Framing trans-border energy transportation: the case of Keystone XL

Increasing discussion over the safety of natural resource extraction and transportation to facilitate international energy needs has given rise to controversy over the prospect of large quantities of bitumen and crude oil flowing through trans-national pipelines. This debate, incorporating the voices of industry, government and advocacy groups, has gained traction in the news media, alternately framed as an environmental, economic, trade, human rights or public safety concern. It is possible, however, that such coverage may vary substantially with regional interests and perceptions of costs and benefits, locally or nationally. To uncover how the framing of energy transportation varies with proximity considerations, regional and national media coverage in Canada and the United States of the Keystone XL pipeline from 2010 to 2014 is analyzed. National and local papers frame the pipeline according to different considerations, as do cities near to and distant from the pipeline route.     

Local vs. national: Epidemiology of pedestrian injury in a mid-Atlantic city

Objective: Understanding pedestrian injury trends at the local level is essential for program planning and allocation of funds for urban planning and improvement. Because we hypothesize that local injury trends differ from national trends in significant and meaningful ways, we investigated citywide pedestrian injury trends to assess injury risk among nationally identified risk groups, as well as identify risk groups and locations specific to Baltimore City.

Methods: Pedestrian injury data, obtained from the Baltimore City Fire Department, were gathered through emergency medical services (EMS) records collected from January 1 to December 31, 2014. Locations of pedestrian injuries were geocoded and mapped. Pearson's chi-square test of independence was used to investigate differences in injury severity level across risk groups. Pedestrian injury rates by age group, gender, and race were compared to national rates.

Results: A total of 699 pedestrians were involved in motor vehicle crashes in 2014—an average of 2 EMS transports each day. The distribution of injuries throughout the city did not coincide with population or income distributions, indicating that there was not a consistent correlation between areas of concentrated population or concentrated poverty and areas of concentrated pedestrian injury. Twenty percent (n = 138) of all injuries occurred among children age ≤14, and 22% (n = 73) of severe injuries occurred among young children. The rate of injury in this age group was 5 times the national rate (Incident Rate Ratio [IRR] = 4.81, 95% confidence interval [CI], [4.05, 5.71]). Injury rates for adults ≥65 were less than the national average.

Conclusions: As the urban landscape and associated pedestrian behavior transform, continued investigation of local pedestrian injury trends and evolving public health prevention strategies is necessary to ensure pedestrian safety.     

Fracking and Framing: A Comparative Analysis of Media Coverage of Hydraulic Fracturing in Canadian and US Newspapers

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a controversial but popular method of extracting oil and gas in North America. There are a myriad of completing claims about the economic benefits and the environmental costs of the technology. This paper examines news media coverage of fracking in four Canadian and four American newspapers over a five-year period. A comparison is made at the national level as well as at a paired subnational level between jurisdictions where fracking is embraced and where fracking is banned. The paper demonstrates that in both countries the main storyline is about water quality, but beyond that differences emerge as Americans focus more on wildlife and public health and Canadians focus more on moratoriums and energy independence. Moreover, while there were similarities in media coverage of fracking in pro-fracking and anti-fracking jurisdictions, there were notable differences in attention to the topics of public health and economic benefits.     

Why trust you? Security cooperation within humanitarian NGO networks

Although the literature is increasingly concerned with cooperation among humanitarian non-governmental organisations (NGOs), we still lack studies that explain cooperation under conditions of competition. Drawing on 22 semi-structured interviews, this article argues that trust is the driving force behind security-related cooperation within networks of humanitarian NGOs. Which type of trust comes into play and how trust is built depends on the structure of a network. In small, stable networks, trust is typically based on experience, whereas shared identity is at the heart of trust in large, unstable networks. In the latter case, cooperation among humanitarian NGOs is exclusive and comparable to a form of club governance, because NGOs are kept out based on their identity—that is, if they adopt a different operational interpretation of the humanitarian principles.     

4-hours resolution data to study PM10 in a “hot spot” area in Europe

Nowadays, high-time resolved aerosol studies are mandatory to better understand atmospheric processes, such as formation, removal, transport, deposition or chemical reactions. This work focuses on PM10 physical and chemical characterisation with high-time resolution: elements (from Na to Pb), ions and OC/EC fractions concentration were determined during two weeks in summer and two in winter 2006 with 4-hours resolution. Further measurements aimed at hourly elemental characterisation of fine and coarse fractions and at the determination of particles number concentration in the 0.25-32 microm size range in 31 bins. The chemical mass closure was carried out in both seasons, enhancing intra-day differences in PM10 composition. In Milan, the highest contribution came from organic matter (34% and 33% in summer and winter, respectively); other important contributors were secondary inorganic compounds (16% and 24% in summer and winter, respectively) and, in summer, crustal matter (14%). Temporal trends showed strong variations in PM10 composition during contiguous time-slots and diurnal variations in different components contribution were identified. Moreover, peculiar phenomena, which would have hardly been detected with 24-hours samplings, were evidenced. Particles removal due to precipitations, aerosol local production and long range transport were studied in detail.     

