Few issues have been exposed in media recently as much as the climate change issue. Afterthe documentary film ?An Inconvenient Thruth? presented by Al Gore was released in 2006,most of the world saw a lot of attention directed towards global warming. This was a turningpoint that is refered to in this dissertation an history-graded critical event, which is assumed tohave a significant impact on peoples lives.The purpose of this dissertation is to examine whether or not political parties in Swedenresponded to this critical event in the way that they, in their party programmes, haveformulated policies related to climate change. Alternatively if media produces an image ofpolitical activity which does not comport with the forming of actual political standpoints.

Something that all people have come across and more or less experienced is climate change. Climate change in itself is a very complex problem since there are no borders between countries that can stop the problem. The link between science and the public is largely in the hands of the media, since the media play an important role in defining environmental issues and to inform the public about research findings. In recent years, reports from the media showed a slightly skeptical and uncertain picture of this problem. This is despite the largely prevailing consensus among climate scientists that there is an anthropogenic climate change.

The aim of my study is to answer the question whether there is a potential for services by working horses in the Swedish municipalities. The Swedish University for Agricultural Sciences (SLU) and Swedish Farmers Union (LRF) has started a cooperation called Climate School (Klimatskolan), with the purpose to increase knowledge in environmental and climate related issues in context of agriculture. This Master thesis is in the framework of the Climate School.Global warming is a problem that gets much attention today. Global warming and climate change are two subjects that are very much in focus on the political agenda. The municipalities of Sweden have a big responsibility concerning environmental work and to develop their own environmental thinking.

Due to human influences on the climate an increase in Earth's mean temperature is today an accepted conception. With a rising temperature discussions have started how the climate in an area will change in the future. Equally interesting and important is it also to study the precipitation in an area. Precipitation is the factor, next to temperature, that affects most how a climate in an area looks like and feels. Since precipitation is connected to evaporation the latter parameter is also of interest to study.

With the climate change issues growing in importance on the social agenda, the field of urban masterplanning is of no exception when it comes to minimizing the carbon footprint in a variety of projects. The aim of this thesis has been to prepare the Carbon Critical Masterplanning tool, a software plugin for carbon dioxide emissions assessment developed by Atkins, to be used in Swedish conditions. The main targets were to improve the areas of the tool associated with energy conversion and renewable energy sources, and to test the tool in a real case. A planned construction of a new campus in Albano, Stockholm was chosen for the pilot study. A 3D model was built in the tool and the carbon footprint was calculated for a variety of combinations for energy supply to the future area.

It?s a fact that the climate is affected by the vehicle that runs on the worlds roads. But theconstruction of the road itself is rarely thought of as a climate threat. Svevia and the Swedish roadadministration have opposite views of how the construction of roads should be carried thru. It?sthe difference between those two construction methods that is the base in our thesis.The amount of energy use or the emissions are not analyzed for neither the Swedish roadadministrations nor Svevias construction models.

With the climate change issues growing in importance on the social agenda, the field of urban masterplanning is of no exception when it comes to minimizing the carbon footprint in a variety of projects. The aim of this thesis has been to prepare the Carbon Critical Masterplanning tool, a software plugin for carbon dioxide emissions assessment developed by Atkins, to be used in Swedish conditions. The main targets were to improve the areas of the tool associated with energy conversion and renewable energy sources, and to test the tool in a real case. A planned construction of a new campus in Albano, Stockholm was chosen for the pilot study. A 3D model was built in the tool and the carbon footprint was calculated for a variety of combinations for energy supply to the future area. The results show that use of locally installed renewable energy sources can reduce the total Climate impact when life cycle perspective is applied.

With the climate change issues growing in importance on the social agenda, the field of urban masterplanning is of no exception when it comes to minimizing the carbon footprint in a variety of projects. The aim of this thesis has been to prepare the Carbon Critical Masterplanning tool, a software plugin for carbon dioxide emissions assessment developed by Atkins, to be used in Swedish conditions. The main targets were to improve the areas of the tool associated with energy conversion and renewable energy sources, and to test the tool in a real case. A planned construction of a new campus in Albano, Stockholm was chosen for the pilot study. A 3D model was built in the tool and the carbon footprint was calculated for a variety of combinations for energy supply to the future area.

