Optimal Design of a Multi-Pollutant Air Quality Monitoring Network in a Metropolitan Region Using Kaohsiung, Taiwan as an Example

An air quality monitoring network (AQMN) usually performs the basic function of assessment of regional air quality and demonstration of compliance with ambient air quality standards in an urban area. Different pollutants, however, may present different characteristic variabilities due to their specific emission patterns, rates of diffusion, and transport and transformation behaviors. But the costs of siting in a pollutant-specific monitoring network would be higher than that for a common network with respect to several pollutants monitored simultaneously. This paper presents a survey of multi-pollutant design principles and optimal searches for siting patterns of an AQMN using both simulation and optimization models as a combined tool. While conservative, quasi-stable, and reactive pollutants are considered in the design principles, cost, coverage effectiveness, and spatial correlation characteristics are included in the multi-criteria decision making process. For illustrative purpose, a series of technical settings and two types of objectives were examined in the case study for the city of Kaohsiung in Taiwan.     

Optimal Selection of Priority Development Areas Considering Tradeoffs Between Hydrology and Development Configuration

Mixed-integer linear programs are proposed for siting development and conservation areas in watersheds, addressing economic objectives (development perimeter and proximity) and ecological objectives. Links between watershed hydrology and ecology need not be well defined. Parameters for the linear programs are obtained from linearization of the SWAT hydrologic model.     

Public participation in China's EIA process and the regulation of environmental disputes

This article reconsiders the role that public participation in the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process plays in China. Whilst some commentators have found that public participation has largely failed to make an impact in China, this article argues that it has been an important focal point during environmental disputes over siting decisions. The principles of transparency and public participation embodied in EIA legislation have been prominent frames used to legitimize public action against locally-unwanted-land-uses when decisions are taken unilaterally without sufficient public input or notification. In this sense, the EIA becomes a lightning rod for citizen claims-making in relation to siting disputes. At the same time, these principles help depoliticize contention by channeling it within state-approved discourses, enabling officials to buy time and defuse tension. Here, EIA serves as a shock absorber, helping contribute to social stability when disputes break out. By showing how public participation regulations are closely intertwined with contentious politics, this article highlights the paradoxical and contradictory nature of public participation in China.     

欧洲大气颗粒物标准及监测体系

以欧洲环境空气质量及清洁空气指令为基础,从标准限值、监测点位布设、监测方法等多个方面,对欧洲大气颗粒物标准及监测体系进行了综合阐述。由极限值、目标值、暴露浓度限值、评价上限和下限等构成的标准限值体系协同作用,将欧洲大气颗粒物浓度控制在一定范围内;大气颗粒物监测点位布设方法遵循基本布设原则和最少点位数及AEI计算要求的详细规定;在颗粒物监测方法上,参比方法和等效方法并存,近年多种方法的应用情况也有所变化。通过对欧洲大气颗粒物标准及监测体系的综述,以期为中国大气颗粒物监测管理提供先进思路和技术参考。     

Background precipitation chemistry monitoring in the Soviet Union

An overview is given of the precipitation chemistry field and laboratory programs of the former U.S.S.R. World Meteorological Organization Background Air Pollution Monitoring Program (WMO BAPMoN). Field and laboratory procedures are discussed, siting criteria are examined, station histories are documented, and four Soviet quality assurance techniques are discussed. Comparison of data from three Soviet BAPMoN stations with data from three U.S. BAPMoN stations indicate that sulfate concentrations are comparable but that U.S. samples are typically much more acidic. Soviet samples tend to have higher concentrations of cations of soil origin and higher concentrations of ammonium.     

A quantitative methodology for indexing environmental sensitivity and pollution potential

A methodology for rating the suitability of sites forthe location of industrial facilities is formulated and appliedto the case of a coal-fired power plant location. The methodologycomprises two major interlinked components: the environmentalplant location indexing component, which involves theidentification, scaling and weighting of environmentalsensitivity factors; and the impact analysis component, whichinvolves the superimposition of the pollution generation impactsof an industrial facility on spatially gridded zones of variousenvironmental sensitivities. For each rectangular areal unitdefined by a square grid, the Unit Pollution Potential Index isdetermined by the severity and distribution of key environmentalsensitivity factors and the coverage of superimposed pollutanteffects as determined by contaminant fate and transport models.For any alternative site of a planned facility, the summation ofthe unit indices over the area of influence of the facilityprovides the quantitative Pollution Index, which can be used as abasis for comparison of alternative sites for planned facilities.For this paper, this methodology is applied to the hypotheticalcase of the siting of a coal-fired power plant in thenortheastern region of the United States, in which threealternative sites are considered. The three sites: A, B and Cyielded indices of 47.83, 47.91 and 47.6, respectively, indicatingthat site C is the most suitable for siting the power plant.     

