Reply to "Down-to-Earth" is Imperative! On the Problems of Landscape-Ecological Regionalisation by Means of Multivariate Statistical Methods Friedrich Weller (Ravensburg, Germany) in DIE ERDE 2009, 140:113-125

This report provides a brief review of the fourth joint meeting of the German Language Branch of Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC GLB) and the Working Group "Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology" of the German Chemical Society (GDCh) held from 6^th to 9^th of September 2010 at the Federal Environment Agency (UBA) in Dessau-Rosslau (Germany). For the first time a governmental institution was responsible for the local organization, a novelty that was expressed in the meeting's main theme "From insight to decision (making)". 366 participants discussed 105 oral and 125 poster presentations and three invited key speakers from government, academia and industry. The best oral and poster presentations of the meeting were awarded. Moreover, the annual young scientist award of SETAC GLB for the best diploma and doctoral thesis and the best publication award of the GDCh-Working Group "Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology" were officially handed over. The reader of the meeting (mostly in German language) including the meeting program and all abstracts is for free available via: http://www.setac-glb.de     

Wissenschaftstheoretische Grundlagen der Beobachtung von GVO-Umweltwirkungen

Zusammenfassung Hintergrund und Ziel  Die Exposition gentechnisch ver?nderter Kulturpflanzen erfordert die Beobachtung ihrer Umweltwirkungen. Ziel der Beitragsserie über die Beobachtung ?kologischer Wirkungen von GVO ist es, den hierzu erreichten Stand der Wissenschaft vorzustellen. Da bei einem Bundesl?nder und ggf. europ?ische Staaten übergreifenden Monitoring besonders auf methodisch vergleichbare und r?umlich aussagekr?ftige Daten zu achten ist, werden in diesem einführenden Beitrag wissenschaftstheoretische und statistische Grundlagen des Monitoring sowie die Standardisierung der Beobachtungsverfahren behandelt. Schwerpunkte  Im Mittelpunkt stehen zun?chst ?kologische Anforderungen an das GVO-Monitoring. Um mit GVO ggf. zusammenh?ngende Umweltver?nderungen ermitteln zu k?nnen, ist eine Eingliederung in bestehende Umweltbeobachtungsprogramme erforderlich. GVO-Exposition und-Wirkung sind aufeinander bezogen über die Organisationsstufen ?kologischer Systeme hinweg zu erfassen. Ein effizientes und suffizientes Monitoring bedarf eines wissenschaftstheoretisch und statistisch soliden Designs. Deshalb werden einem weiteren Schwerpunkt dieses Beitrags wissenschaftstheoretische Grundlagen der Hypothesenbildung und-prüfung behandelt. Hierfür bedarf es Daten, die mehreren, im Einzelnen behandelten Qualit?tskriterien entsprechen müssen. Eines dieser Kriterien ist die r?umliche und zeitliche Verallgemeinerungsf?higkeit der Monitoring-Befunde, die in dem dritten Schwerpunkt des Beitrags dargestellt wird. Schlussfolgerungen  Für die Prüfung von Hypothesen über Umweltfolgen von GVO sind konsequent ?kosystemforschung und Monitoring eng miteinander zu vernetzen. Denn sie erfüllen komplement?re Funktionen, die für das Monitoring der Umweltwirkungen von GVO von gro?er praktischer und wissenschaftlicher Bedeutung sind. Empfehlungen  Das GVO-Monitoring sollte in bestehende Programme der ?kosystemforschung und der Umweltbeobachtung eingebettet werden und die ?kologischen Organisationsstufen sowie GVO-Exposition und-Wirkung einschlie?en. Die Lokalisierung der Messorte sollte die erwartete Exposition oder Wirkung berücksichtigen. Perspektiven  Weitere Beitr?ge dieser Serie werden die Messplanung, das Pollenmonitoring und die r?umliche Verallgemeinerung von Ergebnissen standortspezifischer Messungen oder Modellierungen behandeln.

