The United Kingdom Acid Waters Monitoring Network: a review of the first 15 years and introduction to the special issue

The United Kingdom Acid Waters Monitoring Network (AWMN) was established in 1988 to determine the ecological impact of acidic emissions control policy on acid-sensitive lakes and streams. AWMN data have been used to explore a range of causal linkages necessary to connect changes in emissions to chemical and, ultimately, biological recovery. Regional scale reductions in sulphur (S) deposition have been found to have had an immediate influence on surface water chemistry, including increases in acid neutralising capacity, pH and alkalinity and declines in aluminium toxicity. These in turn can be linked to changes in the aquatic biota which are consistent with "recovery" responses. A continuation of the current programme is essential in order to better understand apparent non-linearity between nitrogen (N) in deposition and runoff, the substantial rise in organic acid concentrations, and the likely impacts of forecast climate change and other potential constraints on further biological improvement.     

The Predatory Bird Monitoring Scheme: identifying chemical risks to top predators in Britain

The Predatory Bird Monitoring Scheme (PBMS) is a long term (>40 y), UK-wide, exposure monitoring scheme that determines the concentration of selected pesticides and pollutants in the livers and eggs of predatory birds. This paper describes how the PBMS works, and in particular highlights some of the key scientific and policy drivers for monitoring contaminants in predatory birds and describes the specific aims, scope, and methods of the PBMS. We also present previously unpublished data that illustrates how the PBMS has been used to demonstrate the success of mitigation measures in reversing chemical-mediated impacts; identify and evaluate chemical threats to species of high conservation value; and finally to inform and refine monitoring methodologies. In addition, we discuss how such schemes can also address wider conservation needs.     

Kosetice, Czech Republic--ten years of air pollution monitoring and four years of evaluating the origin of persistent organic pollutants

The regional observatory Kosetice is a central European background station. Unique continuous monitoring from 1988 on is held here. POP (persistent organic pollutant) concentration values of air samples from Kosetice taken between 1996 and 2005 were statistically processed. Values of Czech ambient air quality standards were not exceeded. Concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons reached two maxima, in 1996 and 2001-2002. Polychlorinated biphenyls concentrations reached the highest values in 1997 and 1998 and hexachlorocyclohexanes concentrations in 1998. DDTs, hexachlorobenzene and pentachlorobenzene were analysed as well. Long-range transport of pollutants between 2002 and 2005 was evaluated using the Potential Source Contribution Function hybrid receptor model. Indicated potential source areas of PCBs coincide with many well-known urban and industrialised areas, while the indicated potential source areas of HCHs and DDTs coincide with many agricultural and/or forested regions and the potential source areas of HCB comprise all land use types.     

Global temperature change from the transport sectors: Historical development and future scenarios

Transport affects climate directly and indirectly through mechanisms that operate on very different timescales and cause both warming and cooling. We calculate contributions to the historical development in global mean temperature for the main transport sectors (road transport, aviation, shipping and rail) based on estimates of historical emissions and by applying knowledge about the various forcing mechanisms from detailed studies. We also calculate the development in future global mean temperature for four transport scenarios consistent with the IPCC SRES scenarios, one mitigation scenario and one sensitivity test scenario. There are large differences between the transport sectors in terms of sign and magnitude of temperature effects and with respect to the contributions from the long- and short-lived components. Since pre-industrial times, we calculate that transport in total has contributed 9% of total net man-made warming in the year 2000. The dominating contributor to warming is CO₂, followed by tropospheric O₃. By sector, road transport is the largest contributor; 11% of the warming in 2000 is due to this sector. Likewise, aviation has contributed 4% and rail ～1%. Shipping, on the other hand, has caused a net cooling up to year 2000, with a contribution of ?7%, due to the effects of SO₂ and NOx emissions. The total net contribution from the transport sectors to total man-made warming is ～15% in 2050, and reaches 20% in 2100 in the A1 and B1 scenarios. For all scenarios and throughout the century, road transport is the dominating contributor to warming. Due to the anticipated reduction in sulphur content of fuels, the net effect of shipping changes from cooling to warming by the end of the century. Significant uncertainties are related to the estimates of historical and future net warming mainly due to cirrus, contrails and aerosol effects, as well as uncertainty in climate sensitivity.     

