Examining Trajectories of Change for Prosperous Forest Landscapes in Cambodia

Environmental Management - Tropical forest landscapes are undergoing rapid transition. Rural development aspirations are rising, and land use change is contributing to deforestation, degradation,...     

Circumpolar status of Arctic ptarmigan: Population dynamics and trends

Rock ptarmigan (Lagopus muta) and willow ptarmigan (L. lagopus) are Arctic birds with a circumpolar distribution but there is limited knowledge about their status and trends across their circumpolar distribution. Here, we compiled information from 90 ptarmigan study sites from 7 Arctic countries, where almost half of the sites are still monitored. Rock ptarmigan showed an overall negative trend on Iceland and Greenland, while Svalbard and Newfoundland had positive trends, and no significant trends in Alaska. For willow ptarmigan, there was a negative trend in mid-Sweden and eastern Russia, while northern Fennoscandia, North America and Newfoundland had no significant trends. Both species displayed some periods with population cycles (short 3–6 years and long 9–12 years), but cyclicity changed through time for both species. We propose that simple, cost-efficient systematic surveys that capture the main feature of ptarmigan population dynamics can form the basis for citizen science efforts in order to fill knowledge gaps for the many regions that lack systematic ptarmigan monitoring programs.

     

Tillage and field scale controls on greenhouse gas emissions

There is a lack of understanding of how associations among soil properties and management-induced changes control the variability of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from soil. We performed a laboratory investigation to quantify relationships between GHG emissions and soil indicators in an irrigated agricultural field under standard tillage (ST) and a field recently converted (2 yr) to no-tillage (NT). Soil cores (15-cm depth) were incubated at 25 degrees C at field moisture content and 75% water holding capacity. Principal component analysis (PCA) identified that most of the variation of the measured soil properties was related to differences in soil C and N and soil water conditions under ST, but soil texture and bulk density under NT. This trend became more apparent after irrigation. However, principal component regression (PCR) suggested that soil physical properties or total C and N were less important in controlling GHG emissions across tillage systems. The CO2 flux was more strongly determined by microbial biomass under ST and inorganic N content under NT than soil physical properties. Similarly, N2O and CH4 fluxes were predominantly controlled by NO3- content and labile C and N availability in both ST and NT soils at field moisture content, and NH4+ content after irrigation. Our study indicates that the field-scale variability of GHG emissions is controlled primarily by biochemical parameters rather than physical parameters. Differences in the availability and type of C and N sources for microbial activity as affected by tillage and irrigation develop different levels and combinations of field-scale controls on GHG emissions.     

The role of epicuticular waxes on foliar metal transfer and phytotoxicity in edible vegetables: case of Brassica oleracea species exposed to manufactured particles

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - The rapid industrialization and urbanization of intra- and peri-urban areas at the world scale are responsible for the degradation of the quality of...     

微米气泡强化臭氧氧化的作用机理研究

采用微米气泡系统(平均粒径约为58 μm)和普通的鼓泡系统进行对比研究微米气泡对臭氧氧化的强化作用机理.在相同的进气流率下,采用微米气泡体系臭氧在水中的传质系数和利用率是鼓泡系统的1.6-2.7倍和2.3-3.2倍.利用臭氧氧化模拟活性艳蓝KN-R废水(100 mg·l-1)的实验结果表明,染料在微米气泡体系中的脱色速率高于鼓泡系统,二者达到99%脱色效率所需的时间分别为30 min和60 min.在同样的脱色速率下,染料在微米气泡系统中的TOC去除率较大,说明微米气泡不仅能够提高臭氧的传质速度,而且可以强化臭氧的氧化能力.     

Energy use,blue water footprint,and greenhouse gas emissions for current food consumption patterns and dietary recommendations in the US

This article measures the changes in energy use, blue water footprint, and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with shifting from current US food consumption patterns to three dietary scenarios, which are based, in part, on the 2010 USDA Dietary Guidelines (US Department of Agriculture and US Department of Health and Human Services in Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2010, 7th edn, US Government Printing Office, Washington, 2010). Amidst the current overweight and obesity epidemic in the USA, the Dietary Guidelines provide food and beverage recommendations that are intended to help individuals achieve and maintain healthy weight. The three dietary scenarios we examine include (1) reducing Caloric intake levels to achieve “normal” weight without shifting food mix, (2) switching current food mix to USDA recommended food patterns, without reducing Caloric intake, and (3) reducing Caloric intake levels and shifting current food mix to USDA recommended food patterns, which support healthy weight. This study finds that shifting from the current US diet to dietary Scenario 1 decreases energy use, blue water footprint, and GHG emissions by around 9 %, while shifting to dietary Scenario 2 increases energy use by 43 %, blue water footprint by 16 %, and GHG emissions by 11 %. Shifting to dietary Scenario 3, which accounts for both reduced Caloric intake and a shift to the USDA recommended food mix, increases energy use by 38 %, blue water footprint by 10 %, and GHG emissions by 6 %. These perhaps counterintuitive results are primarily due to USDA recommendations for greater Caloric intake of fruits, vegetables, dairy, and fish/seafood, which have relatively high resource use and emissions per Calorie.     

