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Heilongjiang Province is located in the northeastern part of China and is the province with the highest latitude in China. As Heilongjiang Province is the most important grain production base in China, the Chinese government attaches great importance to the quality of the ecological environment in Heilongjiang Province, especially the analysis of changes in the quality of the water environment and their driving factors. We studied the changes in the environmental quality of surface water in Heilongjiang Province during the “13th Five-Year Plan” period (2016–2020), and analyzed the surface water for four major pollutants including the permanganate index, chemical oxygen demand, ammonia nitrogen and total phosphorus, and the change trends of the proportion of the water quality of class I–III and the proportion of the water quality of inferior class V. The results show that the environmental quality of surface water in Heilongjiang Province has improved significantly during the “13th Five-Year Plan”. The analysis of the driving factors of the change of surface water environment quality shows that the population, the primary industry, the tertiary industry and forestry are the main factors affecting the change of water environment quality in Heilongjiang Province.

Through interviews with three generations of Yalálag Zapotecs (\"Yaláltecos\") in Los Angeles and Yalálag, Oaxaca, this book examines the impact of international migration on this community. It traces five decades of migration to Los Angeles in order to delineate migration patterns, community formation in Los Angeles, and the emergence of transnational identities of the first and second generations of Yalálag Zapotecs in the United States, exploring why these immigrants and their descendents now think of themselves as Mexican, Mexican Indian immigrants, Oaxaqueños, and Latinos-identities they did not claim in Mexico.Based on multi-site fieldwork conducted over a five-year period, Adriana Cruz-Manjarrez analyzes how and why Yalálag Zapotec identity and culture have been reconfigured in the United States, using such cultural practices as music, dance, and religious rituals as a lens to bring this dynamic process into focus. By illustrating the sociocultural, economic, and political practices that link immigrants in Los Angeles to those left behind, the book documents how transnational migration has reflected, shaped, and transformed these practices in both their place of origin and immigration.

The research of origin and functioning of mobilization model of economy is possible on the basis of the hypothesis about the government entrepreneurship as a typological sign of Russian economy development, the concept of threshold changes of macroeconomic dynamics, methodology of a chronotope and the theory of interrelation of the government organization of accumulation of the capital, industrialization, militarization, economic and territorial expansion of state power. Socio-economic reforming in our country was connected with threshold levels of impact of the government on economy that is confirmed by the analysis of macroeconomic conditions of emergence of the centralized planned management of a national economy. System transformations of the Russian economy to the revolutionary-military period (1914-1920) in the second half of the 1920s – early 1930s, in the period of the Great Patriotic War were carried out by the ruling power for the purpose of increase in quantity of the benefits, services, factors of production appropriated, distributed or used in its interests. The level of the centralized withdrawal of resources on irretrievable military expenses and on investments into industrialization of the power defined macroeconomic dynamics and extent of reorganization of a market mechanism of regulation of a domestic national economy. The mobilization model of directive planned management of a national economy created as a result of reforms of the beginning of the 1930s provided an economic basis of the USSR victory in the Great Patriotic War.

With the development of urban economy and the transition of the traditional industrial structure, Xi’an has witnessed a large-scale demolition and abandonment of industrial buildings in urban renewal during last 30 years. The paper presented the historical background of industrial buildings of Xi’an in the First Five-year Plan Period, and analyzed the value of industrial buildings from the perspectives of historical, social, architectural and technological aspects accordingly. Therefore, it confirms the heritage values of the industrial buildings of Xi’an on the whole and presents they should be protected.

The ever increasing demand for electricity and the rapid increase in the number of automatic electrical appliances have posed a critical energy management challenge for both utilities and consumers. Substantial work has been reported on the Home Energy Management System (HEMS) but to the best of our knowledge, there is no single review highlighting all recent and past developments on Demand Side Management (DSM) and HEMS altogether. The purpose of each study is to raise user comfort, load scheduling, energy minimization, or economic dispatch problem. Researchers have proposed different soft computing and optimization techniques to address the challenge, but still it seems to be a pressing issue. This paper presents a comprehensive review of research on DSM strategies to identify the challenging perspectives for future study. We have described DSM strategies, their deployment and communication technologies. The application of soft computing techniques such as Fuzzy Logic (FL), Artificial Neural Network (ANN), and Evolutionary Computation (EC) is discussed to deal with energy consumption minimization and scheduling problems. Different optimization-based DSM approaches are also reviewed. We have also reviewed the practical aspects of DSM implementation for smart energy management.

