Ban on landfilling of wooden pallets in North Carolina: an assessment of recycling and industry capacity

Pallets literally move the world and an estimated 2 billion of them are in use in the U.S. every day. However, pallets have a short life span and thus consume vast quantities of resources. They are also responsible for 2–3% of all waste landfilled in the United States. This is despite the fact that technologies and markets exist that allow pallets to be reused, recycled, converted into other products or turned into mulch, boiler fuels or alcohols (ethanol). The State of North Carolina's legislature debated a ban on landfilling pallets for several years and has now enacted legislation to ban this practice beginning in 2009. This study provided information used to help reach that decision.North Carolina had 103 known pallet recycling operations that were surveyed in 2003–2004. Using 34 responses, the total pallet recycling capacity in North Carolina was close to 60 million units per year, while 34 million pallets were actually recycled in 2003. The average operation employed nearly 34 persons and recycled about 326,000 pallets per year. On average, 20% of the pallets received by a recycling operation were reused, 45% were refurbished, 19% were recycled, and 15% were ground. The industry generally thought that a ban on landfilling pallets was a good idea (56%) with 18% indicating it was a bad idea. Another 18% of respondents did not care and 9% had different ideas.     

Enhancement of the anaerobic hydrolysis and fermentation of municipal solid waste in leachbed reactors by varying flow direction during water addition and leachate recycle

Poor performance of leachbed reactors (LBRs) is attributed to channelling, compaction from waste loading, unidirectional water addition and leachate flow causing reduced hydraulic conductivity and leachate flow blockage. Performance enhancement was evaluated in three LBRs M, D and U at 22 ± 3 °C using three water addition and leachate recycle strategies; water addition was downflow in D throughout, intermittently upflow and downflow in M and U with 77% volume downflow in M, 54% volume downflow in U while the rest were upflow. Leachate recycle was downflow in D, alternately downflow and upflow in M and upflow in U. The strategy adopted in U led to more water addition (30.3%), leachate production (33%) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) solubilisation (33%; 1609 g against 1210 g) compared to D (control). The total and volatile solids (TS and VS) reductions were similar but the highest COD yield (g-COD/g-TS and g-COD/g-VS removed) was in U (1.6 and 1.9); the values were 1.33 and 1.57 for M, and 1.18 and 1.41 for D respectively. The strategy adopted in U showed superior performance with more COD and leachate production compared to reactors M and D.     

Do cod form spawning leks? Evidence from a Newfoundland spawning ground

Catch and acoustic telemetry data were used to test three predictions of lekking behaviour in Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua L.) at a small-scale spawning ground (∼25 km²) in Placentia Bay, Newfoundland: (1) that cod form male-skewed aggregations during spawning; (2) spawning arenas occur at consistent sites; and (3) on the arenas, there will be higher proportions of spawning fish. Forty-two fishing sets from 1998 to 2003 indicated male-skewed sets early in the spawning season (April) in 5 of 6 survey years. Male-skewed sets were consistently distributed at depths < 50 m and mostly in one part of the ground. The proportions of spawning females and spent males were significantly higher in male-skewed sets, whereas sets with equal sex ratios had significantly higher proportions of immature males and spent females. In addition, cod of both sexes were significantly larger in male-skewed sets. Telemetric tracking of 25 cod in 2002 and 2003 (12 males, 13 females) indicated that both males and females were highly mobile while present on the spawning ground. Overall, our results add support to the hypothesis that cod employ a lekking mating system.     

一种改进的多学习教与学优化算法

针对传统教与学算法在解决复杂多峰函数优化问题时,具有局部最优且搜索开发能力较差的缺点,提出了一种改进的多学习教与学优化算法,新算法为学员的每一维加入不同的教学因子,设计了基于学员均值比较的教师选择策略和向教师及学员学习的多学习策略。基于多个单峰和多峰函数的仿真结果表明,新算法跟传统的、改进的教与学算法相比,在稳定性、寻优精度和收敛速度方面更具优势。     

Spatiotemporal Associations of Reservoir Nutrient Characteristics and the Invasive,Harmful Alga Prymnesium parvum in West Texas

Golden alga (Prymnesium parvum) is a harmful alga that has caused ecological and economic harm in freshwater and marine systems worldwide. In inland systems of North America, toxic blooms have nearly eliminated fish populations in some systems. Modifying nutrient profiles through alterations to land or water use may be a viable alternative for golden alga control in reservoirs. The main objective of this study was to improve our understanding of the nutrient dynamics that influence golden alga bloom formation and toxicity in west Texas reservoirs. We examined eight sites in the Upper Colorado River basin, Texas: three impacted reservoirs that have experienced repeated golden alga blooms; two reference reservoirs where golden alga is present but nontoxic; and three confluence sites downstream of the impacted and reference sites. Total, inorganic, and organic nitrogen and phosphorus and their ratios were quantified monthly along with golden alga abundance and ichthyotoxicity between December 2010 and July 2011. Blooms persisted for several months at the impacted sites, which were characterized by high organic nitrogen and low inorganic nitrogen. At impacted sites, abundance was positively associated with inorganic phosphorus and bloom termination coincided with increases in inorganic nitrogen and decreases in inorganic phosphorus in late spring. Management of both inorganic and organic forms of nutrients may create conditions in reservoirs unfavorable to golden alga.     

Evaluating betterment projects

In the past decade Australia has experienced a series of large‐scale, severe natural disasters including catastrophic bushfires, widespread and repeated flooding, and intense storms and cyclones. There appears to be a prima facie case for rebuilding damaged infrastructure to a more disaster resilient (that is, to ‘betterment’) standard. The purpose of this paper is to develop and illustrate a consistent and readily applied method for advancing proposals for the betterment of essential public assets, which can be used by governments at all levels to determine the net benefits of such proposals. Case study results demonstrate that betterment investments have the potential to deliver a positive economic return across a range of asset types and regions. Results, however, are highly sensitive to underlying assumptions; in particular the probability of the natural disaster affecting the infrastructure in the absence of betterment.