Biogas and biomass technology: Energy generation from biomass and waste in the Netherlands

Within the European Community, the interest in energy generation from biomass and waste is increasing. A brief overview is given of several thermal conversion technologies, of biomass production and waste availability in the Netherlands. Based on this, the possibilities for energy generation from biomass and waste in the Netherlands are evaluated.     

Partnership patterns and homeownership: a cross-country comparison of Germany,the Netherlands and the United Kingdom

Using detailed micro-level survey data for three advanced European welfare-state economies (Germany, Netherlands and UK), our analyses suggest a fairly common hierarchy to homeownership, according to partnership status, exists. In all three countries, a variety of interrelated factors appear to encourage greater propensities for homeownership amongst co-residential households (married/cohabiting), as compared to single-person households. However, important macro-contextual differences do appear to play a significant role in mediating the magnitude of difference within this hierarchy. For instance, in Germany the importance of marriage as a predictor of homeownership is found to be particularly strong, with married couples having far higher propensities for homeownership, even when compared to non-married cohabiters. In the Netherlands and UK, where an emphasis on traditional family and marriage is less pronounced, and where homeownership is generally more popular and accessible, the differentiation between married/unmarried partners is greatly reduced. Furthermore, we find no evidence to suggest that living-apart-together partners are more/less likely to own their home than singles.     

Protection through property: from private to river-held rights

ABSTRACT

This article explores how private owners can protect bodies of water through private property rights. It compares the use of conventional property rights in the Netherlands and New Zealand with a novel approach whereby a New Zealand river owns itself.     

Taking on a wider view: public value interests of construction clients in a changing construction industry

For financial and strategic reasons, public and semi-public construction clients increasingly depend on private parties to carry out public service delivery. They subcontract operational responsibilities to private parties while remaining socio-politically responsible for ensuring public values. Public administration literature mainly addresses the importance of procedural and performance values in safeguarding public values. However, safeguarding the quality of the built environment also requires a focus on product values. In this study, we aim to increase the understanding of the meaning and significance of public values in the daily practice of public construction clients and identify the challenges they face in commissioning these seemingly opposing values. A set of semi-structured interviews with the public administrators of a variety of public and semi-public construction client organizations in the Netherlands shows that both internal and external factors influence the collaborative practices between clients and contractors. This causes a value shift from an emphasis on procedural values to managing performance and product values, indicating that clients need to take on a wider view on public values. Six main public value dilemmas were found that complicate the task of developing an open, transparent and sustainable long-term client–contractor relationship. The current contractual system, however, lacks the flexibility to facilitate this product-based value view in construction.     

No More Stopping

The dissolution of the conventional breaking points in the construction and completion phases of a building's delivery has blurred ‘the distinction between the production of design intent and the transmission of information’. Here Richard Garber , Director of the School of Architecture at the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), advocates that architects should use this as an opportunity to widen their remit, gaining agency and with it responsibility and the financial rewards to practice. Here he draws from the examples of UNStudio, GLUCK+ and his own New-York based practice, GRO Architects.     

荷兰住房协会——社会住房建设和管理的非政府模式

荷兰社会住房比例在全欧洲最高,其社会住房主要由住房协会建设和管理.文章追溯了住房协会的发展历程以及对荷兰政府不同住房政策的反应,总结了住房协会的双重二元特征:私人机构但是却承担了公共责任,是资金来源于政府的NGO组织.在1990年代资金独立之后,公共使命和从事市场活动成为了住房协会新的特征.文章还分析了住房协会在与政府、协会之间以及居民的关系中所扮演的的不同角色,反映了其各项职能.此外,对荷兰住房协会管理的模式进行了总结和反思,以期对我国的保障性住房建设提供借鉴和思考.     

Mainport and corridor: exploring the mobilizing capacities of Dutch spatial concepts

Spatial concepts play a major role in planning practices all over the world. Some of them rise to the surface and then disappear, others remain thriving for a long time, becoming mobilized to shape politics, public policy and projects. By analysing two important spatial concepts in Dutch planning practice (mainport and corridor), this paper aims to explore the mobilizing capacities of new spatial concepts. The paper argues that the success of spatial concepts in the political arena depends on the interplay of two elements: (1) the concept's meaning, which effectively imagines the spatial challenge, and (2) the presence of a powerful coalition that uses this concept to name, frame and claim. The more meanings a concept accumulates, the more support it attracts. However, as this paper shows, this only holds if a major condition is being met: that the different meanings of the concept do not mutually conflict or contradict. This article presents a method by which to analyse the concept's meanings and to track conceptual changes.     

Phenology of the landscape: the role of organic agriculture

It is becoming increasingly clear that the agricultural sector will have to find an additional raison d'être beyond the production of food alone. One of the new services that agriculture can provide is contributing to the environmental quality of rural areas. In this respect a great burden of expectation is placed on organic farming. Here we examine how organic farming can contribute to the quality of specific regional landscapes. We do this with the help of a new instrument, the phenology of the landscape, which measures the contributions made by organic and conventional farming to the succession of colours and shapes during the seasons. This seasonal development plays an important role in people's appreciation of the landscape. The study shows that seasonal development is more recognizable on organic farms than on conventional farms, and that seasonal development is a scientifically‐usable criterion for evaluating the environmental quality of farms.     

Uncertainties in the fate of nitrogen I: An overview of sources of uncertainty illustrated with a Dutch case study

This study focuses on the uncertainties in the fate of nitrogen (N) in the Netherlands. Nitrogen inputs into the Netherlands in products, by rivers, and by atmospheric deposition, and microbial and industrial fixation of atmospheric N₂ amount to about 4450 Gg N y^–1. About 60% of this N is transported out of the Netherlands in products. The fate of the remaining 40%, however, is less clear. We discuss uncertainties in losses to the atmosphere (as ammonia or through denitrification), by leaching and runoff, and in N accumulation in biomass and soils. These processes may account for the fate of about 40% of the N in the Netherlands, and for the fate of about 60% of the N in Dutch agricultural soils. Reducing uncertainties in the estimates of these fluxes is necessary for reducing the impact of excess N in the environment. In particular, monitoring the environmental effects of ammonia emissions and nitrate leaching to groundwater and aquatic systems requires an increased understanding of the fate of N. Uncertainties arise because (1) some N fluxes cannot be measured directly and are usually quantified indirectly as the balance in N budgets, (2) direct measurements of N fluxes have inevitable inaccuracies, (3) lack of experimental data and other information (e.g. statistics) needed for upscaling, (4) large spatial and temporal variability of fluxes, and (5) poor understanding of the processes involved. These uncertainties can be reduced by additional experimental studies and by further development of process-based models and N budget studies. We prioritize these future research needs according to a range of different criteria.