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.     

The influence of radiopharmaceutical isotope production on the global radioxenon background

Radioxenon isotopes play a major role in confirming whether or not an underground explosion was nuclear in nature. It is then of key importance to understand the sources of environmental radioxenon to be able to distinguish them from those of a nuclear explosion.     

环境库兹涅茨曲线假说在中国的经验研究

改革开放以来,中国年均98%的经济持续增长举世瞩目,然而对经济增长所付出的环境代价却存在着诸多争议。环境库兹涅茨曲线（EKC）假说是对环境 收入关系研究的经典表述,可以直观地展现环境与收入变化的关系。在前人研究EKC时运用单一或多个单一指标测量污染程度存在缺陷的基础上,基于 1982～2006年中国6类环境污染物,用改进的熵值法计算出代表我国整体环境污染状况的环境污染指数,利用协整检验来研究中国环境库兹涅茨曲线的存在性及其“本土化”特征,发现与一般发达国家和新兴发展中国家的“倒U”型环境库兹涅茨曲线不同,中国综合环境污染模型呈“正U”型,以21世纪初为分界点,之前环境污染水平不断下降,之后环境污染又开始有所恶化;利用脉冲响应函数来考察环境污染和经济增长的互动关系,发现经济增长在追溯期内对环境污染均为正向影响,而环境污染仅在短期对经济增长有促进作用。这一研究旨在为制定符合中国国情的环境、经济政策,实现经济与环境协调发展提供理论依据.     

Design considerations for environmental sustainability in high density development: a case study of Hong Kong

This study has indicated that there is close relationship between development density and environmental quality; therefore, it is necessary to decide the form of development carefully beforehand. The form of development is shaped either by new development or urban renewal which is a major tactic nowadays adopted by the Hong Kong Government to improve the living condition of the citizens and the quality of the built environment. This study is limited to urban renewal and aims to find out the major urban design considerations for sustaining the environment. Through a questionnaire survey carried out in Hong Kong, the opinions of architects, planners, property development managers, and local citizens were sought and evaluated, and critical design factors for enhancing environmental sustainability of urban renewal projects are highlighted. The results derived from factor analysis indicated that certain design considerations should be incorporated for sustaining the urban environment. “Land Use Planning”, “Quality of Life”, “Conservation & Preservation”, “Integrated Design”, “Provision of Welfare Facilities”, and “Conservation of Existing Properties” were believed to be the significant underlying factors for achieving environmental sustainability of local urban renewal projects. Readers should send their comments on this paper to: BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue.     

Australia and Russia: How do their environmental policy processes differ?

This paper focuses on comparative review and analysis of the systems of environmental protection, national environmental strategies and fundamentals of environmental legislation in Australia and the Russian Federation. These countries have many socioeconomic similarities, such as low population densities and richness in natural resources which are largely exported. The main disparity between Australia and Russia is in the types of economy. This paper ‘continues’ the sequence of recent scholarly publications on comparison of various features of environmental policies in the countries from all over the world. Comparative analysis in this research has been based on examination of scholarly publications, legislation, government documents, mass media sources and NGO responses. The analysis has revealed a number of differences including top-down implementation of policies in Russia whereas in Australia, each State (Territory) implements policies with significant independence from the Commonwealth Government. At the same time, similarities between the countries have been identified: for example, in deficits in the budget of local environmental authorities and in the presence of contradictions in legislation at national and regional levels of government. Suggestions resulting from this analysis include further integration of sustainable development strategies at all levels of Australian government to encourage further protection of the environment and, for Russia, creating a separate Ministry of Environmental Protection. These approaches should assist facilitation of sustainable development for both nations. Readers should send their comments on this paper to: BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue.     

Environmentally compatible energy resource production—consumption pattern (case study: Iran)

