Survival of biomass and waste power generation: A global overview.

Biomass and waste power generation holds the promise to secure electricity supply for a growing population and mitigate global warming simultaneously. Along with the increasing commission and installation of biomass/waste power units (BWPUs) across the globe, some BWPUs failures have been observed, including the cancellation of planned/commissioned BWPUs and the termination of those in operation before reaching their natural retirement. While empirical evidence suggests that factors like feedstock accessibility and policy instruments might affect the feasibility and performance of BWPUs, there is a lack of comprehensive investigation about why some BWPUs failed at the global scale. To fill this knowledge gap, this study quantifies the hazard ratio of BWPUs via a parametric survival analysis using a panel dataset covering a total of 12,829 BWPUs (relying on woody, non-woody, and waste biomass as raw feedstocks) located in 164 countries/regions worldwide for the period of 2001-2021. The analytical results suggest that large unit size is conducive to BWPUs failure, while feedstock accessibility and the implementation of policy instruments (including Feed-in-Tariff and carbon pricing) could largely reduce the hazard ratio of BWPUs, with varying impacts on BWPUs at the planned/commissioned stage or the operation stage, located in developed or developing countries. Our findings not only shed additional light on the fate of BWPUs, which is crucial to enriching our understanding about the development of the bioenergy sector worldwide, but also provide salient empirical evidence for policy-making in terms of ensuring feedstock accessibility, overcoming diseconomies of scale, and making fiscal instruments available and transparent to boost the confidence of investors and entrepreneurs in support of BWPUs development.

Embedding nature-based solutions into the social cost of carbon.

China, the world's largest CO2 emitter, is making every effort to transition to a low-carbon economy and fulfill its part of a concerted global commitment to combating climate change. In tandem with decarbonizing energy and industries, feasible supplementary measures are urgently needed to help remove anthropogenic CO2 from the atmosphere. A burgeoning literature has emphasized the CO2 removal capability of land re-naturalization (such as afforestation and wetland restoration), thereby regarding cognate land-use conversions as Nature-based Solutions (NbS) and potential climate policy options. However, little empirical evidence exists concerning the effectiveness of different land re-naturalization pathways (such as converting wetlands to forests or agricultural lands to grasslands), and it also remains unclear how NbS alternatives (i.e., land-use conversions resulting in negative CO2 emission) and non-NbS options (i.e., land-use conversions resulting in positive CO2 emission) could affect the social cost of carbon (SCC), a conventional measurement for prescribing carbon mitigation approaches. This study aims to fill in this knowledge gap via embedding NbS into the dynamic integrated climate-economics (DICE) model to quantify their impacts on the SCC. Using the Pearl River Delta region (south China) as a case study for the temporal horizon during 2000-2020, we find that both positive and negative CO2 fluxes have been brought by different natural/semi-natural land conversions, affecting the SCC correspondingly. A total of 7 out of 17 types of land-use conversions could be identified as feasible NbS interventions, including forest restoration, forest-to-wetland, grassland-to-forest, grassland-to-wetland, grassland-to-cropland, cropland-to-forest, and cropland-to-wetland conversions, which could reduce the SCC values (comparing 2020 base-year with 2000 base-year) by 0.0132, 0.0009, 0.0033, 0.0030, 0.0001, 0.0082, and 0.0001 (USD/tCO2), respectively. While the SCC is mainly determined by energy and industrial structure, the overall effect of NbS is larger than the sum of land urbanization and non-NbS land-use conversions. Via embedding the real-world inter-dynamics of land-use conversions into the SCC quantification, this study presents a pioneer assessment of the impacts of NbS on the SCC in an integrated framework, sheds important insights into the effectiveness of NbS, and offers practical implications for policy-makers to devise comprehensive policies covering all feasible CO2 abatement options.

Effects of auricular stimulation on functional constipation among female college students / 中国学校卫生

Objective@#To explore the effects of auricular point stimulation on constipation among college students and to provide a reference for improving constipation among college students.@*Methods@#Between September 15 and September 30, 2019, the International Nursing College of Hainan Medical College Nursing School Survey, which included the constipation assessment scale (CAS), was conducted among 603 female college students. There were 90 cases of functional constipation, which were divided into a control group and an observation group of 45 cases each using the random number table method. The control group was given health education and behavioral guidance, such as a diet intervention, an exercise intervention, an emotional management intervention, and guidance on defecation habits, etc, via WeChat. The observation group received auricular stimulation intervention in addition to the control group measures. Before and two weeks after the intervention, the Wexner constipation and the Patient Assessment of Constipation Quality of Life (PAC-QOL) scales were used to assess the effect of auricular stimulation on students with constipation.@*Results@#Before intervention, there was no significant difference in the Wexner constipation scores between the two groups (P>0.05). After the intervention, the Wexner constipation scores in the observation group were lower than those in the control group, and the differences were statistically significant (t=8.38, 8.95, 11.96, 9.08, 6.45, 13.18, 11.93, 6.19, P<0.05). Before intervention, there was no statistically significant difference in PAC-QOL score between the two groups (P>0.05). After intervention, the difference in the control group s PAC-QOL scores on all dimensions and total dimension score lower earlier, was statistically significant (t=5.29, 6.64, 10.28, 7.81, 9.60, P<0.01). The observation group s PAC-QOL scores after the intervention were lower compared to before the intervention (t=7.98, 11.81, 11.44, 6.93, 8.81, P<0.01), and the difference was statistically significant. All individual and total dimension scores of the observation group and the control group were significantly lower than those of the control group, and the difference was statistically significant(P<0.05).@*Conclusion@#Auricular stimulation of TCM can significantly improve the constipation score of college students and improve their quality of life.