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Trust: The Feature That Vending Machines And Atms Share, But Simplygo Lacks, Sun Sun Lim Jan 2024

Trust: The Feature That Vending Machines And Atms Share, But Simplygo Lacks, Sun Sun Lim

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

The article discussed the intricacies of trust in the SimplyGo debacle and highlighted how the design of physical interfaces like vending machines and ATMs and digital interfaces from apps like Grab, Parking.sg and ShopBack have critical features to instil trust. People need to be reassured that their transactions have proceeded as they should, and thay have not been short-changed.


Green Stormwater Infrastructure: A Critical Review Of The Barriers And Solutions To Widespread Implementation, Bardia Heidari, Sarah Priscilla Randle, Dean Minchillo, Fouad H. Jaber Mar 2023

Green Stormwater Infrastructure: A Critical Review Of The Barriers And Solutions To Widespread Implementation, Bardia Heidari, Sarah Priscilla Randle, Dean Minchillo, Fouad H. Jaber

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Rapid urbanization, aging infrastructure, and climate change impacts have put a strain on existing stormwater drainage systems. One commonly acknowledged solution to relieve such stress is Green Stormwater Infrastructure (GSI). Interest in GSI technology has been growing. However, the level of implementation in many areas around the world lags behind the interest level. This study aims to critically review the body of literature from the last decade to determine the main barriers to wide adoption and the offered solutions to overcome them. Based on a review of 92 peer-reviewed journal articles published between 2012 and 2022, we classify barriers and …


Using Virtual Simulations Of Future Extreme Weather Events To Communicate Climate Change Risk, Terry Van Gevelt, Brian G. Mcadoo, Jie Yang, Linlin Li, Fiona Williamson, Alex Scollay, Aileen Lam, Kwan Nok Chan, Adam D. Switzer Feb 2023

Using Virtual Simulations Of Future Extreme Weather Events To Communicate Climate Change Risk, Terry Van Gevelt, Brian G. Mcadoo, Jie Yang, Linlin Li, Fiona Williamson, Alex Scollay, Aileen Lam, Kwan Nok Chan, Adam D. Switzer

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Virtual simulations of future extreme weather events may prove an effective vehicle for climate change risk communication. To test this, we created a 3D virtual simulation of a future tropical cyclone amplified by climate change. Using an experimental framework, we isolated the effect of our simulation on risk perceptions and individual mitigation behaviour for a representative sample (n = 1507) of the general public in Hong Kong. We find that exposure to our simulation is systematically associated with a relatively small decrease in risk perceptions and individual mitigation behaviour. We suggest that this is likely due to climate change scepticism, …


Forest Structure And Composition Alleviate Human Thermal Stress, Loïc Gillerot, Dries Landuyt, Rachel Oh, Winston T. L. Chow, Et Al Dec 2022

Forest Structure And Composition Alleviate Human Thermal Stress, Loïc Gillerot, Dries Landuyt, Rachel Oh, Winston T. L. Chow, Et Al

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Current climate change aggravates human health hazards posed by heat stress. Forests can locally mitigate this by acting as strong thermal buffers, yet potential mediation by forest ecological characteristics remains underexplored. We report over 14 months of hourly microclimate data from 131 forest plots across four European countries and compare these to open-field controls using physiologically equivalent temperature (PET) to reflect human thermal perception. Forests slightly tempered cold extremes, but the strongest buffering occurred under very hot conditions (PET >35°C), where forests reduced strong to extreme heat stress day occurrence by 84.1%. Mature forests cooled the microclimate by 12.1 to …


Harmonized Gap-Filled Datasets From 20 Urban Flux Tower Sites, Matthew Lipson, Sue Grimmond, Martin Best, Winston T. L. Chow Nov 2022

Harmonized Gap-Filled Datasets From 20 Urban Flux Tower Sites, Matthew Lipson, Sue Grimmond, Martin Best, Winston T. L. Chow

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

A total of 20 urban neighbourhood-scale eddy covariance flux tower datasets are made openly available after being harmonized to create a 50 site–year collection with broad diversity in climate and urban surface characteristics. Variables needed as inputs for land surface models (incoming radiation, temperature, humidity, air pressure, wind and precipitation) are quality controlled, gap-filled and prepended with 10 years of reanalysis-derived local data, enabling an extended spin up to equilibrate models with local climate conditions. For both gap filling and spin up, ERA5 reanalysis meteorological data are bias corrected using tower-based observations, accounting for diurnal, seasonal and local urban effects …


Outdoor Thermal Comfort Research In Transient Conditions: A Narrative Literature Review, Yuliya Dzyuban, Graces N. Y. Ching, Sin Kang Yik, Adrian J. Tan, Shreya Banerjee, Peter Jay Crank, Winston T. L. Chow Oct 2022

