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Details a behavioral theory of economic welfare that overlaps and extends the global theoretical framework contained in Pareto Optimality, with significant public policy implications. The essence of this framework is contained in Adam Smith’s the Wealth of Nations where it is argued that the economic welfare of society cannot be augmented if the material level of well‐being of the working population is reduced, even if the economy experiences growth. Moreover, it is argued that there need not be an equity‐efficiency trade‐off in a competitive market economy to the extent that wages positively affect productivity and do not increase production costs. Therefore, shifting from a low to a high wage economy is welfare improving. Smith, in effect, argues that one can have economic ‘justice’ and economic efficiency where the former is necessary to the latter. The behavioral model of economic welfare paints a dynamic picture of economic welfare in contradistinction to the static framework provided by Pareto Optimality wherein the conditions of Pareto Optimality need not be violated.

The right supply chain (SC) strategy is widely believed to be able to improve supply chain management (SCM) performance. Ignoring the important concept of alignment means that failures in SCM resulting from a mismatch between two or more crucial factors remain common. Accordingly, Lee proposed an environmental uncertainty framework to devise the right SC strategy. However, the proposed framework has thus far remained conceptual. Therefore, this study seeks to empirically investigate Lee's uncertainty framework and examine how alignment between SC strategy and environmental uncertainty impacts perceived SCM performance.

A survey was designed and used to collect 243 usable responses from manufacturers. A profile deviation approach was applied to compute the alignment between SC strategy and environmental uncertainty.

The results of the study verify that the alignment between SC strategy and environmental uncertainty is positively associated with SCM performance.

The data were collected from a cross‐sectional survey and represented a snapshot of practice. Replication from a longitudinal perspective would better reflect long‐term impacts of alignment on SCM performance.

Different SC strategies are appropriate for distinct environmental uncertainties. It is not enough to simply form an SC strategy for improving SCM performance without considering the alignment between SC strategies and environmental uncertainties.

The study empirically examines Lee's uncertainty framework, which has received considerable attention in relation to SCM, but has not previously been clearly verified. The study also develops the a priori theoretical profiles for SC strategies by using an integrated perspective that incorporates both manufacturing and information system capabilities.

The key purpose of this paper is to quantify the size of the energy-efficiency gap (EEG) for air conditioners at the household level in Delhi. Most of the studies in the EEG tradition broadly define EEG as the difference between the actual and optimal level of energy efficiency. The optimal level of energy efficiency is defined at the societal level (that weigh social costs against social benefits) and the private level (that weigh private costs against private benefits).

The authors base the empirical results in this study on the basis of the primary data collected through in-person interviews of the high-income urban households in Delhi in 2014-2015. The sample of 101 households was collected through purposive random sampling. The survey data include information on type and number of AC possessed, hours of operations, socioeconomic characteristics and awareness and habits of households.

Using primary data of 101 high-income urban household, the paper finds that average EEG is about 10 per cent of total electricity demand of ACs at the household level. The maximum current saving potential measured as a difference between hypothetical energy consumption, if everyone adopts five star ACs, and actual energy consumption is estimated about 14 per cent of the total electricity demand of ACs. Results from the ordinary least squares regressions demonstrate that individual’s habits, attitude, awareness of energy-efficiency measures and perceptions significantly determine the size of the EEG. Among other things, authors’ empirical analysis shows that information can play a central role in guiding investment in energy-efficient technologies. From the analysis of improving access to understandable information about cost savings, payback period and emission reduction, it is found that full information leads to the significant reduction in the size of the expected private energy-efficiency gap from 10 to 2.98 per cent at the household level.

This paper tests the significance of non-economic and non-social factors in determining the size of the EEG. Apart from socioeconomic factors such as income, occupation and education, individual’s energy-conserving habits and attitudes, awareness of energy-efficiency measures and perceptions are other important factors found to have a significant negative impact on the size of the EEG. This is particularly important for the designing of information programs by policymakers for promoting energy-efficiency choices in view of the change that is required in the behavior and attitudes of the households.

