Social scientists of conservation typically address sources of legitimacy of conservation policies in relation to local communities’ or indigenous land rights, highlighting social inequality and environmental injustice. This chapter reflects on the underlying ethics of environmental justice in order to differentiate between various motivations of conservation and its critique. Conservation is discussed against the backdrop of two main ethical standpoints: preservation of natural resources for human use, and protection of nature for its own sake. These motivations will be examined highlighting mainstream conservation and alternative deep ecology environmentalism. Based on this examination, this chapter untangles concerns with social and ecological justice in order to determine how environmental and human values overlap, conflict, and where the opportunity for reconciliation lies, building bridges between supporters of social justice and conservation. https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783319713113#aboutBook LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenkopnina/
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Energiebeheer gericht aanpakken, Het analyseren van doelstellingen, resultaten en impacts van energie- en broeikasgasbeheersprogramma’s in bedrijven (met een samenvatting in het Nederlands): De wereldwijde uitstoot van broeikasgassen moet drastisch worden teruggebracht om de mondiale stijging van de temperatuur tot het relatief veilige niveau van maximaal 2 graden Celsius te beperken. In de komende decennia zal de verbetering van de energie-efficiëntie de belangrijkste strategie zijn voor het verminderen van de energiegerelateerde uitstoot van broeikasgassen. Hoewel er een enorm potentieel is voor verbetering van de energie-efficiëntie, wordt een groot deel daarvan nog niet benut. Dit wordt veroorzaakt door diverse investeringsbarrières die de invoering van maatregelen voor energie-efficiëntie verbetering verhinderen. De invoering van energiemanagement wordt vaak beschouwd als een manier om dergelijke barrières voor energiebesparing te overwinnen. De invoering van energiemanagement in bedrijven kan worden gestimuleerd door de introductie van programma's voor energie-efficiëntie verbetering en vermindering van de uitstoot van broeikasgassen. Deze programma's zijn vaak een combinatie van verschillende elementen zoals verplichtingen voor energiemanagement; (ambitieuze) doelstellingen voor energiebesparing of beperking van de uitstoot van broeikasgassen; de beschikbaarheid van regelingen voor stimulering, ondersteuning en naleving; en andere verplichtingen, zoals openbare rapportages, certificering en verificatie. Tot nu toe is er echter beperkt inzicht in het proces van het formuleren van ambitieuze doelstellingen voor energie-efficiëntie verbetering of het terugdringen van de uitstoot van broeikasgassen binnen deze programma's, in de gevolgen van de invoering van dergelijke programma's op de verbetering van het energiemanagement, en in de impact van deze programma's op energiebesparing of de vermindering van de uitstoot van broeikasgassen. De centrale onderzoeksvraag van dit proefschrift is als volgt geformuleerd: "Wat is de impact van energie- en broeikasgasmanagement programma’s op het verbeteren van het energiemanagement in de praktijk, het versnellen van de energieefficiëntie verbetering en het beperken van de uitstoot van broeikasgassen in bedrijven?".
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The purpose of this paper is to perform a metaphorical analysis of knowledge as energy. This paper is based on a theoretical research concerning the nature, perception, basic laws and challenges brought up by these fundamental concepts of knowledge and energy. The metaphorical analysis of knowledge and intellectual capital has been initiated by Daniel Andriessen and his findings have been presented in several seminal works (Andriessen, 2006; 2008; Andriessen and Boom, 2007). In his work, Andriessen concluded we need to find new metaphors for knowledge. In our theoretical research we shall consider the knowledge as energy metaphor, with energy as the source domain, and knowledge as the target domain, and we are interested in identifying the metaphorical semantic kernel and the limitations of this analysis. The semantic kernel contains: (1) the concept of field as a nonuniform and nonlinear distribution of knowledge; (2) dynamics of potential and kinetic forms of manifestations; (3) dynamics of work and heat, and (4) entropy and syntropy process characteristics. Limitations of this analysis come from the conservation laws of energy transformation which cannot be applied to the knowledge domain.
