A conceptual model for assessing ecological risk to water quality function of bottomland hardwood forests

Ecological risk assessment provides a methodology for evaluating the threats to ecosystem function associated with environmental perturbations or stressors. This report documents the development of a conceptual model for assessing the ecological risk to the water quality function (WQF) of bottomland hardwood riparian ecosystems (BHRE) in the Tifton-Vidalia upland (TVU) ecoregion of Georgia. Previus research has demonstrated that mature BHRE are essential to maintaining water quality in this portion of the coastal plain. The WQF of these ecosystems is considered an assessment endpoit—an ecosystem function or set of functions that society chooses to value as evidenced by laws, regulations, or common usage. Stressors operate on ecosystems at risk through an exposure scenario to produce ecological effects that are linked to loss of the desired function or assessment end point. The WQF of BHRE is at risk because of the ecological and environmental quality effects of a suite of chemical, physical, and biological stressors. The stressors are related to nonpoint source pollution from adjacent land uses, especially agriculture; the conversion of BHRE to other land uses; and the encroachment of domestic animals into BHRE. Potential chemical, physical, and biological stressors to BHRE are identified, and the methodology for evaluating appropriate exposure scenarios is discussed. Field-scale and watershed-scale measurement end points of most use in assessing the effects of stressors on the WQF are identified and discussed. The product of this study is a conceptual model of how risks to the WQF of BHRE are produced and how the risk and associated uncertainties can be quantified.     

An Assessment of Ecosystem Risks in the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway

The information needed for conducting the risk assessment was provided by the participants in a 2-day workshop. The invited participants, who possessed knowledge of the St. Croix ecosystem, identified through a group-consensus process a list of stressors and a list of ecosystem values. They then assigned numerical values to each stressor-ecosystem value pair that reflected the degree to which the given stressor contributes to ecosystem risk as measured by the given ecosystem value. Based on this information, the analytical portion of the methodology was then used to rank the ecosystem risks (stressors) when examined from several different perspectives: immediate impact, time-duration, and management activities. Regardless of the perspective taken, riverway development emerged as the most significant stressor.     

Fuzzy Modeling of Interactions Among Environmental Stressors in the Ecosystem of Lake Koronia,Greece

The development of a model for assessing the impact and interactions of stressors in the ecosystem of Lake Koronia, based on fuzzy inference, is presented in this paper. The proposed fuzzy inference model assesses the synergistic interactions among several significant stressors on fish production. These stressors include industrial pollution, pesticide and nutrient usage due to agricultural activities, and water level decrease due to irrigation works. Apart from the experts knowledge, expressed in a set of fuzzy rules, a number of parameters such as pH, conductivity, biochemical and chemical oxygen demand, and nitrate concentration were used as stressor indicators. The proposed model is capable of simulating the effect of a large variety of environmental conditions, and it can be used as a dynamic tool for ecosystem risk assessment since it produces both qualitative and quantitative results, allowing for comparisons of predictions with on-going observational research and ecosystem monitoring. Its operation was successfully verified for a number of different conditions, ranging from low stressor impact to high stressor impact (where, in fact, the fish production was diminished). Moreover, the proposed fuzzy inference model can be used as a tool for the investigation of the behavior of the aquatic ecosystem under a large number of hypothetical environmental risk scenarios.     

Using Ecological Risk Assessment to Identify the Major Anthropogenic Stressor in the Waquoit Bay Watershed,Cape Cod,Massachusetts

