It is important to understand the process of appraisal of a business in order to establish its value. The purpose of our thesis is to establish which methods and models are used when evaluating a business and investigate the factors that may affect the value and price tag of a business. We have used a qualitative approach by conducting both indepth interviews and a survey as well as reading literature within the field. The main conslusion in our findings is that the common practice of discounted cash flow is widely used when bestowing a monetary value for a business, and in order to raise the value a well established customer relationship was the single most important factor. As far as lowering the value, the answers were of such a wide spread that a single factor could not be attributed.

The purpose of this study is to examine how risk is perceived by the urban architect's in the region Dalarna, as well as how this is reflected in their everyday work with risk and decision- making according to urban planning. The ambition is also to show how their risk awareness could be improved. The study is written in cooperation with Länsstyrelsen Dalarna as a part of their regional long-term goal to improve the region's proactive risk' and crisis management. The study is based upon 12 semi-structured interviews with local urban architects conducted during the summer and autumn 2007. The result shows that some architects are motivated for working with risk and think that risk awareness should be integrated in their everyday work, while others are not motivated and think that risk is more of a passing trend.

The aim of this study was to examine the current and historic mercury(Hg) load of the lake Storjuktan due to its recent exposure to a local potential source of Hg in form of the Sulphide mine Blaikengruvan(2006) and an earlier potential sources of Hg-load, the damming of the lake(1960s). Sediments were extracted using a HTH-sampler, freeze-dried, and analyzed for tot-Hg, LOI and activity of 210Pb and compared to samples extracted prior to the opening of the mine(2006). Constant initial concentration (CIC)-dating model was used for dating the samples. Low levels of Hg (100ng/g) were found throughout the lakes sediment. The highest levels of Hg(220ng/g) was detected at a depth of 4-5cm dating back to the mid 1970:s, suggesting that increased levels of atmospheric Hg rather than damming of the lake has caused the increase of Hg.

Background: Today many companies are competing to get space in our minds. Companies spend a tremendous amount of money on building strong brands. It is not just about making us aware of their logo, today it?s more about giving the brand a ?soul? and to load it with different values. Due to today?s globalization there is also interesting to look at it from a cultural perspective.

This study evaluates the retention of nitrogen and phosphorus in four newly constructed wetlands in the municipality of Falkenberg, Sweden. The four wetlands have been selected because they have been specifically constructed with the aim to reduce nitrogen and phosphorus in farming areas. The process of selecting the specific wetlands has been done in collaboration with the county administration in Halland. Through field studies in collaboration with the landowners where the wetlands are sited, the areas that provide the wetlands with water were determined. The size of these drainage areas were determined in a GIS computer program. The type of land use within the drainage areas was also determined.

The current standards for design of steel beams are divided into four classes based on the slenderness of cross-sectional parts. Depending on the section class a beams load capacity is either determined by a plastic, elastic or a reduced elastic model. The division between cross-sections calculated by a plastic and an elastic model is today done in a very harsh way with no smooth transition. This leads to a large difference in the calculated resistance for the sections located near the class limits. Elasto-plastic sections are in the current situation calculated as purely elastic and their large plastic reserve is not considered in the current standards.

As a consequence of increasing wind power installations in the Nordic grid the last years, the need for regulating power has become larger. In the Nordic grid, regulating power is mainly provided by hydro power. One part of the regulating power is called frequency control, which ensures that the grid frequency is stable and close to 50 Hz.However, setting the turbine into frequency controlled operation may cause stress and wear of the components in the mechanical control system. Frequency controlling implies large and frequent servo forces and longer travelling distance of the sliding bearings in the Kaplan turbine.Based on one selected Kaplan turbine, Selsfors G1, measurements and MATLAB calculations have been performed in order to determine forces and movements of the linkage system. With these forces and movements as input, stresses and fatigue have been determined as well as sliding distances, bearing pressures and wear of bearings during a typical lifetime of 40 years.The results indicate that no severe wear exists on the bearings during 40 years of service.

