The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of how medium-sized construction companies adapt and how they choose to reorganize their operations in relation to the recession. The study has as its theoretical starting point theories about organizational learning, the impact of the economy on construction companies and strategies for dealing with recessions. The method used to conduct the study was semi-structured interviews with representatives from 15 different construction companies. The results of the study show that they used several strategies to adapt and reorganize the business in accordance with the recession. Some construction companies had to make cost savings as a result of the recession.

Abstract The objective of our study was to get knowledge about how teachers think when they make purchases to preschool. Do they consider making environmentally conscious purchases? Do they work actively to transfer environmental consciousness to the children?We chose to interview nine preschool teachers and one cook in two different local municipalities. Our investigation showed that there was a very low engagement in these issues. The teachers said that they were very strictly bound to already existing public contracts and did not see any possibilities to influence the preschools consumption.The teachers hade no idea that not only their work could result in environmental savings in the school, but also result in attitudes changes among the children, their parents and, in the long term, society in general.

pcSKOG-gård is a computerised manager plan for private forest owners, developed by the pcSKOG AB. The program is based on forest stand data, joined with a map of the forest and GIS-applications. The purpose is to offer a program for private forest owners managing the forest and with the possibility of updating the actual status of the forest. The company pcSKOG AB is the leading producer of programs for forest management and has developed the program since 1997. The program is currently the most common program used by private forest owners in Sweden. The aim of this thesis, leading to MSc in forestry, is to investigate the purpose of the private forest owners when purchasing the pcSKOG-gård. The thesis also studies how private forest owners use the program, what they use it for and how the private forest owners state that the program has achieved to fulfil their expectations. The thesis is also a market research concerning the knowledge and attitudes the private forest owners have about the program and associated services. The study material has been collected during two phases.

The purpose of this empirical study was to investigate if stress exists among nurses, and if it exists how do they experience it and how do they cope whit it. The nurses also got to define the word stress. Karasek and Theorells demandcontrollmodell were used as a theoretical framework. The result of the study answers our research questions and gives us a good insight how the nurses experience stress and how they cope with it. The result shows that 56 of 60 nurses indicated that they experience medium to high level of stress a couple of days a week or more often and that it affects their work.

In this report a study is carried out with the aim to identify added values of EPC projects implemented in schools in order to increase the interest of EPC projects on the market. The report examines how the planned maintenance, supervision, maintenance and corrective maintenance is affected, how insurance premiums and terms are affected, the indoor environment and how the tasks of the operating staff is changing. A literature study of energy savings, energy use in schools, maintenance and insurance as well as how energy efficiency improvements are related to the Swedish environmental objectives has been made. Visits were carried out in Ludvika, interviews were also carried out with operation technicians and local strategists in Ludvika as well as employees of insurance companies.Schools often have neglected maintenance and problems with ventilation and indoor environment. Schools also have a large energy saving potential due to their low utilization, mainly because they are empty parts of the year.

It is a well known archaeological concern that the remains of human bones left from the bronze age and early iron age Scandinavia are not nearly enough to represent the estimated population of the time. Furthermore the bones of each find rarely represent a whole individual. The majority of the bones must have been disposed of somewhere else, possibly scattered in running waters or in the fields, where they have evaporated or are securely hidden from archaeological excavations.This thesis deals with the grave concept and the problem in using a word that is so very clouded by its modern, western meaning. It also offers an alternative explanation to why the bones are handled the way they are and why they are found in such awkward contexts..

Modern technology and fast development of heat pumps, the hunt for savings in energy consumption and the strive for environmentally friendly energy sources, convenience, and financial profit, have made heat pumps a reasonable alternative for the heating of houses.When the heat pump starts it will consume a considerable amount of current, which may result in a short-lived voltage-drop if the power grid is weak compared to the start-up current.The company Fortum Distribution which owns and administrates electrical network is interested in an investigation that deals with heat pumps affect on the quality of electricity.The purpose of this investigation is to study fast electrical fluctuations (flicker) as a result of start-up currents for single as well as multiple heat pumps on the same electrical station and from this evaluate whether there will be any problems installing heat pumps..