The Value of Monitoring for Radon in the Home: A Decision Analysis

In light of the recent publicity about the adverse health effects of radon gas, many citizens and government officials are considering whether or not to monitor for radon in homes. This paper presents a formal decision analysis of the monitoring dilemma from the perspective of hypothesized homeowners. The analysis considers the costs of radon monitoring and control, the carcinogenic risks of radon exposure, the demographics of household size, and a hypothetical homeowner's knowledge of radon exposure levels—with and without the benefit of specific monitoring data. Since monitoring every home in the United States would be quite expensive, the analysis reveals some more efficient monitoring strategies that might be employed by citizens and government officials. While the paper presents a new analytic perspective in the monitoring problem, the results should not be considered definitive. Further study is necessary to clarify precisely what is known about radon exposure, health effects, and control strategies.     

Analytical protocol for the analysis of polybrominated dibenzo-dioxins and dibenzofurans: Data quality objectives and single-laboratory evaluation

An analytical protocol for the measurement of part per billion and sub-part per billion levels of PBDDs and PBDFs in selected flame retardant chemicals (polybrominated diphenyloxides; PBDPO) was developed. The fractionation/enrichment procedures were optimized to minimize the effects of the PBDPOs upon the ability to recover and measure the PBDD/PBDFs. Results from the method validation show that the current methodology is capable of accuracies ranging from 70% to 150% at the 0.1 to 10 ppb levels while larger sample sizes (from 20–200 mg to 4 g) are necessary in order to meet the EPA target Test Rule limit of quantification (LOQ) requirements.     

Biodegradability of plastics: the issues,recent advances,and future perspectives

Environmental Science and Pollution Research -     

Past, current and future fire frequency in the Canadian boreal forest: implications for sustainable forest management

Over the past decades, there has been an increasing interest in the development of forest management approaches that are based on an understanding of historical natural disturbance dynamics. The rationale for such an approach is that management to favor landscape compositions and stand structures similar to those of natural ecosystems should also maintain biological diversity and essential ecological functions. In fire-dominated landscapes, this approach is possible only if current and future fire frequencies are sufficiently low, comparing to pre-industrial fire frequency, that we can substitute fire by forest management. We address this question by comparing current and future fire frequency to historical reconstruction of fire frequency from studies realized in the Canadian boreal forest. Current and simulated future fire frequencies using 2 and 3 x CO2 scenarios are lower than the historical fire frequency for many sites, suggesting that forest management could potentially be used to recreate the forest age structure of fire-controlled pre-industrial landscapes. There are however, important limitations to the current even-age management.     

The Sulu-Sulawesi Sea: environmental and socioeconomic status, future prognosis and ameliorative policy options

The Sulu-Sulawesi Sea, with neighboring Indonesian Seas and South China Sea, lies at the center of the world's tropical marine biodiversity. Encircled by 3 populous, developing nations, the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, the Sea and its adjacent coastal and terrestrial ecosystems, supports ca. 33 million people, most with subsistence livelihoods heavily reliant on its renewable natural resources. These resources are being impacted severely by rapid population growth (> 2% yr-1, with expected doubling by 2035) and widespread poverty, coupled with increasing international market demand and rapid technological changes, compounded by inefficiencies in governance and a lack of awareness and/or acceptance of some laws among local populations, particularly in parts of the Philippines and Indonesia. These key root causes all contribute to illegal practices and corruption, and are resulting in severe resource depletion and degradation of water catchments, river, lacustrine, estuarine, coastal, and marine ecosystems. The Sulu-Sulawesi Sea forms a major geopolitical focus, with porous borders, transmigration, separatist movements, piracy, and illegal fishing all contributing to environmental degradation, human suffering and political instability, and inhibiting strong trilateral support for interventions. This review analyzes these multifarious environmental and socioeconomic impacts and their root causes, provides a future prognosis of status by 2020, and recommends policy options aimed at amelioration through sustainable management and development.     

Four years of continuous monitoring of the Meirama end-pit lake and its impact in the definition of future uses

Following the technical closure of the brown lignite Meirama mine (NW Spain) in April 2008, the reclamation of the mined area is being accomplished with the controlled flooding of its large pit. During the first 7 months of flooding, the sequential arrest of the ground water dewatering system led to the growth of an acidic water body of about 2 hm³. Since October 2008, the surface waters from some local streams have been diverted towards the pit so that these have become the major water input in the flooding process. Surface water has promoted a major change in the chemical composition of the lake water so that, at present, its surface has a circum neutral pH, net alkalinity, and low conductivity. At present, the lake has slightly more than one half of its final volume, and it is expected the overflow in 3 to 3.5 years. The lake is meromictic, with a sharp chemocline separating the acidic monimolimnion (pH?≈?3.2, acidity?≈?150 mg CaCO₃/L, κ ₂₅?≈?2.4 mS/cm) from the main water body (pH?≈?6.5, alkalinity?≈?15 mg CaCO₃/L, κ ₂₅?≈?0.3 mS/cm). Oxygen is being depleted at the bottom of the lake so that the monimolimnion became anoxic in January 2011. Above the chemocline, the composition of the lake is similar, but not identical, to that of the flooding stream waters. Close to the surface, some constituents (pH, metals) show strong seasonal variations in coincidence with the phytoplankton growing periods. Those parameters whose limits are legally prescribed comply with the corresponding water quality standards, and they are also consistent with the forecasting results obtained in early modeling. At present, a project considering the construction of an uptake tunnel to exploit the lake is being developed for the emergency water supply of the metropolitan area of A Coruña.     

