Around 85 percent of the total population in Sweden today lives in an urban environment. This means that the nature within the urban areas has come to play an important role for the human well being. At the broader picture, the nature within urban areas is profitable in many ways. It is therefore important for the municipalities around in Sweden to work for sustainability within the urban areas. Linköping adopted an environmental policy, in year 2001, from the delegate of the municipality.

This thesis is a product of research about how implementation issues occur due to the relationbetween bureaucrats and politicians. Our study treats the democratic dilemma that occurs whenschools are to implement environmental certifications. Through a comparative study we comparetwo schools in Norra Hisingen, a district in Gothenburg municipal where one of the schools iscertificated and one is not. By using theories from top down and bottom up approaches toimplementation we develop key factors that will lead us to answer our research questions.Through text analysis of policy documents and through interviews with bureaucrats we analyzewhat may be the causes for only one of the two schools to be certificated though Gothenburgmunicipal wish all schools to be. Through our analytical tool we can establish that the policydocuments are well formed according to our top down-theory and that these documents does nothave a major impact on the fact that one school is certificated and one is not.

This report is of technical character and treats how to plan a small building in Borlänge, Sweden.The technical components that have been treated in the report are the construction, foundation,installations and thermic abilities of the house. In addition to planning this house the report alsocontains a part that deepens in net zero energy buildings. The purpose of the report is toinvestigate if the house in Borlänge can be constructed to meet net zero energy buildingdemands.Energy efficient houses such as passive- and net zero energy houses are showing more frequenton the market in Sweden. Ongoing climate changes and growing consciousness about theenvironment in society have contributed to that the environment is a well discussed topic. Toconsume small amounts of energy and at the same time produce local energy is thereforesomething that lies in the future and future houses.

Presently environmental and ethical matters are in the centre of attention and companies producing sustainability reports have become more common. It has also started to become more and more ordinary to assure these sustainability reports by an external part. However, the amount of assured sustainability reports differs a lot between different countries.There can be several reasons for why the companies chose to get the sustainability report assured. Previous studies state that the choice to produce sustainability reports can be re-lated to theories like the legitimacy theory, stakeholder theory and the agent theory. Other aspects that can affect the decision to construct a sustainability report can according to prior studies be different company characteristics and the national culture in the country in which the company is operating.

The nitrogen cycle in freshwater bodies is complex and consists of many separate processes affected by a number of important factors for example oxygen concentration in the water, temperature and circulation. Knowledge of the different components of the nitrogen cycle exists; however, a complete and comprehensive picture is difficult conceptually as well as theoretically. The available literature illustrates that the research on nitrogen and the related freshwater processes is still associated with high uncertainty of how much of the supplied nitrogen from the catchment is transported with the water versus and how much is lost due to denitrification, sedimentation or uptake by plants. This report is an interdisciplinary survey of Nitrogen discharge permitting. The research focuses in particular on the decision-making process, the levels of scientific standard and the administrative framework.Application for Nitrogen discharge permits are decided by the Environmental Court with council from their own experts as well as relevant government authorities and organisations.

The European Water Framework Directive (WFD; 2000/60/EC) was incorporated into the Swedish legislation in 2004 through the ordinance Förordningen om förvaltningenav kvaliteten på vattenmiljön (SFS 2004:660). The objective is that all water bodies shall reach a good status by the year 2015. In Sweden the comprehensive plans of the municipalities can play a large role in reaching these goals. A comprehensive plan deals with the long term water and land use of the municipality, which can facilitate an early consideration of water management in the planning process of the municipality. In Sweden five river basin districts have been established in accordance with the Water Framework Directive.

The increasing public concern regarding the government?s priorities in spending public resources puts pressure on public organisations to address quality issues in their practice. In United Kingdom both BRTF (Better Regulation Task Force) (BIS, 2005b) and the Hampton report (BIS, 2005a) highlighted management and quality problems in public organisations in UK. These reports revealed obstacles within institutions? intent to offer recommendations and appropriate solutions for agencies working with legal enforcement and control.

