Digital Commons Network^™

Peer Influence In Nipf Landowner Decision Making In The Western Upper Peninsula, Michigan , Jillian R. Schubert

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

Non-industrial private forest (NIPF) owners hold the largest amount of privately owned forest in the United States. Activities undertaken by NIPF owners have the potential to drastically impact the forested landscape of the United States, along with its associated biodiversity and ecological services. Many government sanctioned programs are in place to discourage the conversion of forest to other uses as well as to ensure sustainable management and a continuous supply of timber. Reaching NIPF owners with information about these programs and other management information is therefore important to the forests of the United States.

This thesis presents research on how …

Preserving And Interpreting The Mining Company Office : Landscape, Space And Technological Change In The Management Of The Copper Industry, Renee M. Blackburn

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

The purpose of this research is to examine the role of the mining company office in the management of the copper industry in Michigan’s Keweenaw Peninsula between 1901 and 1946. Two of the largest and most influential companies were examined – the Calumet & Hecla Mining Company and the Quincy Mining Company. Both companies operated for more than forty years under general managers who were arguably the most influential people in the management of each company. James MacNaughton, general manager at Calumet and Hecla, worked from 1901 through 1941; Charles Lawton, general manager at Quincy Mining Company, worked from 1905 …

U.S. Utilities' Experiences With The Implementation Of Energy Efficiency Programs, Courtney Goss

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

In the U.S., many electric utility companies are offering demand-side management (DSM) programs to their customers as ways to save money and energy. However, it is challenging to compare these programs between utility companies throughout the U.S. because of the variability of state energy policies. For example, some states in the U.S. have deregulated electricity markets and others do not. In addition, utility companies within a state differ depending on ownership and size. This study examines 12 utilities’ experiences with DSM programs and compares the programs’ annual energy savings results that the selected utilities reported to the Energy Information Administration …

Nongovernmental Organization Staff Views Of Global Water Privatization, Ellis Adjei Adams

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

More than 1 billion people lack access to clean water and proper sanitation. As part of efforts to solve this problem, there is a growing shift from public to private water management led by The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). This shift has inspired much related research. Researchers have assessed water privatization related perceptions of consumers, government officials, and multinational company agents.

This thesis presents results of a study of nongovernmental (NGO) staff perceptions of water privatization. Although NGOs are important actors in sustainable water related development through water provision, we have little understanding of their perceptions …

Car Ownership Modeling And Forecasts For China, Xiayi Huang

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

A great increase of private car ownership took place in China from 1980 to 2009 with the development of the economy. To explain the relationship between car ownership and economic and social changes, an ordinary least squares linear regression model is developed using car ownership per capita as the dependent variable with GDP, savings deposits and highway mileages per capita as the independent variables. The model is tested and corrected for econometric problems such as spurious correlation and cointegration. Finally, the regression model is used to project oil consumption by the Chinese transportation sector through 2015. The result shows that …

Afghanistan Connection : Heroin Production, Distribution, And Consumption , Brandon J. Swartz

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

Heroin prices are a reflection of supply and demand, and similar to any other market, profits motivate participation. The intent of this research is to examine the change in Afghan opium production due to political conflict affecting Europe’s heroin market and government policies. If the Taliban remain in power, or a new Afghan government is formed, the changes will affect the heroin market in Europe to a certain degree. In the heroin market, the degree of change is dependent on many socioeconomic forces such as law enforcement, corruption, and proximity to Afghanistan. An econometric model that examines the degree of …

Public Preferences Of The Great Lakes Environment : A Lake Michigan Pilot Study, Fangming Liu

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

The Great Lakes watershed is home to over 40 million people, and the health of the Great Lakes ecosystem is vital to the overall economic, societal, and environmental health of the U.S. and Canada. However, environmental issues related to them are sometimes overlooked. Policymakers and the public face the challenges of balancing economic benefits with the need to conserve and/or replenish regional natural resources to ensure long term prosperity. From the literature review, nine critical stressors of ecological services were delineated, which include pollution and contamination, agricultural erosion, non-native species, degraded recreational resources, loss of wetlands habitat, climate change, risk …

Quincy And Torch Lake Railroad Engine House Facility Management And Interpretive Plan, Dennis H. Leopold

