeCl₃, CoCl₂, or a mixture thereof. HS at pH ~12 produced a mixture of larger CoFe₂O₄ NPs and α-Fe₂O₃ NPs depending on the Fe:Co molar ratio. The formation of intermediate metastable (oxy)hydroxide phases is considered pH dependent, providing for a variety of different reaction pathways. Further, inclusion of preformed Co₃O₄ and CoFe₂O₄ NPs to the FeCl₃ solution at pH ~2 in the presence of phosphate surfactant resulted in the synthesis of α-Fe₂O₃ NRs with residual Co₃O₄ and CoFe₂O₄ NPs attached to their surfaces. The CoFe₂O₄ NPs encouraged local dissolution leading to the formation of α-Fe₂O₃ NR surface corrugations.     

Domestic demand-side response with heat pumps: controls and tariffs

ABSTRACT

Electric heat pumps feature prominently in projected energy transitions in the UK and elsewhere. Owing to their high electricity consumption, heat pumps are viewed as important targets for demand-side response (DSR). Findings are presented from a field trial of a new control system that aims to optimize heat pump performance, including under time-varying tariff conditions. The trial involved monitoring 76 properties with heat pumps, but without dedicated heat storage; 31 of these received the control system. Interviews were conducted with a subsample of 12 participants. The controller successfully evened out electricity demand over the day (reducing the evening peak), but this was associated with increased late night and daytime temperatures. Interview participants reported some disturbance owing to overnight heating and noise, as well as usability issues with the controller interface and hardware. These issues present risks to the future acceptability of such systems. While the system delivered short-term demand reductions successfully, longer-term demand shifting risked causing unacceptable disturbance to occupants. Future control systems could overcome some of the issues identified in this pioneering trial through more effective zoning, using temperature caps or installing dedicated heat storage, but these may either limit the available flexibility or be challenging to achieve.     

Energy and technology lessons since Rio

The 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change created the basic international architecture for addressing climate change. That treaty was negotiated at a time when the research literature examining emissions mitigation and the role of energy technology was relatively limited. In the two subsequent decades a great deal has been learned. The problem of stabilizing the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has proved far more difficult than envisioned in 1992 and the role of technology appears even more important when emissions mitigation strategies are co-developed in the context of multiple competing ends.     

PADUA: a protocol for argumentation dialogue using association rules

We describe PADUA, a protocol designed to support two agents debating a classification by offering arguments based on association rules mined from individual datasets. We motivate the style of argumentation supported by PADUA, and describe the protocol. We discuss the strategies and tactics that can be employed by agents participating in a PADUA dialogue. PADUA is applied to a typical problem in the classification of routine claims for a hypothetical welfare benefit. We particularly address the problems that arise from the extensive number of misclassified examples typically found in such domains, where the high error rate is a widely recognised problem. We give examples of the use of PADUA in this domain, and explore in particular the effect of intermediate predicates. We have also done a large scale evaluation designed to test the effectiveness of using PADUA to detect misclassified examples, and to provide a comparison with other classification systems.     

奔福玛吉尔酒庄 澳大利亚 阿德莱德

<正>奔富玛吉尔酒庄是奔富品牌以及澳大利亚最著名的红酒Grange的原产地,已被升级定位为南澳国际知名的旅游胜地。这一项目是对这个历史悠久的著名酒庄进行全面改造和提升,范围包括5公顷的优质西拉子葡萄树和酒庄上现存的历史建筑群和餐厅。新展厅与品酒间、先进的会议设施、教育场所、咖啡厅、红酒选购区、个人酒窖和为VIP地下酒库、美术馆和展馆区都为来访者带来一种独特的综合体验。