There is an irregularity in the interregional migration in Sweden. An increasing proportion ofthe population is drawn to the metropolitan areas, which creates problems for the smallermunicipalities and towns when their population declines. At the same time, our whole societyis faced with a great challenge: we need to redirect towards a sustainable development, wherethe environmental issues are discussed and dealt with to secure that all present and futuregenerations are given equal opportunities to live a good life.The aim of this study is to, focusing mainly on the environmental dimension of thesustainability concept, examine the attractivity of housing with sustainability claims. Toanswer this, three research questions were used:? Was the migration motive to reduce their environmental impact a part of the decision tomove, among migrants who had moved to housing with sustainability claims?? If the motive was a part of the decision, how much impact did it have compared to othermigration motives?? Which factors in housing aiming at sustainability are considered important by peopleliving in housing with sustainability claims?The research questions have been answered using quantitative data, gained in the form of selfadministeredquestionnaires which were distributed in four different residential areas withsustainability claims in the county of Västra Götaland, Sweden.

It gets more and more important for companies to get involved in Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, when stakeholders now are more aware of the responsibility companies should take. Through their communication companies show how they take responsibility. Reflected by their goals by which they want to achieve acceptance and understanding through an open dialogue. The paper examines this issue. CSR is an abbreviation for Corporate Social Responsibility which is engagement in responsibility for companies and organisations.

Fuel produced from renewable resources is of big interest. In this project the difference between a few different renewable materials are compared on the matter of environmental load when ethanol is produced. The renewable materials that are compared are Salix, straw and reed canary-grass (rörflen). The cellulose in the material is cut down to small pieces and then hydrolysed so that the sugar from the cellulose can be fermented into ethanol. Tha amount of ethanols that is studied in this work is the smount of ethanol needed to cultivate 1000 ha. The functional unit in the report is 1000 ha.

Through extensive research it has shown that today?s sail boat owners are very frustrated concerning the limited choice of engine alternatives offered by today?s market. Besides rising fuel-costs, environmental awareness is very important in today?s society. Hence it is vital to find alternative environmental-friendly motors and replace combustion-engines. Zilent Ocean is an extensive project within Development engineering program at Halmstad University.

The purpose of this study is to characterize the research in the field of Knowledge Organization, during the period of 1990-2002, focusing on the subject and the epistemology of these studies. The result shows that studies concerning representation, e.g. subjects such as classification, indexing and bibliographic description, are the most frequently researched areas throughout the period. Classification was more popular in the beginning of the period, but later bibliographic description, mostly with studies on metadata, became more visible, together with a growing interest in information retrieval. The theoretical discussions in the studies focused primarily on document analysis and the organization of digital documents.

Aquatic organisms are usually not exposed to single substances but rather to mixtures of toxicants in streams located in agricultural areas. The transport of pesticides used in the agricultural area in Sweden is monitored with continuous environmental supervision every year. During 2002-2008 an average of 10 pesticides were found in each sample and 40% of the samples contained substances with concentrations higher than the Water Quality Standards. Chemical risk management is normally based on single-test evaluations. A problem when assessing mixture toxicities is that the constituents and concentrations of pollutants in the environment vary greatly.

There is an irregularity in the interregional migration in Sweden. An increasing proportion ofthe population is drawn to the metropolitan areas, which creates problems for the smallermunicipalities and towns when their population declines. At the same time, our whole societyis faced with a great challenge: we need to redirect towards a sustainable development, wherethe environmental issues are discussed and dealt with to secure that all present and futuregenerations are given equal opportunities to live a good life.The aim of this study is to, focusing mainly on the environmental dimension of thesustainability concept, examine the attractivity of housing with sustainability claims. Toanswer this, three research questions were used:? Was the migration motive to reduce their environmental impact a part of the decision tomove, among migrants who had moved to housing with sustainability claims?? If the motive was a part of the decision, how much impact did it have compared to othermigration motives?? Which factors in housing aiming at sustainability are considered important by peopleliving in housing with sustainability claims?The research questions have been answered using quantitative data, gained in the form of selfadministeredquestionnaires which were distributed in four different residential areas withsustainability claims in the county of Västra Götaland, Sweden.

Usability studies are not a central field of research in library and information science. Although literature in library and information science treats the importance of usable user interfaces quite extensively, the literature does not significantly treat potential problems in measuring usability. The aim of this master thesis is to investigate, through a critical analysis, the methods used when conducting usability studies in library and information science. The critical analysis is based on potential problems in measuring usability identified through a literature review from the field of studies Human-Computer Interaction, the concept of usabilitys original domain. The material which is to be analysed, is chosen from one library and information science journal Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology.