Guidelines and Techniques for Improving the NEPA Process

/ The Council on Environmental Quality's (CEQ's) principal aims in implementing the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) are (1) to reduce paperwork, (2) to avoid delay, and most importantly (3) to produce better decisions that protect, restore, and enhance the environment. This paper presents four strategies for improving the NEPA process along with tools that can be used to implement each strategy. The tools include guidelines for project management and problem definition, tips for acquiring existing information and identifying issues of public concern, worksheets on how to identify and analyze potential impacts on resources, ideas for enhancing NEPA documents, and a NEPA process checklist. The tools can be used at various stages of the NEPA process and provide a toolbox of guidelines and techniques to improve implementation of the NEPA process by focusing the pertinent information for decisionmakers and stakeholders. KEY WORDS: National Environmental Policy Act; NEPA; Environmental impact assessment; Ecosystem management     

Evaluating Ecosystem Management Capabilities at the Local Level in Florida: Identifying Policy Gaps Using Geographic Information Systems

Because ecosystem approaches to management adhere to ecological systems rather than human-defined boundaries, collaboration across jurisdiction, agencies, and land ownership is often necessary to achieve effective management of transboundary resources. Local natural resource and land use planners increasingly recognize that while ecosystem management requires looking beyond specific jurisdictions and focusing on broad spatial scales, the approach will partly be implemented at the local level with the coordination of local policies across larger landscapes. This article evaluates the collective capabilities of local jurisdictions to manage large transboundary ecological systems in Florida. Specifically, it combines plan evaluation with geographic information systems (GIS) techniques to map, measure, and analyze the existing mosaic of management across selected ecosystems in the southern portion of the State. Visual and statistical results indicate significant gaps in the management framework of southern Florida that, if filled, could achieve a greater level of consistency and more complete coverage of ecosystem management policies. Based on the spatial distribution of 58 ecosystem management indicators, notable gaps persist in the southwest coast, southeast coast, and central Everglades ecosystems, particularly for wildlife corridors and collaboration with neighboring jurisdictions. We also test for spatial autocorrelation of ecosystem planning scores and find that local jurisdictions with strong ecosystem management capabilities tend to cluster within specific ecosystems. Based on the findings, we make recommendations on how and where local plans can be strengthened to more effectively attain the objectives of ecosystem approaches to management.     

工业企业厂界噪声监测几个问题的探讨

针对现行的《工业企业厂界噪声测量方法》(GBl2349—90)在实际应用存在的一些问题进行分析与探讨,并提出解决这些问题的方法与建议。     

Estimated heavy metal emissions to the atmosphere due to projected changes in the Brazilian energy generation matrix

An estimate of heavy metals emissions to the atmosphere due to the projected changes in the Brazilian energy generation fuel matrix is presented. Present use of fossil fuel combustion for energy production is projected to increase from the present 14.5% to 29.6% of the total energy generation in Brazil in 2005. Most of this increase will be based on coal- and natural-gas-burning plants. The changes will result in an increase of about 100% in the average emissions (in tons year⁻¹) of As (9.4 to 17.7), Cr (7.0 to 16.6) and Hg (2.4 to 4.1), 50% of Cd (1.2 to 1.8), and 20% of Ni (101 to 123) and Pb (23.3 to 29.9). Although relatively small for most heavy metals when compared to other industrial sources, the changes in the energy matrix will be particularly important for Hg, reaching a maximum emission of 12 tons (t) year⁻¹, representing 15% of the total emissions of Hg to the atmosphere in Brazil. The use of Brazilian coals and the location of most coal-burning plants in a relatively small region in the south of the country strongly suggest that monitoring programs should be implemented during the building of the new plants. At a regional level the expected increase in Hg emissions to the atmosphere due to coal burning in Brazil, although small relative to North America and Europe, will equal the total amount estimated for South and Central America.     