In this study, authors try to estimate the size of the EEG of ACs for the high-income urban households in Delhi. The private energy-efficiency gap estimated at 10 per cent of the household demand for ACs indicates existing saving opportunity for the private households. It is found that provision of comprehensive information about cost savings, payback period and emission reduction reduces the size of the EEG significantly from 10 to 2.72 per cent at the private level. This highlights the existence of limited and incomplete information in the market about the possible costs and benefits of energy-efficiency investments. This paper tests the significance of non-economic and non-social factors in determining the size of the energy-efficiency gap. Apart from socioeconomic factors such as income, occupation and education, individual’s energy-conserving habits and attitudes, awareness of energy-efficiency measures and perceptions are other important factors found to have a significant negative impact on the size of the EEG. This is particularly important for the designing of information programs by policymakers for promoting energy-efficiency choices in view of the change that is required in the behavior and attitudes of the households.

The paper investigates the determinants of capital structure and the speed of adjustment of capital structure decisions of Nigerian firms.

The paper adopts three methods: difference GMM, system GMM and stochastic frontier analysis (SFA).

The empirical results show that firms' efficiency affects the capital structure decisions of Nigerian firms. At the same time, short-term debt has a higher speed of adjustment in the context of Nigerian firms. The roles of other control variables are established in the paper.

Nigerian firms should adopt short-term debt in order to achieve their targeted debt levels. Managers of Nigerian firms are also advised to be more efficient in order to attract higher performance.

The paper is the first literature to measure the efficiency of firms using SFA method. Extant studies in the literature have neglected the determinant while four papers that adopt the determinant data envelope analysis (DEA) method. This is also the first study to document the speed of adjustment in capital structure decisions in the context of Nigerian firms.

This study analyzes supplier development investment decisions under a triadic setting (two buyers and a common supplier). In a triadic setting, the supplier development investment decision of one buyer can have a spillover effect of the benefits on other buyer. Therefore, it is utmost important for the investing buyer to understand the impact of benefit spillover on other competing buyers'. Therefore, one of the purposes of this study to analyze the supplier development investment decision of buyers under two scenarios. First, under cooperative development structure where both buyers jointly invest in supplier and share equal benefits. Second, non-cooperative investment structure where both buyers individually invest in supplier development and share unequal benefits.

In order to assess the impact of supplier development investment decisions on the profitability of buyers and the common supplier, the authors used game-theoretic approach. The authors design a Stackelberg leader-follower game where the supplier acts as Stackelberg leader and buyers follow the supplier's pricing decision to maximize their profit level. Additionally, both buyers decide either to cooperate or non-cooperate while investing in supplier development.

The results show that the cooperative investment is always an optimal strategy for buyers and supplier. Interestingly, the efficient buyer's share of investment level is lower under non-cooperative investment structure and he is better-off due to its capability of taking advantage from the other buyer's investment. However, the inefficient buyer, on the other hand, is worse-off under non-cooperative investment. Furthermore, comparative analysis between the two shows that initially, the buyer who extracts more profit because of the other buyers' development investment tends to prefer the non-cooperative development investment set up. However, after a certain point, the same buyer is better-off under cooperative development investment through cooperation, and sharing equal benefit of the supplier's development, as the supplier in turn, starts charging a higher wholesale price under non-cooperative investment case.

To the best of authors’ knowledge, extant literature on supplier development has mostly focused on. One supplier-one buyer; thus, the learning spillover effect has almost been unexplored. In real-life, different buyers often purchase from the shared supplier. Therefore, it is important to analyze the spillover of supplier development benefits due to investment of one buyer on other buyer and deriving the condition under which buyers would be incentivized to invest jointly or individually.

The paper seeks to evaluate the changes in efficiency and productivity of coal‐fired electricity generation of 30 Chinese administrative regions from 1999 to 2007.

The paper incorporates data envelopment analysis with the Malmquist index to study the progress made in this sector. The model considers both economic and environmental factors by including the variables fuel consumption, labor, capital, sulfur dioxide emissions and electricity generated. A second model is constructed without the variable sulfur dioxide emissions to evaluate economic performances without taking environmental measures into consideration.

By comparing the two models, the paper identified provinces that favored economic performance over environmental performance, or vice versa. Also, it showed that the more efficient provinces tend to manage both economic and environmental efficiencies equally well, while the reverse is true for the least efficient provinces. The average total factor productivity growth in coal‐fired electricity generation of all provinces was 3.96 per cent for 1999‐2007, and this growth is mainly attributed to technological change. In addition, it found that the Eastern provinces are the most efficient and productive of the group.

