Greenhouse gas emissions in Canada and Japan: sector-specific estimates and managerial and economic implications

Many firms generate large amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases when they burn fossil fuels in their production processes. In addition, production of raw materials and other inputs the firms procure for their operations also generates greenhouse gases indirectly. These direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions occur in many sectors of our economies. In this paper, we first present sector-specific estimates for such greenhouse gas emissions. We then show that estimates for such sector-specific greenhouse gas emissions are often required for various types of corporate as well as public policy analyses in both domestic and international contexts. Measuring greenhouse gas emissions resulting from firms' multi-stage production processes in a multi-sector context is relevant for policies related to the Kyoto protocol, an international agreement to limit global greenhouse gas emissions. For example, since the protocol allows firms to engage in trading and offsetting of their greenhouse gas emissions across national borders, provided that emissions are correctly measured, the firms can take advantage of such trading schemes by placing their energy-intensive production facilities globally and strategically. We present several case studies which illustrate the importance of this and other aspects of greenhouse gas emissions in firms' environmental management. We also argue that our modeling and estimation methods based on input-output analyses are suitable for the types of research goals we have in this paper. Our methods are applied to data for Canada and Japan in a variety of environmental management circumstances.     

Evaluation of activated carbon fiber filter for sampling of organochlorine pesticides in environmental water samples

A simple method for quantitative analyses of organic chlorine pesticides (OCPs) in environmental water samples such as rainwater, river water and seawater using activated carbon fiber filters (ACFF) is described. ACFF was used as adsorbent to collect the chemicals in water samples. The collection of OCPs was completed almost for one day by stirring the mixture of the sample and the ACFF chips at room temperature. The adsorbed OCPs on the ACFF could be extracted easily with toluene-ethanol (4:1) mixed solvent. The purified extract by a florisil column chromatograph was followed by the analysis using high-resolution gas chromatograph/high-resolution mass spectrometer. Recoveries of OCPs spiked to actual samples such as rainwater, river water and seawater samples were approximately more than 80%, and the coefficients of variations were within 10%. This method was applied to the actual samples and was confirmed to be applicable for monitoring sub-ng/l level OCPs in environmental water samples.     

Transportation of organic matter to the sea floor by carrion falls of the giant jellyfish <Emphasis Type="Italic">Nemopilema nomurai</Emphasis> in the Sea of Japan

The fate of the giant jellyfish Nemopilema nomurai after death was examined in the southwest Sea of Japan. The density of dead jellyfish was greater than that of live animals. The dead animals are heavier than the Japan Sea Proper Water which occurs deeper than 200 m, suggesting that dead jellyfish sink to the sea floor. The sea floor survey, conducted with a towed video tape recorder (VTR) monitoring system between mid September and mid October, observed a total of 138 jellyfish during 28 of 29 operations. The density of carrion ranged between 0.2 and 5.1 individuals/1,000 m² (mean ± SE = 1.1 ± 0.2). Ophiuroids occurred abundantly at 23 jellyfish carcasses and a sea anemone was observed attached to five carcasses. The VTR surveys confirmed that carrion sinks to the sea floor not only during the winter, the normal end of life for medusae, but also during the fall. A trap survey baited with medusae was also employed, and four different species were sampled with the traps: the snow crab (Chionoecetes opilio), a shrimp (Pandalopsis japonica), the ivory shell (Buccinum striatissimum) and an ophiuroid (Ophiura sarsii). Much of the trap bait remained (49–68% weight-mean = 60.3%) during the 23 h soak-time, and the reduction in weight was greater than that observed by bacterial decomposition, suggesting benthic animals consume dead organisms. The present study indicates that dead N. nomurai sink to the sea floor continuously and were subsequently consumed by benthic scavengers.     