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Justice for nature remains a confused term. In recent decades justice has predominantly been limited to humanity, with a strong focus on social justice, and its spin-off – environmental justice for people. We first examine the formal rationale for ecocentrism and ecological ethics, as this underpins attitudes towards justice for nature, and show how justice for nature has been affected by concerns about dualisms and by strong anthro-pocentric bias. We next consider the traditional meaning of social justice, alongside the recent move by some scholars to push justice for nature into social justice, effectively weakening any move to place ecojustice centre-stage. This, we argue, is both unethical and doomed to failure as a strategy to protect life on Earth. The dominant meaning of ‘environmental justice’ – in essence, justice for humans in regard to environmental issues – is also explored. We next discuss what ecological justice (ecojustice) is, and how academia has ignored it for many decades. The charge of ecojustice being ‘antihuman’ is refuted. We argue that distributive justice can also apply to nature, including an ethic of bio-proportionality, and also consider how to reconcile social justice and eco-justice, arguing that ecojustice must now be foregrounded to ensure effective conservation. After suggesting a ‘Framework for implementing ecojustice’ for conservation practitioners, we conclude by urging academia to foreground ecojustice. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2018.09.011 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenkopnina/
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Energy efficiency has gained a lot of prominence in recent debates on urban sustainability and housing policy due to its potential consequences for climate change. At the local, national and also international level, there are numerous initiatives to promote energy savings and the use of renewable energy to reduce the environmental burden. There is a lot of literature on energy saving and other forms of energy efficiency in housing. However, how to bring this forward in the management of individual housing organisations is not often internationally explored. An international research project has been carried out to find the answers on management questions of housing organisations regarding energy efficiency. Eleven countries have been included in this study: Germany, the United Kingdom (more specifically: England), France, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Austria and Canada. The state of the art of energy efficiency in the housing management of non-profit housing organisations and the embedding of energy efficiency to improve the quality and performance of housing in management practices have been investigated, with a focus on how policy ambitions about energy efficiency are brought forward in investment decisions at the estate level. This paper presents the conclusions of the research
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As many in society work towards global sustainability, we live at a time when efforts to conserve biodiversity and geodiversity, and combat climate change, take place simultaneously with land grabs by large corporations, food insecurity, and human displacement through an ecological breakdown. Many of us seek to reconcile more-than-human nature and human nature and to balance intrinsic value and the current human expansion phase. These and other challenges will fundamentally alter the way people, depending on their worldview and ethics, relate to communities and the environment. While environmental problems cannot be seen as purely ecological because they always involve people, who bring to the environmental table their different assumptions about nature and culture, so are social problems connected to environmental constraints. Similarly, social problems are fundamentally connected to environmental constraints and ecological health. While nonhumans cannot bring anything to this negotiating table, the distinct perspective of this book is that there is a need to consider the role of nonhumans as equally important stakeholders – albeit without a voice. This book develops an argument that human-environmental relationships are set within ecological reality and ecological ethics. Rather than being mutually constitutive processes, humans have obligate dependence on nature, not vice versa. We argue that over-arching ecological ethics is necessary to underpin conservation in the long-term. This requires a holistic ‘justice’, where both social justice (for humans) and ecological justice (for nature) are entwined. However, given the escalating environmental crisis and major extinction event we face, and given that social justice has been dominant for centuries, we believe that in many cases ecojustice will need to be prioritized. This will depend on the situation, but we feel that under ecological ethics, holistic ethics cannot always allow social justice to dominate, hence there is an urgent need to prioritize ecojustice today. Accordingly, this book will deal with questions of both social and ecological justice, putting forth the idea that justice for both humans and nonhumans and their habitats can only be achieved simultaneously. This book will explore the following questions: What is the relationship between social and ecological justice? How might we integrate social and ecological justice? What are the major barriers to achieving this simultaneous justice? How can these barriers be overcome? What are the major debates in conservation relevant to this? doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-13905-6 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenkopnina/
