Participatory scenario development for integrated sustainability assessment

The paper discusses the role of visions within sustainability assessment and governance for sustainable development in Europe. Currently, our societies (still) develop along an unsustainable path, which results in a number of persistent problems (climate change, loss of biodiversity, poverty, etc.). Integrated sustainability assessment (ISA) is one approach designed to initiate transitions towards sustainability. Visions of a sustainable future form an important part of ISA. These visions support the process of discussing how the transition from today’s societies/systems to a sustainable future can be achieved. According to the principles of ISA, visions should be developed in a participatory way, thus including the ideas and perceptions of stakeholders, decision-makers, experts and/or citizens. The paper starts with an introduction of the concepts of visions and scenarios and describes exemplary methods for their participatory development. Then, the main concepts for integrated sustainability assessment in comparison with other impact assessments are discussed. The main body of the paper presents experiences in three projects (ARTEMIS, ALARM, ECOCHANGE) in which visions and scenarios of sustainable futures were developed with stakeholders. The paper concludes with lessons learned and suggestions for future applications for participatory scenario development.     

Assessing intervention effectiveness at promoting voluntary conservation practice adoption in agrienvironments

Although implementing conservation practices on private farms and forests can produce substantial environmental benefits, these practices are not being adopted widely enough to result in measurable improvements at regional scales. Researchers have investigated the production and program factors influencing producer choices to voluntarily adopt these practices. However, the findings of reviews are inconsistent, raising questions about review methods, including the omission of relevant variables. Further, applying lessons from past work to promote adoption is difficult because many reviews investigated dispositional or demographic variables that practitioners and policy makers cannot directly observe or influence. We conducted a new review of 146 empirical studies that tested the effects of different interventions (e.g., financial incentives, outreach events, and nudges) on increasing the likelihood of producers adopting conservation practices. We conducted a metaregression of quantitative studies from diverse disciplines that filtered studies by quality (i.e., use of randomization and clear analysis reporting). We synthesized these results with a thematic analysis of qualitative studies on producer perspectives about conservation practices. Financial incentives had the strongest evidence of increasing producers’ likelihood of adopting conservation practices (odds ratio 1.86, p < 0.05). However, this effect was only apparent after filtering by study quality, which also improved model fit and identified significant regional differences (odds ratio –1.69, p < 0.01). The thematic review of qualitative studies revealed that peer groups may be successful in reinforcing adoption behaviors due to homophily effects and that financial incentives not only offset implementation costs but also mitigated perceived risks of adoption. Given the problems we encountered in testing hypotheses about the magnitude of variability explained by intervention types and practice characteristics, we recommend additional experimental and longitudinal work that accounts for financial incentives and pairs qualitative and quantitative data to clarify relationships between program design and practice adoption rates.     

Methods for household waste composition studies

The question is how to conduct household waste composition studies. The review is divided into three parts: overview of known methods, sampling theory, and the waste components. Twenty methods are listed and commented on. There is no adopted, working international standard. In accordance with Pierre Gy's Theory of Sampling, the seven types of sampling errors, when collecting and splitting solid samples, are described and commented on in relation to sampling of household solid waste. It is concluded that the most crucial choices in household waste composition studies are: to divide the investigation into relevant number and types of strata; to decide the required sample size and number of samples; to choose the sampling location, i.e., sampling at household level or sampling from loads of waste collection vehicles; and to choose the type and number of waste component categories to be investigated. Various classifications of household waste components used in composition studies are listed and discussed. Difficulties and weaknesses of the reviewed methods are discussed and concluded in suggested questions for further research.     

Strategic Environmental Assessment of Greenhouse Gas Mitigation Options in the Canadian Agricultural Sector

This article presents a methodological framework for strategic environmental assessment (SEA) application. The overall objective is to demonstrate SEA as a systematic and structured policy, plan, and program (PPP) decision support tool. In order to accomplish this objective, a stakeholder-based SEA application to greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation policy options in Canadian agriculture is presented. Using a mail-out impact assessment exercise, agricultural producers and nonproducers from across the Canadian prairie region were asked to evaluate five competing GHG mitigation options against 13 valued environmental components (VECs). Data were analyzed using multi-criteria and exploratory analytical techniques. The results suggest considerable variation in perceived impacts and GHG mitigation policy preferences, suggesting that a blanket policy approach to GHG mitigation will create gainers and losers based on soil type and associate cropping and on-farm management practices. It is possible to identify a series of regional greenhouse gas mitigation programs that are robust, socially meaningful, and operationally relevant to both agricultural producers and policy decision makers. The assessment demonstrates the ability of SEA to address, in an operational sense, environmental problems that are characterized by conflicting interests and competing objectives and alternatives. A structured and systematic SEA methodology provides the necessary decision support framework for the consideration of impacts, and allows for PPPs to be assessed based on a much broader set of properties, objectives, criteria, and constraints whereas maintaining rigor and accountability in the assessment process.     

