Production activities: resource, technologies, environment and impacts. Water as a natural resource. Lithosphere, fossil fuels and renewable energy. Metals. Waste: the other side of progress. Quality and certification. Environmental management system. Micro-enterprise and innovation. Bio-economy and green economy: from theory to practice. Case Study of Tuscan Micro-Enterprise.
Climate change: drivers, scenarios,mitigation strategies critical resources, critical and new material and technologies
For the teaching materials send an email to annalisa.romani@unifi.it and CC chiara.vita@pin.unifi.it
Obiettivi Formativi
KNOWLEDGE: The following topics related to production activities will be presented: resource, technologies, environment and impacts; air and water as a natural resources; lithosphere, fossil fuels and renewable energy; metals; waste (the other side of progress); quality and certification; Ecolabel System for touristic enterprise; environmental management system; micro-enterprise and innovation; Bioeconomy and green economy (from theory to practice). Case Study of Tuscan Micro-Enterprise and touristic Tuscan Micro-Enterprise.
COMPETENCE: To understand and describe the goods and the related production processes using appropriate conceptual tools and technical language.
SKILLS: The student will be able to describe the goods in terms of economic sustainability and green production, new technologies, green technologies and quality of products and production, energy and environmental charges associated with production processes. The student will be able to classify goods; distinguish the uses and weaknesses related to the use of natural resources, the main fossil fuels and renewable energies. The student will be able to recognize the properties of metals and of air and water as resources, to evaluate environmental impacts, environmental management system and the main voluntary certification schemes of products and production.
Prerequisiti
A good knowledge and understanding of written English.
An operative knowledge of a personal connected computer and of the usual software products for navigation, word processing, calculus and presentation.
Metodi Didattici
Lectures with slides.
Visits to case-study enterprises.
Altre Informazioni
Modalità di verifica apprendimento
The exam is oral and usually lasts 30 minutes.
The student has to answer three-four questions, choosen by the teachers, on the following subjects:
1) resource, materials, technologies
2) environment, impacts, pollution, global warming
3) air and water quality, safety, sanitation, processing
4) fossil fuels and renewable energies
5) metals, critical materials, critical resources
6) waste, waste processing, recycling, reusing, circular economy
7) quality and certification, Ecolabel System for touristic enterprise, environmental management system
8) Bioeconomy, green economy, sustainability, LCA, ecological footprint.
9) Climate change, mitigation strategies and tourism systems
There is no difference between attending and non-attending students.
Programma del corso
A special attention is given to the integration of the different subjects in the main theme of the design and management of tourist systems.
Within this framework the course presents issues which are and will be more and more important either for the citizen of today and of tomorrow, or for those who study or work in the field of Humanities, Economy, Social Sciences, Politics, Law, in the framework of a new vision of environmental awareness and of the challenges that such professions have and will have to face.
CONTENTS
New technologies. Introduction to the environmental chemistry.
Renewable and non-renewable natural resources. Secondary raw materials and innovative raw materials. Classification of resources and stocks. Production cycles and environmental protection.Value of the environmental resources. Sustainable development principles for resources use. McKelvin diagram and Govett triangle model.
Air as resource. Air liquid and production of nitrogen, oxygen and noble gases. Air and pollution.
Green-house effect, greenhouse gases, global warming, climate change.
The atmospheric CO2 concentration and temperature: history and trends.
The sea water acidification: chemical bases and recent findings.
Glacers, circumpolar lakes and permafrost melting: recent findings and trends in CH4 atmospheric concentrations.
Greenhouse gases emission by livestock production.
Physical and chemical properties of pure water. Water cycle. Industrial uses of the water.
Desalination technologies, multiphases and multiflash plants.
Osmotic pressure and reverse osmosis. Electrodialysis.
Drinking water purification technology. Characteristics of the drinking water (organoleptic, chemical and biological).
Water pollution. Acid rains.
Ozone layer. Ozone hole.
Critcal elements: lithium, lanthanides, uranium, phosphorus
Natural and artificial radionuclides in the environment and in the human body.
How tourist systems could be involved in radiological emergencies and how to manage them.
The life cycle assessment of a nuclear power plant combined with an energy analysis.
The Life-cycle greenhouse-gas emissions of solar thermal and solar PV.
The comparison of greenhouse-gas emissions of different power plants: combined cycle gas-fired, oil-fired, coal-fired, geothermal high-temp., hydroelectric, wind, nuclear, solar, biogas, biomass.
Hydroelectric power plants. Run-of-the-river hydroelectricity (ROR). Small hydro.
Micro hydro. Pico hydro. Traditional hydro. Wind power plants. The quiet revolution VAWT (vertical axis helical turbine). The World most powerful wind turbine Vestas' V164-8.0 MW prototype.
Nuclear power plants. Pressuruzed-Water Reactor. Westinghouse AP1000.
The Russian VVER. Small floating plants. The Radon in the environment. Distribution, concentration, exposure, risks. Radon in caves, speleology, tourism management.
Tourist system based on the relationship between energy production and landscape shaping.
Biomass and biofuel production. Environmental temporal technology, transfers in the airline industry. District for rail technologies, high speed, safety and security.
Introduction of the quality assurance. NLP (Neuro-Lingustic-Programming).
Physical, chemical and technological characteristics of the metals.
Iron cycle production process.
The close relation between innovation and certification: an empirical analysis in the Como's silk district.
Bioeconomy and Green Economy: From Theory to Practice. Case Study of a Tuscan Micro-Enterprise.
Copper: metal characteristics and production cycle.
Aluminium: metal characteristics and production cycle.
Quality: total quality and quality assurance.