Modelling forest management within a global vegetation model—Part 2: Model validation from a tree to a continental scale

The construction of a new forest management module (FMM) within the ORCHIDEE global vegetation model (GVM) allows a realistic simulation of biomass changes during the life cycle of a forest, which makes many biomass datasets suitable as validation data for the coupled ORCHIDEE-FM GVM. This study uses three datasets to validate ORCHIDEE-FM at different temporal and spatial scales: permanent monitoring plots, yield tables, and the French national inventory data. The last dataset has sufficient geospatial coverage to allow a novel type of validation: inventory plots can be used to produce continuous maps that can be compared to continuous simulations for regional trends in standing volumes and volume increments. ORCHIDEE-FM performs better than simple statistical models for stand-level variables, which include tree density, basal area, standing volume, average circumference and height, when management intensity and initial conditions are known: model efficiency is improved by an average of 0.11, and its average bias does not exceed 25%. The performance of the model is less satisfying for tree-level variables, including extreme circumferences, tree circumference distribution and competition indices, or when management and initial conditions are unknown. At the regional level, when climate forcing is accurate for precipitation, ORCHIDEE-FM is able to reproduce most productivity patterns in France, such as the local lows of needleleaves in the Parisian basin and of broadleaves in south-central France. The simulation of water stress effects on biomass in the Mediterranean region, however, remains problematic, as does the simulation of the wood increment for coniferous trees. These pitfalls pertain to the general ORCHIDEE model rather than to the FMM. Overall, with an average bias seldom exceeding 40%, the performance of ORCHIDEE-FM is deemed reliable to use it as a new modelling tool in the study of the effects of interactions between forest management and climate on biomass stocks of forests across a range of scales from plot to country.     

On-road and simulated driving: concurrent and discriminant validation

Introduction

A converging pair of studies investigated the validity of a simulator for measuring driving performance/skill.

Study 1

A concurrent validity study compared novice driver performance during an on-road driving test with their performance on a comparable simulated driving test.

Results

Results showed a reasonable degree of concordance in terms of the distribution of driving errors on-road and errors on the simulator. Moreover, there was a significant relationship between the two when driver performance was rank ordered according to errors, further establishing the relative validity of the simulator. However, specific driving errors on the two tasks were not closely related suggesting that absolute validity could not be established and that overall performance is needed to establish the level of skill.

Study 2

A discriminant validity study compared driving performance on the simulator across three groups of drivers who differ in their level of experience - a group of true beginners who had no driving experience, a group of novice drivers who had completed driver education and had a learner's permit, and a group of fully licensed, experienced drivers.

Results

The findings showed significant differences among the groups in the expected direction -- the various measures of driving errors showed that beginners performed worse than novice drivers and that experienced drivers had the fewest errors. Collectively, the results of the concurrent and discriminant validity studies support the use of the simulator as a valid measure of driving performance for research purposes.

Impact on industry

These findings support the use of a driving simulator as a valid measure of driving performance for research purposes. Future research should continue to examine validity between on-road driving performance and performance on a driving simulator and the use of simulated driving tests in the evaluation of driver education/training programs.     

Techno-economic characteristics of wastewater treatment plants retrofitted from the conventional activated sludge process to the membrane bioreactor process

• Retrofitting from CAS to MBR increased effluent quality and environmental benefits. • Retrofitting from CAS to MBR increased energy consumption but not operating cost. • Retrofitting from CAS to MBR increased the net profit and cost efficiency. • The advantage of MBR is related to the adopted effluent standard. • The techno-economy of MBR improves with stricter effluent standards. While a growing number of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are being retrofitted from the conventional activated sludge (CAS) process to the membrane bioreactor (MBR) process, the debate on the techno-economy of MBR vs. CAS has continued and calls for a thorough assessment based on techno-economic valuation. In this study, we analyzed the operating data of 20 large-scale WWTPs (capacity≥10000 m³/d) and compared their techno-economy before and after the retrofitting from CAS to MBR. Through cost-benefit analysis, we evaluated the net profit by subtracting the operating cost from the environmental benefit (estimated by the shadow price of pollutant removal and water reclamation). After the retrofitting, the removal rate of pollutants increased (e.g., from 89.0% to 93.3% on average for NH₃-N), the average energy consumption increased from 0.40 to 0.57 kWh/m³, but the operating cost did not increase significantly. The average marginal environmental benefit increased remarkably (from 0.47 to 0.66 CNY/g for NH₃-N removal), leading to an increase in the average net profit from 19.4 to 24.4 CNY/m³. We further scored the technical efficiencies via data envelopment analysis based on non-radial directional distance functions. After the retrofitting, the relative cost efficiency increased from 0.70 to 0.73 (the theoretical maximum is 1), while the relative energy efficiency did not change significantly. The techno-economy is closely related to the effluent standard adopted, particularly when truncating the extra benefit of pollutant removal beyond the standard in economic modeling. The modeling results suggested that MBR is more profitable than CAS given stricter effluent standards.     

Effects of experimental protocol on global vegetation model accuracy: A comparison of simulated and observed vegetation patterns for Asia

Prognostic vegetation models have been widely used to study the interactions between environmental change and biological systems. This study examines the sensitivity of vegetation model simulations to: (i) the selection of input climatologies representing different time periods and their associated atmospheric CO₂ concentrations, (ii) the choice of observed vegetation data for evaluating the model results, and (iii) the methods used to compare simulated and observed vegetation. We use vegetation simulated for Asia by the equilibrium vegetation model BIOME4 as a typical example of vegetation model output. BIOME4 was run using 19 different climatologies and their associated atmospheric CO₂ concentrations. The Kappa statistic, Fuzzy Kappa statistic and a newly developed map-comparison method, the Nomad index, were used to quantify the agreement between the biomes simulated under each scenario and the observed vegetation from three different global land- and tree-cover data sets: the global Potential Natural Vegetation data set (PNV), the Global Land Cover Characteristics data set (GLCC), and the Global Land Cover Facility data set (GLCF). The results indicate that the 30-year mean climatology (and its associated atmospheric CO₂ concentration) for the time period immediately preceding the collection date of the observed vegetation data produce the most accurate vegetation simulations when compared with all three observed vegetation data sets. The study also indicates that the BIOME4-simulated vegetation for Asia more closely matches the PNV data than the other two observed vegetation data sets. Given the same observed data, the accuracy assessments of the BIOME4 simulations made using the Kappa, Fuzzy Kappa and Nomad index map-comparison methods agree well when the compared vegetation types consist of a large number of spatially continuous grid cells. The results of this analysis can assist model users in designing experimental protocols for simulating vegetation.     

Evaluation of ecological network analysis: Validation of output

Ecological network analysis (ENA) is a modeling approach increasingly being used to evaluate food webs and provide an ecosystem-based approach to resource management. Unfortunately, validation of ENA output is rarely performed. This study represents part of a larger effort to critically evaluate ENA. Here we validate ENA output using stable isotope analysis (SIA), and where validation is not met, determine the effects of modifying trophic networks to reflect validation.     

基于GIS技术开发的DSS系统数据结构设计

“省级环境决策支持系统”是以GIS为基础,以模型方法为驱动的环境信息系统,其中涉及的环境信息具有数量巨大和门类繁多的特点。该文探讨了设计此系统空间数据和属性数据结构所遵循的基本原则和基本方法。      

电磁兼容领域的数值分析方法及其有效性验证

阐述了电磁兼容领域内的数值分析方法所能够解决的主要问题,介绍了几种重要的数值分析方法的核心思想,并说明了各种方法的适用范围和发展方向。对如何验证数值模型的有效性进行了分析,提出了灵活、有效的验证方法。对数值分析方法在建立系统,设备或器件的数学模型方面进行了有益地探索。     

