Development and test of a crop growth model for application within a Global Change decision support system

When examining potential impacts of Global Change on water resources on the regional scale, spatial and temporal changes in crop water and nitrogen demand are of fundamental significance. State-of-the-art crop growth models are powerful tools to assess the response of crops to altered environmental conditions and cultivation practices. In this paper, the process-based, object-oriented and generic DANUBIA crop growth model is presented. To evaluate the performance of the model, a validation analysis is carried out by comparing modelled data with various field measurements of sugar beet, spring barley, maize, winter wheat and potato crops. Model performance statistics show that crop growth is efficiently simulated. The closest agreement between measured and modelled biomass and leaf area index is achieved for sugar beet and winter wheat. Additionally, the response of the model to changed nitrogen availability caused by cultivation practices is analysed and reveals good results. The results suggest that the model is a suitable tool for numerically assessing the consequences of Global Change on biomass production, water and nitrogen demand, taking into account the complex interplay of water, carbon and nitrogen fluxes in agro-ecosystems.     

Designing environmental campaigns by using agent-based simulations: strategies for changing environmental attitudes

Agent-based computer simulation was used to create artificial communities in which each individual was constructed according to the principles of the elaboration likelihood model of Petty and Cacioppo [1986. The elaboration likelihood model of persuasion. In: Berkowitz, L. (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology. Academic Press, New York, NY, pp. 123-205]. Campaigning strategies and community characteristics were varied systematically to understand and test their impact on attitudes towards environmental protection. The results show that strong arguments influence a green (environmentally concerned) population with many contacts most effectively, while peripheral cues have the greatest impact on a non-green population with fewer contacts. Overall, deeper information scrutiny increases the impact of strong arguments but is especially important for convincing green populations. Campaigns involving person-to-person communication are superior to mass-media campaigns because they can be adapted to recipients' characteristics.     

Monitoring and assessment of wetlands using Earth Observation: the GlobWetland project

The overall objective of the Ramsar Convention, signed in 1971, is the conservation and wise use of wetlands by national action and international cooperation as a means to achieving sustainable development. This complex and challenging task requires national, local and international bodies involved in the implementation of the convention to rely on suitable geo-information to better understand wetland areas, complete national inventories, perform monitoring activities, carry out assessments and put in practice suitable management plans based on updated and reliable information. In the last years, Earth Observation (EO) technology has been revealed as a key tool and unique information source to support the environmental community in different application domains, including wetlands' conservation and management. In this context, the European Space Agency (ESA) in collaboration with the Ramsar Secretariat launched in 2003 the "GlobWetland" project in order to demonstrate the current capabilities of Earth Observation technology to support inventorying, monitoring, and assessment of wetland ecosystems. This paper collects the main results and findings of the "GlobWetland" project, providing an overview of the current capabilities and limits of EO technology as a tool to support the implementation of the Ramsar Convention. The project was carried out in collaboration with several regional, national and local conservation authorities and wetland managers, involving 50 different wetlands across 21 countries on four continents. This large range of users provided an excellent test bed to assess the potential of this technology to be applied in different technical, economic and social conditions.     

空气微生物不同高度分布情况研究

空气微生物是城市生态系统重要的生物组成部分,空气中广泛分布的细菌、真菌孢子、放线菌和病毒等生物粒子不仅具有极其重要的生态功能,还与城市空气污染,城市环境质量和人体健康密切相关。从生态系统角度出发,着重论述了城市微生物气溶胶的粒谱范围、空气微生物浓度和组成在不同高度变化的相关规律。     

Annoyance due to aircraft noise has increased over the years—Results of the HYENA study

In the HYENA study (HYpertension and Exposure to Noise near Airports) noise annoyances due to aircraft and road traffic noise were assessed in subjects that lived in the vicinity of 6 major European airports using the 11-point ICBEN scale (International Commission on Biological Effects of Noise). A distinction was made between the annoyance during the day and during the night. L_den and L_night were considered as indicators of noise exposure. Pooled data analyses showed clear exposure–response relationships between the noise level and the noise annoyance for both exposures. The exposure–response curves for road noise were congruent with the EU standard curves used for predicting the number of highly noise annoyed subjects in European communities. Annoyance ratings due to aircraft noise, however, were higher than predicted by the EU standard curves. The data supports other findings suggesting that the people's attitude towards aircraft noise has changed over the years, and that the EU standard curve for aircraft noise should be modified.     

