基于引力可达性的公共服务设施公平性分析模型——以福建长汀为例

公共服务设施的完善配套已成为社会文明进步的标志,其空间分布的公平程度深刻影响着城市居民的居住环境和生活质量。本文引入了威布尔的引力模型,借助Arc GIS软件平台,尝试构建基于引力可达性指数的公共服务设施公平性分析模型,并以福建长汀为例进行了实证研究,以期为公共服务设施规划提供实用的分析方法和技术支撑。     

省级水利地理信息服务平台架构研究

面向专业应用的地理信息公共服务平台建设,是近年来地理信息服务的重点内容之一。本文以江苏省水利地理信息服务平台建设为例,系统探讨了专业型地理信息服务平台建设的主要设计思路、架构选型和服务接口设计等关键内容。研究期望为各类专业型地理信息公共服务平台建设提供借鉴。     

基于微信公众平台的智慧旅游系统的开发与实现

主要介绍了五大连池风景区微信公众账号的建设模式,微信公众账号作为景区的宣传推广工具,为游客提供智能化的自助导览服务,解决游客旅行前、中、后所需,实现智慧旅游移动端应用,集旅游推广营销与游客旅行服务构建一体化移动端产品。微信公众账号还将以二维码的形式,在"天地图·五大连池"门户网站、景区入口以及各大商场、酒店醒目位置展示,作为打通线上线下的必要环节,以提升游客访问量,形成智慧旅游O2O闭环。     

组团城市公交线网结构特征研究——以四川省南充市为例

以四川省南充市为例,从城市公交线路统计指标和线路网空间分布特征角度,定量分析了组团城市公交线网结构特征。研究结果表明:组团城市公交线网具有偏大的线路长度和非直线系数;公交复线条数和线路网密度在不同组团存在多个高值中心;不同剖面上线路网密度起伏显著;组团连接地带公交复线条数过大而成为通行瓶颈。这些特征增大了城市公交营运调度的难度,也给居民出行带来不便。     

Industry-academe linkages in the Philippines: Embedding foreign investors,capturing institutions?

The global sourcing of services from developing countries has made human capital a key local asset for attracting foreign direct investment. This paper analyses to what extent individual companies engage in linkages and collaborations with universities and how the education sector responds to the new demands of the knowledge economy. Offshore services are generally recognised as ‘footloose’ investments with limited local linkages. A case study of industry-academe linkages in the growing business process outsourcing sector in the Philippines finds that foreign investors engage in active embedding and develop linkages with human resource providers, leading to increased territorial embeddedness. This paper investigates the kind of linkages created, which actors engage in them and their motivations, to understand the resulting implications for local economic development. Interviews with foreign investors and higher education institutions reveal that most collaboration is initiated by large call centre companies and focuses on entry-level skills development for their operations. I argue that multinational corporations have been able to capture local institutions and introduce changes in the education system to supply mainly lower-end skills. While increasing the available talent pool and raising the competitiveness for further investments, this presents challenges for upgrading into higher value-added services and potentially transforms the country into a dependent market economy.     

Shaping climate policy in the housing sector in northern Chinese cities

What are relevant urban development investment strategies for improving building energy efficiency (BEE) and decarbonizing the urban district heating supply in rapidly urbanizing China? Different trajectories of BEE and energy supply technologies are compared in the urban context in a northern Chinese city. Vigorous improvement of BEE will significantly enhance the prospective financial capacity to facilitate deployment of backstop technologies (e.g. carbon capture and storage) in order to decarbonize the energy supply and achieve the long-term targets of low-carbon buildings. Carbon finance instruments should be used to facilitate public policy to accompany the necessary transition in the urban development process. The government-run efficiency procurement scheme will overcome the problem of insufficient incentive and high transaction costs associated with individual Clean Development Mechanism projects. Appropriate investment strategies (allocation of financial resources over the time frame) will allow local governments to harness the large potentials of carbon emissions mitigation while minimizing the risk of long-term technical lock-in in the built environment in Chinese cities.     

Effects of economic recession and local weather on climate change attitudes

How are large companies responding to the challenges of reducing their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions? An analysis of the published climate change policies and performance of 125 large European companies is presented. The results suggest that most large European companies have now developed the management systems and processes necessary for them to effectively manage their GHG emissions and related business risks. However, there is a significant disconnect between the targets that companies set for themselves and the more ambitious targets being set by the European Union (which has committed to a 20% reduction in its emissions by 2020 against a 1990 baseline). Of the companies surveyed, just over one-third had stabilized or reduced their total GHG emissions over the period 2002–2007, and fewer than one-third expected their emissions to stabilize or reduce in the coming years. The relationship between the quality of corporate policies and performance outcomes (in terms of GHG emissions) suggests that while companies with stronger policies are likely to have relatively better performance, only a minority of those companies with the highest-quality policies are committing to absolute reductions in their GHG emissions.     

Encouraging clean energy investment in developing countries: what role for aid?

A large portion of foreign assistance for climate change mitigation in developing countries is directed to clean energy facilities. To support international mitigation goals, however, donors must make investments that have effects beyond individual facilities. They must reduce barriers to private-sector investment by generating information for developers, improving relevant infrastructure, or changing policies. We examine whether donor agencies target financing for commercial-scale wind and solar facilities to countries where private investment in clean energy is limited and whether donor investments lead to more private investments. On average, we find no positive evidence for these patterns of targeting and impact. Coupled with model results that show feed-in tariffs increase private investment, we argue that donor agencies should reallocate resources to improve policies that promote private investment in developing countries, rather than finance individual clean energy facilities.

Policy relevance

We suggest that international negotiations could usefully shift the focus of climate change finance towards adaptation in exchange for mitigation-improving policy reforms in developing countries. There is little evidence that mitigation-related financing is having broader effects on energy production, so new financial arrangements should be the focus of future negotiations. Additionally, international donors should focus efforts on reforming policies to attract private investment.     

Achieving additional emission reductions under a cap-and-trade scheme

Over the last decade, cap-and-trade emissions schemes have emerged as one of the favoured policy instruments for reducing GHG emissions. An inherent design feature of cap-and-trade schemes is that, once the cap on emissions has been set, no additional reductions beyond this level can be provided by the actions of those individuals, organizations and governments within the covered sectors. Thus, the emissions cap constitutes an emissions floor. This feature has been claimed by some to have undesirable implications, in that it discourages ethically motivated mitigation actions and preempts the possibility that local, state and national governments can take additional mitigation action in the context of weak national or regional targets. These criticisms have become prominent in Australia and the US within the public debate regarding the adoption of an emissions trading scheme (ETS). These criticisms and their potential solutions are reviewed. A set-aside reserve is proposed to automatically retire ETS permits, which would correspond to verified and additional emissions reductions. This minimizes the possibility that ethically motivated mitigation actions are discouraged, allows for additional action by other levels of government, while providing transparency to other market participants on the level of permit retirements.     

Funding low-carbon investments in the absence of a carbon tax

Introducing a carbon tax is difficult, partly because it suggests that current generations have to make sacrifices for the benefit of future generations. However, the climate change externality could be corrected without such a sacrifice. It is possible to set a carbon value, and use it to create ‘carbon certificates’ that can be accepted as part of commercial banks’ legal reserves. These certificates can be distributed to low-carbon projects, and be exchanged by investors against concessional loans, reducing capital costs for low-carbon projects. As the issuance of carbon certificates would increase the quantity of money, it will either lead to accelerated inflation or induce the Central Bank to raise interest rates. Low-carbon projects will thus have access to cheaper loans at the expense of either ‘regular’ investors (in case of higher interest rates) or of lenders and depositors (in case of accelerated inflation). Within this scheme, mitigation expenditures are compensated by a reduction in regular investments, so that immediate consumption is maintained. It uses future generation wealth to pay for a hedge against climate change. This framework is not as efficient as a carbon tax but is politically easier to implement and represents an interesting step in the trajectory towards a low-carbon economy.