Using native epiphytic ferns to estimate the atmospheric mercury levels in a small-scale gold mining area of West Java, Indonesia

Mercury pollution is caused by artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) operations along the Cikaniki River (West Java, Indonesia). The atmosphere is one of the primary media through which mercury can disperse. In this study, atmospheric mercury levels are estimated using the native epiphytic fern Asplenium nidus complex (A. nidus) as a biomonitor; these estimates shed light on the atmospheric dispersion of mercury released during mining.Samples were collected from 8 sites along the Cikaniki Basin during September-November, 2008 and September-November, 2009.The A. nidus fronds that were attached to tree trunks 1-3 m above the ground were collected and measured for total mercury concentration using cold vapor atomic absorption spectrometry (CVAAS) after acid-digestion. The atmospheric mercury was collected using porous gold collectors, and the concentrations were determined using double-amalgam CVAAS.The highest atmospheric mercury concentration, 1.8 × 10³ ± 1.6 × 10³ ng m⁻³, was observed at the mining hot spot, and the lowest concentration of mercury, 5.6 ± 2.0 ng m⁻³, was observed at the remote site from the Cikaniki River in 2009. The mercury concentrations in A. nidus were higher at the mining village (5.4 × 10³ ± 1.6 × 10³ ng g⁻¹) than at the remote site (70 ± 30 ng g⁻¹). The distribution of mercury in A. nidus was similar to that in the atmosphere; a significant correlation was observed between the mercury concentrations in the air and in A. nidus (r = 0.895, P < 0.001, n = 14). The mercury levels in the atmosphere can be estimated from the mercury concentration in A. nidus using a regression equation: log (Hg_A.nidu/ng g⁻¹) = 0.740 log (Hg_Air/ng m⁻³) − 1.324.     

Assays of polychlorinated biphenyl congeners and co-contaminated heavy metals in the transgenic Arabidopsis plants carrying the recombinant guinea pig aryl hydrocarbon receptor-mediated β-glucuronidase reporter gene expression system

The transgenic Arabidopsis plant XgD2V11-6 carrying the recombinant guinea pig (g) aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR)-mediated β-glucuronidase (GUS) reporter gene expression system was examined for assay of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) congeners and co-contaminated heavy metals. When the transgenic Arabidopsis plants were treated with PCB126 (toxic equivalency factor; TEF: 0.1) and PCB169 (TEF: 0.03), the GUS activity of the whole plants was increased significantly. After treatment with PCB80 (TEF: 0), the GUS activity was nearly the same level as that treated with 0.1% dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO) as a vehicle control. After exposure to a 1:1 mixture of PCB126 and PCB169, the GUS activity was increased additively. However, after exposure to a mixture of PCB126 and PCB80, the GUS activity was lower than that of the treatment with PCB126 alone. Thus, PCB80 seemed to be an antagonist towards AhR. When the transgenic plants were treated with each of the heavy metals Fe, Cu, Zn, Cd and Pb together with PCB126, Cd and Pb increased the PCB126-induced GUS activity. On the other hand, Fe, Cu and Zn did not affect the PCB126-induced GUS activity. In the presence of the biosurfactant mannosylerythritol lipid-B (MEL-B) and the carrier protein bovine serum albumin (BSA), the PCB126-induced GUS activity was increased, but the Cd-assisted PCB126-induced GUS activity was not affected. Thus, MEL-B and BSA seemed to increase uptake and transport of PCB126, respectively.     

A New Catalytic Reactor for Nitrogen Oxides Removal

The body of information presented in this paper is directed to those individuals concerned with the catalytic NO_x removal reactor for a dirty (containing dust) flue gas. In the case of treating a dirty flue gas, the concentration of dust is the most important factor. While the dirty gas passes through the catalytic reactor, dust particles deposit and plug up the catalyst causing the reactor pressure loss to rise. As a result, the NO_x reduction efficiency decreases more and more, and continuous operation becomes impossible. A new type of NO_x removal reactor for dirty flue gas, the intermittent moving bed reactor, has been developed. The following characteristics have been evaluated: (1) method of calculating reactor pressure loss caused by dust particles, (2) static pressure distribution across the catalyst bed in the reactor, (3) method of evaluating uniform movement of catalyst and (4) reentrainment pattern of dust by catalyst movement. After carrying out various successful pilot plant tests, the information needed for construction and operation of a commercial plant has been developed.     

Direct assessment of international consistency of standards for ground-level ozone: strategy and implementation toward metrological traceability network in Asia

An international exercise to directly assess consistency of standards for ground-level ozone in East Asia was conducted as part of the East Asian Regional Experiment 2005 (EAREX 2005) in the framework of the Atmospheric Brown Clouds (ABC) project. Ten organizations collaboratively participated in the intercomparison. Four groups representing Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan made comparisons at the Gosan super observatory, Jeju Island, Korea, in March 2005, with ozone instruments calibrated to their national standards, and four Japanese groups made off-site comparisons with laboratory-level standards. All comparisons generally indicated good agreement with the standard reference photometer (SRP) 35, built by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (USA) and maintained by the National Institute for Environmental Studies (Japan). The assessment was expanded to measurement networks contributing to the World Meteorological Organization's Global Atmospheric Watch (WMO/GAW) program as part of off-site comparisons, and excellent agreement was achieved. These efforts contribute to propagating traceability of the national metrology standards among the atmospheric science community, to ensuring comparability of the existing ozone measurements, and to establishing an integrated network of air quality monitoring in Asia.     

