This report describes the Utrecht regio with regard to sustainability and circular business models.
In this dissertation Maarten ter Huurne investigates why users in the sharing economy trust each other.
This article reflects on the workshop Bridging the KAP-gap in global education, which was part of the DEEEP-conference Global Justice through Global Citizenship. The objective of the workshop was, to learn about strategies to bridge the KAP (Knowledge, Attitude, Practice) -gap and to gain ideas how to apply these strategies to participants’ own practices. The workshop turned into a slightly different direction and raised some fundamental questions: What could one expect of global education? Which others factors influence learners’ behaviour? To which manner does global education aim to change behaviour? Should global education aim to change behaviour? This article summarizes the outcomes of an evaluation which was done amongst alumni-students of the minor programme Global Development Issues of Fontys University of Applied Sciences and the main issues that were discussed during the workshop, also based on the integrated model of behavioural prediction. The article ends with some lessons learned, especially for the curriculumowners of the minor programme, who organised this workshop.
MULTIFILE
Micro and macro algae are a rich source of lipids, proteins and carbohydrates, but also of secondary metabolites like phytosterols. Phytosterols have important health effects such as prevention of cardiovascular diseases. Global phytosterol market size was estimated at USD 709.7 million in 2019 and is expected to grow with a CAGR of 8.7% until 2027. Growing adoption of healthy lifestyle has bolstered demand for nutraceutical products. This is expected to be a major factor driving demand for phytosterols. Residues from algae are found in algae farming and processing, are found as beachings and are pruning residues from underwater Giant Kelp forests. Large amounts of brown seaweed beaches in the province of Zeeland and are discarded as waste. Pruning residues from Giant Kelp Forests harvests for the Namibian coast provide large amounts of biomass. ALGOL project considers all these biomass residues as raw material for added value creation. The ALGOL feasibility project will develop and evaluate green technologies for phytosterol extraction from algae biomass in a biocascading approach. Fucosterol is chosen because of its high added value, whereas lipids, protein and carbohydrates are lower in value and will hence be evaluated in follow-up projects. ALGOL will develop subcritical water, supercritical CO2 with modifiers and ethanol extraction technologies and compare these with conventional petroleum-based extractions and asses its technical, economic and environmental feasibility. Prototype nutraceutical/cosmeceutical products will be developed to demonstrate possible applications with fucosterol. A network of Dutch and African partners will supply micro and macro algae biomass, evaluate developed technologies and will prototype products with it, which are relevant to their own business interests. ALGOL project will create added value by taking a biocascading approach where first high-interest components are processed into high added value products as nutraceutical or cosmeceutical.
PBL is the initiator of the Work Programme Monitoring and Management Circular Economy 2019-2023, a collaboration between CBS, CML, CPB, RIVM, TNO, UU. Holidays and mobility are part of the consumption domains that PBL researches, and this project aims to calculate the environmental gains per person per year of the various circular behavioural options for both holiday behaviour and daily mobility. For both behaviours, a range of typical (default) trips are defined and for each several circular option explored for CO2 emissions, Global warming potential and land use. The holiday part is supplied by the Centre for Sustainability, Tourism and Transport (CSTT) of the BUas Academy of Tourism (AfT). The mobility part is carried out by the Urban Intelligence professorship of the Academy for Built Environment and Logistics (ABEL).The research question is “what is the environmental impact of various circular (behavioural) options around 1) holidays and 2) passenger mobility?” The consumer perspective is demarcated as follows:For holidays, transportation and accommodation are included, but not food, attractions visited and holiday activitiesFor mobility, it concerns only the circular options of passenger transport and private means of transport (i.e. freight transport, business travel and commuting are excluded). Not only some typical trips will be evaluated, but also the possession of a car and its alternatives.For the calculations, we make use of public databases, our own models and the EAP (Environmental Analysis Program) model developed by the University of Groningen. BUAs projectmembers: Centre for Sustainability, Tourism and Transport (AT), Urban Intelligence (ABEL).
Worldwide over- and misuse of antibiotics has contributed to the development of antibiotic-resistance. The occurrence and increase of antibiotic-resistance is one of the most pressing global health care issues of the 21st century. Recently it has been recognized that fruit and flower anthocyanins have antimicrobial activity and thereby the potential to function as novel antibiotics. At the Hanze University of Applied Science, we were able to confirm the antimicrobial efficacy of purified Rosa and Tulipa anthocyanin extracts against an array of microbial species. Using our optimized extraction methods, anthocyanins can easily be extracted and purified from floral residual streams. Once marketed as novel antimicrobials, this valorization of residual streams to high-value compounds contributes to the transition towards a circular economy. However, for future application in different antimicrobial products, it is necessary to identify and characterize single antimicrobial anthocyanin molecules. Moreover, analysis of pilot-scale extraction- and fractionation-yields and antimicrobial bench-mark doses will provide information on their market and application potential. In the current project we propose to develop a strategy composed of fractionation and state-of-the-art characterization methods to identify anthocyanin-molecules with potent antimicrobial effects. To our knowledge this is the first strategy that combines in-depth chemical characterization of anthocyanins in relation to their antimicrobial efficacy. Once developed, this strategy will allow us to single out anthocyanin molecules with antimicrobial properties. The development of the proposed fractionation and characterization strategy is the first step towards the development of single anthocyanin molecules as novel plant-based antibiotics.
