Cities play a key role in achieving the climate-neutral supply of heating and cooling. This paper compares the policy frameworks as well as practical implementation of smart heating and cooling in six cities: Munich, Dresden and Bad Nauheim in Germany; and Jinan, Chengdu and Haiyan in China, to explore strategies to enhance policy support, financial mechanisms, and consumer engagement, ultimately aiming to facilitate the transition to climate-neutral heating and cooling systems. The study is divided into three parts: (i) an examination of smart heating and cooling policy frameworks in Germany and China over the past few years; (ii) an analysis of heating and cooling strategies in the six case study cities within the context of smart energy systems; and (iii) an exploration of the practical solutions adopted by these cities as part of their smart energy transition initiatives. The findings reveal differences between the two countries in the strategies and regulations adopted by municipal governments as well as variations within each country. The policy frameworks and priorities set by city governments can greatly influence the development and implementation of smart heating and cooling systems. The study found that all six cities are actively engaged in pioneering innovative heating and cooling projects which utilise diverse energy sources such as geothermal, biomass, solar, waste heat and nuclear energy. Even the smaller cities were seen to be making considerable progress in the adoption of smart solutions.

This study investigates the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) integration on preventing employee burnout through a human-centered, multimodal approach. Given the increasing prevalence of AI in workplace settings, this research seeks to understand how various dimensions of AI integration—such as the intensity of integration, employee training, personalization of AI tools, and the frequency of AI feedback—affect employee burnout. A quantitative approach was employed, involving a survey of 320 participants from high-stress sectors such as healthcare and IT. The findings reveal that the benefits of AI in reducing burnout are substantial yet highly dependent on the implementation strategy. Effective AI integration that includes comprehensive training, high personalization, and regular, constructive feedback correlates with lower levels of burnout. These results suggest that the mere introduction of AI technologies is insufficient for reducing burnout; instead, a holistic strategy that includes thorough employee training, tailored personalization, and continuous feedback is crucial for leveraging AI’s potential to alleviate workplace stress. This study provides valuable insights for organizational leaders and policymakers aiming to develop informed AI deployment strategies that prioritize employee well-being.

Accurate prediction of US Treasury bond yields is crucial for investment strategies and economic policymaking. This paper explores the application of advanced machine learning techniques, specifically Recurrent Neural Networks (RNN) and Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) models, in forecasting these yields. By integrating key economic indicators and policy changes, our approach seeks to enhance the precision of yield predictions. Our study demonstrates the superiority of LSTM models over traditional RNNs in capturing the temporal dependencies and complexities inherent in financial data. The inclusion of macroeconomic and policy variables significantly improves the models’ predictive accuracy. This research underscores a pioneering movement for the legacy banking industry to adopt artificial intelligence (AI) in financial market prediction. In addition to considering the conventional economic indicator that drives the fluctuation of the bond market, this paper also optimizes the LSTM to handle situations when rate hike expectations have already been priced-in by market sentiment.

This study examines the economic feasibility of the environment-friendly farmland use policy to improve water quality. Conventional highland farming, polluting the Han River basin in South Korea, can be converted into environment-friendly farming through land acquisition or application of pesticide-free or organic farming practices. We estimate the welfare measures of improvement in water quality and the costs of policy implementation for economic analysis. To estimate the economic benefit of improvement in water quality experienced by the residents residing in mid-and-downstream areas of the Han River, the choice experiment was employed with a pivot-style experimental design approach. In the empirical analysis, we converted the household perception for water quality grades into scientific water quality measures using Water Quality Standard to estimate the value of changes in water quality. To analyze the costs required to convert conventional highland farmlands into environment-friendly farmlands, we estimated the relevant cost of land acquisition and the subsidy necessary for farm income loss for organic agricultural practice. We find that the agri-environmental policy is economically viable, which suggests that converting conventional highland farming into environment-friendly farming would make the improvement in water quality visible.

The present study is designed to analyse how the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model is helping to create sustainable livelihood opportunities for women. It draws an inference from ‘Marudhara Rangsaaz’, a producer company operating in the textile sector in Rajasthan, India. It explains how this woman-based organisation operates in a PPP model to create economic value for women. It also tries to understand the specific role of the Rajasthan Grameen Aajeevika Vikas Parishad (RAJEEVIKA), The Rajasthan Government partner and ‘Rang Sutra’, the private partner, and the women members of ‘Marudhara Rangsaaz’ in the PPP model. The paper adopted a case study research design. The data was collected using in-depth interviews with all stakeholders and analysis of the documents. The findings indicate that in the said PPP model, Government took the role of mobilizer, financer, mentor, and private player, took the responsibility of building up capacity and arranging market links, and the women members worked together to help themselves sustain the project.

The COVID-19 outbreak on international cruise ships during the early stages of the pandemic has exposed deficiencies in the governance of public health emergencies within the framework of existing international law. These deficiencies encompass various aspects, including the shortcomings of the system of flag state jurisdiction, the vague definition and reasonableness of governments’ “additional health measures” as stipulated in the International Health Regulations (IHR) of 2005, the role of World Health Organization (WHO) in the protection of the fundamental rights of passengers and crew members during epidemic outbreaks on cruise ships, the application of the free pratique rule under the international health law, and other challenges that have not been adequately addressed in current international law. In the post-COVID era, it is essential to revisit these core issues of international law and reassess the allocation of responsibilities among all evolving actors to foster effective multilateral cooperation in epidemic control. This paper adopts the “Diamond Princess” incident as a case study, examining how such public health emergencies pose challenges to international laws, particularly when they occur within the context of a cruise ship. The paper argues that cooperation on global health emergencies will continue to be a challenge until responsibility is more clearly allocated among stakeholders. Additionally, the paper formulates three principles for enhancing governmental cooperation, namely the fairness principle, the nationality principle, and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities. It is advisable to carefully consider these key principles when reevaluating the international laws on public health emergencies in the post-COVID era.