Impacts of COVID-19 on Sustainable Development Goals and effective approaches to maneuver them in the post-pandemic environment

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - In the pursuit of constructing a sustainable world for all through the instrumental seventeen Sustainable Development Goals, the COVID-19 pandemic...     

Effect of gervital in attenuating hepatotoxicity caused by methotrexate or azathioprine in adult albino rats

Environmental Science and Pollution Research - Methotrexate (MTX) and azathioprine (AZA) are chemotherapeutic, antimetabolic, and immunosuppressive agents with substantial risks such as oxidative...     

Flora biodiversity change detection: a case study

Changes in flora biodiversity are a dilemma facing managers in order to cope with challenges of extinction or endangering plant species as well as replacement by invasive species. Such problems can occur in the region as disruption of ecosystem balance. The first step of proper management of a watershed is obtaining accurate information about plant communities and their dominance and biodiversity status. Such information will help decision makers to adopt an appropriate management approach. Accordingly, the current study was conducted to detect various types of plant species in Zanjanrood Watershed. For this porous, quadrate and transect methods were applied to determine available plant species in the region. Afterwards, Shannon and Simpson’s Reciprocal indices were used to specify the biodiversity status of the identified communities. The calculation results revealed 3.19 and 5.98 for Shannon and Simpson’s Reciprocal indices, respectively. As the results suggested, there has been a downward trend in biodiversity status over the last 20 years. Such a deteriorating condition has been accelerated rise in recent years so that the non-palatable species are rapidly replaced by the palatable ones due to uncontrolled overgrazing of livestock. If management is not based on principles of sustainability in the region, the watershed will experience an extreme poverty of land cover. The findings would be so helpful to achieve an appropriate strategy in order to conserve the biodiversity in a sustainable manner.     

House dust as a source of human exposure to polybrominated diphenyl ethers in Kuwait

This study reports concentrations of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) in dust samples collected from 17 homes in Kuwait. PBDEs were measured in all homes investigated with mean summation operatorPBDEs concentration ranging from 1 to 393 ng g(-1), with a geometric mean of 76 ng g(-1). The dominant congener in all samples was BDE 209 constituting ca. 85% of the summationPBDEs followed by BDE 99 (5%), BDE 47 (4.5%), and BDE 183 (2%). The congener mixture in dust is dominated by those in deca and penta formulations. Using the measured concentrations and estimates of dust ingestion rates for children and adults, estimated human non-dietary exposure based on mean PBDE levels were 14.8 and 1.5 ng day(-1) for children and adults, respectively. The 10-fold difference in exposure estimates between children and adults in this study supports previous reports that children are at greater risk from pollutants that accumulate indoors. The ubiquitous distribution of these chemicals as noted in this study highlights the fact that we are continuously exposed to low doses of chemicals in the indoor environment.     

The hotelling valuation of natural resources: some further results

This paper tests the Hotelling Valuation Principle (HVP) for natural resources using data from oil and gas ‘pure plays’ such as royalty trusts and master limited partnerships. The results support the HVP which specifies that the value of any mineral reserve may be predicted by the market price of the resource, net of extraction costs. Regression results also indicate that a Box-Cox transformation of variables provide a better means of estimating the functional relationship between the value of an exhaustible natural resource and its market price.     

Legitimation Struggles in National Park Spaces: The Banff Bow Valley Round Table

This paper presents an in-depth analysis of a multi-stakeholder process, the Banff Bow Valley Round Table (BBVRT) convened by a federally appointed task force in 1995 to provide public input and participation in the Banff Bow Valley Study (BBVS). The purpose of this initiative was to address environmental concerns and conflict over governance, development and growth in Banff National Park, Canada. A key finding from the analysis discussed in this paper is how various participants struggled for legitimation at the negotiation table, and how the discourses of science and instrumental reason served to empower certain interests and agendas in the process. While the discursive appropriation of ecological science enabled some interests to dominate and to legitimize their concerns, this strategy may have intangible and costly consequences for consensus-based processes and for society overall. Analysis of these discursive struggles demonstrates the challenge of bringing ecology and the general public to the same negotiating table in a meaningful way. It shows the conflicting roles and identities of environmental groups who aspire to re-present nature (as a stakeholder) at the negotiating table. Recommendations for multi-stakeholder processes in planning and governance of national parks are presented, along with social implications in the context of historic human-environment dualism and conflict.     