The aim of this study is to investigate a specific form of Special Interest Tourism (SIT), namely health- and fitnesstravels. This kind of travelling is studied from a Swedish perspective and includes aspects like gender and age in active tourism. It also includes which travel motivations that lies beyond the choice of an active vacation.The study is based on a survey that was sent in an e-mail to the health tourism company InShapeTravel´s customers. The answers to the survey has been analyzed and related to earlier research about active tourism.The result shows that more women than men participate in the kind of healthy travels that InShapeTravel offers. A majority of the respondents are between 41-60 years old and the most common travel motivation was ?Better physic/psychic wellbeing?. .

Latent heat storage is a way to store thermal energy when a phase change material undergoes a phase change. The advantage of latent heat storage is the capability to store more energy per mass unit than other heat storage methods. The most commonly used phase change in latent heat storage is the transition between solid and liquid. Phase change materials can be divided into organics, inorganics and eutectics.In the Nordic electricity market the price of electricity is set every hour by Nordpool spot, which leads to price fluctuations because of changes in demand. The main goal of this report is to create a latent heat storage system in a single-family home and investigate the possibility to save money by charging the latent heat storage system when the price of electricity is low, and discharge when the price is high.The thermodynamic model consisted of a ?tube-in-tube? heat exchanger with phase change material in the outer tube and water as the heat transfer fluid in the inner tube.

The technological development and increasing popularity for integrated multichannel solutions constitutes both severe opportunities and challenges for todays' and tomorrows' retailers. On the account of consumers leaving traces when using digital channels and the technological development enabling retailers to use this information to create relevant offers, goal-congruity is relevant to apply in the multichannel shopping context. Based upon previous research on goal congruity and channel integration, our main purpose in this study is to increase the understanding for how congruity in an offer increases the intention to redeem the offer. Several studies focus on and contrast the product characteristics hedonic and utilitarian. However, it has been stated that it is crucial that research also examines the difference in target audience, buying situation and as examined in this study: buying decision process.

In this work an assessment of the compressed air system in the facilities of Vattenfall Heat Uppsala has been conducted. The facilities constitutes, among others, a combined heat and power plant, and two waste incineration plants. The compressed air is supplied primarily by seven rotary screw compressors and yearly electric energy consumption in these has been determined. Furthermore, the usage of compressed air has been mapped in order to find processes with energy savings potential. Several suggestions how to reduce the usage of compressed air have been presented, resulting in decreased need of electric energy and reduced CO2-emissions.The results show that total need of electric energy in the compressors, during a standard production year, amounts to 5.83 GWh.

In the informational age of today, continuous learning is of greatest importance. The demand for this seems to be increasing, while at the same time people are under more pressure to carry out more tasks in shorter amounts of time. A way to solve the problem of finding time to learn could be to make use of the possibilities that Internet offers for learning at a distance. The purpose of this thesis is to, from a pedagogical perspective, contribute to the discussion concerning Internet based distance education for a target population consisting of professionals. We have found that some of the courses included in the two certification programs which we have investigated are suitable for Internet based distance education.

LRF Konsult is a big consulting-firm with offices located all over Sweden. The corporation offers a wide range of services and a lot of the customers are small businesses active within the green sector. An analysis of the corporation made in 2006 showed that one of LRF Konsults weaknesses is that many customers are unaware of the wide range of services that LRF Konsult offers. The internal communication is believed to play a big role in marketing these services. Therefor, the objective of this thesis has been to investigate why the transfer of customers between accounting consultants and business advisors is not greater and how this can be improved.

This thesis, drawing from several empirical investigations, reaches the conclusion that there seems to be a positive correlation between the level of democracy and the level of state capacity in Latin American countries. This correlation is explained by a hypothesis derived from Rational Choice theory. With some important caveats, this conclusion is then applied to the discussion about democracy as a form of government. Within democracy, the thesis also offers an insight into different electoral systems and its possible implications, mostly on a theoretical level. The thesis only exists in swedish as of yet..

Upon marketing the system in Europe and the USA cost savings generated from reduced work force have been prevailing. Since the cost of labour is much lower in the Asia Pacific region other factors have to be stressed. The parameters of flexibility and quality assurance may however cover any initial investment in a production system. Our purpose is to value flexibility and quality in a manufacturing context, applied to DAS, in order to use it in investment calculations. In order to make an adequate estimation of different companies, due to problems associated with acquiring correct figures, the Key Success Factors needs to be examined so that the gathering of numbers can be conducted with more focus.