The current demanding business environment requires corporations to act fast in finding effective solutions to problems given the myriad of challenges they face (Dyllick & Hockerts, 2001). The challenges include the impact of climate change on business practices, natural resource consumption, chemical pollution, technological change etc. Moreover, the forces of globalization, heightened concerns about the deteriorating quality of the physical environment and increased stakeholder power are also increasingly having a real influence on business practices (Rainey, 2008). Since 1992, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) has encouraged the adoption of the concept of ecological efficiency (eco-efficiency) to support business efforts aimed at addressing some of these challenges. The aim of eco-efficiency is to reduce the amount of energy and materials used in production processes to achieve economic and environmental benefits (WBCSD, 2000).

In this paper we examine the possibilities to develop the population based research in Sweden by using technological advancements. The problem that exists with population based research today is that there is a contrast between conducting important research on one side and preserving the individuals? integrity on the other. To examine this problem we are studying two projects that are active in this area. The two projects are SIMSAM (Swedish Initiative for research on Microdata in the Social and Medical Sciences) and DDB (Demografiska databasen).

The purpose of this study has been to increase the awareness of what significance models of explanation have for intervention programmes, aimed at perpetrators of intimate partner violence, within the Swedish social services. The study is not gender neutral, it centres on male batterers in heterosexual relationships. The study is based on qualitative interviews with five people working within the topical field. I analyzed their statements using an ecological model of understanding violence. The main finding was that the people I interviewed had a multiple understanding when it came to comprehending the violence, but that when it came down to the actual intervention they targeted mainly on elements in the individual spectra, such as feelings of frustration.

The activities of beavers in forested landscapes affect both ecological and economical values. The creation of the dynamic wetland mosaic associated to beaver activities can even improve the quality of water and have been documented as an important landscape engineer affecting the environment for many species. The local office of Sveaskog in Skinnskatteberg is responsible for the management of large areas of the forests in the County of Västmanland. In this area one of several company?s goals are to create ten new wetlands in their own forests as a part of cooperation with the Swedish bird society and Swedish wetland association.

Facebook is the most widely used social media in Sweden. It allows the user to easily share the latest from their everyday life, their opinions, as well as communicate with their acquaintances. According to the latest poll from the Foundation for Internet Infrastructure, 33% of teenagers in the ages 12-15 spend their Internet time being active on social media. 63% of these teenagers visit Facebook on daily basis.Herein, we examined how Facebook can be exploited as a complement to the education of the mother tongue. The investigation was performed with a questionnaire as well as a test group that has been supplemented with semi-structured interviews. In conclusion, the study showed promising results in the usage of Facebook with the education.

ABSTRACT System development has become more and more concentrated on development for the Web and this has resulted in larger target groups. It will most surely continue to be so considering that the Web will be the infrastructure of business and services in the future. A big target group involves that the owner of a system can earn a lot of money from the paying users, but that assumes that the system can meet user needs. If a system on the Web does not satisfy the user?s demands then they will use the competitor?s system instead because it is only a mouse-click away.

Technological advancements in information and communication technologies (ICT) have resulted ina need to use ICT in schools. Sweden has actively promoted ICT in schools since the early 1980's.In Japan, 1994 saw the government's first step towards active promotion of ICT in education. In thisstudy, we have compared the strategies used to promote the use of ICT in elementary and secondaryschools in Sweden and Japan. Our findings suggest that a similar 3-step approach was used in bothcountries: 1, infrastructure; 2, effective use of ICT; 3, implementation of ICT. A significantdifference was found in the way the two countries planned their strategies.

BankID är en tjänst för elektronisk identifiering och underskrift på Internet. Tjänsten tillhandahålls av flertalet större svenska banker i dagsläget. BankID bygger på så kallad mjuk certifiering vilket innebär att varje ansluten person måste lagra en fil innehållandes en certifikatnyckel. Målet med denna uppsats är att utföra en fallstudie på användare av BankID. Fallstudien ämnar undersöka hur säkerhetsmedvetandet ser ut hos innehavare av BankID samt hur innehavarna av BankID nyttjar tjänsten.

The purpose of this essay is to compare two investigationprojects /evaluationproject (BBICOHPeL) regarding theoretical anchoring and operationmethods. Important questions in our research has been: What from BBIC can be found in the OHPeL-project, what has become of the fundamentals in BBIC when they have been introduced into this new context, has the ecological development theory remained in the OHPeL-project, is it possible to say that the OHPeL-project is a further development, distortion or something completely different from BBIC. To find answers to our questions we have studied 17 protocols from evaluationmeetings in the OHPeL project. This led us to the results that BBIC in many ways are present in the project. There are also differences between the projects.