Environmental risk evaluation of chemicals: achievements of the project and seeds for future--development of metrics for evaluating risks

Achievements of the research project entitled "Establishment of a scientific framework for the management of toxicity of chemicals based on environmental risk-benefit analysis" supported by the JST were introduced and reviewed, focusing on the development of the methodology for estimating risks; human health risks and ecological risks. The usefulness of loss of life expectancy as a metric for evaluating cancer and noncancer risks was demonstrated. To evaluate ecological risks, three metrics, 1/T, logT and T, developed based on the mean extinction time (T) of species were proposed. Then, their implication and feasibility were examined in terms of what ecological system should be conserved and how easily people can understand the implications of metrics. Protocols for estimating human health risks and ecological risks are illustrated.     

The Characterization of Ozone,Sulfur Dioxide,and Nitrogen Dioxide for Selected Monitoring Sites in the Federal Republic of Germany

Ambient ozone, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide data collected at 11 rural gaseous air pollution monitoring stations located throughout the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) were characterized to provide a basis for investigating the effect these air pollutants may have on forest decline. For any given year, with the exception of the Waldhof site, the ozone monitoring sites did not experience more than 50 occurrences of hourly mean concentrations equal to or above 0.10 ppm. In most cases, the number of occurrences equal to or above 0.10 ppm at the FRG ozone monitoring sites was below the number experienced at a rural forested site located at Whiteface Mountain, New York. Several of the FRG monitoring sites experienced a large number of occurrences of hourly mean ozone concentrations between 0.08 and 0.10 ppm. Hof, Selb, Arzberg, and Waldhof experienced several occurrences of elevated levels of sulfur dioxide concentrations. The nitrogen dioxide 24-h mean concentrations were low for all sites. Because the 24-h mean data may mask the occurrence of a few high concentration events, it is not known if any of the sites that monitored nitrogen dioxide experienced short-term elevated concentrations. To gain further insight into the possible effect of pollutant mixtures on vegetation, future efforts should involve characterizing the timing of multi-pollutant exposures.     

An assessment of the sensitivity and reliability of the relative reduction factor approach in the development of 8-hr ozone attainment plans

The updated regulatory framework for demonstrating that future 8-hr ozone (O3) design values will be at or below the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) provides guidelines for the development of a State Implementation Plan (SIP) that includes methods based on photochemical modeling and analytical techniques. One of the suggested approaches is the relative reduction factor (RRF) for estimating the efficacy of emission reductions. In this study, the sensitivity of model-predicted responses towards emission reductions to the choice of meteorology and chemical mechanisms was examined. While the different modeling simulations generally were found to be in agreement on whether predicted future-year design values would be above or below the NAAQS for 8-hr O3 at a majority of the monitoring locations in the eastern United States, differences existed for a small percentage of monitors (approximately 6.4%). Another issue investigated was the ability of the attainment demonstration procedure to predict changes in monitored O3 design values. A retrospective analysis was performed by comparing predicted O3 design values from model simulations using emission estimates for 1996 and 2001 with monitored O3 design values for 2001. Results indicated that an average gross error of approximately 5 ppb was present between modeled and observed design values and that, at approximately 27% of all sites, model-predicted and observed design values disagreed as to whether the design value was above or below the NAAQS. Retrospective analyses such as the one presented in this study can provide valuable insights into the strengths and limitations of modeling and analysis techniques used to predict future design values over time periods of a decade or more for the purpose of developing SIPs. Furthermore, such analyses could provide avenues for improvement and added confidence in the use of the RRF approach for addressing attainment of the NAAQS.     

Emergence of nano silica for oil and gas well cementing: application,challenges, and future scope

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - Nanotechnology has opened up a plethora of opportunities and has acquired extreme importance in a myriad of fields to produce enhanced materials....