The Waquoit Bay Watershed ecological risk assessment was performed by an interdisciplinary and interagency workgroup. This paper focuses on the steps taken to formulate the analysis plan for this watershed assessment. The workgroup initially conducted a series of meetings with the general public and local and state managers to determine environmental management objectives for the watershed. The workgroup then decided that more information was needed on the impacts of six stressors: nutrient enrichment, physical alteration of habitat, altered freshwater flow, toxic chemicals, pathogens, and fisheries harvesting. Assessment endpoints were selected to establish the link between environmental management objectives, impacts of stressors, and scientifically measurable endpoints. The following assessment endpoints were selected: estuarine eelgrass cover, scallop abundance, finfish diversity and abundance, wetland bird distribution and abundance, piping plover distribution and abundance, tissue contaminant levels, and brook trout distribution and abundance in streams. A conceptual model was developed to show the pathways between human activities, stressors, and ecological effects. The workgroup analyzed comparative risks, by first ranking stressors in terms of their potential risk to biotic resources in the watershed. Then stressors were evaluated by considering the components of stressors (e.g., the stressor chemical pollution included both heavy metals and chlorinated solvents components) in terms of intensity and extensiveness. The workgroup identified nutrient enrichment as the major stressor. Nutrient enrichment comprised both phosphorus enrichment in freshwater ponds and nitrogen enrichment within estuaries. Because phosphorus impacts were being analyzed and mitigated by the Air Force Center for Environmental Excellence, this assessment focused on nitrogen. The process followed to identify the predominant stressor and focus the analyses on nitrogen impacts on eelgrass and scallops will serve as an example of how to increase the use of the findings of a watershed assessment in decision making.     

Prioritizing ecological and human welfare risks from environmental stresses

The ecological systems of Earth are subjected to a wide array of environmental stresses resulting from human activities. The development of appropriate environmental protection and management policies and the appropriate allocation of resources across environmental stresses require a systematic evaluation of relative risks. The data and methodologies for comprehensive ecological risk assessment do not exist, yet we do have considerable understanding of econological stress-response relationships. A methodology is presented to utilize present knowledge for assignment of relative risks to ecological systems and human welfare from anthropogenic stresses. The resultant priorities, developed for the US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) relative risk reduction project, highlight global climate change, habitat alteration, stratospheric ozone depletion, and species depletion as the highest environmental risks, significantly diverging from the present emphasis by EPA and the public on toxic chemical issues. Enhanced attention to ecological issues by EPA and development of ecological risk assessment methodologies that value ecological and economic issues equitably are key recommendations.     

Coupling ecosystem science with management: A Great Lakes perspective from Green Bay,Lake Michigan,USA

Continued resource degradation in various areas of the Great Lakes has led to doubts of the adequacy of conventional science and management approaches. The need for a more holistic approach, identified as an ecosystem approach, appears now to be more widely accepted although progress with implementation is slow. We argue here that ecosystem science is an integral part of an ecosystem approach and is a prerequisite to effective management planning.One of the problems of implementing an ecosystem approach is forging the link between ecosystem based research and management. For Green Bay, Wisconsin, USA, certain structural and functional qualities of the ecosystem have been used to define operational guides and to formulate management objectives. These objectives are being utilized in the development of a remedial action plan for Green Bay.Deceased 5 February 1986.     

Ecological Risk Assessment and Problem Formulation for Lake Uluabat,a Ramsar State in Turkey

Unlike the United States and the European Union, developing countries do not have sufficiently structured legal and institutional systems to apply certain environmental management tools such as ecological risk assessment. However, it is important for countries with valuable environmental and ecological resources to have appropriate tools and to strengthen their environmental management capabilities and capacities for the sake of those resources. The case study described in this paper attempts to be a case study towards developing environmental management plans, especially in developing countries. The problem formulation step of Ecological Risk Assessment applied in this study contributed to the basic elements of an environmental management plan including the following: the partnership-building process, prioritization of the problems and issues of the ecosystem, and development of the action plan. Based on the information provided by participants from a series of workshops held to develop an environmental management plan for Uluabat Lake, ecosystem risks were ranked and an action plan was formed. The results obtained with the aid of fuzzy set theory provided a base for identification of the action steps by allowing scientific information to be included in the process. The degree to which Uluabat Lakes problem formulation fits into the existing legal framework of Turkey is also analyzed in this paper.     