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

The “Quincy & Torch Lake Railroad Engine House Facility Management and Interpretive Plan" was designed to serve as a guide to aid the Quincy Mine Hoist Association in their efforts to restore and interpret historic railroad resources under their stewardship. Early searches for existing management and interpretive plans demonstrated that similar plans were primarily produced by the National Park Service and were intended to guide large scale heritage sites that consist of a variety of cultural resources. This project adapts concepts found in those large scale management and interpretive site plans, to guide small scale site management, restoration, and interpretive …

Balancing Wildlife And Bioenergy Values On Private Forestlands In The Eastern Upper Peninsula Of Michigan, Karl Makinen

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

There is interest in developing a reliable, sustainable, domestic U.S. biofuels industry. A domestic biofuels industry has the potential to provide economic, environmental, and national security benefits on a local, regional, national, and global level. The Mascoma Corporation plans to develop a cellulosic ethanol facility in Michigan’s eastern Upper Peninsula. The primary feedstock of the plant site would be trees sourced within a 150 mile supply radius. In the eastern Upper Peninsula, this radius encompasses Alger, Chippewa, Delta, Luce, Mackinac, and Schoolcraft counties. In these six counties there are 1,320,500 acres of NIPF (non-industrial private forestlands). These acres account for …

More Favorable Combination Of Circumstances Could Hardly Have Been Desired : A Bottom To Top Examination Of The Pittsburgh And Boston Mining Company's Cliff Mine, Sean M. Gohman

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

The Cliff Mine, an archaeological site situated on the Keweenaw Peninsula of Michigan, is the location of the first successful attempt to mine native copper in North America. Under the management of the Pittsburgh & Boston Mining Company from 1845-1879, two-third of the Cliff’s mineral output was in the form of mass copper, some pieces of which weighed over 5 tons when removed from the ground. The unique nature of mass copper and the Cliff Mine’s handling of it make it one of the best examples of early mining processes in the Keweenaw District. Mass copper only constituted 2% of …

Arctic Network Builders : The Arctic Coal Company's Operations On Spitsbergen And Its Relationship With The Environment, Cameron C. Hartnell

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

In 1906, two American industrialists, John Munroe Longyear and Frederick Ayer, formed the Arctic Coal Company to make the first large scale attempt at mining in the high-Arctic location of Spitsbergen, north of the Norwegian mainland. In doing so, they encountered numerous obstacles and built an organization that attempted to overcome them. The Americans sold out in 1916 but others followed, eventually culminating in the transformation of a largely underdeveloped landscape into a mining region.

This work uses John Law’s network approach of the Actor Network Theory (ANT) framework to explain how the Arctic Coal Company built a mining network …

Winning Coal At 78° North : Mining, Contingency And The Chaîne Opératoire In Old Longyear City, Seth C. Depasqual

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the evolution of an early 20^th century mining system in Spitsbergen as applied by Boston-based Arctic Coal Company (ACC). This analysis will address the following questions: Did the system evolve in a linear, technological-based fashion? Or was the progression more a product of interactions and negotiations with the natural and human landscapes present during the time of occupation? Answers to these questions will be sought through review of historical records and material residues identified during the 2008 field examination on Spitsbergen. The Arctic Coal Company’s flagship mine, ACC Mine No. 1, …

Reflection, Refraction, And Rejection : Copper Smelting Heritage And The Execution Of Environmental Policy, Bode J. Morin

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

This dissertation examines the global technological and environmental history of copper smelting and the conflict that developed between historic preservation and environmental remediation at major copper smelting sites in the United States after their productive periods ended. Part I of the dissertation is a synthetic overview of the history of copper smelting and its environmental impact. After reviewing the basic metallurgy of copper ores, the dissertation contains successive chapters on the history of copper smelting to 1640, culminating in the so-called German, or Continental, processing system; on the emergence of the rival Welsh system during the British industrial revolution; and …

Epa's Council For Regulatory Environmental Modeling : A Case Study Of Science Policy Implementation , Genevieve M. Borg

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

As environmental problems became more complex, policy and regulatory decisions become far more difficult to make. The use of science has become an important practice in the decision making process of many federal agencies. Many different types of scientific information are used to make decisions within the EPA, with computer models becoming especially important. Environmental models are used throughout the EPA in a variety of contexts and their predictive capacity has become highly valued in decision making.

