Implementing an environmental business strategy: A step-by-step guide

With more and more organizations seeking opportunities to generate benefits beyond compliance from environmental management activities, the challenges for environmental directors today is to develop and implement an environmental strategy that links environmental performance with the overarching strategic business goals of the organization. Organizations today are looking for opportunities to develop environmental management solutions that not only address the concerns of regulatory stakeholders, but also provide opportunities to improve operating efficiency and financial performance, enhance customer satisfaction, sustain market growth, and enhance goodwill, to satisfy the demands of a broader set of stakeholder groups including customers, investors, and employees. To achieve broader benefits from environmental management investments, this article shows how organizations must first develop a methodology for aligning their environmental management activities with the organization's strategic business goals and create a plan for systematically managing continuous improvement to achieve these goals. The second challenge is to implement this strategy at the business unit and facility level in a manner which integrates environmental management activities with an organization's core business processes to achieve improved product and service performance.     

Fire hazards at the urban-wildland interface: What the public expects

Urban-wildland issues have become among the most contentious and problematic issues for forest managers. Using data drawn from surveys conducted by the authors and others, this article discusses how public knowledge and perceptions of fire policies and fire hazards change over time, the kinds of policy responses homeowners prefer as a way of preventing fire hazards at the urban-wildland interface, and how citizens view their own obligations as participants in interface issues. These data show that public attitudes toward fire have changed significantly over the past two decades and that educating the public about fire and the managers' use of fire can have positive effects on behavior. Yet, modifying the individual's behavior in regard to interface fire risks must also deal with important issues of individual incentives, the distribution of costs, and unanticipated policy impacts.     

Determination and assessment of total mercury levels in local, frozen and canned fish in Lebanon

Fish is an important constituent of the Lebanese diet. However, very little attention in our area is given to bring awareness regarding the effect of the toxicity of mercury (Hg) mainly through fish consumption. This study aimed to report analytical data on total mercury levels in several fish species for the first time in thirty years and to also made individuals aware of the presence and danger from exposure to mercury through fish consumption. Fish samples were selected from local Lebanese markets and fisheries and included 94 samples of which were fresh, frozen, processed, and canned fish. All values were reported as microgram of mercury per gram of fish based on wet weight. The level of mercury ranged from 0.0190 to 0.5700 μg/g in fresh samples, 0.0059 to 0.0665 μg/g in frozen samples, and 0.0305 to 0.1190 μg/g in canned samples. The data clearly showed that higher levels of mercury were detected in local fresh fish as opposed to other types thus placing consumers at higher risk from mercury exposure. Moreover, the data revealed that Mallifa (yellowstripe barracuda/Sphyraena chrysotaenia), Sargous (white seabream/Diplodus sargus), Ghobbos (bogue/Boops hoops), and shrimp (Penaeus sp.) were among the types containing the highest amounts of mercury. On the other hand, processed fish such as fish fillet, fish burger, small shrimp and crab are found to contain lower levels of mercury and are associated with lower exposure risks to mercury. Lebanese population should therefore, be aware to consume limited amounts of fresh local fish to minimize exposure to mercury.     

Cash-based interventions: lessons from southern Somalia

Commodity distributions, the predominant relief response, are subject to growing criticism, while donors and humanitarian actors are increasingly viewing cash-based interventions as a viable alternative. This paper aims to contribute to the current debate on cash-based interventions by drawing on the experience of Action Contre la Faim in southern Somalia, where it has implemented cash for work programmes since 2004. The authors conclude that cash-based interventions are a feasible option in complex emergencies as well as in highly insecure environments as long as appropriate modalities are employed and objectives are clearly set in accordance with the needs and the context. Cash as a relief response offers wide-reaching possibilities for the future from both the perspective of the donor/agency and the standpoint of the beneficiary. It enables the beneficiaries to take control of the relief themselves and to adapt it to their individual requirements in a timely manner.     

