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 evaluates the health and sustainability of higher education systems in nine countries: the USA, UK, Australia, Germany, Canada, China, Brazil, India, and South Africa. Using a multi-level analysis model and principal component analysis (PCA), nine key factors—such as international student numbers, academic levels, and graduate employment rates—were identified, capturing over 90% of the cumulative impact on higher education systems. India, scoring 6.2036 initially, shows significant room for improvement. The study proposes policies to increase graduate employment, promote international faculty collaboration, and enhance India’s educational expenditure, which surpasses 9.8% of GDP. Post-policy simulations suggest India’s score could rise to 8.7432. The paper also addresses the impact of COVID-19 on global education, recommending a hybrid model and increased graduate enrollment in China to reduce unemployment by 5.4%. The research aims to guide sustainable development in higher education globally.

As an important type of knowledge, standards are key factors in economic development and technological innovation. To analyze the impact of participation in standards development on enterprise performance, this study takes China’s high-tech industry as an example. We use the operating data of listed enterprises in the industry in 2019 and conduct the propensity score matching method matching analysis on the entire sample and the classification. The conclusion shows: From an overall point of view, the participation of enterprises in the development of standards has a positive impact on the enterprise’s return on total assets. Specifically, participating in the development of over three standards can also improve the return on total assets. Large enterprises can increase the return on total assets of the enterprise and the return on invested capital. The state-owned enterprises have a positive effect on the return on total assets of the enterprise. Enterprises in the western, central, and eastern region enterprises can increase their net profit, enterprise value and net profit, return on total assets and enterprise value respectively. The enterprises in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area can improve their return on invested capital and enterprise value, average rate of return respectively. The participation in the development of national standards, industry standards and local standards can help increase their return on total assets, the return on total assets and enterprise value, enterprise value respectively. Finally, we suggestions are put forward to enhance enterprises’ enthusiasm to take part in standards development.

In recent years, e-sports, as an emerging form of competition, has been rapidly integrated into the daily life of college students, and with its rich interactivity, instant feedback and teamwork, e-sports provides them with an effective channel for emotional catharsis and psychological regulation. This study takes students from four universities as the survey object and adopts quantitative research method to analyze the relationship between different types of e-sports activities and psychological stress resistance through questionnaire survey method combined with spss. The samples were randomly sampled, and a total of 500 valid questionnaires were collected. The results of the study show that: 1. In terms of participation, the ability of students to withstand academic stress and life stress is significantly improved, and e-sports is an effective way to regulate emotions and relieve stress; 2. the three types of games (First-person Shooter, Multiplayer Online Battle Arena, Real-Time Strategy Game) have different impacts on stress tolerance, of which FPS has the greatest impact on stress tolerance; 3. the frequency of playing e-sports affects your stress tolerance; 4. teamwork and strategy play an important role in e-sports resilience.

The target date for achieving the 2030 UN Agenda [Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)] is fast approaching. The construction sector is critical to achieving many SDGs, including Goal 5. Studies regarding achieving Goal 5 (Gender Equality) in the construction industry, especially women’s consultancy participation in developing countries, are scarce and complexly interrelated. Societal problems and divergence may have contributed to this. Therefore, this study explores issues hindering gender equality and suggests measures to promote more women construction consultants through policy to improve achieving Goal 5 in Nigeria. The research employed face-to-face data collection via a qualitative mechanism to achieve this. The study covered Abuja and Lagos. It accomplished saturation at the 20th participant. The research utilised a thematic method to analyse the collected data from knowledgeable participants. The perceived hindrances facing Nigerian construction consultants’ gender equality were clustered into culture/religion-related, profession-related, and government-related encumbrances. Achieving Goal 5 will be a mirage if these issues are not addressed. Thus, the study recommended measures to motivate women to study construction-related programmes and employment opportunities, including consultancy services slots through programmes and policy mechanisms to achieve Goal 5. As part of the implications, the study suggests that Nigerian construction consultants and other stakeholders need to make feasible improvements to achieve gender equality (Goal 5).