Like all rapidly developing countries, the government of Iran (GOI) has to integrate environment priorities into its energy sector. In order to integrate environmental concerns into energy sector, an Energy-Environment Review (EER) may be considered as the mainstreaming tool capable of examining the interface between energy and the environment. The results of the EER should be interpreted, in the light of the objective of the 4th Five Year Development Plan in Iran, to achieve fast and sustainable growth and accelerate the transition to a market economy. In particular, the suggested actions will promote economic efficiency use of energy resources through a proper allocation of scarce resources, including environmental resources, so as to achieve economic efficiency and environmental and social protection. This paper comprises: (A) an analysis of the current situation with regards to energy production and consumption; (B) an evaluation of the growth prospects with regard to energy production and consumption; (C) the identification of environmental issues induced by the generation and use of energy and estimation of the associated costs of damages; (D) the evaluation of the extent of contribution to the climate-change phenomenon through emission of greenhouse gases; (E) the evaluation of the proposed mitigation measures for the previously identified environmental problems; and (F) conclusions and recommendations. The EER-Iran assessed the total health damage from air pollution in 2001 at about 56  ×  10¹² Rials (US $ seven billion); equivalent to 8.4% of nominal GDP. In the absence of the price reform and control policies, the EER-Iran estimated that the damage in Iran in the money of 2001, will grow to 155  ×  10¹² Rials (US $ nine billion) by 2019. This is equivalent to 10.9% of nominal GDP, i.e., a large percentage of a larger GDP. Of this total, 107  ×  10¹² Rials (US $ 8.4 billion) come from transport sector. The damage cost to the global environment from the flaring of natural gas, assessed on the basis of a carbon price of US $ 10/ton CO₂, is found to be approximately US $ 600 million per year. Readers should send their comments on this paper to: BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue.     

Evaluating the role of environmental quality in the sustainable rural economic development of England

The issue of the sustainable development of rural economies in England has recently received considerable attention. This is because many of the poorest areas in the country are rural, often of high environmental quality, but suffering from high unemployment and a lack of services and facilities. The rapid decline in agricultural incomes and in-migration of affluent urban workers since 1990 has exacerbated economic inequality in such areas. A number of factors have the potential to drive rural development and this paper applies, and considers, the feasibility of a method from the USA for combining economic and environmental variables in a regional growth model to examine the hypothesis that environmental quality is an important determinant of sustainable rural development in England. The model output suggests that, although environmental quality does play a role in sustainable rural development in England there are other, more important, factors driving development. These include business and communications infra-structure, the degree and opportunities for commuting and underlying employment prospects. The robustness and limitations of the method for combining economic and environmental variables is discussed in relation to the spatial interrelatedness of Local Authority Districts in England, and conclusions are drawn about areas for refinement and improvement of the method.

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.

Food chain transfer of cadmium and lead to cattle in a lead–zinc smelter in Guizhou, China

Cadmium (Cd) and Lead (Pb) are environmental pollutants. Environmental samples and bovine tissues were collected from the areas around a lead–zinc smelter in Guizhou, China for Cd, Pb, zinc (Zn) and copper (Cu) analysis. Cd in soil (10 mg/kg) and feed (6.6 mg/kg) from the polluted areas was 10 times higher than the Chinese Standards, resulting in higher Cd in bovine kidney (38 mg/kg) and liver (2.5 mg/kg). Pb in feed (132 mg/kg) from the polluted area was much higher than unpolluted areas, causing higher Pb levels in bovine tissues. Environmental Zn was elevated, but bovine tissue Zn was normal. Cu in bovine liver decreased with increased Cd and Pb. Metals in drinking water and in bovine muscle were within the Standard range. Thus, in the areas of this lead–zinc smelter, the environment has been contaminated with Cd and Pb, which has been transferred to cattle through the food chain.     

Moral Responsibility for Environmental Problems—Individual or Institutional?

The actions performed by individuals, as consumers and citizens, have aggregate negative consequences for the environment. The question asked in this paper is to what extent it is reasonable to hold individuals and institutions responsible for environmental problems. A distinction is made between backward-looking and forward-looking responsibility. Previously, individuals were not seen as being responsible for environmental problems, but an idea that is now sometimes implicitly or explicitly embraced in the public debate on environmental problems is that individuals are appropriate targets for blame when they perform actions that are harmful to the environment. This idea is criticized in this paper. It is argued that instead of blaming individuals for performing actions that are not environmentally friendly we should ascribe forward-looking responsibility to individuals, a notion that focuses more on capacity and resources than causation and blameworthiness. Furthermore, it is important to emphasize that a great share of forward-looking responsibility should also be ascribed to institutional agents, primarily governments and corporations. The urge to ascribe forward-looking responsibility to institutional agents is motivated by the efficiency aim of responsibility distributions. Simply put, if responsibility is ascribed to governments and corporations there is a better chance of creating a society in which the opportunities to act in an environmentally friendly way increase.