Agroforest’s growing role in reducing carbon losses from Jambi (Sumatra), Indonesia

This paper examines the size and intensity of changes among five land categories during the two time intervals in a region of Indonesia that is pioneering negotiations concerning reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD). Maps at 1973, 1993, and 2005 indicate that land-cover change is accelerating, while carbon loss is decelerating in Jambi Province, Sumatra. Land dynamics have shifted from Forest loss during 1973–1993 to Agroforest loss during 1993–2005. Forest losses account for most reductions in aboveground carbon during the both time intervals, but Agroforest plays an increasingly important role in carbon reductions during the more recent interval. These results provide motivation for future REDD policies to count carbon changes associated with all influential land categories, such as Agroforests.     

Sustainable supplier selection criteria classification for Indian iron and steel industry: a fuzzy modified Kano model approach

ABSTRACT

The aim of this work is to provide a systematic approach for sustainability criteria clustering into different useful categories. For this purpose, a methodology has been proposed with the following three steps. (i) A comprehensive set of the sustainability criteria in economic, environmental and social dimension has been extracted from the literature and have been customised for the iron and steel industry. (ii) A fuzzy Kano methodology has been used to classify these sustainability criteria into useful Kano cluster like must-be, one-dimensional, and attractive cluster (iii) further, must-be and attractive criteria derived from the second step were further sub-classified into three categories using Type IV Kano model. All steps have been examined in the iron and steel industry of India and findings indicate that quality and delivery criteria are classified as high must be criteria in the economic realm. Further, environmental and energy management system in the environmental dimension and social responsibility and right of stakeholders criteria in the social dimension are classified as high must be criteria. Prioritising must be and attractive criteria enable decision makers of other industries to select the appropriate criteria to adopt sustainability.     

Trends in lung cancer in London in relation to exposure to diesel fumes

Mortality from lung cancer among males in England and Wales is now beginning to decline, and the urban excess that has persisted for many years is also becoming smaller. There is nothing in these national trends to suggest that pollution from diesel vehicles, which has been increasing in recent decades, would be involved. Some preliminary results are presented from a long-term study of the incidence of lung cancer among London Transport staff, including men who work in bus garages where there are high concentrations of smoke from diesel buses. Over the 25 year period from 1950–1974 the numbers of cases reported in each of the several job categories have been below those expected on the basis of Greater London rates. The absence of data on smoking habits makes it difficult to determine whether the small differences in rates between job categories are of any importance, but the standardised mortality ratios are all well within the range of those found in national studies of lung cancer mortality and smoking in relation to occupation.     

Impacts of climatic disasters in coastal Bangladesh: why does private adaptive capacity differ?

This paper quantitatively assesses the influences of various demographic and socio-economic factors, past adaptive behavioral factors, access to weather/climate information, and spatial/locational factors on coastal populations’ perceived adaptive capacity against major impacts of hydro-meteorological disasters on their livelihood. A total of 285 respondents from three coastal villages in Bangladesh were randomly interviewed between January and April 2009. Respondents rated their perceived adaptive capacity against 25 anticipated impacts of sea-level rise (SLR)-induced events on their livelihood. By employing the principal component analysis (PCA), perceived adaptive capacity was grouped into five major categories. Then, an adaptive capacity index for each of five major impacts, namely, “infrastructure damage and disrupted mobility,” “food and nutritional insecurity,” “low earning and higher cost of maintenance,” “loss of employment in offshore activities,” and “crisis of potable water and public health risk,” was prepared. How adaptive capacity against each of these major five categories of impacts differs due to the influence of various factors was assessed by employing the multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) technique. The MANOVAs show that age, sex, level of education, type of occupation, farmland holdings, past adaptive behavior against rainfall, salinity intrusion, freshwater crises, use of radio for weather information, and the distance of the homestead from the shoreline have varying levels of influence on respondents’ perceived adaptive capacity against each of the five major categories of impacts. Others factors have moderate to limited influences. The policy implication is that specific programs, rather than a generic one-size fits all program, must be initiated for enhancement of adaptive capacity against specific impacts.     

