Artificial radioactivity in environmental media (air, rainwater, soil, vegetation) in Austria after the Fukushima nuclear accident

Several environmental media in Austria were monitored for artificial radionuclides released during the Fukushima nuclear accident. Air (up to 1.2 mBq/m³ particulate ¹³¹I) and rainwater (up to 5.2 Bq/L ¹³¹I) proved to be the media best suited for the environmental monitoring, allowing also a temporal resolution of the activity levels. Significant regional differences in the wet deposition of ¹³¹I with rain could be observed within the city of Vienna during the arrival of the contaminated air masses. Forward-trajectory analysis supported the hypothesis that the contaminated air masses coming from the northwest changed direction to northeast over Northern Austria, leading to a strong activity concentration gradient over Vienna. In the course of the environmental monitoring of the Fukushima releases, this phenomenon—significant differences of ¹³¹I activity concentrations in rainwater on a narrow local scale (8.1 km)—appears to be unique. Vegetation (grass) was contaminated with ¹³¹I and/or ¹³⁷Cs at a low level. Soil (up to 22 Bq/kg ¹³⁷Cs) was only affected by previous releases (nuclear weapon tests, Chernobyl). Here, also significant local differences can be observed due to different deposition rates during the Chernobyl accident. The effective ecological half-lives of ¹³⁷Cs in soil were calculated for four locations in Austria. They range from 7 to 30 years. No Austrian sample investigated herein exceeded the detection limit for ¹³⁴Cs; hence, the Fukushima nuclear accident did not contribute significantly to the total radiocesium inventory in Austrian environmental media. The levels of detected radioactivity were of no concern for public health.     

Proactive limit values for responsible management of chemicals

Limit values (LVs) are legal concentration limits for constituents, residues and contaminants in consumer products or for emissions from production processes into environmental compartments. They are a traditional regulatory aid to manage chemicals in human environments. To make them proactive, LVs should become enforced by means of a transparent and informed decision process whose starting point is the Basic Rule of Environmental Hygiene, BREH:Avoid useless exposure as far as possible, minimize useful exposure in a reasonable manner, and prevent that exposure which is dangerous. The BREH calls upon minimizing exposure not only according toon site risk potentials and acceptance, but also tooff site avoidability and acceptability.     

Online first publication of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Journal of material cycles and waste management</Emphasis>

Announcement

Online first publication of Journal of material cycles and waste management     

Ethylenediurea (EDU): a research tool for assessment and verification of the effects of ground level ozone on plants under natural conditions

Ethylenediurea (EDU) has been widely used to prevent ozone (O₃) injury and crop losses in crop plants and growth reductions in forest trees. Successful use requires establishing a dose/response curve for EDU and the proposed plant in the absence of O₃ and in the presence of O₃ before initiating multiple applications to prevent O₃ injury. EDU can be used to verify foliar O₃ symptoms in the field, and to screen plants for sensitivity to O₃ under ambient conditions. Despite considerable research, the mode of action of EDU remains elusive. Additional research on the mode of action of EDU in suppressing O₃ injury in plants may also be helpful in understanding the mode of action of O₃ in causing injury in plants.     

Predictions for isomer distributions of toxic dioxins and furans in selected industrial combustion processes

Three thermodynamic databases of polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and dibenzo-furans (PCDD/Fs) have been used to simulate the PCDD/F isomer distribution in industrial combustion processes. The three databases had been derived using the Group Additivity approach and two computational molecular modelling methods, Modified Neglect of Diatomic Overlap (MNDO) and Parametrized Model 3 (PM3), respectively. The predictions of the toxic PCDD/F isomer distributions using the three different databases have been compared with measured values from industrial processes. An excellent agreement between the predictions using the MNDO method and the measured data has been obtained. It is concluded that the PCDD/F isomer distributions within each group observed in these combustion processes may be thermodynamically controlled.     