基于 DPEHA 模型生态环境健康评价体系的法治化研究

生态环境健康评价包括生态环境健康风险评估和环境治理有效性的评价,是监测生态环境质量对公众健康的潜在风险和指导决策的重要技术手段。我国至今尚未形成全面有效的生态环境健康评价体系,且在评价某一区域生态环境质量对公众健康的影响时,往往忽略了生态法治的作用。为此,本文基于驱动力—压力—环境条件—健康影响—行动(DPEHA)模型构建了一套具有生态法治特色的生态环境健康评价指标体系,并以深圳市2019年和2020年生态环境健康工作为例,对模型进行验证,以推进深圳生态环境健康保护法治化建设。未来研究要将评价体系应用至不同城市,以深入推进法治中国建设。     

A Comparative Approach for Ranking Contaminated Sites Based on the Risk Assessment Paradigm Using Fuzzy PROMETHEE

A ranking system for contaminated sites based on comparative risk methodology using fuzzy Preference Ranking Organization METHod for Enrichment Evaluation (PROMETHEE) was developed in this article. It combines the concepts of fuzzy sets to represent uncertain site information with the PROMETHEE, a subgroup of Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) methods. Criteria are identified based on a combination of the attributes (toxicity, exposure, and receptors) associated with the potential human health and ecological risks posed by contaminated sites, chemical properties, site geology and hydrogeology and contaminant transport phenomena. Original site data are directly used avoiding the subjective assignment of scores to site attributes. When the input data are numeric and crisp the PROMETHEE method can be used. The Fuzzy PROMETHEE method is preferred when substantial uncertainties and subjectivities exist in site information. The PROMETHEE and fuzzy PROMETHEE methods are both used in this research to compare the sites. The case study shows that this methodology provides reasonable results.     

A Decision Support Framework for Science-Based, Multi-Stakeholder Deliberation: A Coral Reef Example

We present a decision support framework for science-based assessment and multi-stakeholder deliberation. The framework consists of two parts: a DPSIR (Drivers–Pressures–States–Impacts–Responses) analysis to identify the important causal relationships among anthropogenic environmental stressors, processes, and outcomes; and a Decision Landscape analysis to depict the legal, social, and institutional dimensions of environmental decisions. The Decision Landscape incorporates interactions among government agencies, regulated businesses, non-government organizations, and other stakeholders. It also identifies where scientific information regarding environmental processes is collected and transmitted to improve knowledge about elements of the DPSIR and to improve the scientific basis for decisions. Our application of the decision support framework to coral reef protection and restoration in the Florida Keys focusing on anthropogenic stressors, such as wastewater, proved to be successful and offered several insights. Using information from a management plan, it was possible to capture the current state of the science with a DPSIR analysis as well as important decision options, decision makers and applicable laws with a the Decision Landscape analysis. A structured elicitation of values and beliefs conducted at a coral reef management workshop held in Key West, Florida provided a diversity of opinion and also indicated a prioritization of several environmental stressors affecting coral reef health. The integrated DPSIR/Decision landscape framework for the Florida Keys developed based on the elicited opinion and the DPSIR analysis can be used to inform management decisions, to reveal the role that further scientific information and research might play to populate the framework, and to facilitate better-informed agreement among participants.     

The study of a method of regional environmental risk assessment

Regional environmental risk assessment can be defined as risk assessment which deals with a spatial scale that contains multiple habitats with multiple sources of many stressors affecting multiple endpoints. The characteristics of the landscape also affect the estimated risk. In this paper, an information diffusion method based on a grid system is proposed to assess regional environmental risk. The risk information on a single environmental risk source can be diffused effectively by using fuzzy set theory. Regional environmental risk values obtained from information diffusion can be clustered on classification criteria and different environmental risk levels can be depicted in a spatial partition map. Huangge Town and Nansha Town located in the Nansha Area of Guangzhou City in China were selected as model cases. The results derived from this information diffusion method will help the local government to optimize the distribution of industrial areas and establish risk prevention measurements and emergency management procedures.     

