Is ESG Relevant to Electricity Companies during Pandemics? A Case Study on European Firms during COVID-19

The electricity sector was negatively impacted by the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), with considerable declines in consumption in the initial phase. Investors were in turmoil, and stock prices for these companies plummeted. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the significant negative influence of the pandemic on abnormal returns for the electricity sector, specifically for traditional and renewable companies and the influence of ESG scores, using the event study approach and multi-variate regressions. Our results show that the pandemic indeed had a negative impact on the electricity sector, with renewable electricity companies suffering a sharper decline than traditional ones. Moreover, we find that ESG pillar scores affected electricity companies differently and are sector-specific. For renewable electricity companies, the returns were positively influenced by the environmental ESG scores and negatively by governance ESG scores.

Changes in chemical composition and copepod toxicity during petroleum photooxidation

Photoproducts can be formed rapidly in the initial phase of a marine oil spill. However, their toxicity is not well understood. In this study, oil was irradiated, chemically characterized, and tested for toxicity in three copepod species (A. tonsa, T. longicornis, C.finmarchicus). Irradiation led to a depletion of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and n-alkanes in oil residues, along with an enrichment in aromatic and aliphatic oil photoproducts. Target lipid model-based calculations of PAH toxic units (TU-PAH) predicted that PAH toxicities were lower in water accommodated fractions (WAFs) of irradiated oil residues (“irradiated WAFs”) than in WAFs of dark-control samples (“dark WAFs”). In contrast, biomimetic extraction (BE) measurements showed increased bioaccumulation potential of irradiated WAFs compared to dark WAFs, mainly driven by photoproducts present in irradiated oil. In line with the BE results, copepod mortality increased in response to irradiated WAFs compared to dark WAFs. Low copepod toxicities were observed for WAFs produced with photooxidized oil slicks collected during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The results of this study suggest that while oil photoproducts have the potential to be a significant source of copepod toxicity, the water solubility of these products might mitigate their toxicity at sea.

Griseldis Báthory, the Disobedient Bride or the Unsuccessful Taming of a Heretic Shrew

The article aims to examine the initial phase of the marriage of Jan Zamoyski with Griseldis Báthory, the issue of change of the bride’s name, and the problems caused by the newlyweds’ difference of faith. Despite the plans of king Stephen and hetman Zamoyski, the young bride did not become a Catholic. Her upbringing by her Protestant mother and grandmother overrode the political interests of her Catholic male relatives.

The 4.2 ka Event and the End of the Maltese “Temple Period”

The small size and relatively challenging environmental conditions of the semi-isolated Maltese archipelago mean that the area offers an important case study of societal change and human-environment interactions. Following an initial phase of Neolithic settlement, the “Temple Period” in Malta began ∼5.8 thousand years ago (ka), and came to a seemingly abrupt end ∼4.3 ka, and was followed by Bronze Age societies with radically different material culture. Various ideas concerning the reasons for the end of the Temple Period have been expressed. These range from climate change, to invasion, to social conflict resulting from the development of a powerful “priesthood.” Here, we explore the idea that the end of the Temple Period relates to the 4.2 ka event. The 4.2 ka event has been linked with several examples of significant societal change around the Mediterranean, such as the end of the Old Kingdom in Egypt, yet its character and relevance have been debated. The Maltese example offers a fascinating case study for understanding issues such as chronological uncertainty, disentangling cause and effect when several different processes are involved, and the role of abrupt environmental change in impacting human societies. Ultimately, it is suggested that the 4.2 ka event may have played a role in the end of the Temple Period, but that other factors seemingly played a large, and possibly predominant, role. As well as our chronological modelling indicating the decline of Temple Period society in the centuries before the 4.2 ka event, we highlight the possible significance of other factors such as a plague epidemic.