Treatment of spent wash in anaerobic mesophilic suspended growth reactor (AMSGR)

Approximately 400 KL of spent wash or vinasse per annum is generated at an average COD concentration of 100,000 mg/l, by over 250 distilleries in India. There is an urgent need to develop, assess and use ecofriendly methods for the disposal of this high strength wastewater. Therefore, an attempt was made to investigate a few aspects of anaerobic digestion of spent wash collected from a distillery. The study was carried out in a 4 L laboratory scale anaerobic mesophilic suspended growth reactor. After the successful startup, the organic loading was increased stepwise to assess the performance of the reactor. During the study period, biogas generated was recorded and the maximum gas generated was found to be 16.9 L at an Organic Loading Rate (OLR) of 38 g COD/L. A 500% increase in the Volatile Fatty Acid (VFA) concentration (2150 mg/L) was observed, when the OLR was increased from 38 to 39 g COD/L. During the souring phase the removal of COD, Total Solids (TS) and Volatile Solids (VS) were in the order of 52%, 40% and 46% respectively. The methane content in the biogas varied from 65% to 75%.     

Prenatal diagnosis of a de novo supernumerary marker derived from chromosome 16

Marker chromosomes are supernumerary chromosomes of unknown origin and are seldom found in prenatal diagnosis. Application of fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) allows the identification of the chromosomal origin of markers. Estimation of the risk of an abnormal phenotype outcome can be enabled by collecting data on phenotypes associated with markers of the same chromosomal origin. So far only very few cases of prenatal diagnosis of de novo supernumerary markers derived from chromosome 16 have been reported. Here the prenatal diagnosis of a de novo supernumerary marker chromosome 16 is described and the relevant literature discussed. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multivariate Patterns of Antioxidative and Photoprotective Defence Compounds in Spruce Needles at Two Central European Forest Sites of Different Elevation

In this work we measured a set of antioxidative and photoprotective compounds (chlorophylls, carotenoids, tocopherol, ascorbate and glutathione), which were suggested previously as stress markers in conifer needles, at two spruce forest sites at different elevation in Saxony, Germany. Most variables differed significantly between current and 1-year-old needles, but only the content of the xanthophyll cycle per mg total chlorophyll and the oxidation state of glutathione were significantly different between the sites. We applied principal component analysis (PCA) to address the question if underlying accumulated variables are similar to the ones found in spruce needles across Alpine elevation profiles and/or for pines in Mediterranean ecosystems. Four principal components (accumulated variables, PC) representing 68% of the total variance of the dataset were extracted. PC 1 encompassed total chlorophyll, lutein, and β-carotene contents, PC 2 combined the epoxidation state of xanthophylls, ascorbate content and redox state, and glutathione content, PC 3 represented the content of xanthophylls and the redox state of glutathione, and PC 4 encompassed the content of α-carotene and the epoxidation state of xanthophylls. Only PC 3 was significantly different between sites. The PCA structure shows many similarities to corresponding findings in studies on spruce in mountain forests in the Alps and pines in Mediterranean systems. This corroborates the interpretation of PCs as indicative for underlying physiological processes. However, separation of the two investigated sites by PCs was in the present case study not superior to the separation by single input variables.     

Immissionsbelastungen im Umfeld des Flughafens München

The airborne immissions in the eastern surroundings to the new Munich airport have been investigated by means of different analytical methods between 1992 and 1995. For a detection of environmental impacts, bioindicators were applied to determine the pollution by PAH and to quantify the pollution by photooxidants. In addition, the PAH content in the upper soil layer was determined. During high pressure weather periods in summer the actual air pollution was investigated in the course of seven measuring campaigns. The PAH pollution of the soil is typical for rural background sites with highest concentrations in the close vicinity of busy roads, and exhibits no temporary trend. The actual input of PAH does not differ from the typical situation of rural regions in Bavaria at any measuring sites at all. Road traffic can be identified as the main PAH source in summer, whereas the considerably higher pollution in winter can be related to domestic heating. The pollution by photooxidants was found to be rather homogeneous throughout the eastern surroundings to the airport, being lowest at the sites directly influenced by road traffic. The pollution by volatile hydrocarbons at a busy road junction in the city of Erding is considerably higher than in the rural vicinity of the airport. The concentrations exhibit distinct daily courses which, among other things, can be related to atmospheric photooxidation. The hydroperoxides as secondary air pollutants exhibit an inverse course similar to that of ozone, with maximum values in the afternoon.