Structure of small mammal communities in Moscow parks and public gardens

Data collected between 1987 and 2002 have been used to analyze the structure of small mammal communities in parks and public gardens of the city of Moscow. With regard to several ecological parameters, four categories of parks markedly differing in biotopic conditions have been distinguished. The least stable zoocenoses are formed in deteriorating parks. More favorable ecological conditions exist in public gardens and regular parks, where not only synanthropic but also hemisynanthropic rodents can be found. The fauna of small mammals in landscape parks is similar to that in forest cenoses, but this fauna in park forests better complies with the concept of forest community.     

Monitoring of radiation and radioactivity in the environment

This report lists the programs for monitoring radiation and radioactivity in the environment that are known to be in operation or to have been in operation recently. It is intended as a guide to be used when seeking information on the programs of other institutions. Sources of the data have been the literature and personal correspondence and discussions.The programs are divided into the categories of weapons test fallout, natural activity and environmental monitoring of releases from specific facilities. Where possible, the types of measurements being made are also listed. While the data are as up to date as possible the field is changing rapidly and there may be ommissions.     

我国环保产业发展与产业组织理论

本文就我国环保产业发展的现状，运用产业组织理论分析了环保产业的特殊性，探讨了环保产业的市场结构、市场行为和市场绩效三个基本范畴，针对我国产业市场结构存在的问题，提出了我国的环保产业组织政策     

Polar organic pollutants in air: A review of collection and analysis

Pollutants which are capable of being extracted into nonpolar solvent such as hexane have received the greatest attention in environmental monitoring. However, the polar fraction, inherently more difficult to analyze, is currently undergoing closer scrutiny. Sampling methods specifically designed to entrap polar particles and vapors are compared. Ion-exchange and reversed-phase liquid chromatography columns are examples of such specific sampling techniques. Various extraction schemes are presented with their individual problems and capabilities. Although there are numerous papers on the analysis of polar organic pollutants, few report actual measurements of ambient air samples. Current reports on polar organic pollutants measured in air samples are summarized. Polar organics are generally divided into three categories: acidic, basic, and neutral. Analytical methods relating to the following categories of polar organic compounds are reviewed: (1) phenols, mono- and dicarboxylic acids, and sulfonic acids, (2) aliphatic and aromatic amines, and (3) alcohols, aldehydes and ketones, phthalate esters, isocyanates and N-nitrosamines. Derivatization techniques, such as ester formation, are compared to the analysis of the unsubstituted compound. The formation of such derivatives is often the best way to trace specific compounds at very low levels.     

Forest land conversion dynamics: a case of Pakistan

The present research focuses on estimating forest area change with respect to the ongoing forest land conversion. The study tests the hypothesis that forest land is being converted to the selected land use categories with high growth tendency and controlling deforestation rate to its half of the present level would significantly improve the land cover under forest. The rate of forest land conversion to other land use categories is analyzed and then compared with the total area expanded under three land use classes. We used Systems dynamic modeling approach to estimate forest area by simulating forest land conversion in Pakistan, projecting to 2030. The results show that rangeland, built-up area and cultivated land have increased over time; growth rate of built-up area (9%) is highest followed by rangeland area (1.7%) and cultivated area (0.3%), respectively; rangeland is the dominant category in terms of area expanded (0.74 m. ha). Sensitivity analysis showed that reducing deforestation rate to half of the past level of 1% could not significantly improve forest area; therefore, it is suggested that controlling deforestation alone is not an effective strategy unless drastic measures, e.g., demarcation of forest boundaries, land use control policy and afforestation campaign would be started in the country.     

