Co-composting of green waste and food waste at low C/N ratio

In this study, co-composting of food waste and green waste at low initial carbon to nitrogen (C/N) ratios was investigated using an in-vessel lab-scale composting reactor. The central composite design (CCD) and response surface method (RSM) were applied to obtain the optimal operating conditions over a range of preselected moisture contents (45–75%) and C/N ratios (13.9–19.6). The results indicate that the optimal moisture content for co-composting of food waste and green waste is 60%, and the substrate at a C/N ratio of 19.6 can be decomposed effectively to reduce 33% of total volatile solids (TVS) in 12 days. The TVS reduction can be modeled by using a second-order equation with a good fit. In addition, the compost passes the standard germination index of white radish seed indicating that it can be used as soil amendment.     

Tidal influences on the habitat use of Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins in an estuary

This paper offers the first study of diurnal variations in the use of an estuarine habitat by Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins. Passive acoustic data loggers were deployed in the Xin Huwei River Estuary, Western Taiwan, from July 2009 to December 2010, to collect biosonar clicks. Acoustic encounter rates of humpback dolphins on the riverside of the estuary changed significantly over the four tidal phases, instead of the two diurnal phases based on the recordings from 268 days. Among the tidal phases, the encounter rates were lowest during ebb tides. Additionally, circling movements associated with the hunt for epipelagic fish significantly changed in temporal and spatial presence over the four tidal phases, matching the overall pattern of encounter rate changes in the focal estuary. Our findings suggest that the occurrence pattern and habitat utilization of humpback dolphins are likely to be influenced by the tidal-driven activity of their epipelagic prey.     

中型景观尺度下斑块类型和地理特征影响杨树人工林干部病害的发生——以河南省清丰县为例

景观病理学在开展病原扩散、病害发生及其严重程度方面以其全新的视角,为森林病害的区域控制提供了新的研究技术及理论支持。首次利用景观病理学原理和方法对河南省清丰县一个中型景观下杨树人工林干部病害发生特征开展了研究,目的是解析在大尺度下斑块类型和地理特征对杨树人工林病害发生的影响。在100 km2的调查区域,以种植方式和林分类型划分斑块类型,分析显示发病株率在不同斑块间差异显著：农田间作斑块的林木发病株率显著低于孤立斑块、纯林斑块、混交林等斑块的发病株率;但发病株率在孤立斑块、纯林斑块及混交林等斑块间无显著差异。抚育管理措施对预防和减轻杨树人工林干部病害的发生起到关键左右：精细管理林分（有修枝、施肥和锄草）的林木发病株率（p=0.001）和发病指数（p〈0.001）均显著低于粗放管理林分（无修枝、无施肥和锄草等）。人类活动,如无序修剪和放牧很可能是造成村落附近林分发病率显著高于其他地点林分的主要原因。采用logistic回归,以品种编号、树龄、树高、林分密度、林分郁闭度、林分类型、斑块类型、地理特征,等为自变量建立病害发生预测模型。方程拟合达到极显著水平（Wald=71.248,p〈0.001）。方程总的预测正确率为68.2%,发病的预测正确率为79.8%。     

CASS工艺脱氮影响因素分析

针对CASS工艺脱氮的效果不够理想、效率不高、出水不够稳定的现象，对脱氮的主要影响因素曝气时间、DO、温度、λ进行了生产性试验研究，分析结果表明，曝气时间3h，D02．5mg／L是本污水厂最合理的参数控制值，曝气时间3h时NH3-N和TN的平均去除率分别为89．7％和59．7％，D02．5mg／L时NH3-N和TN的平均去除率分别为94．5％和71．3％，脱氮效果良好；温度对脱氮的效果有很明显的影响，春季的脱氮效果明显好于冬季；脱氮效果随冲水比的增高而降低，但出水均达标说明CASS工艺有良好的抗冲击负荷的能力。     

An integrated method for safety pre-warning of complex system

In large-scale and complex industrial systems, unplanned outages and hazardous accidents cause huge economic losses, environmental contamination, and human injuries, due to component degradation, exogenous changes, and operational mistakes. In order to ensure safety and increase operational performance and reliability of complex system, this study proposes an integrated method for safety pre-warning to analyze the current safety state of each component and the whole system indicating hidden hazards and potential consequence, and furthermore predict future degradation trends in the long term.The work presented here describes the rationale and implementation of the integrated method incorporating HAZOP study, degradation process modeling, dynamic Bayesian network construction, condition monitoring, safety assessment and prognosis steps, taking advantage of the priori knowledge of the interactions and dependencies among components and the environment, the relationships between hazard causes and effects, and the use of historical failure data and online real-time data from condition monitoring.The application of the integrated safety pre-warning approach described here to the specific example of the gas turbine compressor system demonstrates how each phase of the presented method contributes to completion of the safety pre-warning system development in a systematic way.     

Review of recycling performance indicators: A study on collection rate in Taiwan

The Taiwan Environmental Protection Administration (Taiwan EPA) launched a national Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) system after integrating eight private recycling organizations in 1998. After that, the environmental performance of the EPR system brought a lot of attention to policy makers. Many studies show positive environmental effects of the EPR system in Taiwan. However, there are controversial questions remained, such as whether the performance indicators used are the right choice to estimate the environmental effects of the recycling policy? Can those estimated results really reflect the performance of the system?This paper would therefore like to more accurately evaluate the performance indicators of the EPR system based on data observed over the past decade in Taiwan. In the process of evaluating the performance indicators, we have found that the collection rates for durable goods are often ignored in countries that pursue a zero waste policy. This may affect the actual recycling outcome and resource direction targeted by producers. However, in order for the collection rate to be adopted as a policy indicator, how to estimate the amounts of retired or waste products during a period is critical. In this paper, we estimate the collection rate for electrical and electronic waste by using the survival analysis and ownership data analysis approaches. We also provide a comparison of both approaches and put forward suggestions for directions in the future in solid waste management.     

Simultaneous determination of three herbicides by differential pulse voltammetry and chemometrics

A novel differential pulse voltammetry method (DPV) was researched and developed for the simultaneous determination of Pendimethalin, Dinoseb and sodium 5-nitroguaiacolate (5NG) with the aid of chemometrics. The voltammograms of these three compounds overlapped significantly, and to facilitate the simultaneous determination of the three analytes, chemometrics methods were applied. These included classical least squares (CLS), principal component regression (PCR), partial least squares (PLS) and radial basis function-artificial neural networks (RBF-ANN). A separately prepared verification data set was used to confirm the calibrations, which were built from the original and first derivative data matrices of the voltammograms. On the basis relative prediction errors and recoveries of the analytes, the RBF-ANN and the DPLS (D – first derivative spectra) models performed best and are particularly recommended for application. The DPLS calibration model was applied satisfactorily for the prediction of the three analytes from market vegetables and lake water samples.     

Simple model for estimating dry deposition velocity of ozone and its destruction in a polluted nocturnal boundary layer

Determining the destructions of both ozone and odd oxygen, O_x, in the nocturnal boundary layer (NBL) is important to evaluate the regional ozone budget and overnight ozone accumulation. This work develops a simple method to determine the dry deposition velocity of ozone and its destruction at a polluted nocturnal boundary layer. The destruction of O_x can also be determined simultaneously. The method is based on O₃ and NO₂ profiles and their surface measurements. Linkages between the dry deposition velocities of O₃ and NO₂ and between the dry deposition loss of O_x and its chemical loss are constructed and used. Field measurements are made at an agricultural site to demonstrate the application of the model. The model estimated nocturnal O₃ dry deposition velocities from 0.13 to 0.19 cm s^?1, very close to those previously obtained for similar land types. Additionally, dry deposition and chemical reactions account for 60 and 40% of the overall nocturnal ozone loss, respectively; ozone dry deposition accounts for 50% of the overall nocturnal loss of O_x, dry deposition of NO₂ accounts for another 20%, and chemical reactions account for the remaining 30%. The proposed method enables the use of measurements made in typical ozone field studies to evaluate various nocturnal destructions of O₃ and O_x in a polluted environment.     

Nitrogen impacts on atrazine-degrading Arthrobacter strain and bacterial community structure in soil microcosms

The objective of this study was to investigate the impacts of exogenous nitrogen on a microbial community inoculated with the atrazine-degrading Arthrobacter sp. in soil amended with a high concentration of atrazine. Inoculated and uninoculated microcosms for biodegradation tests were constructed. Atrazine degradation capacity of the strain DAT1 and the strain's atrazine-metabolic potential and survival were assessed. The relative abundance of the strain DAT1 and the bacterial community structure in soils were characterized using quantitative PCR in combination with terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism. Atrazine degradation by the strain DAT1 and the strain's atrazine-metabolic potential and survival were not affected by addition of a medium level of nitrate, but these processes were inhibited by addition of a high level of nitrate. Microbial community structure changed in both inoculated and uninoculated microcosms, dependent on the level of added nitrate. Bioaugmentation with the strain DAT1 could be a very efficient biotechnology for bioremediation of soils with high concentrations of atrazine.