Responding to a Public Health Objection to Vaccinating the Great Apes

Capps and Lederman, in a paper published in this journal in 2015, argued that, at the time, the dismal circumstances of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa was an opportunity to revisit public health responses to emergent infectious diseases. Using a One Health lens, they argued for an ecological perspective—one that looked to respond to zoonoses as an environmental as well as public health concern. Using Ebola virus disease as an example, they suggested shared immunity as a strategy to vaccinate both humans and great apes. Since then, vaccination as a conservation strategy in this case has been debated and at least one great ape vaccination trial has been proposed: some, however, are less convinced of the ethical arguments to pursue vaccinating wild animals. Using this opportunity, we review Capps and Lederman’s arguments and directly respond to the plausible objections to them.     

Religion and environmental politics in the US House of Representatives

Does religion affect legislators’ behavior on environmental policy in the US? Studies of environmental policy making have not examined this question, although the literature suggests that religion might affect legislative behavior on environmental policy. This study examines the relationship between US House members’ religion and roll-call voting on environmental legislation from 1973 to 2009. It finds significant differences across religious traditions. Legislators’ party and characteristics of constituencies relevant to environmental politics increasingly, but not entirely, mediate these differences.     

Coupling fishery dynamics,human health and social learning in a model of fish-borne pollution exposure

Pollution-induced illnesses are caused by toxicants that result from human activity and are often entirely preventable. However, where industrial priorities have undermined responsible governance, exposed populations must reduce their exposure by resorting to voluntary protective measures and demanding emissions abatement. This paper presents a coupled human–environment system model that represents the effects of water pollution on the health and livelihood of a fishing community. The model is motivated by an incident from 1949 to 1968 in Minamata, Japan, where methylmercury effluent from a local factory poisoned fish populations and humans who ate them. We model the critical role of risk perception in driving both social learning and the protective feedbacks against pollution exposure. These feedbacks are undermined in the presence of social misperceptions such as stigmatization of the injured. Through numerical simulation and scenario analysis, we compare our model results with historical datasets from Minamata, and find that the conditions for an ongoing pollution epidemic are highly unlikely without social misperception. We also find trade-offs between human health outcomes, the viability of the polluting industry and the survival of the fishery. We conclude that an understanding of human–environment interactions and misperception effects is highly relevant to the resolution of contemporary pollution problems, and merits further study.     

Understanding the fate and transport of petroleum hydrocarbons from coal tar within gasholders

Coal tars have been identified as posing a threat to human health due to their toxic, mutagenic and carcinogenic characteristics. Workers involved in former gasholders decommissioning are potentially exposed to relevant concentrations of volatile and semi-volatile hydrocarbons upon opening up derelict tanks and during tar excavation/removal. While information on contaminated sites air-quality and its implications on medium-long term exposure is available, acute exposure issues associated with the execution of critical tasks are less understood. Calculations indicated that the concentration of a given contaminant in the gasholder vapour phase only depends on the coal tar composition, being only barely affected by the presence of water in the gasholder and the tar volume/void space ratio. Fugacity modelling suggested that risk-critical compounds such as benzene, naphthalene and other monocyclic and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons may gather in the gasholder air phase at significant concentrations. Gasholder emissions were measured on-site and compared with the workplace exposure limits (WELs) currently in use in UK. While levels for most of the toxic compounds were far lower than WELs, benzene air-concentrations where found to be above the accepted threshold. In addition due to the long exposure periods involved in gasholder decommissioning and the significant contribution given by naphthalene to the total coal tar vapour concentration, the adoption of a WEL for naphthalene may need to be considered to support operators in preventing human health risk at the workplace. The Level I fugacity approach used in this study demonstrated its suitability for applications to sealed environments such as gasholders and its further refining could provide a useful tool for land remediation risk assessors.