Changing environments or shifting paradigms? Strategic decision making toward water protection in Helsinki, 1850-2000

The study examines the history of strategic decision-making concerning water protection in Helsinki, 1850-2000. We identified five major strategic decisions that occurred during the study period. The results indicate that strategic decision-making evolves in long-term policy cycles that last on average 20-30 years. New policy cycles are caused by paradigm shifts. Paradigms are shared and predominant ways of understanding reality that help when groups must act to solve common and complex environmental problems. However the internal structure and external dynamics of paradigms are contradictory. Although paradigms serve initially as means to redefine problems and find creative solutions, as time goes by each paradigm seems to become also a barrier that restricts the introduction of new ways of thinking and acting. The power of paradigms lies in the fact that they can be defined as scientific but also social, political, or cultural agreements depending on the context.     

Complexing agents in waste waters of finnish electrolytic and chemical surface treatment plants

Goal, Scope and Background  Complexing agents are one of the major environmental concerns in electrolytic and chemical surface treatment (ECST) industry; e.g. the EU reference document on the best available technology (BREF) pays special attention to the usage of EDTA. However, no comprehensive studies are available on usage of EDTA or other complexing agents or their load to the receiving waters from ECST industry. In this study, the concentrations of complexing agents were analyzed to get an overview of their usage and load and also to recognize their relevance in the environmental permitting and compliance monitoring of such facilities. Methods  Complexing agent concentrations of treated waste water samples of 23 ECST plants with vat volume exceeding 30 m³ was studied. HPLC and GC-MS were used to analyze and identify complexing agent concentrations, ICP-AES to analyze metals, and TOC to analyse the organic load. The number of the plants in this study equals around 50% of such installations in Finland subject to environmental permit as the IPPC directive provides. Results  EDTA, DTPA, and NTA were found in 11 samples out of 23 mainly in rather small concentrations. Their annual load to the receiving waters may be estimated to be 0.3 tons and the total load from Finnish ECST industry can be extrapolated to be up to 1 ton. Compared to the estimated use of 5–10 tons in the industry this finding is rather low, even though in Finland cast-off treatment baths are typically delivered to the hazardous waste treatment plants. Discussion  Since the load of complexing agents is rather low, the chemical waste water treatment seems to be either capable of reducing complexing agent concentrations to some extent or their usage is lower than expected. On the other hand, it is possible that not all complexing agents were identified from the samples. The metal concentrations and TOC were well hand in hand with concentrations found in the Finnish environmental database, which proves that the samples were of average quality of the waste water from the facilities. Conclusions  According to the results, complexing agents cannot be considered as an environmental risk in the ECST industry in Finland; EDTA concentrations are clearly below PNEC_aqua (2.2 mg/l) and the total discharge is very marginal compared to the discharge from the pulp and paper industry. However, DPTA seems to be as commonly used as EDTA, but also biodegradable NTA was found. Recommendations and Perspectives  Since EDTA has gained plenty of attention in the BREF, DTPA and other, poorly biodegradable complexing agents should also be taken into account when the BREF is updated within a few years. Also an EU risk assessment report especially for DTPA should be supplied, since its use is obviously increasing.     

Performance and emission study of biodiesel from leather industry pre-fleshings

The possible use of pre-fleshing wastes from tanneries in the production of biodiesel fuel was examimed in our previous study in 2005. In this study, engine performance and emission values of biodiesel obtained from these wastes have been investigated and compared to petrodiesel fuel. The test results demonstrated that although the wheel force and power of biodiesel fuel is slightly lower than petrodiesel and the acceleration periods are accordingly longer, the emission values of hydrocarbons and particulate matter were found to be considerably lower with biodiesel. Thus, it has been shown that a waste byproduct can be utilized in the production of an environmentally friendly fuel, which can be used in some diesel engines without a need for major adjustment, providing economic and ecological benefits.     

Personal exposures and microenvironmental concentrations of particles and bioaerosols

The aim of this study was to compare the personal exposure to particles and bioaerosols with that measured by stationary samplers in the main microenvironments, i.e., the home and the workplace. A random sample of 81 elementary school teachers was selected from the 823 teachers working for two councils in eastern Finland for the winter time measurement period. Bioaerosol and other particles were collected on filters by button samplers using personal sampling and microenvironmental measurements in homes and workplaces. The 24-hour sampling period was repeated twice for each teacher. Particle mass, absorption coefficient of the filter and the concentration of viable and total microorganisms were analyzed from each filter. In this paper, the study design, quality assurance principles and results of particle and bioaerosol exposure are described. The results show that particle mass concentrations, absorption coefficient and fungi were higher in personal exposure samples than in home and workplace samples. Furthermore, these concentrations were usually lower in the home than in the workplace. Bacterial concentrations were highest in heavily populated workplaces, while the viable fungi concentrations were lowest in workplaces. The fungi and bacteria results showed high variation, which emphasises the importance of quality assurance (duplicates and field blanks) in the microbial field measurements. Our results indicate that personal exposure measurements of bioaerosols in indoor environments are feasible and supplement the information obtained by stationary samplers.     

