The decomposition of organic carbon in drained peat soils is a major source of carbon di-oxide in Sweden. A big part of these drained peat soils are used in agriculture and it is a big challenge to slow down their decomposition. It has earlier been thought that less tilling and higher water table levels would decrease the activity of soil microbes and thereby the decomposition, but recent experiments has showed that this has little or no effect. In this bachelor thesis a field experiment was made on drained peat soil with ley, outside Björklinge, Uppsala municipality, Sweden. The experiment was carried out in May 2011. The objective was to develop a method to examine how the net exchange of carbon diox-ide from plant covered peat soil is affected by temperature and photosynthetically active radiation (PAR).

The purpose of this report was to investigate how the abiotic factors (temperature, pH, nutrients, oxygen levels and water content) would affect the decomposition of oil-contaminated soil and how a variance in structured soil would affect the decomposition-rate. A minor field-study was made and soil where structured in five different ways (one was a default pile and was used as a reference). The study took place over 137 days and three samples were taken (start, middle, end) and analyzed for aromatic and aliphatic compounds. The result of this study shows that there is a significant difference between all methods for the aliphatic compounds and no significant difference for the aromatic compounds. The abiotic factors that affect decomposition vary from organism to organism, depending on what type of environment it will function the best.

From January 1st 2011 the use of Eurocode will be mandatory for all constructionprojects. Eurocode is the common European set of struc-tural design codes which willreplace BKR (Boverkets Kon-struktionsregler). BKR is the Swedish set of structuraldesign codes that was used up until December 31 2010. For consulting firms this willcre-ate a need for them to invest in the standards and in education for thecoworkers. This will involve both time and costs for the company.The purpose and aim of this master thesis is the development of compute examplesand calculations aid by dimensioning with Euro-code.

It is important for today?s farmers to minimize the costs for crop establishment, because of decreased prices and support from the EU. Farmers, who plow in autumn on heavy clay soil, often do some kind of tillage in autumn to get better soil structure before spring seeding. This is especially important when growing small seed crop, e.g. sugar beet and oil plants.

This bachelor thesis covers fire protection methods of structural steel and the aim is to develop an information tool designed for inexperienced structural engineers. The information tool covers basic fire protection methods and the general way to produce a fire resistance for structural steel. The layout of this information tool is a simple folder that contains information about the most important steps when producing fire protection for a steel structure.The thesis starts with a general overview of the fire protection needed in buildings to fulfill national legislative and regulatory requirements. To get an understanding of how steel components behave during the influence of fire, a brief overview is presented of the material properties of steel. This chapter also contains a review of previous research in the area.

An increasing demand for wood products in China has resulted in large areas invested in fast-growing tree plantations of eucalyptus. Eucalyptus plantations are often associated with an intensive management including fertilization. By understanding the effects of fertilization and where in the ecosystem nutrients are accumulated a more sustainable forest management could be achieved. In this study, a nutrient budget including all biomass and soil components was created for Eucalyptus urophylla. The examined nutrients were nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium.

In the report we have investigated four high-rise buildings with the intentions to find out witch parts are prefabricated and what relation can be found between structural design, prefabrication and the logistics. After the investigation we noticed that the grad of prefabrication in each one of the projects is good in relation to what purpose the building have and the given background. During the report we found that layout ? structural design ? prefabrication ? logistics is an order that we think can make the production of the building more effective if followed. We believe that the prefabrication of high-rise buildings have potential to grow and get more optimized in the future..

This study was made on former agricultural areas that had been planted with spruce or pine, in the county of Västerbotten. The goal of the project was to investigate suspected deficiency of boron in these areas. Several objects have been reported for possible deficiency and some of these have the characteristic symptoms of boron-deficiency. The hypotheses are that 1) Boron deficiency is present at several of the investigated objects. 2) Planting of forest on cultivated postglacial sediments leads to a successive podzolisation with a decreasing content of organic matter in the mineral soil, due to decomposition, and a decreasing pH in the soil, even on locations that have been added lime. To be able to confirm or reject the hypotheses a number of tests were performed.

