Satellite Tracking of White-naped Crane Migration and the Importance of the Korean Demilitarized Zone

Satellite-tracking of 15 White-naped Cranes ( Grus vipio ) from their Japanese wintering grounds through the Korean Peninsula shows that there are four important regions for conserving migrant cranes: the Three Rivers Plain, the People's Republic of China; Lake Khanka, Russia; Kumya, North Korea; and—most importantly—the demilitarized zone of the Korean Peninsula. Two sites along the Korean demilitarized zone, Panmunch'om and Ch'olwon, were the most heavily used stopover sites, and they present complex international conservation challenges. Cranes stopped at these sites for up to 87.1% of their total migration time; cranes migrating to Zhalong Nature Reserve, China, made it their only lengthy stop. We report the migration routes and the importance of the identified stopover sites, and we outline conservation issues at those sites.     

Evaluation of entanglement properties of crushed automobile shredded residue and detachment of entrapped particles

Automobile shredded residue is a potential solid fuel when its metal and chlorine-containing parts have been removed. The authors have investigated physical separation of automobile shredded residue to obtain the components that may be used in solid fuel and found that agglomerates of entangling fiber-like components are formed during crushing, making removal of metals and chlorine-containing parts difficult. In this paper, a reattachment ratio, entrapment ratio, and disentanglement ratio are proposed to evaluate the entanglement properties of crushed automobile shredded residue. It is found that products smaller than 16 mm were not reattached easily in the sieving process, and an index based on entanglement properties proposed here is useful to predict suitable crushing conditions. Wet detachment of entrapped particles from agglomerates of entangling materials was also applied to separate particulate matter from crushed ASR.     

Is there a difference between urban and rural areas in the disposal of home medical care waste? 13 years of nation-wide repeated cross-sectional study in Japan

Home medical care (HMC) is advancing not only in Japan but also throughout the world. In Japan, HMC waste is legally classified as municipal waste. Nevertheless, some municipalities do not collect some or all the HMC waste because of fear of infection. Therefore, this study was conducted to clarify the following two issues: First, have the municipalities made progress in collecting and appropriate disposal of HMC waste in the past 13 years? Second, is there a difference between a large city and a small city in terms of appropriate disposal progress? A total of 687 municipalities published the treatment of HMC waste. Currently, 42 municipalities collected all HMC waste. 236 municipalities were collecting HMC waste except for self-injection needle. 117 municipalities were collecting HMC waste except for self-injection needle and Syringe. The collection status of HMC waste was better in cities with high population than in cities with low population. HMC waste collection status was progressed over 13 years. However, more than 60% of the municipality staff stated that they could not avoid being anxious about infection caused by HMC waste. We suggest that providing HMC waste education to the municipalities wherein these efforts have not yet progressed is important.

     

Jig separation of crushed automobile shredded residue and its evaluation by float and sink analysis

Automobile shredded residue is a potential solid fuel when its metal and chloride-containing components have been removed. The authors have investigated physical separation of automobile shredded residue to isolate components that may be used as solid fuel and reported that agglomerates of entangling fiber-like material are formed during crushing. These agglomerates make removal of metals and chloride-containing components difficult, and the paper proposes a treatment flowchart consisting of separate treatments of the coarse size fraction containing entangling fiber-like components and the smaller size fraction containing particulate matter. This paper reports the treatment of the smaller size fraction treated with jigging to obtain a low-ash and low-chloride-content product. A new washability curve was developed based on float and sink analysis test results, and it was applied to estimate the gravity separation performance of treatments such as jigging and dense medium separation. The estimated results show good agreement with the experimental results of jig separation.