Improving the TMDL Process Using Watershed Risk Assessment Principles

Ecological risk assessment (ERA) evaluates potential causal relationships between multiple sources and stressors and impacts on valued ecosystem components. ERAs applied at the watershed scale have many similarities to the place-based analyses that are undertaken to develop Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs), in which linkages are established between stressors, sources, and water quality standards, including support of designated uses. TMDLs focus on achieving water quality standards associated with attainment of designated uses. In attempting to attain the water quality standard, many TMDLs focus on the stressor of concern rather than the ecological endpoint or indicators of the designated use that the standard is meant to protect. A watershed ecological risk assessment (WERA), at least in theory, examines effects of most likely stressors, as well as their probable sources in the watershed, to prioritize management options that will most likely result in meeting environmental goals or uses. Useful WERA principles that can be applied to TMDL development include: development and use of comprehensive conceptual models in the Problem Identification step of TMDLs; use of a transparent process for selecting Numeric Targets for TMDLs based on assessment endpoints derived from the management goal or designated use under consideration; analysis of co-occurring stressors likely to cause beneficial use impairment based on the conceptual model; use of explicit uncertainty analyses in the Linkage Analysis step of TMDL development; and frequent stakeholder interactions throughout the process. WERA principles are currently most applicable to those TMDLs in which there is no numeric standard and, therefore, indicators and targets need to be developed, such as many nutrient or sediment TMDLs. WERA methods can also be useful in determining TMDL targets in situations where simply targeting the water quality standard may re-attain the numeric criterion but not the broader designated use. Better incorporation of problem formulation principles from WERA into the TMDL development process would be helpful in improving the scientific rigor of TMDLs.     

Fuzzy adaptive management of social and ecological carrying capacities for protected areas

Commonly used methods of evaluating the degree of consistency of protected area ecosystems with social and ecological carrying capacities are likely to result in decision errors. This occurs because such methods do not account for imprecision and uncertainty in inferring the degree of ecosystem consistency from an observed ecosystem indicator. This paper proposes a fuzzy adaptive management approach to determine whether a protected area ecosystem is consistent with ecological and social carrying capacities and, if not, to identify management actions that are most likely to achieve consistency when there is uncertainty about the current degree of consistency and how alternative management actions are likely to influence that consistency. The proposed approach is illustrated using a hypothetical example that uses an ecosystem indicator that reflects combinations of different levels of user satisfaction and conservation of threatened and endangered species. Application of the proposed fuzzy adaptive management approach requires a protected area manager to: (1) identify alternative management actions for achieving ecosystem consistency with social and ecological carrying capacities in each of several management zones in a protected area; (2) randomly assign alternative management actions to management zones; (3) define fuzzy sets for the ecosystem indicator and degree of ecosystem consistency, and fuzzy relations between the ecosystem indicator and the degree of ecosystem consistency; (4) monitor the indicator in each management zone; (5) define fuzzy sets based on the observed indicator in each management zone; and (6) combine the fuzzy sets defined on the observed indicator and the fuzzy relations between the indicator and the degree of ecosystem consistency to reach conclusions about the most likely degree of consistency for alternative management actions in each management zone. The fuzzy adaptive management approach proposed here is advantageous when the benefits of avoiding the decision errors inherent with crisp and stochastic decision rules outweigh the added cost of implementing the approach.     

Analyzing the factors affecting environmental risks of projects using a hybrid approach of DEMATEL‐ANP,artificial neural network: A case study

The increasing growth of the economy in each country necessitates a great amount of investment in infrastructure. The belief that projects involve various uncertainties, such as technical skills, management quality, and the like, indicates that most projects fail to achieve their aims, interests, costs, as well as their timeframes and space requirements. As the environment can pose significant uncertainty to any project, environmental risks should be deeply studied by project management departments. This study intends to analyze as a case the environmental risk management system within a consulting firm. From this analysis, each aspect of a project's environmental risk management is ranked using a fuzzy analytical network process (ANP), a neural network algorithm, and a decision‐making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) methodology. From the organizational aspect, budget risk is the most significant. From the technical aspect, the risk of regulations is the most important one. Finally, the risk of project failure from poor communication is another identified main risk in this research. By studying high‐ranking items in this hierarchy, it can be understood that these criteria exist in different aspects; therefore, all aspects of the risk should be taken into account to cover and assess risk. A neural network algorithm for validating and reassessment of ranking is employed. Results of this application showed that, based on Spearman's rank correlation method, two different approaches resulted in similar rankings. Finally, some practical implications for responding to the most highly ranked risks are proposed.     