Nitrogen deposition leads to environmental damage in areas where the nitrogen deposition is high. Southwest Sweden receives an annual nitrogen deposition of up to 20 kg N/ha. Nitrogen that is not assimilated by the vegetation is accumulated in the soil, which may lead to nitrogen saturation and an elevated risk of nitrogen leaching. Nitrogen leaching from forest areas in southern Sweden has proven to be higher than from agricultural areas, which have been thought to be the main contributors to elevated nitrogen levels in rivers and lakes. The amount of nitrogen that leaches depends on the fraction of the total nitrogen in the soil that consists of nitrate, since nitrate is easily transported through the soil.

Swedish agriculture has gone through big changes in the latest 60 years. The farm sizes have increased, which has led to raised tractor and machinery sizes and therefore increasing problems with soil compaction. A method to reduce these problems is to implement controlled traffic farming, CTF. All field operations are then concentrated to specific tracks by using GPS guidance. The aim of this work was to study how the tillage regime, with or without CTF, affects the soil, with the main focus on macroporosity. In Säby close to Uppsala, and Alnarp close to Malmö, randomized block trials has been carried out, and the data has mainly been taken from these trials.

Based on laboratory studies with lysimeters, the concentrations of dissolved reactive phosphorus(DRP) and particulate phosphorus, which is the main part of other P (OVRP), has been studied inpercolating water. The experiment was conducted through irrigation of small soil columnscontaining clay topsoil from an experimental field in Västergötland. Three rain simulations wereconsecutively performed. DRP concentrations in the percolating water ranged between 0.2 - 0.3mg·Lclearly related to the phosphorus concentration in the soil, measured in a soil extract ofammonium lactate (P-AL). Concentrations of OVRP were relatively low and ranged between0.12 and 0.16 mg·Lwas not proven and the experiment may reflect how a relatively slow percolation of water mayrelease DRP.

This study was conducted in Kkingo district, west of Masaka, Uganda. It compared soil macrofauna abundance in non-agroforestry farms with that of agroforestry farms. The agroforestry farms had participated in the Vi Agroforestry´s program between 1995 and 2006, and continued on their own after 2006, when Vi Agroforestry left the area. The soil macrofauna is important for soil structure and processes that are contributing to soil organ-ic matter decomposition and nutrient mineralization. They are also predators of potential pests.

Phosphorus is essential to all plants and is taken up from the soil as the ion H2PO4 - (and to some extent HPO42-). Plant availability depends on, among other factors, the soil pH. In order to provide for plant available phosphorus, it is applied as mineral fertilizers and farmyard manure. However, that causes phosphorus leaching from arable land to surrounding surface waters and lakes and contributes to the eutrofication. There are three types of soils in Sweden that are at higher risk of contributing to phosphorus leakage.

A literature study and a field trial have been carried out in order to investigate the physiological response of potato plants to different soil moisture levels. Higher yield, quality and number of tubers can according to the literature be obtained if constant high soil moisture is kept during major parts of the growing season. A field trial was set up where drip irrigation was used as an alternative to conventional irrigation techniques to maintain high and constant soil moisture. The application of water in the drip irrigated area was monitored and adjusted on a daily basis so that the soil moisture stayed as close as possible to the recommended level. The sprinkle irrigated area was irrigated according to traditional practices with approximately 35 mm every 7th to 10th day depending on the whether.

The Arctic region appears as a pristine remote environment, yet there is increasing evidence that it is greatly impacted by pollution such as lead (Pb) and mercury (Hg). In this environment deposition of Hg has increased threefold since the last industrial revolution. In this study five cryosolic soil profiles within non-sorted circles (NSC) in the Abisko region, northwest of Sweden, has been analyzed to improve our understanding regarding how pollutants are distributed within such type of soil. The soil samples have been analyzed with the use of X-ray fluorescence analysis (XRF), for the measurements of the total concentrations of e.g. lead (Pb) and zirconium (Zr).