Mortality and other determinants of bird divorce rate

Pair bonds can end in two different ways: either death of the partner or divorce, where the frequency of divorce varies enormously among bird species, from 0% to 100%. To better understand this variation, we created and analyzed the largest dataset so far, consisting of 158 species and 20 variables that quantify the species’ body size, life history, diet, and other characteristics. Our results suggest that species with a high divorce rate have a high mortality rate, tend to be ornamented and sexually dichromatic, live colonially, and form part-time rather than continuous partnerships. Traits quantifying body size or life history are often nonlinearly related with divorce rate. These nonlinearities might (partly) be caused by nonlinear relationships of the same traits with mortality rate which is, in turn, linearly related with divorce rate. In contrast to what has been found previously, mortality rate appears as a key factor for divorce rate in our study. This makes sense, as the likelihood that a partner survives from one year to the next decreases with increasing mortality rate, diminishing the likely success of a partner that attempts to locate its previous partner. We also found taxonomic differences in divorce rate. Specifically, Anseriformes have an exceptionally low divorce rate, which, however, can be explained by the generally important determinants of divorce rate: They also have a lower mortality rate, lower degree of ornamentation and coloniality, and more continuous partnerships than members of other orders. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Effect of using limestone fines on the chemical shrinkage of pastes and mortars

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - The main aim of this study is to examine the effect of incorporating limestone fine (LF) on chemical shrinkage of pastes and mortars. For this...     

Effects of secondary metabolites produced by different cyanobacterial populations on the freshwater zooplankters Brachionus calyciflorus and Daphnia pulex

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - Cyanobacterial blooms in eutrophic water bodies are a worldwide problem. Combined effects of mixtures of secondary metabolites produced by different...     

Development of a leaching assessment framework for the utilization of coal ash at South Korean mine reclamation sites

Coal-based power generates large quantities of coal ash in South Korea. However, coal ash recycling is still inactive and most wasted coal ash is buried in landfills. Recently, beneficial uses of coal ash such as in mine reclamation sites has been increasingly considered; however, as a result of legal limitations due to environmental concerns, the utilization of coal ash at mine reclamation sites has procrastinated. Consequently, to resolve this issue, the relevant environmental impact of coal ash must be considered. Therefore, a leaching assessment framework to assess the environmental impact of coal ash utilization at South Korean mine reclamation sites is presented. The framework was used to identify leaching mechanisms and support an assessment of the environmental impact of coal ash usage at mine reclamation sites in South Korea. This framework could provide guidance with regard to designing more realistic leaching procedures appropriate for all mine conditions and could support the development of regulations and protocols for future environment-friendly coal ash usage.     

Cost–benefit analysis of beach-cast harvest: Closing land-marine nutrient loops in the Baltic Sea region

Harvesting beach-cast can help mitigate marine eutrophication by closing land-marine nutrient loops and provide a blue biomass raw material for the bioeconomy. Cost–benefit analysis was applied to harvest activities during 2009–2018 on the island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea, highlighting benefits such as nutrient removal from the marine system and improved recreational opportunities as well as costs of using inputs necessary for harvest. The results indicate that the activities entailed a net gain to society, lending substance to continued funding for harvests on Gotland and assessments of upscaling of harvest activities to other areas in Sweden and elsewhere. The lessons learnt from the considerable harvest experience on Gotland should be utilized for developing concrete guidelines for carrying out sustainable harvest practice, paying due attention to local conditions but also to what can be generalized to a wider national and international context.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13280-021-01641-8.     

Mechanical and Thermal Properties of Bamboo Microfibril Reinforced Polyhydroxybutyrate Biocomposites

In the present investigation, microfibrils were extracted from raw bamboo and characterized using scanning electron microscope. Composites based on polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB) and bamboo microfibril were prepared with various microfibril loading. The mechanical and thermal properties of the resulting composites were measured. Tensile strength and impact strength of the composites were found to be increasing with increase in the loading of bamboo microfibrils, reached an optimum and thereafter decreased with further increase in microfibril loading. Percentage crystallinity was found to be increasing with increase in fibril loading. Thermal stability of the composite was higher than that of pure PHB. The composite could be developed further for various structural applications.