The mining sector of Liberia: current practices and environmental challenges

Liberia is endowed with an impressive stock of mineral reserves and has traditionally relied on mining, namely iron ore, gold, and diamonds, as a major source of income. The recent growth in the mining sector has the potential to contribute significantly to employment, income generation, and infrastructure development. However, the development of these mineral resources has significant environmental impacts that often go unnoticed. This paper presents an overview of the Liberian mining sector from historical, current development, and economic perspectives. The efforts made by government to address issues of environmental management and sustainable development expressed in national and international frameworks, as well as some of the environmental challenges in the mining sector are analyzed. A case study was conducted on one of the iron ore mines (China Union Bong Mines Investment) to analyze the effects of the water quality on the local water environment. The results show that the analyzed water sample concentrations were all above the WHO and Liberia water standard Class I guidelines for drinking water. Finally the paper examines the application of water footprint from a life cycle perspective in the Liberian mining sector and suggests some policy options for water resources management.     

Perceptions of the sustainable city and implications for fresh water resources management

Following the emergence of sustainable development as a key environmental management concept in the late 1980s, much discussion and debate has occurred on how the general concept can be understood in the context of particular resources, economic sectors and fields of academic study. This paper attempts to integrate two such particular areas of study, urban development and fresh water resources management. Following an overview of the concept of sustainable development, where the fresh water resource base is used to illustrate different interpretations of sustainability, the paper advances a number of perceptions of the sustainable city and the implications for fresh water management. Key concepts that emerge include a need to reduce the urban ecological sphere of influence, best understood in the context of a quasi-autonomous vision of the sustainable city, requiring a radical shift away from 'engineering-fix' water supply augmentation towards demand management and other approaches that sit more easily with the prime need to maintain the functional integrity of ecosystems.     

Disharmony between society and environmental carrying capacity: a historical review, with an emphasis on China

Nature can survive without humans, but humans cannot survive without nature. Despite a clear understanding of this dependency, humans continue to exist in disharmony with nature, and our current environmental and human dilemmas reflect old problems with a long history. Societies have historically experienced many transitions from harmony between nature and society to a crisis of disharmony, followed by a subsequent transition from crisis to harmony. Such ecological crises arise when society no longer practices sustainable consumption of resources within the limits imposed by the environmental carrying capacity. Over the long term, the growth in human desires has always exceeded the growth in the environmental carrying capacity. Science, technology, and social institutions must all be improved to resolve the ecological crises that arise from this imbalance. This paper discusses how increasing understanding of the problem by the public and by decision makers is the key to minimizing the undesirable impacts of the coming bottleneck for sustainable development. Furthermore, we emphasize how this awareness must be translated into fundamental political and economic changes.     

Development of risk-based air quality management strategies under impacts of climate change

Climate change is forecast to adversely affect air quality through perturbations in meteorological conditions, photochemical reactions, and precursor emissions. To protect the environment and human health from air pollution, there is an increasing recognition of the necessity of developing effective air quality management strategies under the impacts of climate change. This paper presents a framework for developing risk-based air quality management strategies that can help policy makers improve their decision-making processes in response to current and future climate change about 30-50 years from now. Development of air quality management strategies under the impacts of climate change is fundamentally a risk assessment and risk management process involving four steps: (1) assessment of the impacts of climate change and associated uncertainties; (2) determination of air quality targets; (3) selections of potential air quality management options; and (4) identification of preferred air quality management strategies that minimize control costs, maximize benefits, or limit the adverse effects of climate change on air quality when considering the scarcity of resources. The main challenge relates to the level of uncertainties associated with climate change forecasts and advancements in future control measures, since they will significantly affect the risk assessment results and development of effective air quality management plans. The concept presented in this paper can help decision makers make appropriate responses to climate change, since it provides an integrated approach for climate risk assessment and management when developing air quality management strategies. Implications: Development of climate-responsive air quality management strategies is fundamentally a risk assessment and risk management process. The risk assessment process includes quantification of climate change impacts on air quality and associated uncertainties. Risk management for air quality under the impacts of climate change includes determination of air quality targets, selections of potential management options, and identification of effective air quality management strategies through decision-making models. The risk-based decision-making framework can also be applied to develop climate-responsive management strategies for the other environmental dimensions and assess costs and benefits of future environmental management policies.     

