This volume focuses on the collection of waste and waste streams as an integral aspect of sustainable waste management. The authors take economic models and behavioral studies into account to go beyond just descriptions of waste collections technologies and collection route design. Models and tools for sustainable waste collection are described in detail, and the authors provide a comprehensive, integrated methodology to design waste collection systems that reduce environmental impacts, are economically viable, and achieve buy-in and participation from target populations.
Part I of the book provides fundamentals and context on waste hierarchy, including waste prevention, reduction and reuse, waste collection itself, and steps such as preparation for recycling, recycling, treatment, and landfilling. Background in environmental, social, and economic concerns surrounding waste collection is also provided here. Part II addresses tools for design, operation, and maintenance of waste collection systems. Part III focuses on how the tools presented in Part II can be used to support sustainability assessments and decisions that consider the entire life cycle of waste and the role of waste collection programs in waste prevention, reduction, reuse, recycling, treatment, and disposal. Part IV addresses the challenges of developing sustainable waste management systems and addresses the role of waste collection in sustainable waste management in the future.

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https://docentes.fct.unl.pt/lblm/files/sensorsactbchem-2019-285-445.pdf

The normality of the log-return of stock prices is often assumed by the market players in order to use some useful results, as for instance, the Black-Scholes formula for pricing European options. However, several studies regarding different indexes have shown that the normality assumption of the returns usually fails.
In this paper we analyse the normality assumption for intra-day and inter-day log-returns, comparing opening prices and/or closing prices for a large number of companies quoted in the Nasdaq Composite index. We use the Pearson's Chi-Square, Kolmogorov-Smirnov, Anderson-Darling, Shapiro-Wilks and Jarque-Bera goodness-of-fit tests to study the normality assumption.
We find that the failure rate in the normality assumption for the log-return of stock prices is not the same for intra-day and inter-day prices, is somewhat test dependent and strongly dependent on some extreme price observations.
To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study on the normality assumption for the log-return of stock prices dealing simultaneously with a large number of companies and normality tests, and at the same time considering various scenarios of intra-day, inter-day prices and data trimming.

This paper presents a study of the behaviour and load capacity of steel-fibre-reinforced concrete (SFRC) flat slabs under monotonically increased concentrated vertical loads. The SFRC was used only in the local region of the slab–column connection, as the rest of the slab was cast using normal concrete without fibres. The six experimental test specimens had a thickness of 150 mm with different longitudinal reinforcement ratios, using a non-uniform distribution over the slab width. The concretes used were made with different Dramix 4D 65/60 BG steel fibre contents (0, 0·5, 0·75 and 1·0% volume content). The slab tests were complemented by flexural tests on notched beams. This made it possible to determine the tension behaviour of the different concretes used, through a linear post-cracking behaviour and inverse analysis. The inverse analysis made it possible to define the stress–crack opening relationship that characterises the tension behaviour of SFRC and to relate it to the observed behaviour and load capacity of the tested slabs. The tests results show that the tensile behaviour of the SFRC plays an important role in the behavioural and load capacity of the slabs and that it can be considered relevant to physically based models.

This paper presents an experimental study of four flat slab specimens subjected to combined vertical and horizontal cyclic loading. Steel fibre-reinforced concrete (SFRC) was used only in the local region of the slab–column connection, while the rest of the slabs were cast using normal concrete. The specimens measured 4·15 m × 1·85 m × 0·15 m and were connected to two steel half columns by 0·25 m × 0·25 m rigid steel plates, prestressed against the slab using steel bolts, to ensure monolithic behaviour. The specimens were tested using an innovative test setup system that accounted for important factors, such as the ability of bending moment redistribution, line of inflection mobility and assured equal vertical displacements at the opposite slab borders, and symmetrical shear forces. Results show that the presence of SFRC in the slab–column connection region is effective in increasing the deformation capacity of slab–column connections, allowing the increase of horizontal drift ratios.

The current research aims to study the behavior of thin reinforced concrete (RC) slabs under concentrated loads as well as to investigate the application of Critical Shear Crack Theory (CSCT) to such slabs. For this purpose, four square 100-mm-thick slabs were cast and subjected to concentrated punching monotonic loading. The experimental parameters were the flexural reinforcement ratio, 0.38% and 1.00%, and the presence or absence of shear headed stud reinforcement. It is shown that the failure criteria of CSCT describe reasonably well the observed failure modes and the ultimate loads of the specimens. However, attention is brought to some peculiarities in the analytical derivation of the load-rotation curve for thin lightly reinforced flat slabs, in which large deformations are experienced. Results showed that in such slabs, the behavior can be highly influenced by the post-yield stress-strain curve of the flexural steel reinforcement. As a result, the constitutive law of steel reinforcement should be explicitly taken into account in such cases. The versatility of CSCT to adapt to these conditions is demonstrated.

The degradation mechanisms of bonded joints between CFRP laminates and steel substrates under severe environmental conditions require more durability data and studies to increase the database and better understand their causes. Studies on bond properties of double-strap CFRP-to-steel bonded joints with two different composite materials as well as adhesive coupons subjected to freeze-thaw cycles for 10,000 h were conducted to reduce that gap. In addition, the equivalent to the number of thermal cycles and their slips induced in the CFRP laminates was replicated by an equivalent (mechanical) loading-unloading history condition imposed by a static tensile machine. The mechanical properties of the adhesive coupons and the strength capacity of the bonded joints were only slightly changed by the artificial aging. It was confirmed that the interfacial bond strength between CFRP and adhesive is critically related to the maximum shear stress and failure mode. The interfacial bond strength between adhesive and steel degraded with the aging. However, the equivalent thermal cyclic bond stress caused no detectable damage on the bond because only the interfacial elastic regime was actually mobilized, which confirmed that pure thermal cycles aging, per se, at the level imposed, have a low impact on the degradation of CFRP-to-steel bonded joints. © 2019 Elsevier Ltd