Outdoor Thermal Comfort Research In Transient Conditions: A Narrative Literature Review, Yuliya Dzyuban, Graces N. Y. Ching, Sin Kang Yik, Adrian J. Tan, Shreya Banerjee, Peter Jay Crank, Winston T. L. Chow

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

In recent years, urban planners and designers are paying greater attention to Outdoor Thermal Comfort (OTC) studies due to the imminent threat of the Urban Heat Island and climate change on human health. Historically, indoor thermal comfort research assumed steady-state conditions, centralizing on the concept of thermal neutrality to determine optimal environmental parameters. Such research pivoted to investigating how non-steady-state, transient environmental conditions influence comfort. Recent studies underscore the usefulness of positive alliesthesia in providing a productive framework for OTC evaluation. In this article we first clarify the concepts related to thermal comfort-related terms, scales, and models in the literature. …


Why We Should Remember The Soviet Information Age?, Ksenia Tatarchenko Oct 2022

Why We Should Remember The Soviet Information Age?, Ksenia Tatarchenko

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

How to navigate the rapidly changing digital geopolitics of the world today? How do we make sense of digital transformation and its many social, political, cultural, and environmental implications at different locations around the world?


El Niño And The Human-Environment Nexus: Drought And Vulnerability In Singapore 1877-1911, Fiona Williamson Aug 2022

El Niño And The Human-Environment Nexus: Drought And Vulnerability In Singapore 1877-1911, Fiona Williamson

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

This chapter brings a climatic perspective to the study of Singaporean history by exploring the impacts of the strong El Niño inspired droughts of 1877, 1902 and 1911. The narrative focuses on unpacking the nexus of nature-inspired versus human-induced vulnerability to drought within the contexts of colonial urbanisation and looks at the short-to medium-term impacts of the events on society. It also explores how such events inspired new questions about the climate and regional teleconnections, as a wealth of evidence became available due to the increasingly connected nature of scientific institutions, scientific literature, and communications systems across the Indian Ocean …


Integrated Assessment Of Urban Overheating Impacts On Human Life, N. Nazarian, E. S. Krayenhoff, B. Bechtel, D. M. Hondula, R. Paolini, J. Vanos, T. Cheung, Winston T. L. Chow, Et Al Aug 2022

Integrated Assessment Of Urban Overheating Impacts On Human Life, N. Nazarian, E. S. Krayenhoff, B. Bechtel, D. M. Hondula, R. Paolini, J. Vanos, T. Cheung, Winston T. L. Chow, Et Al

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Urban overheating, driven by global climate change and urban development, is a major contemporary challenge that substantially impacts urban livability and sustainability. Overheating represents a multifaceted threat to the well-being, performance, and health of individuals as well as the energy efficiency and economy of cities, and it is influenced by complex interactions between building, city, and global scale climates. In recent decades, extensive discipline-specific research has characterized urban heat and assessed its implications on human life, including ongoing efforts to bridge neighboring disciplines. The research horizon now encompasses complex problems involving a wide range of disciplines, and therefore comprehensive and …


Communicative Strategies For Building Public Confidence In Data Governance: Analyzing Singapore's Covid-19 Contact-Tracing Initiatives, Gordon Kuo Siong Tan, Sun Sun Lim Jun 2022

Communicative Strategies For Building Public Confidence In Data Governance: Analyzing Singapore's Covid-19 Contact-Tracing Initiatives, Gordon Kuo Siong Tan, Sun Sun Lim

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Effective social data governance rests on a bedrock of social support. Without securing trust from the populace whose information is being collected, analyzed, and deployed, policies on which such data are based will be undermined by a lack of public confidence. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated digitalization and datafication by governments for the purposes of contact tracing and epidemiological investigation. However, concerns about surveillance and data privacy have stunted the adoption of such contact-tracing initiatives. This commentary analyzes Singapore's contact-tracing initiative to uncover the reasons for public resistance and efforts by the state to address them. The government's contact-tracing program …


Transboundary Air Pollution And Cross-Border Cooperation: Insights From Marine Vessel Emissions Regulations In Hong Kong And Shenzhen, Seung Kyum Kim, Terry Van Gevelt, Paul Joosse, Mia M. Bennett May 2022

Transboundary Air Pollution And Cross-Border Cooperation: Insights From Marine Vessel Emissions Regulations In Hong Kong And Shenzhen, Seung Kyum Kim, Terry Van Gevelt, Paul Joosse, Mia M. Bennett

