Classification of residential areas according to physical vulnerability to natural hazards: a case study of Çanakkale,Turkey

The selection of new settlement areas and the construction of safe buildings, as well as rendering built‐up areas safe, are of great importance in mitigating the damage caused by natural disasters. Most cities in Turkey are unprepared for natural hazards. In this paper, Çanakkale, located in a first‐degree seismic zone and sprawled around the Sartçay Delta, is examined in terms of its physical vulnerability to natural hazards. Residential areas are analysed using GIS (geographic information system) and remote‐sensing technologies in relation to selected indicators. Residential areas of the city are divided into zones according to an evaluation of geological characteristics, the built‐up area's features, and urban infrastructure, and four risk zones are determined. The results of the analysis show that the areas of the city suitable for housing are very limited. In addition, the historical centre and the housing areas near Sartçay stream are shown to be most problematic in terms of natural disasters and sustainability.     

Effects of environmental conditions on historical buildings: lichens and NOx gases

Environmental conditions affect human life in various ways. One of the domains of environmental conditions is buildings, and amongst them, a major and important group is the historical buildings. To keep this inheritance alive, one needs to determine the effects of environmental conditions. In this work, effects of lichens and NOx on 7 historical buildings in Erzurum were investigated. Historical buildings are readily available for lichen growth, which takes a long time, and this growth was investigated as a sample of environmental effect that occurs through long periods of time. NOx, main source of which is traffic in Erzurum, were considered as the environmental effect of daily life.     

Use of carbonised beet pulp carbon for removal of Remazol Turquoise Blue-G 133 from aqueous solution

Carbonised beet pulp (BPC) produced from agricultural solid waste by-product in sugar industry was used as adsorbent for the removal of Remazol Turquoise Blue-G 133 (RTB-G 133) dye in this study. The kinetics and equilibrium of sorption process were investigated with respect to pH, temperature and initial dye concentration. Adsorption studies with real textile wastewater were also performed. The results showed that adsorption was a strongly pH-dependent process, and optimum pH was determined as 1.0. The maximum dye adsorption capacity was obtained as 47.0 mg g^?1at the temperature of 25 °C at this pH value. The Freundlich and Langmuir adsorption models were used for describing the adsorption equilibrium data of the dye, and isotherm constants were evaluated depending on sorption temperature. Equilibrium data of RTB-G 133 sorption fitted very well to the Freundlich isotherm. Mass transfer and kinetic models were applied to the experimental data to examine the mechanisms of adsorption and potential rate-controlling steps. It was found that both external mass transfer and intra-particle diffusion played an important role in the adsorption mechanisms of dye and adsorption kinetics followed the pseudo second-order type kinetic model. The thermodynamic analysis indicated that the sorption process was exothermic and spontaneous in nature.     

Evaluation of surface water quality characteristics by using multivariate statistical techniques: A case study of the Euphrates river basin, Turkey

The surface water quality of the Euphrates river basin in Turkey are evaluated by using the multivariate statistical techniques known as factor analysis (FA) and multidimensional scaling (MDS) analysis. When FA was applied to the water quality data obtained from the 15 different surface water quality monitoring stations, two factors were identified, which were responsible from the 86.02% of the total variance of the water quality in the Euphrates river basin. The first factor called the urban land use factor explained 44.20% of the total variance and the second factor called the agricultural use factor explained 41.81% of the total variance. MDS technique showed that electrical conductivity (EC), percent sodium (Na%) and total salt are the most important variables causing difference in the water quality analysis.     

Short-term effects of hydrogen fluoride on Nicotiana tabacum L

Data on the short-term effects of fumigation with hydrogen fluoride (HF) on the response behavior of the Nicotiana tabacum L. cv. St. Karabalar 6265 are being presented. Growth rate, fluoride accumulation in leaves and soils, and degradation in chlorophyll and nicotine contents of the plant species against the variations in two experimental factors, namely the exposure concentration and exposure time parameters, were investigated. Resulting data reveals that the variety selected for this study is not so tolerant to fluoride as generally reported in the literature, if only the individual effects of the pollutant is considered.     

Fate of selected pharmaceuticals in hospital and municipal wastewater effluent: occurrence,removal, and environmental risk assessment

The concentrations and distribution of β-blockers, lipid regulators, and psychiatric and cancer drugs in the influent and effluent of the municipal wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) and the effluent of 16 hospitals that discharge into the wastewater treatment plant mentioned in this study at two sampling dates in summer and winter were examined. The pharmaceutical contribution of hospitals to municipal wastewater was determined. The removal of target pharmaceuticals was evaluated in a WWTP consisting of conventional biological treatment using activated sludge. Additionally, the potential environmental risk for the aquatic receiving environments (salt lake) was assessed. Beta-blockers and psychiatric drugs were detected in high concentrations in the wastewater samples. Atenolol (919 ng/L) from β-blockers and carbamazepine (7008 ng/L) from psychiatric pharmaceuticals were detected at the highest concentrations in hospital wastewater. The total pharmaceutical concentration determined at the WWTP influent and effluent was between 335 and 737 ng/L in summer and between 174 and 226 ng/L in winter. The concentrations detected in hospital effluents are higher than the concentrations detected in WWTP. The total pharmaceutical contributions from hospitals to the WWTP in summer and winter were determined to be 2% and 4%, respectively. Total pharmaceutical removal in the WWTP ranged from 23 to 54%. According to the risk ratios, atenolol could pose a high risk (risk quotient > 10) for fish in summer and winter. There are different reasons for the increase in pharmaceutical consumption in recent years. One of these reasons is the COVID-19 pandemic, which has been going on for 2 years. In particular, hospitals were operated at full capacity during the pandemic, and the occurrence and concentration of pharmaceuticals used for the therapy of COVID-19 patients has increased in hospital effluent. Pandemic conditions have increased the tendency of people to use psychiatric drugs. It is thought that beta-blocker consumption has increased due to cardiovascular diseases caused by COVID-19. Therefore, the environmental risk of pharmaceuticals for aquatic organisms in hospital effluent should be monitored and evaluated.

     

Effect of molecular properties on the photocatalytic degradation rates of dichlorophenols and dichloroanilines in aqueous TiO2 suspensions

The kinetics of the photocatalytic degradation of 10 different dichlorophenols and dichloroanilines have been investigated experimentally and theoretically. With the intention of finding certain molecular indices in order to determine the degradation rates of aromatic pollutants, geometry optimizations of the compounds have been performed with the semiempirical PM3 method. The molecular orbital calculations have been carried out by an SCF method using the RHF formalism. The correlations between the apparent first-order rate constants and the calculated molecular properties of the compounds have been examined. Four different structure–activity relationships have been developed expressing the logarithms of the rate constants in terms of the Hammett constants, electron densities of the substituents, the coefficients and the energies of the highest occupied molecular orbitals HOMO, and 1-octanol/water partition coefficients log?K _OW.