Potential of microalgae Bio-Coke as a sustainable solid fuel alternative to coal coke

Energy and environmental issues have triggered the search for new sources of green energy alternatives in recent years. Biofuel production from renewable sources is widely considered one of the most sustainable alternatives for environmental and economic sustainability. Microalgae are currently being promoted as one of the most promising liquid biofuel feedstocks due to their rapid growth, high lipid production capacity, and carbon–neutral cycle. In this study, whole microalgae cells were utilized as raw material to produce solid biofuel, i.e., Bio-Coke, and this study aimed to investigate the possibility of microalgae Bio-Coke as an alternative to coal coke. The results show that Bio-Coke can be produced from microalgae in the temperature range of 80–100 °C. The apparent density is between 1.253 and 1.261 g/cm³, comparable to the apparent density of lignocellulosic Bio-Coke. Additionally, the calorific value is higher than the calorific value of lignocellulosic Bio-Coke and within the range of the calorific value of subbituminous coal. Therefore, microalgae Bio-Coke can be utilized to replace coal coke usage in the future.

     

Simultaneous spectrophotometric determination of crystal violet and malachite green in water samples using partial least squares regression and central composite design after preconcentration by dispersive solid-phase extraction

In this paper, a simple, fast, and inexpensive method is introduced for the simultaneous spectrophotometric determination of crystal violet (CV) and malachite green (MG) contents in aquatic samples using partial least squares regression (PLS) as a multivariate calibration technique after preconcentration by graphene oxide (GO). The method was based on the sorption and desorption of analytes onto GO and direct determination by ultraviolet–visible spectrophotometric techniques. GO was synthesized according to Hummers method. To characterize the shape and structure of GO, FT-IR, SEM, and XRD were used. The effective factors on the extraction efficiency such as pH, extraction time, and the amount of adsorbent were optimized using central composite design. The optimum values of these factors were 6, 15 min, and 12 mg, respectively. The maximum capacity of GO for the adsorption of CV and MG was 63.17 and 77.02 mg g^?1, respectively. Preconcentration factors and extraction recoveries were obtained and were 19.6, 98% for CV and 20, 100% for MG, respectively. LOD and linear dynamic ranges for CV and MG were 0.009, 0.03–0.3, 0.015, and 0.05–0.5 (μg mL^?1), respectively. The intra-day and inter-day relative standard deviations were 1.99 and 0.58 for CV and 1.69 and 3.13 for MG at the concentration level of 50 ng mL^?1, respectively. Finally, the proposed DSPE/PLS method was successfully applied for the simultaneous determination of the trace amount of CV and MG in the real water samples.     

Fog as a Fresh-Water Resource: Overview and Perspectives

The collection of fog water is a simple and sustainable technology to obtain fresh water for afforestation, gardening, and as a drinking water source for human and animal consumption. In regions where fresh water is sparse and fog frequently occurs, it is feasible to set up a passive mesh system for fog water collection. The mesh is directly exposed to the atmosphere, and the foggy air is pushed through the mesh by the wind. Fog droplets are deposited on the mesh, combine to form larger droplets, and run down passing into a storage tank. Fog water collection rates vary dramatically from site to site but yearly averages from 3 to 10 l m⁻² of mesh per day are typical of operational projects. The scope of this article is to review fog collection projects worldwide, to analyze factors of success, and to evaluate the prospects of this technology.     

Tourism and CO<Subscript>2</Subscript> emissions nexus in Southeast Asia: new evidence from panel estimation

The past decade has seen the rapid development of the tourist industry in Southeast Asia. There is increasing concern that tourism is highly affecting CO₂ emissions, but the nature of the relationship is still unclear. The main target of this paper is to investigate the existence of a linear and/or nonlinear relationship between tourism and CO₂ emissions in the five most important countries located in Southeast Asia, using the panel cointegration and pooled mean group techniques. The results indicate that tourism and CO₂ emissions are cointegrated, implying that tourism affects CO₂ emissions in the long run. Our findings support the nonlinear relationship between tourism and emissions as well as economic activities and CO₂ emissions. Accordingly, an inverted U-shaped relationship exists between tourism and emissions confirming the existence of an Environmental Kuznets Curve in the Southeast Asian tourism industry. Furthermore, the empirical results show that economic activities and energy consumption greatly increase emissions.