This study describes what impact activity within Wifstas, Matfors,Grönstas and Nolbys water protection areas have on the quality of the drinkingwater. It considers the use of the area, environmentally dangerous activitiesin the past and present, the geology?s part, what harm hydroelectric power damsmay cause if they break and how climate change might affect the area in thefuture. It also takes into consideration activities outside the waterprotection areas which might have a suspected impact on the water quality. Theresults of the study are that pollution from infrastructure such as roads, orwastewater from treatment plants may cause occasional contamination of thedrinking water, foremost due to flooding.

The attention on environmental issues has never been as huge as today. The climate is changing and more and more evidence suggest that the cause behind climate changes is an increase of carbondioxide into the atmosphere. The increase in turn is considerd to be an act of human activity. Therefore some companies have decided to become climate neutral and implement information technology in their business in order to reduce their emissions. This thesis has three aimes: to calculate a small company´s carbondioxide emissions, study whether or not information technology could help to reduce these emissions and furthermore find out why some companies decided to become climate neutral and describe the concept climate neutral.

In the faster growing pace of changes and competition in the global economy, factors promoting group effectiveness are of interest. How do components of leadershipstyle, especially transformational, team climate and selfefficacy correlate? To answer this question 3 questionnaires regarding leadershipstyle (MLQ), team climate (TCI-Short) and selfefficacy (self developed) were distributed to employees of a Swedish installation company (108 participants). Moderate positive correlations were found between climate and selfefficacy and between varying elements of leadership and selfefficacy. The leadership behaviour Contingent Reward correlated moderately with all climate dimensions and strongly with selfefficay.

I have done a study to see what perceptions held by two principals and four teachers, if adult behavior and attitudes towards each other will affect the climate between the students and put it in relation to the fundamental values of work and policy documents. I have also examined how they describe their work environment in their daily work and how they work to combat bullying.I have used qualitative interviews as a method to get answers to my questions. The interviews took place at two different schools, in which I interviewed a headmaster and two teachers at both schools. What emerged during the interviews were compiled and processed with aid based on previous research and theories which focus is in a social constructionist approach.The results as it shows in my study highlights a consensus among the interviewees that the personnel group working atmosphere affects the climate between the students and that there is a good understanding of the impact they have. The study also shows that the experience of their work climate affects by how the communication between management and staff looks likes and how many resources there are in the form of personnel.

It is extremely important that the construction of the environment where children and youngsters spend the majority of their days supports the progress of their mentality. That is why I in this study will investigate what a certain amount of teachers consider of the interplay between learning and environment and how they thought a satisfactory environment structure eras of learning and also what the teachers consider to be missing at this point.The schools where I gathered my material are located in Thailand but they use the Swedish curriculum as a starting point and the students at these schools are mostly Swedish speaking.An important element that I came across was the impact of the surrounding on how to shape and use the environment as a tool in the teaching. Thailand?s climate is different than the Swedish climate; I want to investigate if that has any effect in the teaching.The educational environment in schools includes not only the classrooms but also every other space closely connected. Earlier scientific research as well as those people that I used as objects for interviews agrees regarding the fact that a suitable and stimulating environment are one of the most impact on how well children learn.

Vegetation is a much appreciated element in our outdoor environment that has many advantages as well for the climate as for people?s health. However in some types of environments vegetation may be problematic. Especially in urban areas with limited space, solid surfaces, pollutions, and warm and dry climate. In these environments vegetations may have difficulty surviving and moreover it may have a negative impact on the environment around it.

The spruce bark beetle (Ips typographhus) is one of the 25 000 species of insects in Sweden, an insect of great economic importance because it can alone terminate forest of high value. During the past decade, insights of climate change received with increasing attention. If the future brings a milder climate in the north and therefore a longer growing season, one would think that it would only affect the forestry to the better? Yet in recent time, outbreaks after storm felling seems to occur more frequently. The Spruce bark beetle ruins millions of cubic meter of Norway spruce (Picea abies) in Sweden alone, with more frequent storm felling and a larger amount of wind thrown threes in the forests there will also be room for an advancing reproduction.