山东半岛北部海岸带城乡聚落扩展变化特征与驱动力分析

改革开放以来,山东半岛北部海岸带地区经济发展迅速,城乡聚落扩展明显,快速城镇化过程对区域土地利用和生态环境产生了深刻影响,因此,及时掌握城乡聚落的时空分布和变化特征对于区域可持续发展具有重要意义。论文以RS技术为主要手段,目视解译获取了研究区1986、1992和2004年3个典型时期的城乡聚落空间分布信息,并以此为基础,借助城镇扩展指数、重心、分形维数等指标,定量分析了城乡聚落的扩展特征,进一步探讨了扩展变化的影响因素。结果表明,研究时段内,城乡聚落扩展明显,其重心表现出从东南向西北转移的态势,并且扩展随意性非常大。在此基础上,进一步探讨了地区GDP、人口城市化率和固定资产投资等社会经济因素对城乡聚落扩展的影响。     

How environmental management driving forces affect environmental and economic performance of SMEs: a study in the Northern China district

Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) form the core of societal and economic development. However, most people query on the implementation and performance of environmental management. In this paper, the manufacturing SMEs in Northern China with different pollution levels are studied to explore the main forces (e.g., government, society, market, and enterprise itself) driving SMEs for promoting environmental management. It focuses on the correlation between environmental management and economic performance for SMEs at different pollution levels. The results show that SMEs of different pollution levels have significant differences in the relationship of driving forces and performance. First, for SMEs with high-pollution levels, social and market driving forces and government incentives are revealed having a significant effect on their environmental performance. Driving forces from within the enterprise itself and the market provide a positive effect on the economic performance, while social forces have a negative effect. Second, for SMEs with light pollution, social and market driving forces, and government assistance play a supporting role on corporate environmental performance improvement. It is also found that the driving force of the enterprise itself does not have a significant effect on the environmental performance for SMEs with different pollution levels. In addition, the environmental performance and economic performance for SMEs with high or light-pollution levels are positively correlated. Further, it shows that the environmental performance is moderately correlated with financial indices, but not significantly with the non-financial indices.     

A Spatiotemporal Analysis of Urban Growth: A Case Study for Jinan Municipality,China

Abstract

China is experiencing a process of rapid industrialization and urbanization at the cost of agricultural land and environment, particularly in the costal areas. This study takes Jinan as a case presenting a time-series analysis of urban land expansion from 313 to 2003. The results show that the urban expansion of Jinan city mainly took place in the last 100 years, especially after the economic reform in 1978. Social development and economic growth, urban population growth and migration policies were factors driving the urban land expansion. Urban sprawl resulted in a disappearance of wetlands and a great loss of agricultural land, and over-pumping of ground water that led to disappearance of the city's feature, namely “the city of springs”.     

Comparing policies to confront permit over-allocation

Instability in cap-and-trade markets, particularly with respect to permit price collapses, has been an area of concern for regulators. To that end, several policies, including hybrid price-quantity mechanisms and the newly introduced “market stability reserve” (MSR) systems, have been introduced and even implemented in some cases. I develop a stochastic dynamic model of a cap-and-trade system, parameterized to values relevant to the European Union׳s Emission Trading System (EU ETS) to analyze the performance of these policies aimed at adding stability to the system or at least at reducing perceived over-allocations of permits. Results suggest that adaptive-allocation mechanisms such as a price collar or MSR can reduce permit over-allocations and permit price volatility in a more cost-effective manner than simply reducing scheduled permit allocations. However, it is also found that the performance of these adaptive allocation policies, and in particular the MSR, are greatly affected by assumed discount rates and policy parameters.     

Procrastinating reform: The impact of the market stability reserve on the EU ETS

We study the impact of the market stability reserve (MSR) on price and emission paths of the EU ETS. From 2019 onwards, the MSR will adjust the number of allowances auctioned as a function of the size of the surplus, i.e. in times of a large surplus it shifts the issue date of allowances into the future. In a perfectly competitive allowance market the MSR only affects price and emission paths if the baseline equilibrium becomes unfeasible. If the MSR is binding, prices increase in the short run but drop in the medium run relative to the baseline. The MSR increases price variability if uncertainty over future allowance demand is resolved while there is a surplus. The long run cap is unaffected by both the MSR and overlapping climate policies. This contrasts the EU׳s objectives of improving the resilience of the EU ETS and increasing synergies with overlapping climate policies.     