Integrated approach of environmental impact and risk assessment of Rosia Montana Mining Area, Romania

The environmental impact assessment of mining sites represents nowadays a large interest topic in Romania. Historical pollution in the Rosia Montana mining area of Romania caused extensive damage to environmental media. This paper has two goals: to investigate the environmental pollution induced by mining activities in the Rosia Montana area and to quantify the environmental impacts and associated risks by means of an integrated approach. Thus, a new method was developed and applied for quantifying the impact of mining activities, taking account of the quality of environmental media in the mining area, and used as case study in the present paper. The associated risks are a function of the environmental impacts and the probability of their occurrence. The results show that the environmental impacts and quantified risks, based on quality indicators to characterize the environmental quality, are of a higher order, and thus measures for pollution remediation and control need to be considered in the investigated area. The conclusion drawn is that an integrated approach for the assessment of environmental impact and associated risks is a valuable and more objective method, and is an important tool that can be applied in the decision-making process for national authorities in the prioritization of emergency action.     

地理信息系统在累积影响评价中的应用

累积影响评价是在可持续发展目标要求下环境影响评价的一种新类型,但目前进行累积影响评价的方法和工具仍较缺乏。文章分析了利用地理信息系统进行累积影响评价的能力,结果表明：地理信息系统能改善对发展行为和环境状况的监测和跟踪,能较好地分析环境影响的时、空累积特征,是进行累积影响评价的有效工具;但是,其对环境影响累积过程的本质考虑有限,需要与能反映累积过程的子模式相结合。     

From Multifunctionality to Multiple Ecosystem Services? A Conceptual Framework for Multifunctionality in Green Infrastructure Planning for Urban Areas

Green infrastructure (GI) and ecosystem services (ES) are promoted as concepts that have potential to improve environmental planning in urban areas based on a more holistic understanding of the complex interrelations and dynamics of social–ecological systems. However, the scientific discourses around both concepts still lack application-oriented frameworks that consider such a holistic perspective and are suitable to mainstream GI and ES in planning practice. This literature review explores how multifunctionality as one important principle of GI planning can be operationalized by approaches developed and tested in ES research. Specifically, approaches developed in ES research can help to assess the integrity of GI networks, balance ES supply and demand, and consider trade-offs. A conceptual framework for the assessment of multifunctionality from a social–ecological perspective is proposed that can inform the design of planning processes and support stronger exchange between GI and ES research.     

Development of a risk assessment methodology for evaluating potential impacts associated with contaminated mud disposal in the marine environment

In order to assess impacts associated with disposal of contaminated mud arising from Hong Kong's dredging and reclamation projects, a methodology has been formulated to determine the level of risk posed by consumption of seafood/marine prey species to humans and to the Chinese White Dolphin (Sousa chinensis). This methodology improves on previously used techniques by incorporating risks for organic contaminants, accounting for doses from sources other than seafood, and incorporating additional local knowledge on Sousa chinensis behaviour. It thus represents an advance in risk assessment techniques and a new integration of risk assessment and monitoring in environmental management.     

Assessing and managing freshwater ecosystems vulnerable to environmental change

Freshwater ecosystems are important for global biodiversity and provide essential ecosystem services. There is consensus in the scientific literature that freshwater ecosystems are vulnerable to the impacts of environmental change, which may trigger irreversible regime shifts upon which biodiversity and ecosystem services may be lost. There are profound uncertainties regarding the management and assessment of the vulnerability of freshwater ecosystems to environmental change. Quantitative approaches are needed to reduce this uncertainty. We describe available statistical and modeling approaches along with case studies that demonstrate how resilience theory can be applied to aid decision-making in natural resources management. We highlight especially how long-term monitoring efforts combined with ecological theory can provide a novel nexus between ecological impact assessment and management, and the quantification of systemic vulnerability and thus the resilience of ecosystems to environmental change.     

Causes and consequences of a tropical forest gold rush in the Guiana Shield, South America

Statistical and spatial analyses of both historical time series and remotely sensed data show a link between the spatial distribution and growth of gold production across the Guiana Shield in northeast Amazonia. Results indicate that an exponential rise in production across an expanding area is primarily a delayed response to the 1971-1978 market flotation of international gold prices. The subsequent 10-fold (2-fold) average nominal (real) price increase has provided a compelling economic incentive to mass exploitation of lower-grade gold deposits. The ground-based and remotely sensed distributions of mining activity are strongly attached to these deposits that dominate the region's gold geology. The presence of these gold-bearing formations in conservation and sustainable timber zones has sparked social conflict and environmental degradation across the region. Left unmanaged, more than a quarter-million square-kilometer area of tropical forest zoned for protection and sustainable management could ultimately be compromised by the price-driven boom in gold mining through poorly integrated resource use planning, lack of reclamation effort, and control of illegal operations. Serious public health issues propagated through the unregulated mining environment further erode the financial benefits achieved through gold extraction. This study demonstrates in part how international economic policies successfully stabilizing more conspicuous centers of the global economy can have unintended but profound environmental and social impacts on remote commodity frontiers.     