Commenting on the figures, the Royal College of Surgeons of England said that it was renewing its call, first made in June, for a five year plan to clear the backlog, which would include increasing hospital beds, staff, and hospital resources. Earlier this month the prime minister, Boris Johnson, announced that his government would release £1.8bn (€2bn; $2.2bn) to fund new equipment and buildings at selected sites across England.2 However, commenting on NHS England’s performance data, Tim Gardner, senior policy fellow at the Health Foundation, said that the investment was nowhere close to what the NHS needed to relieve the growing strain on services. Richard Murray, chief executive at the health think tank the King’s Fund, said that the recently announced proposal to make doctors’ pensions more flexible could help reduce some of the pressures on the NHS.3 But he added that “addressing chronic staff shortages in the NHS will require a raft of measures and must be a priority for the new government.”

The rising energy consumption in residential buildings within the hot summer and cold winter (HSCW) climate zone, driven by occupants’ pursuit of improved thermal comfort, necessitates effective energy conservation measures. This study established urban building energy models for 32,145 residential buildings in Changsha City, China, and conducted a comprehensive retrofit analysis of seven energy conservation measures (ECMs). Additionally, the study assessed the impact of residents’ conscious energy-saving behaviors concerning air conditioner (AC) control. The research commenced by creating six baseline models representative of the diverse building stock. Identifying seven commonly used ECMs, the study examined the potential of each measure for enhancing energy efficiency. To facilitate the analysis, a dedicated toolkit, AutoBPS-Retrofit, was developed to efficiently modify the baseline model for each ECM. Furthermore, the investigation delved into the investment cost of implementing the ECMs and evaluated their simple payback year (PBP) and net present value (NPV). The results demonstrate that tailored retrofit plans are essential when addressing envelope improvements, varying according to building types and ages. Retrofits targeting lighting systems offer both promising energy savings and favorable economic viability, albeit subject to residents’ preferences. Alternatively, upgrading the AC systems emerges as the most energy-efficient approach, yet the economic assessment raises concerns. The study’s findings offer practical insights for governments seeking to establish effective carbon reduction goals and policies. Moreover, the research can assist energy-saving institutions, real-estate companies, and stakeholders involved in renovation projects by offering guidance in making informed decisions to enhance energy efficiency in city-scale residential buildings.

Residents’ willingness to use green energy products is a major concern for different stakeholders and policymakers due to the reformed Chinese electricity market since 2015. This study focused on the Chinese consumer’s willingness to opt and pay for environmentally-friendly electricity sources in Shanghai’s residential sector. A questionnaire survey was used to find out the influence of gender, age, education, awareness and income level on consumers’ attitudes to alter their energy sources to green ones. The results indicated that income level and awareness are significant barriers in the usage of green energy products. Increasing the respondent’s awareness about the issues of non-green energy products convinced 97% of them to change their electricity sources completely or partly, in line with their monthly income. This clearly shows that clarifying the benefits of green energy products is a key tool to achieve a green environment in China.

This article focuses on one of the most fascinating features of contemporary Chinese foreign policy, namely the use of economics as a tool of national power. This article seeks to provide a foundational context for the study of China's economic statecraft. The first portion of this article builds upon existing work to frame the phenomenon of China's post-Cold War economic statecraft. I then offer a rough periodization of this post-Cold War era highlighting key events and strategic turning points for China. I distinguish three major periods: integration into the global economic system following the post-Tiananmen isolation (1989–1997), a decade of win-win diplomacy (1998–2008), and emerging great power economic statecraft (2008–2017). The piece concludes with a proposition that we may be witnessing the early stages of a fourth phase as well as some considerations for the future study of Chinese economic statecraft.