岷江上游植被生境适应性空间分异格局的间隙度分析

了解岷江上游不同植被生境适宜性类型在整体和局部上的空间分异格局对植被生境管理和修复具有非常重要的意义。基于岷江上游4类植被生境适宜性类型空间分布图借助分形和贝叶斯理论,建立间隙度指数模型和多水平贝叶斯模型,实现定量表征不同植被生境适宜性类型在整体和局部空间上的聚簇和分异程度。结果表明:1)汶川在Ⅰ~Ⅳ类、Ⅲ类和Ⅳ类生境适宜性下的间隙度指数最大,其对应的空间分异尺度为3 000 m(即为30倍网格边长,网格边长为100 m)、2 900 m、2 800 m,而松潘在Ⅰ类和Ⅱ类型下的间隙度指数最大,其空间分异尺度为3 000 m、2 700 m。2)Ⅰ~Ⅳ类、Ⅰ类和Ⅱ类生境适宜性分别在汶川、松潘和理县的间隙度维数最大,空间格局聚簇性较小,进一步证明空间分异尺度较大,而Ⅲ类和Ⅳ类生境适宜性在茂县的间隙度维数最大。岷江上游植被生境空间分异格局的间隙度分析,可以为研究生境空间格局及其生境管理尺寸在整体和局部上的差异提供必备的条件和依据。     

Institutions, Forest Management, and Sustainable Human Development – Experiences from India

New institutional economists have argued that there are many categories of institutions, including market and non-market institutions, which may prove economically efficient, specifically for public goods and common pool goods. The Government of India introduced a non-market community-based institution, known as Joint Forest Management (JFM), for forest management and protection in 1990. JFM is a sharing mechanism for forest planning and management based on sharing of rights and duties, control and decision-making authority over forestlands, between forest departments and local user groups. By 2001, 42 000 Village Forest Committees established under JFM were managing over 11.5 million ha forestland. These institutions have proved very useful, and have contributed to forest management as well as four aspects of sustainable human development (SHD) – ecological output, income generation, village infrastructure development, and community empowerment. In the long-term, community-based institutions will prove to be a foundation of SHD and participatory democracy.     

The challenges of water,waste and climate change in cities

Cities play a prominent role in our economic development as more than 80 % of the gross world product (GWP) comes from cities. Only 600 urban areas with just 20 % of the world population generate 60 % of the GWP. Rapid urbanization, climate change, inadequate maintenance of water and wastewater infrastructures and poor solid waste management may lead to flooding, water scarcity, water pollution, adverse health effects and rehabilitation costs that may overwhelm the resilience of cities. These megatrends pose urgent challenges in cities as the cost of inaction is high. We present an overview about population growth, urbanization, water, waste, climate change, water governance and transitions. Against this background, we discuss the categorization of cities based on our baseline assessments, i.e. our City Blueprint research on 45 municipalities and regions predominantly in Europe. With this bias towards Europe in mind, the challenges can be discussed globally by clustering cities into distinct categories of sustainability and by providing additional data and information from global regions. We distinguish five categories of sustainability: (1) cities lacking basic water services, (2) wasteful cities, (3) water-efficient cities, (4) resource-efficient and adaptive cities and (5) water-wise cities. Many cities in Western Europe belong to categories 3 and 4. Some cities in Eastern Europe and the few cities we have assessed in Latin America, Asia and Africa can be categorized as cities lacking basic water services. Lack of water infrastructures or obsolete infrastructures, solid waste management and climate adaptation are priorities. It is concluded that cities require a long-term framing of their sectoral challenges into a proactive and coherent Urban Agenda to maximize the co-benefits of adaptation and to minimize the cost. Furthermore, regional platforms of cities are needed to enhance city-to-city learning and to improve governance capacities necessary to accelerate effective and efficient transitions towards water-wise cities. These learning alliances are needed as the time window to solve the global water governance crisis is narrow and rapidly closing. The water sector can play an important role but needs to reframe and refocus radically.     

Electric vehicles: solution or new problem?

Since electric vehicles (EVs) have been recognized as a technology that reduces local air pollution while improving transport energy security, they have been promoted in many countries. Yet, mainly due to their high costs, especially in the case of pure battery electric vehicles, and a lack of proper infrastructure, the use of EVs is still very limited. In this paper, some of the major barriers and the future challenges are discussed. The current problems are mainly attributed to two categories: (1) the battery performances and costs, as well as battery production including issue of material availability and (2) environmental benefits of EVs depending on the sources used for the electricity generation and their carbon intensity. The major conclusions are that (1) research and development with respect to batteries has by far the highest priority and (2) it has to be ensured that the electricity used in EVs is generated largely from renewable energy sources.     