环境法视域下的生物安全风险规制

生物安全领域的环境风险包括科技风险、生态风险和环境健康风险三种类型。我国目前尚未形成健全的生物安全风险规制制度体系,科技风险规制机制不健全、生态风险规制忽视生物多样性保护、环境健康风险规制领域尚存空白等问题依然存在。为此,应确立多元化的立法目的体系,推动风险规制的类型化制度安排,有效衔接生物安全立法与环境保护法律规范,以最大限度地预防和降低生物安全风险可能带来的损害。     

试论油田开发与干旱荒漠区生态功能划分的原则 ──以诺敏戈壁三塘湖油田生态功能区划为例

三塘湖油田生态环境保护指导思想为:"分区保护、分类防治、分级管理"。文章通过分析干旱荒漠区生态功能的划分,根据三塘湖油田开发区生态环境特征、生态系统服务功能、生态环境功能重要性与敏感性的空间分异规律,确定区域生态功能分区,为制定生态环境保护计划、维护区域生态安全、促进社会经济可持续发展提供科学依据。     

生态环境风险管理与损害赔偿制度现状与展望

我国目前面临的生态环境风险形势复杂严峻，严密防控生态环境风险已成为“十四五”和中长期生态环境保护、美丽中国建设的重要任务之一。本文探讨了生态环境风险的概念、分类，系统梳理了生态环境风险评估与管理、生态环境损害评估与损害赔偿等领域的国内外管理经验与研究进展。在此基础上，重点剖析了我国生态环境风险管理面临的痛点与难点问题，从树立生态环境风险法治管理理念、构建生态环境风险管理战略布局、建立生态环境风险常态化管控体系、加强生态环境风险防控技术支撑、强化经济和社会治理手段助力风险管控、建设生态环境损害赔偿业务化工作体系等六个方面，系统提出了加强我国生态环境风险管理的对策建议，以期为更有效地防范化解重大生态环境风险提供决策参考。     

北京市生态环保建设经验对南京的借鉴

北京以举办奥运为契机,全面改善了环境质量,兑现了“绿色奥运”的庄严承诺。后奥运期间,北京继续实施了一系列环境保护行动计划,大力推进生态文明建设,“绿色奥运”成果得到巩固提升。借鉴北京成功的做法和经验,特提出南京环境保护和生态建设的对策建议。     

Coastal Zone Problems and Environmental Strategies to be Implemented at Edremit Bay, Turkey

This case study examines the coastal zone problems focusing on the existing conflicts between tourism and commercial activities on the coasts of Edremit Bay, Turkey, and attempts to suggest solutions to these problems. Edremit Bay is a characteristic example of such a conflict in collective use of natural resources. The study area, with its 100-km-long sandy beach, naturally attracts different coastal user groups with different beneficial expectations: in terms of rest and recreation for one group and commercial gain offered in a variety of ways for another group. Significant coastal zone problems exist in the study area. Deterioration of shoreline due to tourism activities and illegal constructions, damage to the coastal ecosystem due to domestic/industrial wastewater discharges and some agricultural activities, and disordered urbanization are only a few of the many problems. The data presented here were partly derived from field study and partly collected from local state or private organizations. In this study, it is emphasized that there is a need for viable economic and environmental strategies to be designated in Edremit Bay, Turkey, in order to provide sustainable resource use. For this purpose, an integrated project together with a relevant planning chart including subprojects is also suggested. The success of a local environmental protection management project depends on active participation of all stakeholders including governmental organizations and nongovernmental organizations.