Sustainable Development and Strategic Thinking

From an economic point of view, the industrial economy is efficient to overcome situations of a scarcity of goods. From a technological point of view, the resource efficiency of the manufacturing processes of the industrial economy has been permanently improved during the last 200 years. In addition, cleaner processes have been developed. However, from an ecologic point of view, an increasing world population with increasing consumption has produced a ＂global footprint＂ which approaches the carrying capacity of the planet. A circular economy and its high-value spin-offs-a lake economy and a performance or functional service economy-can fulfil customers＇ needs with considerably less resource consumption, less environmental impairment in production and considerably less end-of-life product waste, especially in situations of affluence, when a considerable stock of physical goods and infrastructures exists. Also, in situations of a scarcity of natural resources, both energy and materials, often characterised by rapidly rising resource prices, the economic actors of a circular economy have a high competitive advantage over the actors of the industrial economy, due to much lower procurement costs for materials and energy. From a social point of view, a circular economy increases the number of skilled jobs in regional enterprises. However, the shift from a linear manufacturing economy to a circular or service economy means a change in economic thinking from flow （throughput） management to stock （asset） management： in a manufacturing economy with largely unsaturated markets, total wealth increases through accumulation as resource throughput （flow） is transformed into a higher stock of goods of better quality （but in a manufacturing economy with largely saturated markets, wealth represented by the stock of goods will no longer increase）; in a circular or service economy, total wealth increases through a smart management of existing physical assets （stock） that are adapted to changes in both technology and customer demand. This second approach not only applies to physical capital but equally to social capital, such as health and education and green GDP. To measure the social wealth of a population, it is not the amount of money spent on schools and hospitals that matters, butif this expenditure has led to a better education of the students, and a better health of the people.     

Organic pollutants in compost and digestate. Part 1. Polychlorinated biphenyls, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and molecular markers

In Europe, 9.3 x 10(6) t(dry weight (dw)) of compost and digestate are produced per year. Most of this is applied to agricultural land, which can lead to considerable inputs of organic pollutants, such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) to soil. This paper presents an inventory of the pollutant situation in source-separated composts, digestates and presswater in Switzerland by a detailed analysis of over 70 samples. PCB concentrations ( summation PCB 28, 52, 101, 118, 138, 153, 180) were significantly higher in urban (median: 30 microg kg(-1)dw, n = 52) than in rural samples (median: 14 microg kg(-1)dw, n = 16). Together with low concentrations in general, this points to aerial deposition on compost input material as the major contamination pathway. Enantiomeric fractions of atropisometric PCB were close to racemic. Median PAH concentration was 3010 microg kg(-1)dw( summation 15PAH, n = 69), and one quarter of the samples exhibited concentrations above the relevant Swiss guide value for compost (4000 microg kg(-1)dw). The levels were influenced by the treatment process (digestate > compost), the season of input material collection (spring-summer > winter > autumn), the particle size (coarse-grained > fine-grained), and maturity (mature > less mature). The main source of PAH in compost was pyrogenic, probably influenced mainly by liquid fossil fuel combustion and some asphalt abrasion, as suggested by multiple linear regression. This study, together with a companion paper reporting on other organic contaminates including emerging compound classes, provides a starting point for a better risk-benefit estimation of the application of compost and digestate to agricultural soil in Switzerland.     

Dry Deposition of Ammonia at Environmental Concentrations on Selected Plant Species

The deposition velocity of NH₃ on six plant species at environmental concentrations has been studied in a dynamic plant gas exchange reactor. The total resistance to the transport of NH₃ was studied. The aerodynamic resistance was determined directly by NH₃ gas absorption in aqueous solutions at environmental concentrations in a two-phase gradientless reactor modeling the transfer processes through the stomata in a leaf. The concentration of NH₃ in the gas phase ranged from 50 to 1000 ppb and the temperature varied from 25 to 30°C. The results for the deposition velocity for NH₃, during the day, varied from 0.3 to 1.3 cm/s. The deposition velocities at night were about one order of magnitude smaller. These results are compared with estimates from the Frdssling equation which consistently yields higher values of the same order of magnitude. To determine accurate atmospheric transport models or global budget models, a variable deposition velocity should be used to account for the diurnal and seasonal variations in the surface resistance.     

陕西民俗文化旅游资源的保护与开发

陕西民俗文化旅游资源丰富,具有较高的社会价值和旅游价值,但由于政府部门的疏于重视和广大民众认识的浅薄,导致陕西民俗文化旅游资源受到严重的破坏,同时也造成不良风气的大量出现,使这些价值未能得以发挥.针对这一现状,以全国民俗文化的保护和开发为参照,结合陕西民俗文化旅游资源的自身特点,从保护和发展两个方面涉及的具体问题为出发点,就具体的问题提出了具体的建议,希望以此引起各方重视.参5.     

Critical evaluation of PAH source apportionment tools using data from the Swiss soil monitoring network

In this study a large dataset on the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) content of Swiss soils was analysed to evaluate two source apportionment tools, i.e., characteristic PAH ratios/molecular markers and a linear mixing model. Population density and total organic carbon (TOC) content were identified by a multiple regression model as independently and positively influencing the PAH concentrations in Swiss background soil. Specifically, TOC was more strongly positively correlated with the sum of light PAH (naphthalene to phenanthrene) than with the sum of heavy PAH (anthracene to benzo[ghj]perylene), whereas population density was more strongly positively correlated with the sum of heavy PAH than with light PAH. In addition, the sum of the heavy PAH as well as the total sum correlated negatively with sample site altitude. It is therefore hypothesised that heavy PAH are less mobile, whereas light PAH were closer to equilibrium with TOC in the soil. Similar results were found for polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB). The characteristic ratios and molecular markers pointed to pyrogenic origin of PAH in Swiss background soil but did not allow for further differentiation of individual fuel contributions, even though attempts to take environmental fractionation processes into account were made. The comparison of three soil profiles identified with a linear mixing model from the pattern of 16 PAH with >300 PAH emission profiles from the literature suggested urban dust, wood combustion and binders from asphalt as PAH sources. However, also here, environmental fractionation processes probably obscured source characteristic PAH ratios and fingerprints, which thus need to be interpreted with caution.