Evaluation of the European Space Agency Climate Change Initiative Soil Moisture Product over China Using Variance Reduction Factor

In this study, we evaluated the European Space Agency Climate Change Initiative soil moisture product v02.1 (ESA CCI SM v02.1) using in situ observations collected at 547 stations in China from 1991 to 2013. A conventional validation was first conducted, and the triple collocation errors of ESA CCI SM and the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting reanalysis data were approximately 0.053 and 0.050 m³/m³, respectively. To obtain more reliable validation results, the average soil moisture of the in situ observations per ESA CCI SM pixel was also used as the validation sites. Variance reduction factor (VRF) was adopted to quantify the accuracy of the soil moisture validation sites, and the average VRF was estimated at 4.88%. The validation results were enhanced by excluding validation sites with VRF errors greater than 5% from the statistical analysis. Although the ESA CCI SM underestimated the in situ observations with a Bias of 0.05 m³/m³, a moderately high correlation coefficient of 0.44 and a relatively small unbiased root‐mean‐square difference of 0.05 m³/m³ were observed. This study provides information on the utilization of ESA CCI SM for ecological protection, climate change, and hydrological forecasting. It also suggests the adoption of VRF for future error corrections of satellite‐based products.     

Assessing the sustainability and adaptive capacity of the gooseneck barnacle co-management system in Asturias,N. Spain

The gooseneck barnacle fishery in Asturias (N. Spain) has undergone three important changes: (1) the early implementation of a co-management system based on Territorial User Rights for Fishing, (2) a change in management measures (due to a decrease in landings), and (3) an economic crisis. This has allowed us to analyze the systems’ sustainability in time through examining five critical variables: landings, effort, catch per unit effort (CPUE), mean market prices, and annual revenue. Additionally, we used focus groups and questionnaires to determine the response of the system to these three changes. Co-management has succeeded in maintaining or increasing CPUE throughout all management areas and produced stable mean market prices. This was achieved through flexible management policies and adaptive strategies adopted by the fishers, such as increased selectivity and diversification. The analysis of this fishery provides important lessons regarding the need to understand the evolutionary dynamics of co-management and the importance of embracing adaptive capacity.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s13280-015-0687-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

How Grammatical Choice Shapes Media Representations of Climate (Un)certainty

Although mass media continue to play a key role in translating scientific uncertainty for public discourse, communicators of climate science are becoming increasingly aware of their own role in shaping scientific messages in the news. As an example of how future media research can provide relevant feedback to climate communicators, the present study examines the ways in which grammatical and word choices represent and construct uncertainty in news reporting about the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Qualifying and hedging language and other “epistemic markers” are analyzed in four newspapers during 2001 and 2007: the New York Times and Wall Street Journal from the USA and El País and El Mundo from Spain. Though the US newspapers contained a higher density of epistemic markers and used more ambiguous grammatical constructs of uncertainty than the Spanish newspapers, all four media sources chose similar words when questioning the certainty around climate change. Moreover, the density of epistemic markers in each newspaper either remained the same or increased with time, despite ever-growing scientific agreement that human activities modify global climate. While the US newspapers increasingly adopted IPCC language to describe climate uncertainties, they also exhibited an emerging tendency to construct uncertainty by highlighting differences between IPCC reports or between scientific predictions and observations. The analysis thus helps identify articulations of uncertainty that will shape future media portrayals of climate science across varying cultural and national contexts.     

Sandy desertification change and its driving forces in western Jilin Province, North China

This paper investigates the sandy desertification change between 1986 and 2000 in the western Jilin province, North China. Land use and land cover data were obtained from Landsat TM data by using a supervised classification approach. We summarized the total area of desertified land by each county, as well as the area for each of the four categories of desertified land. The changes of different types of land use and land cover between 1986 and 2000 were calculated and analyzed. Taking Tongyu and Qianan as examples, both human and natural driving forces of the sandy desertification were analyzed. Our analyses indicate that the material sources and windy, warm and dry climate are the immanent causes of potential land desertification, while the irrational human activities, such as deforestation, reclaiming and grazing in the grassland, are the external causes of potential land desertification. However, rational human activities, such as planting trees and restoring grassland can reverse the land desertification process. Furthermore, the countermeasures and suggestions for the sustainable development in ecotone between agriculture and animal husbandry in North China are put forward.     

新疆伊犁州2000～2005年生态环境质量变化评价与分析

利用Landsat-5 TM遥感影像解译的土地利用数据分析了新疆伊犁州(州直辖)2000～2005年的土地利用变化,同时根据<生态环境状况评价技术规范>(试行)(HJ/T192-2006),对该区域生态环境质量状况进行综合评价,对生态环境指标变化情况进行对比分析.结果表明,2000～2005年伊犁州的生态环境质量均为一般,生态环境质量指数(E1)减少0.71.主要原因为草地面积明显减少,耕地面积明显增加.