New Technology for Conducting Radiation Hazard Assessments: The Application of the Underwater Radiation Spectral Identification System (URSIS) at the Massachusetts Bay Industrial Waste (U.S.A.)

The Underwater Radiation Spectral Identification System (URSIS) is a portable spectrometer used for the in situ detection of radioactivity in the marine environment. This paper reports on the first time application of this technology to assess, in a preliminary manner, the potential radiation threat to the public and environment at an aquatic disposal site – the Massachusetts Bay Industrial Waste Site (IWS). Utilizing the meneuvering capabilities of ROV and manned submersible vehicles, the URSIS was successfully positioned close (5–10 cm) to waste containers for a period sufficient to detect, in real time, the presence of radioactive materials. Spectral data from 45 individual targets indicated that the radionuclides present in sediments which draped or partially buried waste containers were consistent with natural background concentrations. No man-made radionuclides were detected at any of the target or background measurement locations. These data support the conclusion that low-level radiation does not pose an imminent and widespread human health or ecological threat in Massachusetts Bay.     

A practical wind farm siting framework integrating ecosystem services — A case study of coastal China

Deploying renewable energy (RE) technologies has been acknowledged as an effective way of mitigating the pressure from increasing energy-related carbon emissions. However, evidence shows that RE deployment frequently leads to the loss and degradation of multiple ecosystem services (ES). Therefore, a sustainable RE deployment scheme should proactively identify and manage the potential trade-offs between RE production and ES provisioning. This study proposed a practical RE siting framework that integrates ES considerations (named as IES framework), and formulated a novel method that integrates Geographic Information Systems, fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process and Weighted Slacks-based Measure to implement this framework. Then, the suitability of wind farm sites in coastal China was evaluated and mapped using the IES framework. Results show that the suitable locations for wind farms in this region were mainly distributed in the provinces of Shandong, Hebei, Liaoning, and Jiangsu. Avian habitat and cultural ES were identified as the two services most vulnerable to wind farm deployment. A suitability map of wind farm siting in coastal China was created. Results prove that the proposed IES framework and the corresponding integrated method can effectively evaluate the trade-offs between RE production and ES provisioning and can be easily extended to guide the site selection for other REs, such as biomass, photovoltaic, and hydroelectric energy.     

Success in negotiating environmental regulations

The US Environmental Protection Agency recently completed two regulatory negotiation demonstrations. These demonstrations suggest that the current EPA rule-making process could be improved through the introduction of face-to-face negotiation at the earliest stages of rulemaking. In the demonstrations, EPA (1) relied on a consensus building process to forestall litigation after the promulgation of the final rule; (2) Used a nonpartisan facilitator to convene the negotiations; (3) Defined criteria to determine which parties should be represented in the negotiation. From the perspective of participants, the negotiating consensus version of a draft regulation is a successful alternative to the traditional rulemaking process. It is still too soon to say negotiated rulemaking significantly reduces the likelihood of ligitation. The results of the demonstration indicate that it is possible for either an agency employee or a neutral outsider to facilitate the sessions. A successful negotiation also requires top level agency support as well as the confidence of the environmental community. The single most important outcome of the negotiations was that the participants developed a greater understanding of the interests of the other parties. The demonstrations also suggest possible changes in future regulatory negotiations.     

Selection of MSW landfill site for Konya, Turkey using GIS and multi-criteria evaluation

Landfill is a common solution for the final disposal of municipal solid waste (MSW) in Turkey. Landfill siting is an extremely difficult task to accomplish because the site selection process depends on different factors and regulations. To ensure that an appropriate site is chosen, a systematic process should be developed and followed. Unsuccessful landfill siting is typically the result of strong public opposition. In this study, candidate sites for an appropriate landfill area in Cumra County of Konya City are determined by using the integration of geographic information systems (GIS) and multi-criteria evaluation (MCE). ArcGIS 9.0 software and its extensions were used as the GIS tool since it is able to perform suitability analysis using MCE analysis. To identify appropriate landfill areas in the Cumra district, eight input map layers including proximity to municipal and local wells and irrigational canals, distance from transportation routes and rails, distance from archaeological sites, distance from urban areas, land use/land cover, and land slope are used in constraint mapping. A final map was generated which identifies regions showing suitability for the location of the landfill site. According to the map, 6.8% of the study area is most suitable, 15.7% is suitable, 10.4% is moderately suitable, 25.8% is poorly suitable, and 41.3% is unsuitable. At the end of the analyses, three candidate sites are determined. The selection of the final MSW landfill site, however, requires further field research.     