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Environmental monitoring of ecological impacts of GMOs

Goal, Scope and Background  The release of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) may result in ecological impacts to be monitored. This series presents the state-of-art concerning the environmental monitoring of ecological impacts of GMOs. Since this monitoring is conducted by several authorities, the methodical comparability and spatial validity of the monitoring data is crucial. Thus, the respective fundamentals of philosophy of science and of statistics as well as the methodical standardisation form the focus of this article. Main Features  At first, the monitoring requirements will be described from the viewpoint of ecology. Consequently, the GMO monitoring needs to be integrated into existing programmes. Exposure and effects of GMOs have to be monitored across the hierarchy of ecological organisation. For monitoring to be efficient and sufficient, the design must be founded in terms of philosophy of science and statistics. Hence the fundamentals concerning the verification of hypotheses represent another feature of this article. The data used for the verification of hypotheses must comply with quality criteria. One of these criteria is the spatial and temporal extrapolation of the monitoring results, which is the third feature in this introductory article. Conclusions  The evaluation of hypotheses on GMO impacts requires the linkage to ecosystems research and environmental monitoring. These both are, in terms of methodology, complementary and of significant technical and scientific value for GMO monitoring. Recommendations  GMO-monitoring should closely be connected with ecosystems research and environmental monitoring. The levels of ecological organisation should be covered as well as the exposure and the effects of GMOs. The expected GMO exposure and effects should be considered by localising the monitoring sites. Perspectives  Further articles of this series will deal with network designing, GMO pollen monitoring and extrapolation of site-specific measurements and modelling results.

     

Polybrominated diphenyl ether in sewage sludge in Germany

Sewage sludge samples from 11 municipal waste water treatment plants in Germany were collected from March 2002 to June 2003. Total Tri- to HpBDE concentrations (sum of significant congeners BDE 28, 47, 99, 153, 154 and 183) ranged from 12.5 to 288 (median 108) and DeBDE (BDE 209) concentrations from 97.1 to 2217 (median 256) ng/gd.m. BDE 209 dominated the congener profile. A significant change of the Tri- to HpBDE congener profile (% of total BDE 28, 47, 99, 153, 154, 183 without 209) in sludge from different stages of the waste water treatment process (primary sludge, secondary excess sludge and (dewatered) digested sludge), indicating a degradation of DeBDE to these congeners, was not observed.     

Ökologische, ökonomische und rechtliche umweltbewertung

This article provides information about a Series dealing with Integrated environmental assessment’ (IEA). We describe the development and the structure of a ‘Graduiertenkolleg’ (interdisciplinary course of study) which has been established in two phases at the University of Kiel from 1996–2002. The central terms ‘integration’, ‘environment’, and ‘assessment’ are discussed. Here, we take a special look at the chances and problems of interdisciplinary cooperation and communication (ecosystem research, jurisprudence, economics, social sciences) with regard to the general subject of IEA as a subject of research and schooling. Finally, we give a short review about the articles in the series.     

Aktuelle und künftige Emissionen treibhauswirksamer fluorierter Verbindungen in Deutschland

Zusammenfassung  Die fluorierten Verbindungen Schwefelhexafluorid (SF₆), perfluorierte Fluorkohlenwasserstoffe (CF₄, C₂F₆) und wasserstoffhaltige Fluorkohlenwasserstoffe (H-FKW) z?hlen zu den atmosph?rischen Spurengasen mit extrem hohen Treibhauspotentialen. Untersucht werden für Deutschland ihre realen Emissionen für 1990–1995, und Prognosen für die Jahre bis 2020 werden aufgestellt. Diesen Prognosen zufolge vermindern sich die j?hrlichen Freisetzungen von CF₄/C₂F₆ von 1990 bis 2000 von 335 t/34 t auf 100 t/10 t infolge Automatisierungsma?nahmen an der Hauptquelle (Aluminiumhütten). Die Emissionen von SF₆ bleiben dagegen bis 2020 im Schwankungsbereich zwischen 200 und 300 t j?hrlich. Hauptemittenten sind nicht elektrische Schaltanlagen, da diese relativ dicht sind und über ein Entsorgungs-und Wiederaufarbeitungskonzept für gebrauchtes Gas verfügen, sondern mit gro?em Abstand Autoreifen und Schallschutzscheiben. Bei den erst seit 1990 gezielt als FCKW-Nachfolger eingesetzten H-FKW ist mit fortschreitender FCKW-Substitution in der station?ren und mobilen K?lte-und Klimatechnik, bei PU-Montageschaum und Asthmasprays mit einer sprunghaften Zunahme der Emissionen bis auf über 9700 t/a ab dem Jahr 2007 zu rechnen, sofern sich nicht halogenfreie Alternativen st?rker durchsetzen. Im Jahr 2020 werden bei Annahme dieser Trends die kumulierten Emissionen der genannten fluorierten Verbindungen der Treibhauswirkung von 25 Mio. t CO₂ entsprechen (GWP-Betrachtungszeitraum: 100 Jahre).      