不同水分管理方式下水稻生长季N_2O排放量估算:模型验证和输入参数检验

利用2005～2007年我国稻田N2O排放通量的田间原位测定资料和国际上其它地区稻田N2O报道结果,对作者建立的不同水分管理方式下水稻生长季N2O排放估算模型进行了验证.结果表明,持续淹水稻田N2O排放的拟合结果与其他地区淹水稻田N2O通量值相一致.淹水-烤田-淹水的水分管理方式下,稻田N2O排放的拟合值接近于国际上同类研究结果.淹水-烤田-淹水-湿润灌溉的水分管理方式下,稻田N2O排放的估算模型对田间原位测定资料有很好的适切性.为了检验模型输入参数的可信度,将本研究建立的有关我国水稻生产的相关资料数据库与以往研究报道结果进行了比较,结果表明,两者具有高度的一致性.数据库资料表明,在20世纪50～70年代间,持续淹水稻田占20%～25%,大约75%～80%的稻田采用淹水-烤田-淹水的水分管理方式.在20世纪80～90年代间,采用持续淹水,淹水-烤田-淹水和淹水-烤田-淹水-湿润灌溉水分管理方式的稻田分别约占12%～16%、77%和7%～12%.20世纪50年代水稻生长季平均每季总施氮量为87.49 kg·hm-2,而90年代平均为224.64 kg·hm-2.其中,化学氮肥的施用量从20世纪50年代的37.4 kg·hm-2增加到了90年代的198.8 kg·hm-2,分别占水稻生长季氮输入总量的43%和88%.在20世纪50～70年代间有机氮的输入量相对比较稳定,平均变幅在45.2～48.2 kg·hm-2之间,随后逐步降低,有机肥料氮占氮输入总量的比例从20世纪50年代的52%降低到了90年代的9%.作物残体N输入量从20世纪50年代的4.9 kg·hm-2增加到了80年代的6.3 kg·hm-2.20世纪50～70年代水稻生长季氮肥施用量具明显的空间变异性,而80～90年代间其空间变异较小.模型验证和输入参数检验的结果表明,该模型能较好地模拟我国不同水分管理方式下的稻田N2O直接排放量.     

TRMM降水数据在东北地区的精度验证与应用

利用东北地区2000-2007 年的APHRODITE降水数据,基于GWR方法对TRMM降水数据进行修正,分析新的TRMM降水数据精度,并基于修正的TRMM降水数据对东北地区降水进行时空分布特征分析.结果表明:①APHRODITE降水数据与观测数据之间的线性相关性更高、均方根误差RMSE更小,数据具有较高的精度;②修正后的TRMM降水数据相关系数R有所提高,且RMSE值均有降低.整体来看,TRMM降水数据的降水量数值偏大于观测值;③修正TRMM降水数据在5-10 月的误差相对较小,整体来看,在大部分区域的误差在0~30%之间;④东北地区降水分布极不均匀,整体呈从东南向西北减少趋势.11 月到翌年3 月的降水稀少,降水主要集中在夏季,其中7月降水量最大.     

Assessing farming eco-efficiency: a Data Envelopment Analysis approach

This paper assesses farming eco-efficiency using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) techniques. Eco-efficiency scores at both farm and environmental pressure-specific levels are computed for a sample of Spanish farmers operating in the rain-fed agricultural system of Campos County. The determinants of eco-efficiency are then studied using truncated regression and bootstrapping techniques. We contribute to previous literature in this field of research by including information on slacks in the assessment of the potential environmental pressure reductions in a DEA framework. Our results reveal that farmers are quite eco-inefficient, with very few differences emerging among specific environmental pressures. Moreover, eco-inefficiency is closely related to technical inefficiencies in the management of inputs. Regarding the determinants of eco-efficiency, farmers benefiting from agri-environmental programs as well as those with university education are found to be more eco-efficient. Concerning the policy implications of these results, public expenditure in agricultural extension and farmer training could be of some help to promote integration between farming and the environment. Furthermore, Common Agricultural Policy agri-environmental programs are an effective policy to improve eco-efficiency, although some doubts arise regarding their cost-benefit balance.