BACKGROUND: Today?s societal changes, including high rate of change and increasing information flows, are increasing the demand on the individual mental capacity. It becomes increasingly difficult to analytically process all the different dilemmas and everyday decisions as individuals have a limited mental capacity available to make these decisions. Thus, it has been suggested that ego-depleted relies more heavily on intuition, which is less burdensome, when making decision. However little is known about to what extent intuitive decisions differ from analytic.

This master thesis is a study of the Swedish hydropower capacity to balance wind power. The Swedish government has decided that it should be possible to produce 30 TWh from wind power in the year 2020. The Swedish municipalities have to have plans for wind power plants with total yearly generation of 30 TWh. Wind power is an variable energy source that needs to be balanced by other energy sources. In Sweden the Swedish hydropower can be used for balancing a large scale introduction of wind power.

This study evaluates the retention of nitrogen and phosphorus in four newly constructed wetlands in the municipality of Falkenberg, Sweden. The four wetlands have been selected because they have been specifically constructed with the aim to reduce nitrogen and phosphorus in farming areas. The process of selecting the specific wetlands has been done in collaboration with the county administration in Halland. Through field studies in collaboration with the landowners where the wetlands are sited, the areas that provide the wetlands with water were determined. The size of these drainage areas were determined in a GIS computer program. The type of land use within the drainage areas was also determined.

Today, we use BKR and BBK 04 when designing concrete structures inSweden, which will, in the near future, be replaced by Eurocode 2. When you are designing buildings, you will use Eurocode 2 Part 1-1 and with this new standard, some new rules and general rules will be necessary to adopt. To examine how BKR and BBK 04 tells apart from Eurocode 2 when designing concrete structures, one beam and one column with often common dimensions, is studied. The beam is designed with consideration of (considerate to) durability at bending moments, shear forces and control of cracking. The column is designed with consideration of durability at eccentric axial load and bending moments in cross section on account of (due to) geometric imperfections. BBK 04 has gone one step closer to Eurocode 2 than earlier editions and the things that are different, when calculating reinforcement, is how they use the partial factors.

Before the European construction standards were introduced in January 2011, it was mainly themethod in BBK04 that was used for calculating punching capacity in concrete structures, and in lesscommon cases the method in BHB. The method of BBK04 is easy to use and have had the samestructure since the first was published in 1979. The Concrete handbook method (BHB) where usuallyonly used when a higher punching capacity was needed and the cross-sectional height where fixed,calculations using this method entails more work, but will in return usually give a higher capacity. Italso allows the use of shear reinforcement to increase the cross-section capacity. The method ofcalculating punching shear in EC2 differs largely from the methods of BBK04 and BHB.

This master thesis is a study of the Swedish hydropower capacity to balance wind power. The Swedish government has decided that it should be possible to produce 30 TWh from wind power in the year 2020. The Swedish municipalities have to have plans for wind power plants with total yearly generation of 30 TWh. Wind power is an variable energy source that needs to be balanced by other energy sources. In Sweden the Swedish hydropower can be used for balancing a large scale introduction of wind power.

AbstractThe main aim of this study was to investigate if four humour styles, affiliative, self-enhancing, aggressive, and self-defeating humour can be related to all five dimensions of the Big Five Factor Model of personality and study if gender has any influence on those relation-ships. A survey questionnaire was distributed among 72 individuals from Kalmar County, in the South-east of Sweden. There were 42 women and 30 men. A humour test questionnaire, Humour Scale Questionnaire (HSQ), with 32 items was used and the Big Five Factor test with 40 items was used for personality test. The results showed that men have a more aggressive humour than women and that the older we get the less affiliative and self-enhancing humour we have.

Total organic carbon (TOC) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) are two methods used for measuring organic pollutants in wastewater. Both methods are widely used but the COD method results in production of hazardous wastes, including mercury.The purpose of this study was to validate the method TOC that will replace COD and find a factor to convert TOC to COD. In this study 26 samples were analyzed from four sewage treatment plant in the municipality of Enköping.The results show that the COD method could be replaced by the TOC method.The factor for COD/TOC was between 3.1 - 3.3. Both methods will be used in parallel until 2013 when it will be forbidden to use the COD analysis..