This report covers a product development project conducted as Bachelor of Science thesis forthe Innovation & design engineer program at Karlstad University.The assignment was supplied by MMB Consulting, Kristinehamn. The purpose of this projectwas to find an alternative way of shaping wire-net insulation mats. This insulation product isused for fire and thermal insulation of technical installations. The insulation consists of stoneor glass wool with a sewn on steel wire netting on the out facing side. This netting has thepurpose to enable fastening to e.g.

Couch grass (Elymus repens (L.) Gould) is a severe weed in Sweden, and since both the use of herbicides and cultivation should be decreased, it will become increasingly problematic to control couch. The present work is meant to, by literature studies and an experiment, give some answers to the question if cutting and competition can depress the growth of couch. The experiment was carried out in the growing season 2001 at Ultuna, Uppsala, in plastic boxes. The design was three-factorial randomised complete blocks. The factors were plant combination, nitrogen level and cutting strategy.

Organic agriculture is financially promoted in Sweden by special environmental support and as consumers we are all encouraged to buy organic food. At the same time scholars at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences claim that organic farming does not provide any environmental benefits. The main criticism is that organic farming has lower yields than conventional, which means that more land is needed to produce the same amount of food as in conventional farming, leading to deforestation and loss of biodiversity. As for climate change, the critics claim that the significantly higher productivity in conventional crop production compared to organic, releases surplus land, which could be used for bio-fuel production and thereby replace the fossil fuels. The critics also claim that organic farming causes higher nutrient leaching than conventional.

The 1990s were one of the most profitable periods for European airline companies, mainly because of development of world economy and increasing globalisation trends. However, towards the end of the decade, a global economic downturn, high oil prices and new forms of competition turned the industry towards troubled times. The European air-travel industry had to face and accept the new airline business concept, called low-cost or no-frill airlines. In these conditions, traditional airlines had to rethink their strategies and question the old business model. As a response to the competition, European traditional full-service airlines formed alliances or networks to expand the route network and to increase efficiency.

Schmallenberg virus (SBV) is a novel arthropod-borne orthobunyavirus emerging in Europe in 2011 to 2012. Acute SBV infection causes diarrhoea, fever and reduced milk production in dairy cattle, but it is mainly the reproductive disorders (abortions, malformed foetuses and stillborn animals) in ruminants that have caused substantial economical losses. The prevalence of the virus outside of Europe is poorly investigated. SBV or SBV-like antibodies were detected in Mozambique in 2013, which raised interest for a similar study in Tanzania. In this study in Tanzania, blood samples were collected from 478 sheep and goats from 39 herds in 15 different villages in three districts, covering areas in the north, south and east of Tanzania. The epidemiology of the virus was investigated by tracing antibodies by ELISA and mapping of the virus by PCR was started.

This final thesis is initiated by the wood fuel department at the Swedish forest company Sveaskog as part of a project which also involves two other final thesises. The overall goal of the project is to investigate Sveaskog´s possibilities to produce and sell different wood fuel assortments in Västerbotten and the southern parts of Norrland. The aim of this thesis is to investigate how much wood fuel Sveaskog can produce in the area during the next five years and what that would cost. Furthermore the thesis will investigate the total possible supply of wood fuel from all other possible producers in the area. Treated assortments are forest residues from final fellings, whole trees from direct wood fuel thinnings, non industrial wood and industrial by-products from sawmills. The main effort to investigate Sveaskog´s production possibilities has been made to calculate the possible annual amount of forest residues and fuel from wood fuel thinnings that can be produced.

The interest in small-scale electricity in Sweden has increased strongly in recent years. The interest is noticeable both among politicians to increase the share of renewables in the energy mix, and among electricity consumers to partially replace purchased electricity with self-produced. This has resulted in a significant increase of electricity production in low voltage grids in recent years, and the trend appears to continue in the coming years. The majority of the new production plants are solar cells, followed by wind turbines, and it is also in these the greatest efforts are made in this paper.Distributed generation is often seen as something positive since it will contribute to reduced transmission losses and reduced voltage drop in the networks, and that it increases the share of electricity from renewable sources. In cases where the grids are not strong enough, or in other ways not adapted to manage the installed production, power quality may be adversely affected.

The amount of cargo has since the 1970s increased in Sweden and the road traffic accounts for a large part of the transported volume. In Stockholm County the amount of cargo is calculated to be doubled in size from year 2001 to 2020 which means a greater need for transport is required. Much of these transports are being carried out by haulage companies of varying sizes which acts externally as carriers for their customers. All of this despite a greater awareness, laws and demands regarding environmental performance.The trend shows that the haulage industry in Sweden are moving towards fewer but larger haulage companies, which means that the competition is getting tougher for the smaller haulage companies. Smaller haulage companies and research about their competitive strategies is a neglected part of this industry.

Tomato production is a common and important agricultural activity in Nicaragua. During the last decades tomato producers have suffered great yield losses due to begomoviruses (family Geminiviridae). The genome of begomoviruses generally consists of two circular ssDNA components, DNA-A and DNA-B. Tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV) is an example of a begomovirus with only one component. An approach to manage the virus epidemics has been to breed a cultivar with begomovirus resistance genes, which have been transferred from wild tomato.

The objective of this paper is to estimate monetary and non-monetary costs for the huntercaused by deer-vehicle collisions in Sweden. These costs include losses in hunting value as wellas time and money efforts related to the handling of wildlife casualties. The calculations arebased on available statistics from 2004 on deer-vehicle collisions involving moose, deer, roedeerand wild boar and on telephone interviews with hunters involved in the tracking of injuredanimals. Altogether, the annual loss in hunting value for moose was assessed to approximately30 million SEK based on the 2004 accident statistics. For roe-deer and fallow deer, thecorresponding figure was approximately 56 million SEK and 1.2 million SEK, while wild boaraccounted for 1.3 million SEK, respectively.

A common perception is that fungicide treatments increases yield, but that the nitrogen of the particular grain is diluted so that the overall removal of grain nitrogen from the field remains unchanged. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that a healthy crop reduces the risk of nutrient loss from agricultural land. The results from genotype and plant protection trials often show constant nitrogen content in the grain, although the yield has been increased. Results from such experiments are therefore processed in order to confirm this and show that it is no statistically significant difference between the protein content (and also nitrogen content) in crops which have undergone fungicide treatment compared to crops which remained untreated. The trials processed have been carried out in the southernmost part of Sweden and are distinguished to concern winter wheat production.The explanation to the results is that a healthy crop is able to maintain the biological functions of the plant in a more efficient way than a crop damaged by a fungal infection.

Vaccination of fish can be assumed to cause pain. This study was designed to see if we can minimize the suffering of fish following vaccination. Fishes are cold-blooded animals and thus more primitive than warm-blooded animals. Despite this, many organs, e.g. the nervous system, have the same basic structure as that of other vertebrates. The fibre system for conducting pain is more diffuse than in humans.

The energy sector is facing an impending paradigm shift. Today?s technology enables the end-user to generate their own energy locally at home. Furthermore, recently developed storage technologies make it possible to balance energy demand with stored energy and integrate district heating with the local power grid. This means that in the future heat and electric power will interact and energy flows is converted over energy boundaries.

Cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) is a root crop that plays an important role in many households in Africa. It is sometimes called ?Africa´s food insurance?. The advantages with the crop are that cassava is drought-resistant and it can grow in a semi-dry land. It is a perennial crop and does not require much labor.

The development of software was considered until the beginning of the 1990th as a cathedral like product development in closed companies. This way of development changed in the last decade. Open source software (OSS) development challenged this consideration significantly. OSS is produced in co-operation by skilled people, distributed and used by many moral agents. The result, the software itself, can be studied and modified.