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in ash: determination of total and leachable concentrations

Before wood ash can be used as a soil fertilizer, concentrations of environmentally hazardous compounds must be investigated. In this study, total and leachable concentrations of 16 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) were determined in four ash samples and one green liquor sludge. The ash sample with the highest carbon content also contained high levels of PAHs; three of the ash samples had total concentrations exceeding the limit permitted by the Swedish Forest Agency for recycling to forest soils. The leachable concentrations were higher for the non-stabilized samples; this was probably due to colloid-facilitated transport of the contaminants in these samples. However, the leachable concentrations were overall relatively low in all the samples studied. The amounts of PAHs introduced to forest soils by additions of stabilized, recyclable ash products will be determined primarily by the rate of weathering of the ash particles and the total concentration of contaminants.     

Effects of Landscape Composition and Wetland Fragmentation on Frog and Toad Abundance and Species Richness in Iowa and Wisconsin, U.S.A.

Abstract: Management of amphibian populations to reverse recent declines will require defining high-quality habitat for individual species or groups of species, followed by efforts to retain or restore these habitats on the landscape. We examined landscape-level habitat relationships for frogs and toads by measuring associations between relative abundance and species richness based on survey data derived from anuran calls and features of land-cover maps for Iowa and Wisconsin. The most consistent result across all anuran guilds was a negative association with the presence of urban land. Upland and wetland forests and emergent wetlands tended to be positively associated with anurans. Landscape metrics that represent edges and patch diversity also had generally positive associations, indicating that anurans benefit from a complex of habitats that include wetlands. In Iowa the most significant associations with relative abundance were the length of the edge between wetland and forest ( positive) and the presence of urban land (negative). In Wisconsin the two most significant associations with relative abundance were forest area and agricultural area ( both positive). Anurans had positive associations with agriculture in Wisconsin but not in Iowa. Remnant forest patches in agricultural landscapes may be providing refuges for some anuran species. Differences in anuran associations with deep water and permanent wetlands between the two states suggest opportunities for management action. Large-scale maps can contribute to predictive models of amphibian habitat use, but water quality and vegetation information collected from individual wetlands will likely be needed to strengthen those predictions. Landscape habitat analyses provide a framework for future experimental and intensive research on specific factors affecting the health of anurans.     

Strengthening road safety strategy development ‘Towards Zero’ 2008–2020 – Western Australia’s experience scientific research on road safety management SWOV workshop 16 and 17 November 2009

With a significant list of achievements in traffic safety over some 40 years, Australia’s most successful initiatives have emerged from consideration of the scientific basis for achieving effective results. Over time, the increasing use of scientific methods has matured to an extent whereby road safety strategies for entire jurisdictions are now being formed and optimised on the basis of evidence-based mathematical modelling of predicted strategy performance over periods of ten or more years ahead. This paper describes the approach used in the State of Western Australia (WA) to support the development of its new strategy, ‘Towards Zero’, addressing the 12-year period from 2008 to 2020. Also described is the early development of the modelling approach in the State of Victoria, Australia, subsequently applied, refined and adapted to Western Australia. The ‘Towards Zero’ strategy aims to ensure that road safety policies continue to evolve within a strategic framework, based on Australasia’s Safe System framework, which was derived from the best elements of the Swedish Vision Zero and the Dutch Sustainable Safety visions.The process for the development of the strategy involved a greater degree of community and stakeholder engagement than has been the case previously, based on the fundamental belief that the community should be provided with the best evidence about what works no matter how controversial, so that it can debate and consider the options available to improve safety.It is equally important to have a strategy based on the best possible evidence. The Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) was appointed by the WA Office of Road Safety to identify, describe and recommend proven counter-measures within the Safe System framework and develop a series of scientifically sound directions and options.This paper outlines the modelling technique used by MUARC along with results and summarises the community consultation process.     

Environmental legislation and regulation in 1995—what to expect

The environment will continue to be a “hot” issue in 1995. Having accomplished its early goals of attracting attention, cleaning up existing environmental problems, and preventing the development of new ones, the environmental movement in the last decade of the twentieth century will be a more measured, moderate response to environmental issues, driven in part by economic realism, economic opportunity, and the forces of political conservatism.