The members of the OECD have agreed on giving aid assistance to developingcountries in a way of promoting their own capacity of handling the challengeof poverty and development. The members also cooperate and coordinate theiraid to recipient countries in the purpose of giving as effective assistance aspossible. The aid from these countries is often intended to human rights,democracy and has a humanitarian idea. This is the way from the OECDcountries. The Chinese way of giving aid mostly aimed at the industry of therecipient to promote the economic growth to lift the country out of poverty.The Chinese way do not aim or intend their aid at promoting human rights ordemocracy, often just industry and infrastructure.

Detta examensarbete har utförts på högskoleingenjörsprogrammet för Byggteknik och Design vid Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan i samarbete med Svensk Bygglogistik AB. Arbetet diskuterar betydelsen av byggnadslogistik i ett infrastrukturprojekt för att uppnå en högre utnyttjandegrad för grävmaskiner med stöd av logistiksamordningsverktyg.Sammanlagt har 2150 mätningar utförts under två veckors tid för att kartlägga utnyttjandegraden för en bandgrävare (EC250CL) och en hjulgrävare (Atlas 1505M) på ett referensprojekt i Stockholmsregionen. Resultatet har sammanställts separat för de olika resurserna genom att redovisa och analysera andelen outnyttjad tid och de bakomliggande orsakerna till den outnyttjade tiden.Resultatet visar att utnyttjandegraden för bandgrävaren är 53 % och 59 % för hjulgrävaren vilket tyder på att ett förbättringsutrymme finns.Avslutningsvis diskuteras rekommendationer för hur användning av logistiksamordningsverktyg kan utökas inom anläggningssidan..

Embedded Systems Lab at Umeå University is currently part of a research project with the purpose to examine the behavior of dairy cows inside a barn. Each cow needs to be tracked with a precision of 50 cm, and since GPS-technique has poor functionality at indoor environments, an indoor positioning system needs to be developed.Embedded Systems Lab has already developed an indoor positioning system using IR-light and radio, but since this system demands extensive infrastructure and is rather expensive, an alternate positioning system using ultrasonic pulses and radio is being examined.In this report the range, beam angle and current consumption of ultrasonic transmitters- and receivers are investigated. Three different driver stages for the transmitter is tested, and two amplifier solutions for the receiver. The report also describes how the length of the transmitted ultrasonic pulse affects the received signal, accessibility of a ?shadowed? signal, and the effect of different sound frequency..

Biodiversity can be described as the total variation of life forms, where diversity ranges from gene level up to the ecosystem level. The diversity can be calculated in a number of ways, and this study use one of these methods. In this study empirical food webs have been used and analyzed, where eleven characters are defined and used as parameters to calculate the Euclidean distances between food webs that describe the variation that may exist within classes of terrestrial, marine and freshwater habitats. The class who stood out and showed the greatest diversity at the ecosystem level was the marine food webs, which showed a high value of the average euclidean distance. The other networks were not as distinctive and the average of the euclidean distance in these classes was comparatively low..

Statliga myndigheter använder i allt större utsträckning öppna system, så som Internet, i sin kommunikation med medborgare, företag och andra myndigheter, därmed ställs allt högre krav på säkerhet och tillit. I takt med den ökade användningen av elektronisk kommunikation uppstår nya problem. Några av dessa är att vi inte med säkerhet vet vem vi kommunicerar med, vem som beställer tjänster och att vi inte kan vara säkra på att information kommer till rätt person eller har ändrats på vägen. Verktyg som finns för att lösa dessa problem och öka säkerheten är digitala signaturer och elektronisk identifiering. Med detta som bakgrund ställde vi oss följande frågor, vilken teknik ska statliga myndigheter använda för elektronisk identifiering och signering? Vilken teknik ska användas för att uppfylla kraven på säker elektronisk överföring? Kan statliga myndigheter ersätta traditionella namnunderskrifter med kvalificerade elektroniska signaturer? Syftet med vår uppsats blir därför att i första hand redogöra för hur statliga myndigheter avser att ersätta traditionella namnunderskrifter med kvalificerade elektroniska signaturer.

Through this thesis, we want to discuss how the marginalization of people, several precedent political, city planning- and engineering decisions resulted in a catastrophic outcome after hurricane Katrina in New Orleans 2005. We also put forward a case study of the Make It Right Foundation, to demonstrate how the residents of the Lower Ninth Ward are involved in the urban development of their community. We would like to draw attention to the power of citizens and how they can influence the urban development of a community after a trauma. This study also focuses on the mission of The Make It Right Foundation: which is to rebuild the Lower Ninth Ward with firm concepts on sustainable development where all dimensions are accounted: ecological, social, cultural and economic. The empirical data was collected by a field study in New Orleans 2010-03-22 and semistructured interviews were made during the same days..