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Many coastal cities regulate shipping emissions within their jurisdictions. However, the transboundary nature of air pollution makes such efforts largely ineffective unless they are accompanied by reciprocal, legally-binding regulatory agreements with neighbouring cities. Due to various technical, economic, and institutional barriers, it has thus far been difficult to isolate the effects of legally-binding cross-border cooperation on vessel emissions at the city-level. We exploit the unique administrative characteristics of Hong Kong and its relationship with neighbouring cities in China's Pearl River Delta to isolate the effect of legally-binding cross-border cooperation. Using a regression discontinuity design, we find that Hong Kong's unilateral …


Ecosystem Duties, Green Infrastructure, And Environmental Injustice In Los Angeles, Sayd Randle Mar 2022

Ecosystem Duties, Green Infrastructure, And Environmental Injustice In Los Angeles, Sayd Randle

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

In Los Angeles, water managers and environmentalist NGOs champion green infrastructure retrofits, installations intended to maximize the water-absorbing capacity of the urban landscape. In such arrangements, the work of water management is necessarily spread among a more-than-human community, including (but certainly not limited to) humans, plants, soils, and gravels. This article analyzes the human labor within these collaborations, tracking when and how this work gets enrolled in networks of water management and circuits of value. I develop the term ecosystem duties to characterize these exertions and as a useful analytic for assessing emergent dynamics of environmental justice.


Fact Sheet - Human Settlements: Climate Change Impacts And Risks, Winston T. L. Chow, Richard Dawson, Bruce Glavovic, Marjolijn Haasnoot, Mark Pelling, William Solecki Feb 2022

Fact Sheet - Human Settlements: Climate Change Impacts And Risks, Winston T. L. Chow, Richard Dawson, Bruce Glavovic, Marjolijn Haasnoot, Mark Pelling, William Solecki

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

This regional factsheet on cities and human settlements gives a snapshot of the key findings of the Sixth Assessment Report: Climate Change 2022 - Impacts. Adaptation and Vulnerability, distilled from the relevant Chapters and Cross-Chapter Papers, the Technical Summary and the Global to Regional Atlas.


Battling Over Bathwater: Greywater Technopolitics In Los Angeles, Sayd Randle Nov 2021

Battling Over Bathwater: Greywater Technopolitics In Los Angeles, Sayd Randle

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

In Los Angeles, domestic wastewater recycling ("greywater") systems are controversial, loved by local environmentalists and disdained by the city's water agencies. Drawing on fieldwork among greywater advocates and public water agency workers, this article examines how greywater systems function as nodes that unsettle relations between residents and the public agencies that manage the city's water grid. Elaborating the longstanding frictions over greywater reuse in LA reveals how these fixtures are mobilized by advocates to rescript the roles of both individuals and the state within the urban waterscape. Detailing public agency workers' resistance to this form of selective disconnection from the …


Public Transit Infrastructure And Heat Perceptions In Hot And Dry Climates, Yuliya Dzyuban, David M. Hondula, Paul J. Coseo, Charles L. Redman Jan 2021

Public Transit Infrastructure And Heat Perceptions In Hot And Dry Climates, Yuliya Dzyuban, David M. Hondula, Paul J. Coseo, Charles L. Redman

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Many cities aim to progress toward their sustainability and public health goals by increasing use of their public transit systems. However, without adequate protective infrastructure that provides thermally comfortable conditions for public transit riders, it can be challenging to reach these goals in hot climates. We took micrometeorological measurements and surveyed riders about their perceptions of heat and heat-coping behaviors at bus stops with a variety of design attributes in Phoenix, AZ, USA, during the summer of 2018. We identified the design attributes and coping behaviors that made riders feel cooler. We observed that current infrastructure standards and material choices …


Public Transit Infrastructure And Heat Perceptions In Hot And Dry Climates, Yuliya Dzyuban, David M. Hondula, Paul J. Coseo, Charles L. Redman Jan 2021

Public Transit Infrastructure And Heat Perceptions In Hot And Dry Climates, Yuliya Dzyuban, David M. Hondula, Paul J. Coseo, Charles L. Redman

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Many cities aim to progress toward their sustainability and public health goals by increasing use of their public transit systems. However, without adequate protective infrastructure that provides thermally comfortable conditions for public transit riders, it can be challenging to reach these goals in hot climates. We took micrometeorological measurements and surveyed riders about their perceptions of heat and heat-coping behaviors at bus stops with a variety of design attributes in Phoenix, AZ, USA, during the summer of 2018. We identified the design attributes and coping behaviors that made riders feel cooler. We observed that current infrastructure standards and material choices …


Central Inspection Teams And The Enforcement Of Environmental Regulations In China, C. Xiang, Terry Van Gevelt Oct 2020

