Refereed Journals

The importance of petroleum infrastructure is undeniable in the face of both local and global energy needs. However, incidents such as explosions originating from these facilities often lead to tragic consequences, including the loss of life and property in nearby communities. This situation has raised significant concerns among government officials and citizens alike. This situation calls for a comprehensive study to identify tangible strategies for reducing the associated risks. Unlawful siting of oil refineries, petrochemical facilities, berthing terminals, pipelines, storage terminals, and oil and gas retail assets stems from a failure to evaluate the environmental impact on a growing human population, consumer competition, and a failure to enforce energy standards. The study aims to employ a multifaceted approach comprising of suitability, proximity and spatial statistical analysis in assessing viable areas for developing petroleum hubs in the district. Through validation using newly acquired land for petroleum hub and existing filling stations in the study area. This study investigated the efficiency of the method and level of adherence to established protocols by the Ministry of Energy, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and Town and Country Planning Department. The study relied on both primary and secondary data. The basic data set consists of the positions of filling stations as determined by the Garmin handheld GPS and the measured land border. The secondary data was gathered from Ghana's Land Commission's Survey and Mapping section. It consists of topographic data, geology, and pedology from which the area's soil types, lithology, road networks, terrain slope, water bodies and land use elements were extracted and utilised. Using Fuzzy AHP and VIKOR, the dataset was categorised and weighted. Spatial evaluations were performed using ArcGIS software to identify regions suitable or unsuitable for the placement of petroleum hubs in the research area. Results shows 67.44% of the area are highly suitable for establishment of petroleum hubs, 32.33% of the area falls within moderate suitability zones whereas the least suitability zones occupied 0.23% of the total area. The newly acquired government land for the petroleum hub project fell within the highly suitable zone confirming the validity of the studies in comparison with studies from field experts via environmental impact assessment. The proposed petroleum hub covered areas dominated by very high and high area suitability for its establishment constituting 75.9 km 2 (90.3%) of its entire area whereas the moderate suitability zones constituted 8.2 km 2 (9.7%) of the remaining areas. Towns situated in very high areas includes; Bakakole Nkwanta, Ahobre, Nawule, Allowule, Tikobo No.1, Edu, Damofu, Ave lenu and Ebonloa, Mpatabo. High areas comprises of Kengen Kpokezo, Alenda wharf, Tekyinta. Anwonakrom, Nkwamta, Elubo and Agege are among the moderate and low area zones for hub and oil retail assets establishment. 75% of the oil retail assets complied with the established protocols whiles 25% defaulted. The combination of GIS methodologies and multi-criteria decision analyses has proven to be an efficient method for highlighting acceptable areas for petroleum hubs, oil retail assets, and determining high-risk areas for adequate area planning. It is proposed that authorities and stakeholders implement efforts to educate, assess site suitability, and enforce specified standards in the construction of petroleum infrastructure.

Governments in developing economies continue to find solutions for accommodation shortfalls by using indigenous local materials like burnt clay brick. This paper seeks to help promote the use of burnt clay brick from the building professionals' perspective. Purposive sampling and questionnaires were administered to gather data. Ranking of the properties influencing the selection of brick was done using relative important index. Fire resistance, thermal stability and durability were the main influential properties. Kendall's coefficient of concordance indicated high level of agreement amongst built professionals. Using burnt clay bricks are less expensive than sandcrete block by at least 18%. The study recommends that built environment professionals should recommend and advise their clients about the economic and structural properties of burnt clay bricks. Government as a matter of policy should strictly enforce the use of burnt clay brick for all educational levels and social housing projects.

Pedestrians are considered as one of the vulnerable road user groups. Among pedestrians of all ages, children are the most at risk. Previous studies have shown that children have inadequate knowledge of road safety and are unable to identify risks on road. Despite these limitations associated with children, society places the burden on them to protect themselves. However, to be able to adequately address child pedestrian safety issues there is the need to understand the factors that influence their crash involvement and severity of injury they sustain. To address this gap, this study performed a comprehensive analysis of historical crash data in Ghana to find holistic countermeasures for these crashes. The study used five years of child pedestrian (below 10 years) crash records obtained from the Building and Road Research Institute (BRRI) in Ghana. A temporal analysis of the data revealed that the highest number of the crashes coincide with when school-going children go to and close from school. A random parameter multinomial logit model was developed to identify crash variables that are significantly associated with child pedestrian crash outcomes. The estimation results revealed that children are likely to be killed in crashes when the driver is speeding and inattentive. Also, it was found that children walking along the road, crossing the road, and those in urban areas are more susceptible to incapacitating injury crashes. Male drivers accounted for 95.8% of child pedestrian crashes, and crashes involving male drivers are 7.8% more likely to be fatal.

The findings from this study provide a deeper, data-driven understanding of child pedestrian crashes and how temporal characteristics, vehicle type, location of pedestrian, traffic operation, and environmental and human factors affect crash outcomes. These findings will help in developing countermeasures like providing conspicuous pedestrian crossings, footbridges on multi-lane high-speed roadways, and the use of school buses to convey students to help mitigate the number and severity of child pedestrian crashes in Ghana, and by extension other countries in the sub-region.

Governments in developing economies continue to find solutions for accommodation shortfalls by using indigenous local materials like burnt clay brick. This paper seeks to help promote the use of burnt clay brick from the building professionals' perspective. Purposive sampling and questionnaires were administered to gather data. Ranking of the properties influencing the selection of brick was done using relative important index. Fire resistance, thermal stability and durability were the main influential properties. Kendall's coefficient of concordance indicated high level of agreement amongst built professionals. Using burnt clay bricks are less expensive than sandcrete block by at least 18%. The study recommends that built environment professionals should recommend and advise their clients about the economic and structural properties of burnt clay bricks. Government as a matter of policy should strictly enforce the use of burnt clay brick for all educational levels and social housing projects.