The EU Water Framework Directive (WFD) obliges EU Member States to achieve good ecological status in all surface waters by 2027 at the latest. In many regions, this implies fundamental transformation from engineered water landscapes back to near-natural structures. By example of the German State of Lower Saxony it is shown how this transformation of water landscapes essentially requires a transformation of the institutional foundations of water management, too.

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology deployment in developing Asian countries largely depends on public acceptance, which is highly dependent on the stakeholders involved in CCS. This paper illuminates how stakeholder issues could be strategically managed in the deployment of CCS, in a manner customized to such developing countries.

Since the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has been put in practice by the Chinese government, several High-Speed Railways (HSR) have been built by Chinese Engineering Procurement and Construction (EPC) firms. However, many delays have created severe detrimental consequences on the progress of most HSR projects. This study sought to explore the essence of the recurring triggers of delays in international EPC HSR projects under the BRI, and a structured questionnaire survey approach was applied to compile the first-hand dataset from Chinese EPC firms working for BRI infrastructure projects.

Habitat conservation banking is a policy instrument for conserving endangered species by providing financial incentives for the landowners in the United States. This policy instrument aims to protect habitat, but little or no thought has been given to its financial performance. A financial analysis of habitat conservation banks (HCB) informs policymakers and conservation biologists of the long-term success of this policy and the future of HCBs. This paper evaluates 26 habitat conservation banks (HCB) in California by calculating their Net Present Values (NPV).

Water erosion is a phenomenon that significantly damages agricultural land. The current land fragmentation in Slovakia and the complete ambiguity of who owns it leads to a lack of responsibility to care for the land in its current condition, which could affect its sustainability in the future. The reason so much soil has eroded is obvious when looking at current land management, with large fields, a lack of windbreaks between them, and no barriers to prevent soil runoff. Land consolidation might be the solution.

Rapid urbanization aggravates the degradation of wetland function. However, few studies have quantitatively analyzed and predicted the comprehensive impacts of different scenarios and types of human activities on wetland ecosystems from the perspective of land development.

In Taiwan, the daytime temperature usually exceeds 37 °C in summer, and the increase in air-conditioning usage has led to higher energy demand, which brings a heavy burden to power plants. The Kaohsiung House Project, undertaken by the city government, encourages the installation of greening facilities in buildings, such as photovoltaic (PV) panels on rooftops and vertical gardens on balconies, in order to preserve energy and reduce carbon emissions.

Under the task requirements of China’s 3rd national land survey on the grade determination of cultivated land, research on a reasonable and unified survey and evaluation system of cultivated land quality (CLQ) is of great importance. From the three dimensions of agricultural climate, production potential, and health status components of cultivated land, six factors are selected in this study to construct a set of simple, practicable, and operable county-level CLQ survey and evaluation system.

The expansion of oil palm plantation has caused adverse impacts on the ecosystem. It has been associated with deforestation, biodiversity loss, disturbances to environmental services and livelihood change. The government of Indonesia has made an effort to control the negative effects by issuing relevant policies. One of the policies is Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO)’s sustainability standards to which large-scale plantations and smallholders are obliged to adhere.

Urbanization processes are some of the key drivers of spatial changes which shape and influence land use and land cover. The aim of sustainable land use policies is to preserve and manage existing resources for present and future generations. Increasing access to information about land use and land cover has led to the emergence of new sources of data and various classification systems for evaluating land use and spatial changes.

This study espouses a multi-strategy method comprising of a qualitative study and system dynamics (SD) to deliver the long-term dynamic behaviour of human resource development (HRD) in Ghana’s oil and gas sector. The adoption of the SD differed from previous studies addressing the local content implementation challenge of human resources, thereby allowing HRD to be considered a ‘system’ which, in turn, aided in comprehensively identifying and analysing the interrelationships among the dominant variables.

The trend of using modern technologies in the construction industry has been growing stronger recently, particularly in the fields of additive construction or robotic bricklaying. Therefore, specifically for the purpose of robotic bricklaying, we created a digital layout plan for robotic construction works. This article presents a universal methodology for creating a bricklaying plan for various variations of wall building systems.