Butterfly effects in mimicry? Combining signal and taste can twist the relationship of Müllerian co-mimics

Müllerian co-mimics are aposematic species that resemble each other; sharing a warning signal is thought to be mutually beneficial for the co-mimics by reducing per capita predation risk. In Batesian mimicry, edible mimics avoid predation by resembling an aposematic model species. The protection of both the model and the mimic is weakened when the mimics are abundant compared to the models. The quasi-Batesian view suggests that defended (Müllerian) co-mimics, when unequal in their defences, could also show a Batesian-like trend of increasing mortality with increasing abundance of a less defended “mimic”. We manipulated frequencies of unequally distasteful artificial co-mimics that were prey for great tits. The co-mimics had different signals (imperfect mimicry) but were equally preferred by the birds when palatable. Unexpectedly, when unpalatable, one of the signals was easier for the birds to learn to avoid. Consequently, during predator learning, the signal design of the prey strongly affected mortality of the co-mimics; there was an interaction between the signal and frequency treatments, but increasing the frequency of a less defended “mimic” did not increase co-mimic mortalities as predicted. In contrast, in a memory test that followed, the effect of signal design disappeared; if the birds had experienced high frequency of “mimics” during learning, co-mimic mortalities did subsequently increase. Since the effect of co-mimic frequencies on mortalities changed depending on the signal design of the prey and predator experience, the results suggest that mimetic relationship may be an unpredictable interplay of several factors in addition to taste and abundance.     

Major air pollutants in Bursa,Turkey: their levels,temporal changes,interactions, and sources

Bursa is one of the largest cities of Turkey and it hosts 17 organized industrial zones. Parallel to the increase in population, rapidly growing energy consumption, and increased numbers of transport vehicles have impacts on the air quality of the city. In this study, regularly calibrated automatic samplers were employed to get the levels of air pollution in Bursa. The concentrations of CH₄ and N-CH₄ as well as the major air pollutants including PM₁₀, PM_2.5, NO, NO₂, NO_x, SO₂, CO, and O₃, were determined for 2016 and 2017 calendar years. Their levels were 1641.62?±?718.25, 33.11?±?5.45, 42.10?±?10.09, 26.41?±?9.01, 19.47?±?16.51, 46.73?±?16.56, 66.23?±?32.265, 7.60?±?3.43, 659.397?±?192.73, and 51.92?±?25.63 µg/m³ for 2016, respectively. Except for O₃, seasonal concentrations were higher in winter and autumn for both years. O₃, CO, and SO₂ had never exceeded the limit values specified in the regulations yet PM₁₀, PM_2.5, and NO₂ had violated the limits in some days. The ratios of CO/NO_x, SO₂/NO_x, and PM_2.5/PM₁₀ were examined to characterize the emission sources. Generally, domestic and industrial emissions were dominated in the fall and winter seasons, yet traffic emissions were effective in spring and summer seasons. As a result of the correlation process between O_x and NO_x, it was concluded that the most important source of O_x concentrations in winter was NO_x and O₃ was in summer.     

Bioaerosol Generation at Large-Scale Green Waste Composting Plants

Abstract

Bioaerosol release from composting plants is a cause of concern because of the potential health impacts on site workers and local residents. A one-year monitoring was undertaken in a typical composting plant treating green wastes by windrowing in the open. Aspergillus fumigatus spores and mesophilic bacteria were used as monitoring parameters and were collected in a six-stage Andersen sampler impactor from the air at different locations and during different operational activities. Background concentrations of both microorganisms were generally below 1000 colony-forming units m^?3 when no vigorous activity was taking place. Shredding of fresh green wastes, pile turning, and screening of mature compost were identified as the activities generating the highest amounts of both bioaerosols 40 m downwind of the composting pad. These air concentrations were ～2 log units higher than background levels. Screening of mature compost generated lower amounts of A. fumigatus than the other two activities (an average of 1 log unit higher than background levels). Workers were identified as the main potential receptors of high bioaerosol concentrations in areas close to the composting pad, whereas no major risk for local residents was expected because the concentrations recorded at distances of 200 and 300 m downwind of the operational area were not significantly different from background levels.     

Gene expression responses of paper birch (Betula papyrifera) to elevated CO2 and O3 during leaf maturation and senescence

Gene expression responses of paper birch (Betula papyrifera) leaves to elevated concentrations of CO₂ and O₃ were studied with microarray analyses from three time points during the summer of 2004 at Aspen FACE. Microarray data were analyzed with clustering techniques, self-organizing maps, K-means clustering and Sammon's mappings, to detect similar gene expression patterns within sampling times and treatments. Most of the alterations in gene expression were caused by O₃, alone or in combination with CO₂. O₃ induced defensive reactions to oxidative stress and earlier leaf senescence, seen as decreased expression of photosynthesis- and carbon fixation-related genes, and increased expression of senescence-associated genes. The effects of elevated CO₂ reflected surplus of carbon that was directed to synthesis of secondary compounds. The combined CO₂ + O₃ treatment resulted in differential gene expression than with individual gas treatments or in changes similar to O₃ treatment, indicating that CO₂ cannot totally alleviate the harmful effects of O₃.