Central Inspection Teams And The Enforcement Of Environmental Regulations In China, C. Xiang, Terry Van Gevelt

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Despite the existence of a comprehensive set of environmental regulations, China’s environmental issues continue largely unabated and are increasingly leading to discontent among its citizens. Mirroring recent governance trends in China, the central government has increasingly taken a more hands-on-role to ensure the enforcement of environmental regulations by local government officials. One manifestation of this effort to re-centralize environmental institutions has been the establishment and deployment of Central Environmental Inspection Teams (CEITs). CEITs report directly to the central government and are dispatched to carry out crackdowns where the central government has reason to believe that environmental regulations are not being …


The Uk Summer Heatwave Of 2018 And Public Concern Over Energy Security, Shaun Larcom, Po-Wen She, Terry Van Gevelt Apr 2019

The Uk Summer Heatwave Of 2018 And Public Concern Over Energy Security, Shaun Larcom, Po-Wen She, Terry Van Gevelt

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

The UK summer heatwave of 2018 led to changes in consumer behaviour, including large increases in electricity demand due to increased use and intensity of refrigeration and air-conditioning devices1,2. Although the United Kingdom experienced its equal hottest summer on record, the extreme temperatures were concentrated in the south and east of England3. Here we exploit the regional variation to test for the effect of experiencing extreme temperatures on perceptions of resource security and on related pro-environmental behaviour. We analyse data from 2,189 individuals across the UK over a 7 day period and use a difference-in-differences estimation to compare responses of …


Do Voluntary Commons Associations Deliver Sustainable Grazing Outcomes? An Empirical Study Of England, Shaun Larcom, Terry Van Gevelt Apr 2018

Do Voluntary Commons Associations Deliver Sustainable Grazing Outcomes? An Empirical Study Of England, Shaun Larcom, Terry Van Gevelt

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

In 1965, the Commons Registration Act came into force in England and Wales. The Act led to the removal of the capacity of commoners to regulate the intensity of grazing via traditional legal means. From this policy shock a number of voluntary commons associations were formed. These voluntary groups relied on their members to agree upon how the commons should be managed. Using two-stage least squares regression analysis we find that commons governed by these associations are much more likely to produce sustainable grazing outcomes. These results are robust to the existence of a variety of controls, including overlapping institutional …


Regulating The Water-Energy-Food Nexus: Interdependencies, Transaction Costs And Procedural Justice, Shaun Larcom, Terry Van Gevelt Jun 2017

Regulating The Water-Energy-Food Nexus: Interdependencies, Transaction Costs And Procedural Justice, Shaun Larcom, Terry Van Gevelt

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

There have been calls for an overhaul of regulatory and governance frameworks to incorporate the implications of the water-energy-food nexus. We map one small component of the regulatory space of the nexus and highlight its immense complexity. We draw on insights from the economics and socio-legal literatures to show that a decentralised approach to regulation based upon procedural justice can enable the trade-offs of the nexus to be considered and addressed. We use a nexus case study of micro hydro-electricity generation in Dartmoor National Park in England to show that when we take into account interactions between state and non-state …


Precolonial Institutions And Deforestation In Africa, S. Larcom, Terry Van Gevelt, A. Zabala Feb 2016

Precolonial Institutions And Deforestation In Africa, S. Larcom, Terry Van Gevelt, A. Zabala

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

We find that local institutions inherited from the precolonial era continue to play an important role in natural resource governance in Africa. Using satellite image data, we find a significant and robust relationship between deforestation and precolonial succession rules of local leaders (local chiefs). In particular, we find that those precolonial areas where local leaders were appointed by ‘social standing’ have higher rates of deforestation compared to the base case of hereditary rule and where local leaders were appointed from above (by paramount chiefs). While the transmission mechanisms behind these results are complex, we suggest that areas where local leaders …


The Role Of State Institutions In Non-Timber Forest Product Commercialisation: A Case Study Of Tricholoma Matsutake In South Korea, Terry Van Gevelt Mar 2014

The Role Of State Institutions In Non-Timber Forest Product Commercialisation: A Case Study Of Tricholoma Matsutake In South Korea, Terry Van Gevelt

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Two major barriers to non-timber forest product (NTFP) commercialization are a thin market structure and ensuring long-term supply. There is a growing literature suggesting potential solutions to address these two issues. The majority of these solutions, however, marginalize the role of state institutions in favour of other institutional arrangements. This study used the example of (S. Ito and S. Imai) Singer commercialisation in South Korea to show that state institutions can play a leading role in addressing the thin market structure and ensuring long-term supply. Specifically, the Korea Forest Service (KFS) and National Forestry Cooperatives Federation (NFCF) addressed the thin …