Assays with Daphnia magna and Danio rerio as alert systems in aquatic toxicology

For the evaluation and monitoring of the water quality, a series of methodologies, which have as basis an ample variety of bioindicators, may be applied. The aim of this research was to evaluate the use of ecotoxicity assays with Daphnia magna and Danio rerio as alert systems in water contaminated with toxic substances. Using two toxicity databases, the sensibility of those aquatic organisms to a wide variety of chemical products and elements and to some chemical categories was investigated. The relation between the reference dose for human oral chronic exposure (RfD) of all chemical products and the acute toxicity values for both bioindicators was also studied. Acute toxicity tests with D. magna respond to a larger variety of chemicals with a higher sensitivity than those with D. rerio. Although mammals, crustaceans and fish have different routes of exposure, target organs and toxic mechanisms, acute toxicity essays with fish and Daphnia may be used as an initial screening before mammal models are used.     

Longer-duration uses of tetracyclines and penicillins in U.S. food-producing animals: Indications and microbiologic effects

We review and analyze regulatory categories for longer duration of use (defined as ≥ 7 day) tetracyclines (TCs) and penicillins (PNs) approved for U.S. livestock and poultry, together with scientific studies, surveillance programs and risk assessments pertaining to antimicrobial resistance. Indications listed on a government database were grouped into three broad categories according to the terminology used to describe their use: disease control (C), treatment (T) and growth improvement (G). Consistent with mostly therapeutic uses, the majority (86%) of listed indications had C and/or T terms. Several studies showed interruption of early disease stages in animals and modulation of intestinal microflora. Longer-duration exposures are consistent with bacteriostatic modes of action, where adequate exposure time as well as concentration is needed for sufficient antimicrobial activity. Other effects identified included reduced animal pathogen prevalence, toxin formation, inflammation, environmental impacts, improved animal health, reproductive measures, nutrient utilization, and others. Several animal studies have shown a limited, dose-proportionate, selective increase in resistance prevalence among commensal animal bacteria following longer-duration exposures. Pathogen surveillance programs showed overall stable or declining resistance trends among sentinel bacteria. Quantitative, microbiologically detailed resistance risk assessments indicate small probabilities of human treatment failure due to resistance under current conditions. Evaluations of longer-duration uses of TCs, PNs, and other antimicrobial classes used in food-producing animals should consider mechanisms of activity, known individual- and population-level health and waste reduction effects in addition to resistance risks.     

Economic implications of groundwater exploitation in hard rock areas of southern peninsular India

The present paper analyses the consequences of groundwater exploitation by using field-level data collected from two distinct well irrigated areas of Karnataka. The study results show that the consequences arising out of groundwater overexploitation are severe in high well interference area compared to low well interference area. The burden of well failure is more or less equally shared by all categories of farmers but small farmers are the worst victims of resource scarcity. As a result, overexploitation of groundwater has different impacts on different categories of farmers in terms of access to groundwater, cost and returns to groundwater irrigation and its negative externality cost. The study suggests maintaining inter-well distance to prevent resource mining and calls for supply and demand side interventions. The institutional reform is necessary to restore surface water bodies to facilitate aquifer recharge.     

Remediation strategies for rural territories contaminated by the Chernobyl accident.

The objective of the present paper is to derive remediation strategies for rural settlements contaminated by the Chernobyl accident in which annual doses to a critical group still exceed 1 mSv. Extensive radioecological data have been collected for 70 contaminated settlements. A dose model based on these data resulted in estimates that are on average close to and a bit less than the official dose estimates ('catalogue doses') published by the responsible Ministries of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. For eight remedial actions that can be applied on a large scale, effectiveness and costs have been assessed in light of their dependence on soil type, contamination level and on the degree of previous application of remedial actions. Remediation strategies were derived for each of the 70 settlements by choosing remedial actions with lowest costs per averted dose and with highest degree of acceptability among the farmers and local authorities until annual doses are assessed to fall below 1 mSv. The results were generalised to 11 contamination/internal-dose categories. The total numbers of rural inhabitants and privately owned cows in the three countries distributed over the categories were determined and predicted until the year 2015. Based on these data, costs and averted doses were derived for the whole affected population. The main results are (i) about 2000 Sv can be averted at relatively low costs, (ii) the emphasis on reducing external exposures should be increased, (iii) radical improvement of hay-land and meadows and application of Prussian blue to cows should be performed on a large scale if annual doses of 1 mSv are an aim to be achieved, (iv) additional remedial actions of importance are fertilising of potato fields, distribution of food monitors and restriction of mushroom consumption, and (v) for inhabitants of some settlements (in total about 8600) annual doses cannot be reduced below 1 mSv by the remedial actions considered.     