Influence of model grid resolution on NO2 vertical column densities over East Asia

NO₂ vertical column densities (VCDs) over East Asia in June and December 2007 were simulated by the Community Multi-scale Air Quality (CMAQ) version 4.7.1 using an updated and more elaborate version of the Regional Emission Inventory in Asia (REAS) version 2. The modeling system could reasonably capture observed spatiotemporal changes of NO₂ VCDs by satellite sensors, the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment-2 (GOME-2), the Scanning Imaging Absorption Spectrometer for Atmospheric Cartography (SCIAMACHY), and the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI), even at the coarsest horizontal resolution of 80 km. The CMAQ simulations were performed in a sequence of three horizontal resolutions (80 km, 40 km, and 20 km) for June and December 2007 to investigate the influence of changes of horizontal resolution on the obtained NO₂ VCDs. CMAQ-simulated NO₂ VCDs generally increased with improvements in resolution from 80 km to 40 km and then to 20 km. Increases in the CMAQ-simulated NO₂ VCDs were greater for the change from 80 km to 40 km than for those from 40 km and 20 km, in which the increases of NO₂ VCDs due to the improvement of horizontal resolution were approached convergence at the horizontal resolution of approximately 20 km. Conversely, no clear convergences in NO₂ VCDs changes were found at near Tokyo and over the East China Sea. The biases of the NO₂ VCDs simulated at a resolution of 20 km against the satellite retrievals were ～36% near Beijing (CHN1) and ～78% near Shanghai (CHN2) in summer; these errors were found to be comparable to the horizontal resolution-dependent errors, which were 18–25% at CHN1 and 44–58% at CHN2 from 80 km to 40 km. Conversely, the influence of changes of horizontal resolution in winter was relatively less compared to that in summer.

Implications: NO₂ VCDs over East Asia in June and December 2007 were simulated using CMAQ version 4.7.1 and REAS version 2. The modeling system could reasonably capture observed spatiotemporal changes of NO₂ VCDs by satellite sensors. The CMAQ simulations were performed in a sequence of three horizontal resolutions, 80, 40, and 20 km, to investigate the influence of changes of horizontal resolution on the obtained NO₂ VCDs. The results suggested that the influence of changes of horizontal resolution was larger in summer compared to that in winter. The magnitude of the influence was comparable to the biases of the NO₂ VCDs simulated at a resolution of 20 km against the satellite retrievals.     

Effects of biosurfactants on assays of PCB congeners in transgenic arabidopsis plants carrying a recombinant guinea pig AhR-mediated GUS reporter gene expression system

The transgenic Arabidopsis plants carrying a recombinant guinea pig (g) aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR)-mediated β-glucuronidase (GUS) reporter gene expression system were generated for assays of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) congeners. The selected transgenic Arabidopsis plant XgD2V11-6 exhibited a correlation between uptake of PCB126 and PCB126-induced GUS activity. Also, the plants showed induced GUS activity towards the supplemental indole 3-acetic acid (IAA). Thus, the GUS assay may reflect induction by both endogenous and exogenous AhR ligands. When biosurfactants, MEL-B, produced in the culture of yeast isolated from plants were used for assays of PCB congeners in the transgenic Arabidopsis plants, they showed marked PCB126 dose-dependent and toxic equivalency factor (TEF) dependent GUS activities. The effects of biosurfactants were clearer when the plants were cultivated on soils containing PCB congeners for 7 days as compared with on soils for 3 days as well as in the medium for 3 days. Therefore, it was estimated that biosurfactants form micellae with PCB congeners, which are easily uptaken by the plants in a mode of passive diffusion, transport into the aerial parts and then induce GUS activity.     

Evaluation of the physiology of miniature pig fed Shochu distillery waste using mRNA expression profiling

Journal of Material Cycles and Waste Management - Shochu distillery waste is the discarded material generated during Shochu production, and it has been used as feed for livestock. In this study, we...