Schwermetallgehalte von Straßenlaub und seine Kompostierung

Loads of Pb, Cd, Ni, Cu and Zn in litter from trees of representative roads in Kiel are analyzed by means of atom-absorption spectroscopy (Chapter 1). The heavy metal loads are far beyond relevant quality measures (Chapter 2). Consequently, the litter-compost could be used for horticulture and need not be stored, for instance, at waste deposits. No statistically significant correlations exists between the litter’s heavy metal loads and boundary conditions such as density of traffic, spatial structure of allocation of buldings, micro-climatic situation, tree species or allocation of streets within Kiel.     

Mapping carbon sequestration in forests at the regional scale - a climate biomonitoring approach by example of Germany

Background

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change recognizes carbon (C) fixation in forests as an important contribution for the reduction of atmospheric pollution in terms of greenhouse gases. Spatial differentiation of C sequestration in forests either at the national or at the regional scale is therefore needed for forest planning purposes. Hence, within the framework of the Forest Focus regulation, the aim of this investigation was to statistically analyse factors influencing the C fixation and to use the corresponding associations in terms of a predictive mapping approach at the regional scale by example of the German federal state North Rhine-Westphalia. The results of the methodical scheme outlined in this article should be compared with an already-published approach applied to the same data which were used in the investigation at hand.

Methods

Site-specific data on C sequestration in humus, forest trees/dead wood and soil from two forest monitoring networks were intersected with available surface information on topography, soil, climate and forestal growing areas and districts. Next, the association between the C sequestration and the influence factors were examined and modelled by linear regression analyses. The resulting regression equations were applied on the surface data to predicatively map the C sequestration for the entire study area.

Results

The computations yielded an estimation of 146.7 mio t C sequestered in the forests of North Rhine-Westphalia corresponding to 168.6 t/ha. The calculated values correspond well to according specifications given by the literature. Furthermore, the results are almost identical to those of another pilot study where a different statistical methodology was applied on the same database. Nevertheless, the underlying regression models contribute only a low degree of explanation to the overall variance of the C fixation. This might mainly be due to data quality aspects and missing influence factors in the analyses.

Discussion

In another study, an alternative approach was introduced to map the spatial differentiation of C sequestration in North Rhine-Westphalia based on the combination of geostatistics, decision tree analyses and GIS techniques. As a result, the overall mean of C sequestration amounted for 177 t C/ha which is 8.4 t C/ha higher than what was calculated in the study at hand and 14 t C/ha below the roughly guessed German-wide mean of 191 t C/ha.

Conclusions

The surface estimations of C pools in living forest trees/dead wood, the humus layer and the mineral soil enable to map the fixation of the greenhouse gas CO₂ in forests at the regional scale. The estimations that were derived in this study are in good accordance with estimations based on techniques which, in contrast, did neither allow for spatial differentiation nor for mapping. The presented approach should be validated by application of other statistical techniques and by use of German wide inventory data. Furthermore, C sequestration should be modelled according to different climate change scenarios by combining statistical methods and dynamic modelling.