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The conservation of our heritage buildings is a European wide policy objective. Historical buildings are not only works of art, but embody an important source of local identity and form a connection to our past. Protection agencies aim to preserve historical qualities for future generations. Their work is guided by restoration theory, a philosophy developed and codified in the course of the 19th and 20th century. European covenants, such as the Venice Charter, express shared views on the conservation and restoration of built heritage. Today, many users expect a building with modern comfort as well as a historical appearance. Moreover, new functionality is needed for building types that have outlived their original function. For example, how to reuse buildings such as old prisons, military barracks, factories, or railway stations? These new functions and new demands pose a challenge to restoration design and practices. Another, perhaps conflicting EU policy objective is the reduction of energy use in the built environment, in order to reach climate policy goals. Roughly 40% of the consumption of energy takes place in buildings, either in the production or consumption phase. However, energy efficiency is especially difficult to achieve in the case of historical buildings, because of strict regulations aimed at protecting historical values. Recently, there has been growing interest in energy efficient restoration practices in the Netherlands, as is shown by the 'energy-neutral' restoration of Villa Diederichs in Utrecht, the 'Boostencomplex' in Maastricht and De Tempel in The Hague. Although restoration of listed buildings is obviously focused on the preservation of historical values, with the pressing demands from EU climate policy the energy efficiency of historical building
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The ambition of a transition to a sustainable society brings forth the dual challenge to preserve historical buildings and simultaneously improve the energy performance of our built environment. While engineers claim that a dramatic reduction of energy use in the built environment is feasible, it has proven to be a difficult and twisting road.In this paper we focus on historical buildings, where difficulties of energy reduction are paramount, as such buildings provide local identity and a connection to our past. It is a EU policy objective to conserve and redesign heritage buildings like prisons, military barracks, factories, stations, and schools. Such redesign should also ensure reduction of energy use without compromising historical identity. In this paper we conceptually and empirically investigate how the two conflicting aspirations unfold. In particular we elaborate the obduracy and scripts of buildings, to clarify how they resist change and invite a specific use. We analyse the tensions between identity and energy conservation in a case study of a restoration project in Franeker. This buildinghas recently undergone a restoration, with energy efficiency as one of its goals.Scripts and networks are traced by a combination of methods, such as studyinglayout, materials and building history, and qualitative interviews with restoration architects and users. We identified three types of strategies to conserve identity and energy: design strategies; identity strategies and network strategies. Such strategies are also relevant for other efforts where conservation and innovation have to be reconciled.
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The goal of a local energy community (LEC) is to create a more sustainable, resilient, and efficient energy system by reducing dependence on centralized power sources and enabling greater participation and control by local communities and individuals. LEC requires transformations in local energy systems, and strongly depends on the preferences and actions of the local actors involved. The necessity for extensive stakeholder involvement adds complexity to the energy transition, posing a significant challenge for all involved parties. The municipality of Leidschendam-Voorburg has committed to the national decision for energy transition. It has taken a strategic approach by proceeding De Heuvel/Amstelwijk as the pioneer in this initiative, leading the way for other neighborhoods to follow. It is crucial to devise strategies that effectively facilitate stakeholder engagement. To this end, a thorough stakeholder analysis is needed. Such an analysis can focus on the identification of key stakeholders, their interests, their influence, and their behavioral characteristics in relation to the energy transition. Additionally, it's crucial to uncover the challenges encountered by these stakeholders and finally develop appropriate strategies to address them hence enhance their engagement. This thesis begins with an introduction to the research background, including a presentation of the case study and a statement of the problem identified in the field, followed by the research questions underpinning the study. A thorough literature review ensues, providing a robust synthesis of existing research relating to stakeholder engagement in LECs, with a view to expediting energy transitions. The literature review not only forms the foundation for the research methods adopted in this study but also promotes in the construction of the conceptual model. Subsequent to the literature review, the research method is detailed. The filed research is conducted in five steps: Step 1 - identification of stakeholders, Step 2 - prioritization of stakeholders, Step 3 - interviewing, Step 4 - data analysis, including stakeholder profiling with mapping and addressing challenges, and finally, Step 5 - proposal of strategies for stakeholder engagement enhancement based on the expected and current levels of stakeholders engagement. This research collects necessary information to understand the profiles of stakeholders in De Heuvel/Amstelwijk, tackle challenges faced by different stakeholders, propose strategies to increase stakeholders engagement. It not only aims to enrich the depth of theoretical knowledge on the subject matter but also strives to aid in the development of a localized energy strategy that is optimally suited for the De Heuvel/Amstelwijk neighborhood as good example for other neighborhoods.
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This study explores how households interact with smart systems for energy usage, providing insights into the field's trends, themes and evolution through a bibliometric analysis of 547 relevant literature from 2015 to 2025. Our findings discover: (1) Research activity has grown over the past decade, with leading journals recognizing several productive authors. Increased collaboration and interdisciplinary work are expected to expand; (2) Key research hotspots, identified through keyword co-occurrence, with two (exploration and development) stages, highlighting the interplay between technological, economic, environmental, and behavioral factors within the field; (3) Future research should place greater emphasis on understanding how emerging technologies interact with human, with a deeper understanding of users. Beyond the individual perspective, social dimensions also demand investigation. Finally, research should also aim to support policy development. To conclude, this study contributes to a broader perspective of this topic and highlights directions for future research development.
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