Search results for "European Commission."

TERRE project: interplay between unsaturated soil mechanics and low-carbon geotechnical engineering

2020

The geotechnical construction industry is a major component of the overall construction sector and is strategically important in infrastructure development (transportation, flood and landslide protection, building foundations, waste disposal). Although industry and research in the overall construction sector have been investing significantly in recent years to produce innovative low-carbon technologies, little innovation has been created in geotechnical construction industry, which is lagging behind other construction industry sectors. This paper discusses the interplay between low-carbon geotechnical engineering and unsaturated soil mechanics based on the research carried out within the pr…

The Bioshale Project: Search for a Sustainable Way of Exploiting Black Shale Ores Using Biotechnology

2007

The Bioshale project, involving 13 partners throughout Europe, is co-funded by the European Commission under the FP6 program. The main objective of this project (which started in October 2004) is to identify and develop innovative biotechnological processes for ‘’eco-efficient’’ exploitation of metal-rich, black shale ores. Three extensive deposits have been selected for R&D actions. These are: (i) a site (in Talvivaara, Finland) that, at the outset of the project, had not been exploited; (ii) a deposit (in Lubin, Poland) that is currently being actively mined, and (iii) a third site (in Mansfeld, Germany) where the ore had been actively mined in the past, but which is no longer exploit…

Risk Indicators and Road Accident Analysis for the Period 2012–2016

2017

Road accidents are a major societal issue for every country. The purpose of this paper is to assess the number of traffic and road accidents depending on a series of variables (collision mode, road configuration, conditions of occurrence, road category, type of vehicle involved, personal factors, and length of time of the driving license) in Romania from 2012–2016. The analysis of the road accident trend identifies the causes of accidents, road safety performance indicators, and risk indicators. Having these identified data, a framework is proposed for improving the road safety system and reducing accidents. The Romanian Police, the National Institute of Statistics (NIS) in Romania, and the…

Entrepreneurs’ Exit and Paths to Retirement: Theoretical and Empirical Considerations

2019

The number of ageing entrepreneurs in micro- and small-sized companies is rapidly increasing in Finland and other European Union countries. Over half a million jobs, in over one hundred thousand companies within the EU, are lost annually due to unsuccessful, predominantly retirement-related transfers of businesses. This challenge coincides with EU Grand Challenges and has been highlighted in the Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan (European Commission 2013). It has been estimated that in Finland, some 8000 jobs are lost yearly due to the ageing of entrepreneurs. Therefore, entrepreneur ageing has implications not only for the ageing individual but also for the company and the society at large…

Comparing analytical methods to detect SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater

2021

Wastewater based epidemiology (WBE) has emerged as a reliable strategy to assess the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Recent publications suggest that SARS-CoV-2 detection in wastewater is technically feasible; however, many different protocols are available and most of the methods applied have not been properly validated. To this end, different procedures to concentrate and extract inactivated SARS-CoV-2 and surrogates were initially evaluated. Urban wastewater seeded with gamma-irradiated SARS-CoV-2, porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV), and mengovirus (MgV) was used to test the concentration efficiency of an aluminum-based adsorption-precipitation method and a polyethylene…

Perspectives for parasitology and parasitology networks in Europe

2009

This article describes networks of parasitologists in Europe. Some research networks are supported by the European Commission within highly diverse framework programs. The European Federation of Parasitologists aims to promote the exchange of knowledge and the coordination of research in the fields of basic, veterinary and medical parasitology, particularly via meetings (e.g. the European Multicolloquium of Parasitology) that offer an unparalleled opportunity to assess the development of the discipline on the continent. The present situation is discussed here and some perspectives are proposed.

Agenda Setting in the European Commission: How the European Commission Structure and Influence the EU Agenda

2013

Case Comment: C-82/10 European Commission v Ireland - Judgement of the Court of Justice of the European Union, September 29, 2011 (VHI Case)

2011

This article (published online for the EJLE, see below) is the case comment on the recent judgement (September 29, 2011) of the Court of Justice of the European Union in the case No C-82/10 concerning non-life insurance. This case was initiated by the European Commission against Ireland for failure to fulfil its obligations by not covering the Voluntary Health Insurance Board by insurance supervisory scheme as provided for by relevant Directives. The above insurance institution which is the main health insurer in Ireland enjoys exemption from the supervisory scheme envisaged by relevant Directives. Ireland may maintain this exemption if its capacity is not amended; otherwise the above insti…

Instrumental calculation, cognitive role-playing, or both?: self-perceptions of Seconded National Experts in the European Commission

2011

This is the authors’ final, accepted and refereed manuscript to the article Most work studying micro-processes of integration – i.e. how agents develop identities and decision-making behaviours within a particular institution – offers explanations based on either instrumental rationality or socialisation. This article proposes a two-dimensional framework that allows analysing under which conditions both logics of social action co-exist. Our empirical analysis employs a unique dataset from a 2011 survey of all 1098 currently active Seconded National Experts (SNEs) in the European Commission. We find that a) instrumental cost-benefit calculation and cognitive role-playing (as semi-reflexive s…

Representative Bureaucracy and the Role of Expertise in Politics

2015

This is an open access journal from Cogitatio http://www.cogitatiopress.com The vast majority of existing studies on bureaucratic representation focus on bureaucracies’ permanent and internal staff. Yet, the rising sophistication of modern democracies and the technocratization of political life are gradually inducing an increased reliance on external experts to assist in the development and implementation of policy decisions. This trend, we argue, raises the need to extend studies of bureaucratic representation to such external and non-permanent experts in governmental affairs. In this article, we take a first step in this direction using seconded national experts (SNEs) in the European Com…