This paper presents the methodology and findings of an international survey carried out in l>89 on the existing information needs and technical facilities of professionals in the field of construction and housing (448 responses from 92 different countries). The survey aimed at the determination of future information services, and five guidelines for future database development in the area were ...

Identifying proper business processes, formalizing and documenting them has always been a challenge. Maintaining them in synchronization with changing business needs makes the problem harder. It becomes even harder when business processes are fully or partially implemented in IT systems where changes to the business cause changes in IT configurations. This paper presents an approach how IT conf...

Small dams for hydropower have caused widespread alteration of Central American rivers, yet much of recent development has gone undocumented by scientists and conservationists. We examined the ecological effects of a small hydropower plant (Doña Julia Hydroelectric Center) on two low-order streams (the Puerto Viejo River and Quebradon stream) draining a mountainous area of Costa Rica. Operation...

Land use and climate change occur simultaneously around the globe. Fully understanding their separate and combined effects requires a mechanistic understanding at the local scale where their effects are ultimately realized. Here we applied an individual-based model of fish population dynamics to evaluate the role of local stream variability in modifying responses of Coastal Cutthroat Trout (Onc...

The shrinking Baiyangdian Lake and drying up rivers are widely observed in recent years. Due to the significant advantages in integrated analyses of natural and economic systems, emergy analysis is introduced in this paper to assess the health status of Baiyangdian Watershed. First, we establish a emergy based conceptual framework for the assessment, delineate an emergy flow diagram of Baiyangd...

The challenge of producing food for a rapidly increasing population in semi-arid agro-ecosystems in Southern Africa is daunting. More food necessarily means more consumptive use of so-called green water flow (vapour flow sustaining crop growth). Every increase in food production upstream in a watershed will impact on water user and using systems downstream. Intensifying agriculture has in the p...