Microeconomic measurement of the social costs of environmental regulation

This paper provides a coherent microeconomic framework for defining and measuring the social costs of environmental regulations. A fundamental identity between two alternative means of measuring social costs is established and used to illustrate how erroneous methodologies have crept into the impact assessment literature. Several interesting cases of “ripple effects” including those related to the siting of hazardous waste disposal facilities are considered using this identity.     

Counterpart Models in Facility Location Science and Reserve Selection Science

Five classes of zero–one programming models for discrete facility location problems are compared to counterpart models for the selection of conservation reserves. The basic problem of siting facilities to cover demand for services is analogous to the problem of selecting reserves to support species diversity. The classes of models include the set covering and maximal covering models, as well as models for backup and redundant coverage. Issues of reliability and uncertainty are addressed by chance constrained covering models and maximal expected covering models. Exact and heuristic solution approaches are discussed. Multi-objective and economic issues are considered.     

Multi-route risk assessment from trihalomethanes in drinking water supplies

The USA is entering an era of energy diversity, and increasing nuclear capacity and concerns focus on accidents, security, waste, and pollution. Physical buffers that separate outsiders from nuclear facilities often support important natural ecosystems but may contain contaminants. The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) licenses nuclear reactors; the applicant provides environmental assessments that serve as the basis for Environmental Impact Statements developed by NRC. We provide a template for the types of information needed for safe siting of nuclear facilities with buffers in three categories: ecological, fate and transport, and human health information that can be used for risk evaluations. Each item on the lists is an indicator for evaluation, and individual indicators can be selected for specific region. Ecological information needs include biodiversity (species, populations, communities) and structure and functioning of ecosystems, habitats, and landscapes, in addition to common, abundant, and unique species and endangered and rare ones. The key variables of fate and transport are sources of release for radionuclides and other chemicals, nature of releases (atmospheric vapors, subsurface liquids), features, and properties of environmental media (wind speed, direction and atmospheric stability, hydraulic gradient, hydraulic conductivity, groundwater chemistry). Human health aspects include receptor populations (demography, density, dispersion, and distance), potential pathways (drinking water sources, gardening, fishing), and exposure opportunities (lifestyle activities). For each of the three types of information needs, we expect that only a few of the indicators will be applicable to a particular site and that stakeholders should agree on a site-specific suite.     

日本道路交通噪声监测体系与借鉴

系统介绍了日本环保部门每年在全国范围内开展的道路交通噪声普查性监测工作及评价体系,分析了中日两国监测与评价方法的异同和优缺点,提出在点位布设、评价方法、信息公开等方面的改进建议,以推进中国道路交通噪声监测工作向科学化、精细化、定量化转变。     

Methodology for Identifying Optimal Locations of Water Quality Sensors in River Systems

A method to optimally site river water quality sensors is expanded and applied to a case study river to explore the application of mathematical siting methods to the design of river sampling networks. Fecal coliform contamination due to flooded swine waste lagoons was modeled as it moves downstream, and optimal sensor locations are located by minimizing the objective function of the optimization problem. The results of the simulations are analyzed by varying the number of allowed sampling locations and the simulated contamination event. For the case study application, the model suggests three sampling locations along the modeled river section. These three suggested sensing points did not greatly vary in location for different river flows and contamination events, indicating the robustness of the model results for this specific case study. Generally, the application of mathematical contaminant modeling is a useful and systematic approach to aid the design of river water quality monitoring networks.     