The main focus of this research is to examine the EPA’s Council for Regulatory Modeling (CREM) as a case study in addressing science …

Federal And State Policy Influence On Woody Biomass Utilization, Susan Balint

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

A considerable portion of public lands in the United States is at risk of uncharacteristically severe wildfires due to a history of fire suppression. Wildfires already have detrimental impacts on the landscape and on communities in the wildland-urban interface (WUI) due to unnatural and overstocked forests. Strategies to mitigate wildfire risk include mechanical thinning and prescribed burning in areas with high wildfire risk. The material removed is often of little or no economic value. Woody biomass utilization (WBU) could offset the costs of hazardous fuel treatments if removed material could be used for wood products, heat, or electricity production. However, …

Financial Decision Making About Found Oil And Gas In Ghana : Real Options Vs. Traditional Methods, Isaac Owusu-Ansah

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

This research is a study of the use of capital budgeting methods for investment decisions. It uses both the traditional methods and the newly introduced approach called the real options analysis to make a decision. The research elucidates how capital budgeting can be done when analysts encounter projects with high uncertainty and are capital intensive, for example oil and gas production. It then uses the oil and gas find in Ghana as a case study to support its argument.

For a clear understanding a thorough literature review was done, which highlights the advantages and disadvantages of both methods.

The revenue …

Economic Sustainability Of The Flambeau Mine Ladysmith, Wisconsin, Anne M. Hartingh

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

Today sustainable development is a very pertinent issue. Communities do not want companies, specifically mining companies, to deplete a natural resource and leave. The goal is to minimize the negative impacts of mining and the boom/bust cycles of natural resource extraction.

In this study a three part framework was developed to analyze the sustainability of the Flambeau Mine in Ladysmith, Wisconsin. The first and second part dealt with an in-depth local and regional analysis and whether the community was developing within its own vision. The third part used nine sustainability measures including:

1. Need Present Generation

2. Future Need

3. …

Iso 14001 In India: More Than A Certificate On The Wall?, Samir Aslam Qadir

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

The growth of ISO 14001 certificates worldwide has led to much research on the role of voluntary standards in improving the environmental impacts of industry. Most of this research, however, has focused on industrialized countries, with very little research examining the effects of ISO 14001 and other voluntary initiatives in the developing world. This is especially unfortunate because it is in these very countries that proponents of ISO 14001 claim the largest benefits of the standard will occur, by helping polluting industries improve performance and by assisting environmental regulators in enforcing laws more effectively.

Indian industries have begun adopting ISO …

Price Risk Management In The Copper Market Using Commodity Derivatives And Options Strategies, Bold Sandagdorj

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

Metals price risk management is a key issue related to financial risk in metal markets because of uncertainty of commodity price fluctuation, exchange rate, interest rate changes and huge price risk either to metals’ producers or consumers. Thus, it has been taken into account by all participants in metal markets including metals’ producers, consumers, merchants, banks, investment funds, speculators, traders and so on. Managing price risk provides stable income for both metals’ producers and consumers, so it increases the chance that a firm will invest in attractive projects.

The purpose of this research is to evaluate risk management strategies in …

Waterpower : A Geophysical And Archaeological Investigation Of The Waterpower System At The West Point Foundry, Cold Spring, New York, Kimberly A. Finch

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

Waterpower: A Geophysical and Archaeological Investigation of the Waterpower System at the West Point Foundry, Cold Spring, New York, describes the results of ground penetrating radar surveys and archaeological excavation undertaken by Michigan Technological University (MTU) archaeologists during the summer of 2003 at the West Point Foundry, Cold Spring, New York. 2003 constituted MTU's second field season at the foundry. Fieldwork concentrated on the foundry's waterpower system, an intricate network of surface and subsurface drains, races, flumes, waterwheels, turbines, dams, and ponds that powered operations and regulated water flow throughout the site. Archaeologists utilized non-destructive geophysical technology, which expedited survey, …

Examining Patterns Of Italian Immigration To Michigan's Houghton County, 1860-1930 , Cristina Menghini

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

No abstract provided.