Adaptive threat management framework: integrating people and turtles

In the 35 years since its inception, the Brazilian National Program for the Conservation of Marine Turtles (TAMAR) has had great success in protecting the five species of sea turtles that occur in Brazil. It has also contributed significantly to worldwide scientific data and knowledge about these species’ biology, such as life cycles and migration patterns. TAMAR’s conservation strategies have always relied on a variety of environmental education and social inclusion (EESI) activities highly adapted to the socio-environmental evolving contexts of its 25 locations distributed across nine states. Diversity and flexibility are critical to enable timely and effective local responses to existing or potential threats to sea turtles. The intuitive, locally adapted, decentralized, and independent way EESI activities have been carried out have generated positive results in the resolution of specific and evolving local problems through the course of the project. This article brings EESI under the same conceptual framework that underlies its conservation approach by adopting an adaptive threat management framework to organize and qualify its educational and social inclusion interventions according to the main categories of threat addressed by TAMAR.     

武汉城市圈土地利用空间关联的碳排放效率及其收敛性分析

通过测算武汉城市圈土地利用空间关联的碳排放效率及其收敛性,为该城市群提供碳减排方案。通过运用结合Bootstrap技术的Malmquist指数方法测算了武汉城市圈土地利用空间关联的碳排放效率及其技术进步和技术效率,并对该效率做σ-收敛和β-收敛分析。研究发现该城市圈土地利用空间关联的碳排放效率在2010年前呈上升趋势,之后出现下降;究其原因,虽然技术进步是持续的,但是不足以弥补技术效率的不断降低;将武汉城市圈按照土地类型分为三类城市,收敛性分析发现它们均出现了不同程度的收敛,而且收敛于较高的碳排放水平。根据以上的分析结果,结合该城市圈的产业布局,提出了相应的减碳方案。     

新能源汽车补贴政策工具挖掘及量化评价

现阶段中国大力开展新能源汽车示范推广工作,中央及各地方政府已相继出台一系列补贴政策。在严厉打击新能源汽车"骗补"及补贴政策重新调整等背景下,分析梳理现有政策从而对其进行整体把握与正确判断显得尤为重要,从而为政策改进与优化做准备。本文选取了截至2016年底国家和北京市颁布的涉及新能源汽车补贴的相关政策。首先,从采用文本挖掘的方法整理出的政策文本的高频有效关键词从中提炼出的政策工具,可分为供给型、需求型、环境型三类,分别从技术推动、市场拉动和环境支撑三个方面促进和规范新能源汽车市场。发现现有政策工具仍存在一些问题,如缺乏支持新能源汽车技术提升和产品开发的供给型政策工具;环境型政策工具的作用重点欠科学,对充电基础设施建设的重视程度不够;补贴过于聚焦新能源汽车购买环节等。其次,结合政策特点运用PMC指数模型构建了新能源汽车补贴政策的量化评价框架,通过变量分类、参数识别建立了多投入产出表,并通过PMC指数的测量、PMC曲面的生成综合反映政策各维度的情况。再次,采用实证分析的方法,选取3项新能源汽车补贴政策(P1、P2、P3)为研究对象,对政策进行量化评价。结果得出3项政策的PMC指数分别为7.52、6.95、6.21,均在良好的等级之内,P1政策的量化结果为优秀,P2、P3政策结果为良好,且具有较大的提升空间,可考虑在激励措施等方面予以加强。最后,根据新能源汽车补贴政策无法取得预期效果的原因,提出三点政策优化意见:(1)重视供给型政策工具的使用,加大新能源汽车科研资金投入;(2)环境型政策工具的作用重点应放在充电等基础设施的建设上;(3)需求型可考虑采取以公共交通带动私人交通的策略。