In the absence of provincial coal quality data, a key efficiency factor is missing from the analysis.

Efficiency improvement efforts in the Chinese generation sector should target the least efficient provinces identified in this paper. Practices in the most efficient provinces should be further investigated to be replicated when possible.

The paper provides a contemporary overview of Chinese provincial efficiency and productivity measures for policy makers and investors to improve China's coal‐fired electricity generation sector.

THE shortened runway has become an order of the day. Commercial operators want to offer jet service to communities with small airports. Military services seek to use small, unprepared fields—or no fields at all, just clearings.

This paper aims to present an analysis of a hybrid high‐voltage switch based on the parallel connection of IGBT and IGCT. The proposed configuration combines the advantages of both semiconductors, resulting in substantially reduced power losses. Such energy efficient switches could be used in high‐power systems where the requirements of high switching frequency or decreased cooling systems are a major concern.

The operation principle of the switch is described and simulated. The power dissipation is estimated at different operation conditions. Further, the implementation possibilities of the proposed switch configuration in a three‐level NPC inverter are analysed. The operation with the proposed PWM control algorithm is simulated and inverter power loss distribution is estimated.

According to estimations, the proposed hybrid switch configuration allows the reduction of total losses in semiconductors by at least 50 percent. If two of these switches are used in a three‐level NPC inverter as outer switches, the total losses of the inverter are reduced by 27 percent, at the same time the losses in the most stressed semiconductor device are reduced by a factor of 2.25. Therefore, achieving higher power density is possible.

The proposed switch configuration is intended for high‐power (>500 KVA) industrial, marine and railway traction systems, such as FACTS and high power variable frequency AC drives.

The paper presents the novel energy‐efficient high‐voltage switch based on the parallel connection of commercially available IGBTs and IGCTs.

Almost all projects in the world are delayed, and sometimes even lead to the full bankruptcy of their beneficiaries. These delays can be calculated using techniques, but most importantly, there must be a fair and realistic division of delays between project beneficiaries. The most valid delay calculation techniques belong to the SCL Global Protocol, but they also have significant drawbacks, such as these: (1) They do not have the capability to prevent project delays (Delay Risk Management); (2) The protocol identifies and introduces any delays in activities with a ratio of one to one as a delay (Effective Delay); (3) It also does not offer the capability to share delays between stakeholders, which is a huge weakness. Floating in the base schedule activities is one of the cost control tools of projects, but it can hide project delays. In this paper, the researchers believe that the floating ownership belongs to the project and not belong to the stakeholders. This is the main tool for analyzing and sharing delays in this research.

The research methodology adopted included an extensive literature review, expert interviews, use of questionnaire and designing three innovative linked together models by researchers.

In this research, an integrated technique is introduced which has the following capabilities; delay risk control, result-based delay analysis and stakeholders delay sharing. This technique with an incursive and defensive approach implements claims management principles and calculates, respectively, non-attributable and attributable delays for each beneficiary.

This creativity led to the introduction of the Incursive and Defensive (In-De) technique; in the SCL protocol techniques, none of these capabilities exist.

In many countries, innovation in building design for improving energy performance, reducing CO2 emissions and minimizing life cycle cost has received much attention for sustainable development. This paper investigates the importance of optimization tools for enhancing the design performance in the early stages of Vietnam's cooling-dominated buildings in hot and humid climates using an integrated building design approach.

The methodology of this study exploits the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II) optimization algorithm coupled with building simulation to research a trade-off between the optimization of investment cost and energy consumption. Our approach focuses on the whole optimization problem of thermal envelope, glazing and energy systems from preliminary design phases. The methodology is then tested for a case study of a non-residential building located in Hanoi.

The results show a considerable improvement in design performance by our method compared to current building design. The optimal solutions present the trade-off between energy consumption and capital cost in the form of a Pareto front. This helps architects, engineers and investors make important decisions in the early design stages with a large view of impacts of all factors on energy performance and cost.

This is one of the original research to study integrated building design applying the simulation-based genetic optimization algorithm for cooling-dominated buildings in Vietnam. The case study in this article is for a non-residential building in the north of Vietnam but the methodology can also be applied to residential buildings and other regions.