Environmental dimensions of fertilizer and pesticide use; relevance to Indian agriculture

This paper presents an overview of the environmental consequences of fertilizers and pesticides in agriculture and the measures needed to mitigate the adverse impact of these chemicals on environment. The issues are then analysed from the perspective of the use of fertilizers and pesticides in Indian agriculture. Fertilizer consumption in India is concentrated in about one-third of the cultivated area. Its use has been increasing but it is being used inefficiently. Pesticide use is also concentrated in five states and on a few crops such as rice, cotton and chillies. Evidence from micro studies on the environmental consequences of these chemicals is presented. It is suggested that the present methods of fertilizer and pesticide use and growth are not sustainable. There are several possible technologies and alternatives to reduce the adverse impact of these chemicals on the environment, such as biological control of pests, integrated pest management, development of pest-resistant varieties of crops, vermiculture. etc., that need to be supplemented through an economic approach. These issues need to be considered while formulating strategies for sustainable agriculture in India and other developing countries.     

Chemical leasing in the context of sustainable chemistry

Chemical leasing is a new and innovative approach of selling chemicals. It aims at reducing the risks emanating from hazardous substances and ensuring long-term economic success within a global system of producing and using chemicals. This paper explores how, through chemical leasing, the consumption of chemicals, energy, resources and the generation of related wastes can be reduced. It also analyses the substitution of hazardous chemicals as a tool to protect environmental, health and safety and hence ensure compliance with sustainability criteria. For this, we are proposing an evaluation methodology that seeks to provide an answer to the following research questions: (1) Does the application of chemical leasing promote sustainability in comparison to an existing chemicals production and management system? 2. If various chemical leasing project types are envisaged, which is the most promising in terms of sustainability? The proposed methodology includes a number of basic goals and sub-goals to assess the sustainability for eight different chemical leasing case studies that have been implemented both at the local and the national levels. The assessment is limited to the relative assessment of specific case studies and allows the comparisons of different projects in terms of their relative contribution to sustainable chemistry. The findings of our assessment demonstrate that chemical leasing can be regarded as promoting sustainable chemistry in five case studies with certainty. However, on the grounds of our assessment, we cannot conclude with certainty that chemical leasing has equivalent contribution to sustainable chemistry in respect of three further case studies.     

Beyond ‘trees are good’: Disservices,management costs,and tradeoffs in urban forestry

The provision of ecosystem services is a prominent rationale for urban greening, and there is a prevailing mantra that ‘trees are good’. However, understanding how urban trees contribute to sustainability must also consider disservices. In this perspective article, we discuss recent research on ecosystem disservices of urban trees, including infrastructure conflicts, health and safety impacts, aesthetic issues, and environmentally detrimental consequences, as well as management costs related to ecological disturbances and risk management. We also discuss tradeoffs regarding species selection and local conservation concerns, as well as the central role of human perception in the interpretation of ecosystem services and disservices, particularly the uncritical assertion that ‘everybody loves trees’. Urban forestry decision-making that fails to account for disservices can have unintended negative consequences for communities. Further research is needed regarding life cycle assessments, stakeholder decision-making, return-on-investment, and framings of services and disservices in urban forestry.     

The challenges of marine spatial planning in the Arctic: Results from the ACCESS programme

Marine spatial planning is increasingly used to manage the demands on marine areas, both spatially and temporally, where several different users may compete for resources or space, to ensure that development is as sustainable as possible. Diminishing sea-ice coverage in the Arctic will allow for potential increases in economic exploitation, and failure to plan for cross-sectoral management could have negative economic and environmental results. During the ACCESS programme, a marine spatial planning tool was developed for the Arctic, enabling the integrated study of human activities related to hydrocarbon exploitation, shipping and fisheries, and the possible environmental impacts, within the context of the next 30 years of climate change. In addition to areas under national jurisdiction, the Arctic Ocean contains a large area of high seas. Resources and ecosystems extend across political boundaries. We use three examples to highlight the need for transboundary planning and governance to be developed at a regional level.     

