基于新常态下环境监察执法的难点和重点分析

随着社会经济的发展和人民生活水平的日益提高,广大人民对环境的要求也达到了一个新的高度。在新常态下,如何加强环境监察执法力度与效率、高效解决环境问题、改善生态环境,成为普遍关注的问题。本文从当下环境监察执法工作中的重点与难点出发,分析了新常态下的环境局势,并给出了几点新常态背景下高效开展环境监察执法工作的措施,以期能够改进环境监察执法现状,促进环境问题的早日解决。     

环境污染治理工程管理对策分析

随着环境问题的日益突出,环境保护以及环境治理越来越迫切,由于造成环境污染问题的因素特别多,在对污染原因没有明确了解的情况下,盲目的着手进行环境污染治理工作,将会很难达到预期的治理效果。因此,作者从环境污染治理工程管理入手,进一步探索导致环境污染问题日益严重的根本原因,并详细分析加强环境污染治理工程管理的有效方略,旨在提高我国环境污染治理工程管理水平。     

Chemical Controversy: Canadian and US News Coverage of the Scientific Debate about Bisphenol A

This study analyzes how newspapers covered the scientific controversy surrounding the health effects of exposure to Bisphenol A (BPA). Specifically, it examines whether framing, sources of scientific information, and balancing of competing sides in the debate differed across national political contexts and journalistic approaches. In regard to the former, it compares coverage in Canada (represented by the Globe and Mail), which had banned BPA in baby bottles and cups, to coverage in the United States (represented by the New York Times and Washington Post), which had not. In regard to the latter, it compares coverage in two US newspapers that took a conventional journalistic approach (the New York Times and Washington Post) to coverage in a US newspaper that launched an investigative series regarding BPA (the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel). The study concludes by considering what the findings suggest about how social forces shape coverage of scientific controversies involving environmental issues.     

Personae and Natural Capitalism: Negotiating Politics and Constituencies in a Rhetoric of Sustainability

This essay critiques natural capitalism, a concept developed as a strategic response to the antagonism of capitalist production and the ideology of sustainability. I trace and critique the second and third personae of the book Natural Capitalism. The second persona of natural capitalism constitutes already dominant capitalists and technocrats as the constituency best prepared to meet the exigencies of sustainability. Simultaneously, civil society and non-propertied classes constitute a marginalized third persona whose interests can be satisfied only if aligned with those of the second persona. This precarious arrangement is possible due to the non-ideological representation of natural capitalism. I argue that such a representation is misleading. Criticism of the tensions between natural capitalism's personae suggests radical potential for environmental rhetoric.     

The Flood Myth in the Age of Global Climate Change

When released, The Day After Tomorrow was widely described by critics and the movie's creators as a pro-environmentalist film. This essay argues that The Day After Tomorrow articulates a variation of apocalyptic discourse identified as a flood myth. The authors conclude that this version of the flood myth largely undermines contemporary environmental discourse that attempts to generate public activism in addressing ecological problems, by replacing an emphasis on human efficacy with symbolic vindication and exchanging collective effort for individual survivalism. The film thus serves as a cautionary tale about the potential consequences of contemporary mythic discourse presented as supporting environmental activism.     

Willingness to pay and demand elasticities for two national parks: empirical evidence from two surveys in Pakistan

Using survey-based data approach for modeling the demand for environmental goods/resources, this study estimates income and price elasticities of demand for improved environmental quality of two National Parks in Northern Pakistan. The study uses data from two studies. The estimates indicate that improved environmental quality effects can be described as a luxury and an ordinary and price elastic service. Confidence intervals show however that the classification as a luxury is not statistically significant. Income elasticities of willingness to pay are estimated for a broad range of environmental services. The study finds that income and willingness to pay vary directly and significantly. The elasticity estimates, in general, are greater than zero, but less than unity. The study concludes that environmental improvements are more beneficial to low-income groups than for high-income groups.

Secondary arsenic minerals in the environment: A review

Information on arsenic (As) speciation in solid materials is critical for many environmental studies concerned with As stability and/or mobility in natural As-impacted soils and mining or industrial sites contaminated by As. The investigation of these systems has provided evidence for a number of secondary As minerals that have often played a significant role in As mobility in the solid phase–water system. This paper presents a list of environmentally important secondary As minerals in contaminated soil and waste systems, summarizes the information about their origin, occurrence, environmental stability and thermodynamics, and proposes several important avenues for further investigation.     

Connecting the Dots: Public Engagement with Environmental Data

Air pollution and other environmental hazards are often imperceptible and need to be made publicly visible. The paper argues for the importance of visualizations in drawing public attention to imperceptible hazards and in providing the public with access to empirical data describing the risks. It also argues for critical inquiry into hazards’ selective visibility as it is produced by visualizations. The impact of visualizations and their selective visibility are considered through the example of a public art project called Particle Falls installed in 2014 in Pittsburgh, a city with a long history of both ignoring air pollution and working to ameliorate this problem. I examine the impact and selective visibility of Particle Falls by considering the underlying production of data, as well as context and support systems for this visualization, and by comparing it with other visualizations of local air quality.     

自然资源、技术进步与环境库兹涅茨曲线

不可再生自然资源的约束和环境质量的不断恶化是经济可持续发展必须要面对的挑战。就环境问题而言,现实中一个特征事实是,在不同的收入水平下人们对环境质量的需求不同,只有当收入达到一定水平之后,人们才会注重生活质量的改善。基于现有研究,在考虑非再生自然资源的约束条件下,本研究将环境质量作为生产要素的一部分引入最优增长理论的分析框架,探讨了在环境污染和自然资源双重约束下的长期经济增长问题。在非再生自然资源和环境污染的双重约束下,本研究表明解决环境问题必须要采用的手段是促使技术进步的创新研发,因为技术进步是环境库兹涅茨曲线出现拐点的不可或缺的一个必要条件。在市场竞争的环境下,由于知识的非竞争性质使得研究部门的研究是次优的。因此,政府应当通过适当的财政政策和法制安排以激励私人投资者研究与开发新技术的积极性。     

广东省土地资源可持续利用评价研究

基于广东省城市化进程中土地资源利用之特点，利用熵权技术和线性加成技术建立了广东省土地资源可持续利用的评价体系，并对广东省1992～2002年期间土地利用的基本状况进行了实证分析，研究表明：广东省土地资源利用状况从总体上看是趋好的，在经历了1992～1995年的弱可持续之后，目前已进入良性发展阶段，其经济指标和社会指标均处于良好发展势头．但资源和环境指标在2000年后呈明显下滑趋势。这应该引起政府及有关部门高度重视。