Environmentally stratified sampling design for the development of Great Lakes environmental indicators

Understanding the relationship between human disturbance and ecological response is essential to the process of indicator development. For large-scale observational studies, sites should be selected across gradients of anthropogenic stress, but such gradients are often unknown for a population of sites prior to site selection. Stress data available from public sources can be used in a geographic information system (GIS) to partially characterize environmental conditions for large geographic areas without visiting the sites. We divided the U.S. Great Lakes coastal region into 762 units consisting of a shoreline reach and drainage-shed and then summarized over 200 environmental variables in seven categories for the units using a GIS. Redundancy within the categories of environmental variables was reduced using principal components analysis. Environmental strata were generated from cluster analysis using principal component scores as input. To protect against site selection bias, sites were selected in random order from clusters. The site selection process allowed us to exclude sites that were inaccessible and was shown to successfully distribute sites across the range of environmental variation in our GIS data. This design has broad applicability when the goal is to develop ecological indicators using observational data from large-scale surveys.     

Design of sampling locations for river water quality monitoring considering seasonal variation of point and diffuse pollution loads

The design of a water quality monitoring network (WQMN) is a complicated decision-making process because each sampling involves high installation, operational, and maintenance costs. Therefore, data with the highest information content should be collected. The effect of seasonal variation in point and diffuse pollution loadings on river water quality may have a significant impact on the optimal selection of sampling locations, but this possible effect has never been addressed in the evaluation and design of monitoring networks. The present study proposes a systematic approach for siting an optimal number and location of river water quality sampling stations based on seasonal or monsoonal variations in both point and diffuse pollution loadings. The proposed approach conceptualizes water quality monitoring as a two-stage process; the first stage of which is to consider all potential water quality sampling sites, selected based on the existing guidelines or frameworks, and the locations of both point and diffuse pollution sources. The monitoring at all sampling sites thus identified should be continued for an adequate period of time to account for the effect of the monsoon season. In the second stage, the monitoring network is then designed separately for monsoon and non-monsoon periods by optimizing the number and locations of sampling sites, using a modified Sanders approach. The impacts of human interventions on the design of the sampling net are quantified geospatially by estimating diffuse pollution loads and verified with land use map. To demonstrate the proposed methodology, the Kali River basin in the western Uttar Pradesh state of India was selected as a study area. The final design suggests consequential pre- and post-monsoonal changes in the location and priority of water quality monitoring stations based on the seasonal variation of point and diffuse pollution loadings.     

河流水质自动监测站选址适宜性评价

为建立和量化适于河流水质自动监测站选址的评价方法体系,提出了河流水质自动监测站选址一致性、可行性和适宜性评价问题,并建立了选址可行性和适宜性评价2套指标体系。以自动站选址与手工断面位置不一致为前提,利用累乘指数判断选址可行性,在可行的基础上利用模糊综合评价进一步分析选址的适宜性。应用案例显示,罗汉大桥断面水质自动站选址于手工断面下游150 m处是可行的,并且此选址高度适宜,在具有水质代表性的同时兼顾成本和运维管理需求。     

A method for monitoring ground water quality near waste storage facilities

A practical optimization approach developed in this paper derives effective monitoring configurations for detecting contaminants in ground water. The approach integrates numerical simulation of contaminant transport and mathematical programming. Well sites identified by the methodology can be monitored to establish the occurrence of a contaminant release before a plume migrates to a regulatory compliance boundary. Monitoring sites are established along several horizons located between the downgradient margin of a contaminant source and a compliance boundary. A horizon can form an effective line of defense against contaminant migration to the compliance boundary if it is spanned (covered) by a sufficient number of sites to yield a well spacing that is equal to or less than a maximum value established by numerical modeling. The objective function of the integer programming model formulation expresses the goals of: (1) covering a maximum number of siting horizons, and (2) allocating wells to the single most effective horizon. The latter is determined from well spacing requirements and the width of the zone of potential contaminant migration traversed by the horizon. The methodology employs a highly tractable linear programming model formulation, and the user is not required to predefine a set of potential well sites. These attributes can facilitate its implementation in practice.     

Siting a liquid hazardous waste incinerator: Experience with California's tanner act

The siting of hazardous waste facilities is complex, controversial, time-consuming, expensive, and sometimes impossible. Pressures for and against these facilities are immense. California is developing the “Tanner process,” a one-stop concept in which a single agency serves as the focal point (lead agency) for all the state institutions involved. In this paper I review the experience gained to date with the proposal for the largest liquid toxic waste incinerator proposed for California. I present positive and negative aspects of the process, and draw some policy conclusions. I explore a key policy goal: the search for win/win solutions such that both the community and industry come out ahead environmentally and economically. The experience, especially the approach to negotiation/discussion, is a model for possible use elsewhere in California and the nation.