Virtual phosphorus ore requirement of Japanese economy

Phosphorus is indispensable for agricultural production. Hence, the consumption of imported food indirectly implies the import of phosphorus resources. The global consumption of agricultural products depends on a small number of ore-producing countries. For sustainable management of phosphorus resources, the global supply and demand network should be clarified. In this study, we propose the virtual phosphorus ore requirement as a new indicator of the direct and indirect phosphorus requirements for our society. The virtual phosphorus ore requirement indicates the direct and indirect demands for phosphorus ore transformed into agricultural products and fertilizer. In this study, the virtual phosphorus ore requirement was evaluated for the Japanese economy in 2005. Importantly, the results show that our society requires twice as much phosphorus ore as the domestic demand for fertilizer production. The phosphorus contained in “eaten” agricultural products was only 12% of virtual phosphorus ore requirement.     

Development of Tools for Integrated Monitoring and Assessment of Hazardous Substances and Their Biological Effects in the Baltic Sea

The need to develop biological effects monitoring to facilitate a reliable assessment of hazardous substances has been emphasized in the Baltic Sea Action Plan of the Helsinki Commission. An integrated chemical–biological approach is vitally important for the understanding and proper assessment of anthropogenic pressures and their effects on the Baltic Sea. Such an approach is also necessary for prudent management aiming at safeguarding the sustainable use of ecosystem goods and Services. The BEAST project (Biological Effects of Anthropogenic Chemical Stress: Tools for the Assessment of Ecosystem Health) set out to address this topic within the BONUS Programme. BEAST generated a large amount of quality-assured data on several biological effects parameters (biomarkers) in various marine species in different sub-regions of the Baltic Sea. New indicators (biological response measurement methods) and management tools (integrated indices) with regard to the integrated monitoring approach were suggested.     

Environmental impact assessment of salmonid feeds using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)

Understanding the environmental burdens associated with aquafeeds is a critical component for assessing and improving the environmental performance of aquaculture. The aim of the study was to assess the environmental impacts associated with feeds for rainbow trout production in France, using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). The stages assessed are: the extraction of the raw materials, the production and transformation of the primary ingredients used, the manufacturing of the feeds, the use of the feeds at the farm, transport at all stages, and the production and use of energy resources. The assessment revealed that the use of fishery resources (such as biotic resource use) and nutrient emissions at the farm (such as eutrophication potential) contribute most to the potential environmental impacts of salmonid aquafeeds. Improvements in feed composition and management practices seem to be the best ways for improving the environmental profile of aquafeeds.     

Agricultural opportunities to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions

Agriculture is a source for three primary greenhouse gases (GHGs): CO(2), CH(4), and N(2)O. It can also be a sink for CO(2) through C sequestration into biomass products and soil organic matter. We summarized the literature on GHG emissions and C sequestration, providing a perspective on how agriculture can reduce its GHG burden and how it can help to mitigate GHG emissions through conservation measures. Impacts of agricultural practices and systems on GHG emission are reviewed and potential trade-offs among potential mitigation options are discussed. Conservation practices that help prevent soil erosion, may also sequester soil C and enhance CH(4) consumption. Managing N to match crop needs can reduce N(2)O emission and avoid adverse impacts on water quality. Manipulating animal diet and manure management can reduce CH(4) and N(2)O emission from animal agriculture. All segments of agriculture have management options that can reduce agriculture's environmental footprint.     

The role of stakeholder attitudes in managing contaminated sites: survey of Romanian stakeholder awareness

The past decade has seen substantial policy effort directed at promoting the reclamation and reuse of urban brownfield or potentially contaminated land. This paper is based on the results of a survey regarding the role of stakeholder attitudes in managing contaminated sites at the Romanian level. Findings indicate that effective policies and programmes need to be framed within an understanding of the different needs of national development. While different perceptions were identified in regard to the meanings of several concepts and terms used in this field, important aspects related to the need for developing a correctly ranked and coordinated decision-making process were also identified. Additional findings indicate gaps in the legal mechanisms intended to promote brownfield rehabilitation in the course of redevelopment. At the same time, the survey respondents suggested several recommendations such as the necessity of developing a risk assessment to establish the level and extent of contamination that can endanger human health and the environmental integrity on a site and also the need for greater compatibility between land-use planning processes and environmental legislation related to contaminated site management. The paper presents general conclusions engaging all the recommendations drawn from the survey questionnaire as well as from the general current situation in Romania.