Nexus security: governance, innovation and the resilient city

Nexus security is a compound mix of ideas: reconciling human needs and wants with access to multiple resources; diversity of access to those resources and services; resilience in the face of weather- and climaterelated variability; resilience likewise in the face of infrastructure failure; and the personal, individual sense of belonging. At the level of Systems Thinking there is a very close relationship between resilience in the behavior of natural (ecological) systems and resilience in the social dynamics of governance within communities, where such resilience establishes the viability of these communities over centuries, which in turn entails successful stewardship of the man-environment relationship. We use insights from this cross-system mapping — across natural, built, and human systems — to assess, first, the role of city governance in achieving nexus security (or not) and, second, the role of technological innovations in serving the same purpose. More specifically, eight principles, covering resilience and diversity of access to resources and services, are used to gauge security-enhancing features of city buildings and infrastructure. Case studies include new designs of resilient office blocks, nutrient (nitrogen and phosphorus) recovery systems for sanitation and wastewater treatment, and the reconstruction of urban parks for the provision of ecosystem services. Throughout the paper, matters of risk in the face of meteorological variability are prominent. We do not conclude, however, that the presence of risk implies nexus insecurity.     

On water security, sustainability, and the water-food-energy-climate nexus

The role of water security in sustainable development and in the nexus of water, food, energy and climate interactions is examined from the starting point of the definition of water security offered by Grey and Sadoff. Much about the notion of security has to do with the presumption of scarcity in the resources required to meet human needs. The treatment of scarcity in mainstream economics is in turn examined, therefore, in relation to how each of us as individuals reconciles means with ends, a procedure at the core of the idea of sustainable development. According to the Grey-Sadoff definition, attaining water security amounts to achieving basic, single-sector water development as a precursor of more general, self-sustaining, multi-sectoral development. This is consistent with the way in which water is treated as “first among equals”, i.e. privileged, in thinking about what is key in achieving security around the nexus of water, food, energy and climate. Cities, of course, are locations where demands for these multiple resource-energy flows are increasingly being generated. The paper discusses two important facets of security, i.e., diversity of access to resources and services (such as sanitation) and resilience in the behavior of coupled human-built-natural systems. Eight quasi-operational principles, by which to gauge nexus security with respect to city buildings and infrastructure, are developed.     

湖南省耕地动态变化及驱动力研究

利用湖南省各地、市近50年长序列耕地统计数据,近10多年土地利用调查数据及相关社会经济资料,从湖南省土地利用结构变化、耕地的数量变化和空间变化等方面,宏观分析了湖南省耕地时空动态变化趋势和规律。应用相关分析和主成分分析相结合,定量地诊断出耕地变化的驱动因子,揭示耕地变化的驱动机制。结果表明：人口系统压力、经济发展动态和农业科技进步是影响湖南省耕地动态变化的三类主要动因。在此基础上,运用多元回归分析构建耕地变化回归模型,预测出2010年和2025年的耕地数量,并探讨未来耕地变化趋势及达到预测指标和实施区域耕地总量动态平衡的可行性,研究结果应用GIS进行了空间表达。研究内容和分析结论对湖南省农业可持续发展具有重要意义。     

我国安全生产基层执法队伍建设问题与对策

通过收集分析相关统计数据和资料,深入分析我国安全生产基层执法队伍建设现状。统计分析结果表明:专门的基层执法机构仍不健全;与基层实际执法工作需要相比,执法人员相对不足;执法人员业务素质不高;执法队伍不稳定,人员变动频繁。最后从建立人员配备标准、合理调配人员、加快监察人员专业化建设进程、落实从优待安政策等4方面,提出了相应的对策。     

Are energy efficiency standards justified?

This paper develops an analytical framework for comparing the welfare effects of energy efficiency standards and pricing policies for reducing gasoline, electricity, and nationwide carbon emissions. The model is parameterized with US data and includes key externalities in the energy/transportation sectors and possible underinvestment in energy efficiency due to “misperceptions” over energy savings. Even with large misperceptions, the extra welfare gains from complementing efficient pricing policies with energy efficiency standards are zero for reducing gasoline and 5 percent for reducing electricity. And when viewed as substitutes, these standards forgo 60 percent or more of the potential welfare gains from corresponding pricing policies. A combination of energy efficiency and emissions standards is more than three times as costly as carbon pricing when there is no misperception over energy savings, and even with large misperceptions, combining carbon pricing with gasoline/electricity taxes is better than combining it with energy efficiency standards.