'Capacity for Change': Testing a Model for the Inclusion of Social Indicators in Australia's National Land and Water Resources Audit

The complexity of relationships between social change and natural resource management has generated interest in the identification of indicators that might provide more streamlined means for monitoring and planning. In the case of Australia's National Land and Water Resources Audit, interest has focused on the capacity of resource managers to implement more sustainable resource-use practices. This paper reports on an attempt to develop indicators of 'capacity for change' that are statistically reliable and both meaningful and useful to resource managers at a variety of scales. It will be argued, however, that social, spatial and temporal variability in change processes means that no discrete list of social indicators can achieve this task. At the same time that rigorous testing is needed to challenge common-sense assumptions about who is capable of change and where to target capacity-building programmes, data collection and interpretation must be embedded in processes of ongoing negotiation and adaptation among all those involved in, or affected by, resource management.     

Development of a Dynamic Pharmacokinetic Model to Estimate Bioconcentration of Xenobiotics in Earthworms

A simple and dynamic pharmacokinetic model was developed to predict bioconcentration of organic contaminants in earthworms. The model was parameterized experimentally by placing Lumbricus terrestris in soil contaminated with 200 μg/cm² of malathion. The toxicokinetics of malathion uptake, depuration, and degradation in soil is measured. After parameterization, the model was able to accurately predict the bioconcentration factor of malathion at steady state. Sensitivity analyses were performed and the rate of absorption was determined to be the most sensitive parameter. Varying the rate of malathion elimination from earthworm tissues, malathion degradation, and the amount of malathion applied to the soil by 25-fold did not result in the bioconcentration of malathion. An increase in the rate of malathion absorption into earthworm tissues by 25-fold did result in bioconcentration. Previously published pharmacokinetic studies on xenobiotics with log K _ow values ranging up to 8.05 were used to test the predictive capacity of the model. The model was able to predict from 83% to 105% of the experimentally derived bioconcentration factors.     

Recording the Response of Plants to Various Air Pollutants

A discussion of the methods used to determine the most economic design of chimney for a new thermal power station or large industrial plant is presented, with the objective that ground level concentration of pollutants will be kept at a minimum. Attention is paid to the geography and climatology of the site, with special reference to the frequency and height of inversions and the prevailing wind direction and speed.

A method is illustrated in using a large thermal power station as an example. The maximum sulfur dioxide concentrations at ground level are computed for several chimney heights and gas exit velocities. The values of these sulfur dioxide concentrations, the capital cost of the chimney, the pumping costs, and the gas pressures within the chimney are considered in selecting a suitable chimney height and a gas exit velocity which will meet most economically the stated objective.

The paper deals primarily with chimneys for industrial or power boiler plant of maximum continuous rating greater than 450 million Btu/hr (about 450,000 lbs of steam/hr), or to chimneys serving furnaces burning fuel at a maximum rate greater than 50,000 lbs/hr of coal, or 80,000 lbs/hr of oil. For chimneys serving plant with smaller heat inputs, chimney selection by reference to Clean Air Act 1956, Memorandum on Chimney Heights is suggested.     

Transition towns and world cities: towards green networks of cities

The Transition Initiative is a highly successful movement promoting localisation of economic processes. The basic question that this essay considers is how to relate this movement's favoured units of practice, transition towns with populations of around 5000, to the contemporary world of large cities, so-called world cities, global cities and mega-cities. My means to achieve this end is to interrogate the concept of “local” to make it more strategically amenable to analysing multiple-scale living, and concomitantly, to recognise and understand the importance of non-local spheres of behaviour. The latter is derived from Jane Jacobs work on the city in which the balance between local production and imported (non-local) production is crucial. Her import replacement argument is used to show compatibility between economic change and sustainability. This leads to the concept of green networks of cities which I begin to explore.     

Who Visits a National Park and What do They Get Out of It?: A Joint Visitor Cluster Analysis and Travel Cost Model for Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park visitor data were obtained from a survey collected for the National Park Service by the Park Studies Unit at the University of Idaho. Travel cost models have been conducted for national parks in the United States; however, this study builds on these studies and investigates how benefits vary by types of visitors who participate in different activities while at the park. Visitor clusters were developed based on activities in which a visitor participated while at the park. The clusters were analyzed and then incorporated into a travel cost model to determine the economic value (consumer surplus) that the different visitor groups received from visiting the park. The model was estimated using a zero-truncated negative binomial regression corrected for endogenous stratification. The travel cost price variable was estimated using both 1/3 and 1/4 the wage rate to test for sensitivity to opportunity cost specification. The average benefit across all visitor cluster groups was estimated at between $235 and $276 per person per trip. However, per trip benefits varied substantially across clusters; from $90 to $103 for the “value picnickers,” to $185–$263 for the “backcountry enthusiasts,” $189–$278 for the “do it all adventurists,” $204–$303 for the “windshield tourists,” and $323–$714 for the “creature comfort” cluster group.     

Linking workplace incivility to citizenship performance: The combined effects of affective commitment and conscientiousness

Although all human relationships are believed to generally adhere to the basic tenets of social exchange theory, recent research suggests that exchange processes may vary as a function of individual differences. We tested this possibility by examining whether the effects of uncivil workplace exchanges on employee attitudes and behavior were moderated by conscientiousness. Using matched data from 190 job incumbents and their supervisors, we found (i) the effect of workplace incivility on citizenship performance to be transmitted through affective commitment and (ii) the strength of this effect to depend on individual differences in conscientiousness. As such, the overall pattern of relationships supported moderated mediation, in that, the indirect effect of workplace incivility on citizenship performance through affective commitment was stronger for individuals high (as compared with those low) in conscientiousness. These findings broaden the focus of prior research by illustrating that, in addition to the mediating effects of cognitive and stress‐based factors, social exchange processes are important for understanding incivility's adverse effects on citizenship performance and that such exchanges are moderated by individual differences in conscientiousness. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Influence of Urban Density and Drainage Infrastructure on the Concentrations and Loads of Pollutants in Small Streams

Effective water quality management of streams in urbanized basins requires identification of the elements of urbanization that contribute most to pollutant concentrations and loads. Drainage connection (the proportion of impervious area directly connected to streams by pipes or lined drains) is proposed as a variable explaining variance in the generally weak relationships between pollutant concentrations and imperviousness. Fifteen small streams draining independent subbasins east of Melbourne, Australia, were sampled for a suite of water quality variables. Geometric mean concentrations of all variables were calculated separately for baseflow and storm events, and these, together with estimates of runoff derived from a rainfall-runoff model, were used to estimate mean annual loads. Patterns of concentrations among the streams were assessed against patterns of imperviousness, drainage connection, unsealed (unpaved) road density, elevation, longitude (all of which were intercorrelated), septic tank density, and basin area. Baseflow and storm event concentrations of dissolved organic carbon (DOC), filterable reactive phosphorus (FRP), total phosphorus (TP) and ammonium, along with electrical conductivity (EC), all increased with imperviousness and its correlates. Hierarchical partitioning showed that DOC, EC, FRP, and storm event TP were independently correlated with drainage connection more strongly than could be explained by chance. Neither pH nor total suspended solids concentrations were strongly correlated with any basin variable. Oxidized and total nitrogen concentrations were most strongly explained by septic tank density. Loads of all variables were strongly correlated with imperviousness and connection. Priority should be given to low-impact urban design, which primarily involves reducing drainage connection, to minimize urbanization-related pollutant impacts on streams.