Arsenic concentration and speciation of the marine hyperaccumulator whelk Buccinum undatum collected in coastal waters of Northern Britain

European whelks (Buccinum undatum) have shown to accumulate high levels of arsenic. Since the accumulation process is not well understood it is necessary to gain information about the geographical variability of the arsenic concentration in them. Here we show that the mean arsenic concentrations of the whelks are site specific and vary by a factor of 3.5 in ten different geographical locations. At fishing grounds where whelks exhibited low arsenic concentrations the arsenic concentration increased linearly with size, whereas the whelks with high arsenic levels from a different location showed no correlation. Although the overall arsenic concentration in the whelks differed between 45 and 655 mg kg(-1) d.w., the inorganic arsenic concentration did not exceed 0.4 mg kg(-1) d.w. The main arsenic compound is arsenobetaine, which is widely considered as non-toxic. The exposure to toxic inorganic arsenic when eating whelks cannot be estimated from their size or their total arsenic concentration.     

Loggerhead turtle (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Caretta caretta</Emphasis>) matrilines in the Mediterranean: further evidence of genetic diversity and connectivity

We re-sequenced 815 bp of the mtDNA of loggerhead turtles from a population nesting in Calabria (southern Italy), which was found recently. Non-invasive sampling was applied and information on deposition date and place was used to avoid possible resampling of nesting females. Among 38 nests laid by independent females, we found the common haplotype CC-A2.1 (57.9%) and two other haplotypes which have never been described in Mediterranean nesting grounds, CC-A20.1 (36.8%) and CC-A31.1 (5.3%). Calabria harbors the highest intra-population diversity among 11 Mediterranean nesting populations. Our findings narrow the gap between haplotypes recorded in feeding grounds and those found in nesting grounds. Analyses of population structure show a strong maternal isolation, with Calabria and east Turkey displaying far more diversity than expected considering their census size. These observations suggest that recurrent female founder effects from sources yet to be identified in the Atlantic or in the Mediterranean may have shaped the pattern of mtDNA diversity in this latter basin. Our results provide evidence that the Ionian Calabrian sites should be protected because of the high diversity found there. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Regional risk assessment for contaminated sites part 2: ranking of potentially contaminated sites

Environmental risks are traditionally assessed and presented in non spatial ways although the heterogeneity of the contaminants spatial distributions, the spatial positions and relations between receptors and stressors, as well as the spatial distribution of the variables involved in the risk assessment, strongly influence exposure estimations and hence risks. Taking into account spatial variability is increasingly being recognized as a further and essential step in sound exposure and risk assessment. To address this issue an innovative methodology which integrates spatial analysis and a relative risk approach was developed. The purpose of this methodology is to prioritize sites at regional scale where a preliminary site investigation may be required. The methodology aimed at supporting the inventory of contaminated sites was implemented within the spatial decision support sYstem for Regional rIsk Assessment of DEgraded land, SYRIADE, and was applied to the case-study of the Upper Silesia region (Poland). The developed methodology and tool are both flexible and easy to adapt to different regional contexts, allowing the user to introduce the regional relevant parameters identified on the basis of user expertise and regional data availability. Moreover, the used GIS functionalities, integrated with mathematical approaches, allow to take into consideration, all at once, the multiplicity of sources and impacted receptors within the region of concern, to assess the risks posed by all contaminated sites in the region and, finally, to provide a risk-based ranking of the potentially contaminated sites.     

Seasonal and spatial variability of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in vegetation and cow milk from a high altitude pasture in the Italian Alps

The seasonal and spatial variability of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in vegetation and cow milk was studied in a high altitude pasture in the Alps (1900 m a.s.l.). PCB contamination in vegetation shows a concentration peak in June, which is mainly interpreted as the consequence of a temporary PCB enrichment of the air layer above the ground due to net emission fluxes from the soil. A three compartment dynamic model was developed to test this hypothesis. The North/South enrichment factor in the vegetation was 1.5-1.6 for penta- and hexa-substituted congeners and 1.7 for hepta- and octa-PCBs, according to the effect of temperature on compounds having higher K_oa values. Milk concentrations followed the vegetation seasonal trend. The congener abundance in milk is in agreement with the biotransformation susceptibility, absorption efficiency and residence time of the different congeners in dairy cows.