江苏省土壤污染重点监管单位管理现状与对策建议

与水、大气污染相比，土壤污染具有隐蔽性、滞后性、累积性等特点，污染土壤治理恢复成本高、周期长、难度大，需要强化源头防控，防患于未然。简述了我国土壤污染重点监管单位的管理要求，从环境准入期、施工期、运营期和退役期4个环节梳理了重点监管单位的管理要点，分析了江苏省土壤污染重点监管单位的管理现状和存在问题，并从强化宣传培训，实施分类分级管理，探索开展边生产边管控技术模式，提升基层监管能力等方面提出了对策建议，以期为江苏省土壤环境管理工作提供决策参考。     

关于学校化学教学实验废液量及废液管理状况的调研报告

利用基于实验内容的废液量统计方法，对北京大学、湖南大学、首都师范大学3所有代表性高校的化学实验教学中心以及3所普通高中的废液量进行了统计。得到的数据对于学校实验室废液的管理具有一定的参考价值。通过网页浏览、文献检索、实地考察、电话访谈等方式对国内一些知名大学的废液管理状况进行了考查，针对存在的主要问题，提出了进一步加强学校实验室废液管理的建议。     

Climate change impacts on irrigation water requirements in the Guadalquivir river basin in Spain

Irrigated production in the Guadalquivir river basin in Spain has grown significantly over the last decade. As a consequence, water resources are under severe pressure, with an increasing deficit between available supplies and water demand. To conserve supplies, the water authority has reduced the volume of water assigned to each irrigation district. Major infrastructural investments have also been made to improve irrigation efficiency, including the adoption of high technology micro-irrigation systems. Within a context of increasing water scarcity, climate change threatens to exacerbate the current supply-demand imbalance. In this study, the impacts of climate change on irrigation water demand have been modelled and mapped. Using a combination of crop and geographic information systems, maps showing the predicted spatial impacts of changes in agroclimate (climate variables that determine the irrigation requirements) and irrigation need have been produced. The maps highlight a significant predicted increase in aridity and irrigation need. Modelling of irrigation water requirements shows a typical increase of between 15 and 20% in seasonal irrigation need by the 2050s, depending on location and cropping pattern, coupled with changes in seasonal timing of demand.     

Local Air Quality Management policy and practice in the UK: The case for greater Public Health integration and engagement

The UK’s Local Air Quality Management (LAQM) regime is designed to protect people’s health from the ill-effects of air pollution, but it is failing to achieve its full potential. The Public Health aspects of, perspectives on, and integration and engagement in, LAQM have been poorly considered to date. This critical literature review assessed LAQM-related strengths and limitations in order to explore how Public Health, through greater integration and engagement, can add value to the regime.‘Structure’ and ‘process’ weaknesses were identified, including: a poorly defined Public Health role, a narrowly-scoped prescribed process, risk assessment uncertainties, ineffective communications, shallow evaluations and disconnected policies. Separately and cumulatively, these have hindered Public Health integration in LAQM policy and practice and stunted the regime's evolution. Engaging Public Health in LAQM future design and delivery can help solve these problems, by improving risk assessments and raising awareness of air pollution and other health-influencing relationships, targeting action in high-need areas, coordinating air pollution mitigation and health improvement interventions, and connecting different policy areas.Increasing Public Health integration and engagement in LAQM can enhance the existing regime. Acting now is timely from both LAQM and Public Health perspectives. This review's findings should be used to inform debates and decisions around the future development of Local Air Quality Management arrangements both in the UK and beyond.     

北方地区城市污水厂冬季运行管理

以沈阳市北部污水处理厂5年的实际运行管理为例,阐述北方地区城市污水处理厂冬季运行时应注意的问题及对策。     

Modelling above-ground herbage mass for a wide range of grassland community types

Whereas it is recognized that management of plant diversity can be the key to reconciling production and environmental aims, most grassland models are tailored for high-value grass species. We proposed to adapt a mono-specific grass model to take into account specific features of species-rich permanent grasslands, especially over the reproductive phase. To this end, we used the concept of plant functional type (PFT), i.e. the grouping of plant species according to plant traits determined by the response of plant species to different management practices (land use and fertilization) and characterizing of agronomic properties of the corresponding species. In the model, weather and nutrient availability act upon rates of biophysical processes (radiation capture and use, plant senescence). These rates are modified over times due to PFT-specific parameters determined experimentally which represent the different strategies of plant species regarding growth. The integration of these parameters into the model made it possible to predict herbage biomass accumulation rate under different management practices for a wide range of plant communities differing in their PFT composition. The model was evaluated in two steps, first by analyzing separately the effects of PFT and an indicator of nutrient availability on herbage accumulation and then by conducting a sensitivity analysis. It was validated using two independent datasets; a cutting experiment running over the whole growing season to examine the consistency of the model outputs under different cutting regimes, and a monitoring of meadows and pastures in spring over a whole growth cycle to assess the model’s ability to reproduce growth curves. Although a good fit was observed between the simulated and observed data, the few discrepancies noticed between field data and predicted values were attributed mainly to the potential presence of non-grass species. More specifically, we noticed that nutrient (mainly nitrogen) availability is the main driver of plant growth rate, and that PFT determines the times at which this rate changes in relation to the phenological characteristics of species present. We concluded that integration of the PFT concept into the initial mono-specific growth model is especially suited to evaluating the consequences of management practices on species-rich permanent grasslands to meet feed production targets.     