Unique Evolution of SARS-CoV-2 in the Second Large Cruise Ship Cluster in Japan

In the initial phase of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, a large-scale cluster on the cruise ship Diamond Princess (DP) emerged in Japan. Genetic analysis of the DP strains has provided important information for elucidating the possible transmission process of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) on a cruise ship. However, genome-based analyses of SARS-CoV-2 detected in large-scale cruise ship clusters other than the DP cluster have rarely been reported. In the present study, whole-genome sequences of 94 SARS-CoV-2 strains detected in the second large cruise ship cluster, which emerged on the Costa Atlantica (CA) in Japan, were characterized to understand the evolution of the virus in a crowded and confined place. Phylogenetic and haplotype network analysis indicated that the CA strains were derived from a common ancestral strain introduced on the CA cruise ship and spread in a superspreading event-like manner, resulting in several mutations that might have affected viral characteristics, including the P681H substitution in the spike protein. Moreover, there were significant genetic distances between CA strains and other strains isolated in different environments, such as cities under lockdown. These results provide new insights into the unique evolution patterns of SARS-CoV-2 in the CA cruise ship cluster.

The Spatial Model of Paddy Productivity Based on Environmental Vulnerability in Each Phase of Paddy Planting

The national primary always growth and increase in line with the increase in population, such as the rise of rice consumption in Indonesia. Paddy productivity influenced by the physical condition of the land and the declining of those factors can detected from the environmental vulnerability parameters. Purpose of this study was to compile a spatial model of paddy productivity based on environmental vulnerability in each planting phase using the remote sensing and GIS technology approaches. This spatial model is compiled based on the results of the application of two models, namely spatial model of paddy planting phase and paddy productivity. The spatial model of paddy planting phase obtained from the analysis of vegetation index from Sentinel-2A imagery using the random forest classification model. The variables for building the spatial model of the paddy planting phase are a combination of NDVI vegetation index, EVI, SAVI, NDWI, and time variables. The overall accuracy of the paddy planting phase model is 0.92 which divides the paddy planting phase into the initial phase of planting, vegetative phase, generative phase, and fallow phase. The paddy productivity model obtained from environmental vulnerability analysis with GIS using the linear regression method. The variables used are environmental vulnerability variables which consist of hazards from floods, droughts, landslides, and rainfall. Estimation of paddy productivity based on the influence of environmental vulnerability has the best accuracy done at the vegetative phase of 0.63 and the generative phase of 0.61 while in the initial phase of planting cannot be used because it has a weak relationship with an accuracy of 0.35.

Влияние предыонизации на микроканальную структуру искрового разряда в воздухе в промежутке острие-плоскость

The initial phase of a spark discharge in the gap between the pin (cathode) and a plane 1.5 mm long in atmospheric pressure air under conditions of preliminary photoionization by an auxiliary discharge was investigated by the method of shadow photography. In the absence of preionization, the discharge from the first nanoseconds after breakdown is an aggregate of a large number of micron-diameter channels. It was found that the electron concentration resulting from preionization, estimated at 108  109 cm-3, increases the degree of uniformity of the discharge channel in the near-cathode region; however, in the near-anode region, the channel remains microstructured. Within the framework of the mechanism of microstructure formation due to the instability of the ionization wave front, a criterion for the formation of a uniform discharge is obtained and an explanation of the results obtained is presented.

Social Reactions to the Pandemic

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has become a global health and economic crisis and has had many impacts on daily life. This study investigates the effect of the pandemic on movie viewing preferences in Turkey. Using Google Trends data, it handles trends towards epidemic movies with a quantitative analysis method. Google Trends data is a valuable source of information for examining quarantine's psychological, sociological, and health effects. In this way, it can be determined which media preferences the society, which wants to get rid of the epidemic's concerns, is turning to. In this study, the search was made on IMDb with the keyword “contagion,” and movies with an IMDb rating above 6.0 among the listed pandemic movies were examined as sampling. The interest in epidemic films determined three months before and after the epidemic's start was compared. This study suggests an increase in watching pandemic movies in Turkey in response to the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic.