Spray mechanism of crepidogastrine bombardier beetles (Carabidae; Crepidogastrini)

Summary.   The defensive glandular apparatus of primitive bombardier beetles of the tribe Crepidogastrini (Carabidae) is described for the first time. As exemplified by two African species (Crepidogaster ambreana and C. atrata), the apparatus conforms to the basic bombardier plan, in that the glands are bicompartmented and the secretion is quinonoid (it contains 1,4-benzoquinones and hydrocarbons), hot, and discharged audibly. In a number of morphological respects the crepidogastrine apparatus resembles that of the classical bombardiers of the tribe Brachinini (rather than that of bombardiers of the paussoid lineage), reinforcing the view, already held on taxonomic grounds, that the Crepidogastrini and Brachinini are closely related. That the Crepidogastrini may be primitive relative to Brachinini is underscored by the finding that, unlike brachinines, crepidogastrines do not pulse their secretory emissions. Moreover, they discharge their secretion as a mist, rather than forcibly in the form of jets. Received 22 May 2001; accepted 29 May 2001.     

Precious metals and rare earth elements in municipal solid waste – Sources and fate in a Swiss incineration plant

In Switzerland many kinds of waste, e.g. paper, metals, electrical and electronic equipment are separately collected and recycled to a large extent. The residual amount of municipal solid waste (MSW) has to be thermally treated before final disposal. Efforts to recover valuable metals from incineration residues have recently increased. However, the resource potential of critical elements in the waste input (sources) and their partitioning into recyclable fractions and residues (fate) is unknown. Therefore, a substance flow analysis (SFA) for 31 elements including precious metals (Au, Ag), platinum metal group elements (Pt, Rh) and rare earth elements (La, Ce, etc.) has been conducted in a solid waste incinerator (SWI) with a state-of-the-art bottom ash treatment according to the Thermo-Re® concept. The SFA allowed the determination of the element partitioning in the SWI, as well as the elemental composition of the MSW by indirect analysis. The results show that the waste-input contains substantial quantities of precious metals, such as 0.4 ± 0.2 mg/kg Au and 5.3 ± 0.7 mg/kg Ag. Many of the valuable substances, such as Au and Ag are enriched in specific outputs (e.g. non-ferrous metal fractions) and are therefore recoverable. As the precious metal content in MSW is expected to rise due to its increasing application in complex consumer products, the results of this study are essential for the improvement of resource recovery in the Thermo-Re® process.     

The effect of protected areas on forest disturbance in the Carpathian Mountains 1985–2010

Protected areas are a cornerstone for forest protection, but they are not always effective during times of socioeconomic and institutional crises. The Carpathian Mountains in Eastern Europe are an ecologically outstanding region, with widespread seminatural and old‐growth forest. Since 1990, Carpathian countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Ukraine) have experienced economic hardship and institutional changes, including the breakdown of socialism, European Union accession, and a rapid expansion of protected areas. The question is how protected‐area effectiveness has varied during these times across the Carpathians given these changes. We analyzed a satellite‐based data set of forest disturbance (i.e., forest loss due to harvesting or natural disturbances) from 1985 to 2010 and used matching statistics and a fixed‐effects estimator to quantify the effect of protection on forest disturbance. Protected areas in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and the Ukraine had significantly less deforestation inside protected areas than outside in some periods; the likelihood of disturbance was reduced by 1–5%. The effectiveness of protection increased over time in these countries, whereas the opposite was true in Romania. Older protected areas were most effective in Romania and Hungary, but newer protected areas were more effective in Czech Republic, and Poland. Strict protection (International Union for Conservation of Nature [IUCN] protection category Ia‐II) was not more effective than landscape‐level protection (IUCN III‐VI). We suggest that the strength of institutions, the differences in forest privatization, forest management, prior distribution of protected areas, and when countries joined the European Union may provide explanations for the strikingly heterogeneous effectiveness patterns among countries. Our results highlight how different the effects of protected areas can be at broad scales, indicating that the effectiveness of protected areas is transitory over time and space and suggesting that generalizations about the effectiveness of protected areas can be misleading.     

Defending the scientific integrity of conservation‐policy processes

Government agencies faced with politically controversial decisions often discount or ignore scientific information, whether from agency staff or nongovernmental scientists. Recent developments in scientific integrity (the ability to perform, use, communicate, and publish science free from censorship or political interference) in Canada, Australia, and the United States demonstrate a similar trajectory. A perceived increase in scientific‐integrity abuses provokes concerted pressure by the scientific community, leading to efforts to improve scientific‐integrity protections under a new administration. However, protections are often inconsistently applied and are at risk of reversal under administrations publicly hostile to evidence‐based policy. We compared recent challenges to scientific integrity to determine what aspects of scientific input into conservation policy are most at risk of political distortion and what can be done to strengthen safeguards against such abuses. To ensure the integrity of outbound communications from government scientists to the public, we suggest governments strengthen scientific integrity policies, include scientists’ right to speak freely in collective‐bargaining agreements, guarantee public access to scientific information, and strengthen agency culture supporting scientific integrity. To ensure the transparency and integrity with which information from nongovernmental scientists (e.g., submitted comments or formal policy reviews) informs the policy process, we suggest governments broaden the scope of independent reviews, ensure greater diversity of expert input and transparency regarding conflicts of interest, require a substantive response to input from agencies, and engage proactively with scientific societies. For their part, scientists and scientific societies have a responsibility to engage with the public to affirm that science is a crucial resource for developing evidence‐based policy and regulations in the public interest.     

“No fences make bad neighbors” but markets make better ones: cap-and-trade reduces cross-border SO2 in a natural experiment

The clean air interstate rule (CAIR) was a regional cap-and-trade program announced in 2005 which covered 27 eastern US states and sought to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants. The rule was later vacated after a court found that the non-targeted design of the program did not comply with the Clean Air Act provision to regulate interstate air pollution. Using a custom air pollution dispersion model, I calculate the interstate SO₂ pollution from 493 coal-fired power plants across the United States between 1997 and 2020. In a difference-in-differences setup with plants not covered by CAIR in the control group, I estimate the treatment effect of the program on overall- and cross-border SO₂ emissions and find a 24% reduction in overall emissions and reduces the risk that a plant violates air quality standards across state borders by 2–4%. I report evidence of heterogeneous treatment effects where the reduction in overall emissions attributed to CAIR is lower among plants transporting SO₂ in excess of 1% of the National Air Quality Standards to another state.

     

Comprehensive and high-resolution emission inventory of atmospheric pollutants for the northernmost cities agglomeration of Harbin-Changchun, China: Implications for local atmospheric environment management

Using a bottom-up estimation method, a comprehensive, high-resolution emission inventory of gaseous and particulate atmospheric pollutants for multiple anthropogenic sectors with typical local sources has been developed for the Harbin-Changchun city agglomeration (HCA). The annual emissions for CO, NOx, SO₂, NH₃, VOC_S, PM_2.5, PM₁₀, BC and OC during 2017 in the HCA were estimated to be 5.82 Tg, 0.70 Tg, 0.34 Tg, 0.75 Tg, 0.81Tg, 0.67 Tg, 1.59 Tg, 0.12 Tg and 0.26 Tg, respectively. For PM₁₀ and SO₂, the emissions from industry processes were the dominant contributors representing 54.7% and 49.5%, respectively, of the total emissions, while 95.3% and 44.5% of the total NH₃ and NOx emissions, respectively, were from or associated with agricultural activities and transportation. Spatiotemporal distributions showed that most emissions (except NH₃) occurred in November to March and were concentrated in the central cities of Changchun and Harbin and the surrounding cities. Open burning of straw made an important contribution to PM_2.5 in the central regions of the northeastern plain during autumn and spring, while domestic coal combustion for heating purposes was significant with respect to SO₂ and PM_2.5 emissions during autumn and winter. Furthermore, based on Principal Component Analysis and Multivariable Linear Regression model, air temperature, relative humidity, electricity and energy consumption, and the urban and rural population were optimized to be representative indicators for rapidly assessing the magnitude of regional atmospheric pollutants in the HCA. Such indicators and equations were demonstrated to be useful for local atmospheric environment management.     

Estimation of the spatial covariance in Universal Kriging: Application to forest inventory

This paper presents a simple least squares procedure for estimating the spatial covariance and compares it with the numerically more difficult restricted maximum likelihood procedure. Thereafter, it compares design-based and kriging techniques for the estimation of spatial averages in the context of double sampling, as used in forest inventory, where terrestrial sample plots are combined with auxiliary information based on aerial photographs. A case study illustrates the theory.