Using MCA tools for evaluating community-managed forests from a green economy perspective: lessons from Nepal

ABSTRACT

Nepal is in the process of formulating its forest policies at the provincial level . Various community-managed forests have been designed in the past by the Nepal government to decentralize the forest for its sustainable management practice. This study facilitates the process of identifying appropriate forest management options in two of the provinces, namely Provinces Three and Gandaki. Four forest management options – passive, active, scientific and multiple – were identified following the existing management practices. For the evaluation of the overall performance of the options, a framework with three criteria, 10 indicators and 28 verifiers were designed. The framework followed the green economy perspective considering the improvement of the forest conditions, economic and social well-being, and low carbon emission. The Analytical Hierarchy Process was used to prioritize the best management option and analyse trade-offs to guide future decision-making and reduce the risk of unwanted consequences. Our results show that the elicitation of preferences for the evaluation criteria varied by stakeholder groups. Their preference was largely guided by improving the forest resource condition and economic well-being. Foresters prefer scientific and active forest management, policymakers prefer multiple-use forest management and scientific management, whereas community forest user groups prefer active forest management. We argue that a scientific management approach may contribute better to economic aspects, although it may often compromise the other aspects. The multiple forest management option seems to be the best for green economy considering ecological, economic and social consequences.     

Baseline requirements can hinder trades in water quality trading programs: Evidence from the Conestoga watershed

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) are promoting point/nonpoint trading as a way of reducing the costs of meeting water quality goals. Farms can create offsets by implementing management practices such as conservation tillage, nutrient management and buffer strips. To be eligible to sell offsets or credits, farmers must first comply with baseline requirements. USEPA guidance recommends that the baseline for nonpoint sources be management practices that are consistent with the water quality goal. A farmer would not be able to create offsets until the minimum practice standards are met. An alternative baseline is those practices being implemented at the time the trading program starts, or when the farmer enters the program. The selection of the baseline affects the efficiency and equity of the trading program. It has major implications for which farmers benefit from trading, the cost of nonpoint source offsets, and ultimately the number of offsets that nonpoint sources can sell to regulated point sources. We use a simple model of the average profit-maximizing dairy farmer operating in the Conestoga watershed in Pennsylvania to evaluate the implications of baseline requirements on the cost and quantity of offsets that can be produced for sale in a water quality trading market, and which farmers benefit most from trading.     

Simple rules for ranking and optimally managing metapopulations

We present two ‘rules of thumb’ for metapopulation management. The first identifies an explicit formula for the persistence time of the population, and thus enables the population manager to form a priority species ranking by identifying those species most at risk of extinction. The second identifies an optimal management strategy that gives direction on how to alter the colonisation rate (creation or improvement of habitat corridors) and local extinction rate (restoring habitat quality or expanding habitat) in order to maximise the persistence time under a budgetary constraint. We employ a simple stochastic version of Levins (1969) metapopulation model, which is first calibrated to a more realistic spatial model. Our rules are tested on computer-generated patch networks and a model for malleefowl (Leipoa ocellata) in the Bakara region of South Australia.     

Modelling trade-offs between livestock grazing and wader conservation in a grassland agroecosystem

The objective of this study was to model the trade-offs between ecological and productive performance of a grassland agroecosystem. We developed a dynamic model linking grass dynamics controlled by livestock grazing to stochastic population dynamics of two wader bird species with high conservation value. Bird dynamics were driven by both direct and indirect effects of grazing. Viable control framework was used to predict grazing strategies ensuring production and conservation and to generate the whole trade-off curve between ecological and productive performance. Bird population size was used as an indicator of ecological performance and the total number of grazing days defined productive performance. Model results show that conciliating ecological and productive performance implies a temporal shift in grazing sequences. The best ecological performance was obtained at intermediate levels of productive performance. Without grazing or with too low a grazing intensity, it was not possible to maintain any of the bird populations due to the indirect effects of grazing on habitat quality. However, too high a level of grazing implied fast population decline for both populations due to direct negative effects of grazing on nest survival. Field data on current grazing regimes and grass height showed a low proportion of suitable fields in our case study area. This result indicates an antagonism between direct and indirect effects of grazing on wader birds, implying the need of very specific management of grassland. Our results illustrate the fact that European grasslands are anthropic habitats which are highly dependent on human activity. In such habitats, trade-off curves are not expected to be strictly decreasing or increasing.