Public support for ecosystem restoration in the Hudson River Valley,USA

We applied the Theory of Planned Behavior to help understand the relationships between environmental beliefs, support for ecosystem restoration actions, and willingness to pay (WTP) for restoration and protection goals in the Hudson River estuary, New York State, USA. We conducted a mail survey with 3,000 randomly-chosen local residents of the Hudson River estuary in the fall of 1999. As hypothesized, the broad ecosystem restoration goals of the Hudson River Estuary Action Plan were more strongly supported than the corresponding specific implementation actions. We found that beliefs and past behavior were better explanatory variables than sociodemographic characteristics for explaining people's support for ecosystem restoration actions and WTP for restoration and protection goals. Because ecosystem restoration goals appear to be more generally acceptable than specific restoration actions, proponents of restoration programs should not become complacent about the need for active public outreach and involvement even if initial restoration program discussions have been low in controversy. Efforts to assess and foster support for ecosystem restoration should be targeted toward audiences identified on the basis of beliefs and past behaviors rather than on sociodemographic characteristics.     

Fuzzy assessment of land suitability for scientific research reserves

Evaluating the characteristics of a set of sites as potential scientific research reserves is an example of land suitability assessment. Suitability in this case is based upon multiple criteria, many of which can be linguistically imprecise and often incompatible. Fuzzy logic is a useful method for characterizing imprecise suitability criteria and for combining criteria into an overall suitability rating. The Ecosystem Management Decision Support software combined a fuzzy logic knowledge base we developed to represent the assessment problem with a GIS database providing site-specific data for the assessment. Assessment of sites as a potential natural reserve for the new University of California campus at Merced demonstrates the benefits of fuzzy suitability assessment. The study was conducted in three stages of successively smaller assessment regions with increasingly fine spatial resolution and specificity of criteria. Several sites were identified that best satisfy the suitability criteria for a reserve to represent vernal pool habitat.     

SO2 Dispersion and Monthly Evaluation of the Industrial Source Complex Short-Term (ISCST32) Model at Mina Al-Fahal Refinery,Sultanate of Oman

Modeling of air pollutant dispersion has been undertaken for emissions of sulfur dioxide (SO₂) at the Mina Al-Fahal refinery in the Sultanate of Oman. The study was conducted during the period of November 1999 to October 2000. The Industrial Source Complex Short-Term (ISCST32) air pollution model was adopted to predict the ground level concentration of SO₂ in and around the refinery. The modeling results were validated against measured data during the study period. The comparison, based on the monthly average measurements, showed that the model underestimates the observed SO₂ concentrations. However, the predicted ground level concentrations of SO₂ during the months of September, October, November, and June were in better agreement with the observations. The predicted SO₂ values are presented in the form of concentration contours to determine the spatial distribution of SO₂ and to assess the impact on air quality over the survey area. Predicted SO₂ concentrations were found lower than the World Health Organisation (WHO) guideline value of 365 μg/m³, with the maximum ground level concentrations being found to occur relatively close to the sources of emission. Moreover, concentration contour patterns for the modeled area vary with changes in meteorological conditions. On the basis of this study, the refinery is not likely to cause any significant deterioration in air quality, and predicted concentrations of SO₂ are well below those likely to influence health.     

中国的污水处理与水环境管理政策

中国已建有420座污水处理厂,城市污水处理率达30％以上。但污水处理任务仍很艰巨,必须采取加强工业污染防治,建设大批新的污水处理厂和控制面源污染等对策。     

水力侵蚀对路基表面稳定性的影响研究

通过降雨试验和天然降雨水土流失调查 ,笔者首先探讨了风化花岗岩地区路基表面水力侵蚀的表现形式和规律 ,其中 ,基床表层已填筑级配碎石的易于发生级配碎石粗粒化 ,未填筑级配碎石的易于发生沟蚀 ;裸露的路堤边坡水力侵蚀发生发展规律一般为 :沟蚀→边坡滑坍 ;裸露的路堑边坡水力侵蚀发生发展规律一般为 :溅蚀→面蚀→沟蚀→坍塌 ;片石护坡的路堤和路堑边坡易于发生潜蚀。然后分析了水力侵蚀对路基表面稳定性的影响 ,认为溅蚀和面蚀对路基表面稳定性的影响较小 ;沟蚀对路堤边坡表面稳定性的影响程度随侵蚀程度和工程进度具体情况而定。最后 ,提出了施工期路基表面防护的建议     

基于GIS工业危险源和隐患控制及应急调控技术的应用研究

笔者把面向对象方法及地理信息系统 (GIS)的技术应用于工业危险源与隐患控制及其应急调控技术中。介绍了面向对象的工业危险源、隐患控制及应急调控地理信息系统的功能、特点、开发环境以及设计与系统实现 ,旨在研究和探索更加完善和科学的现代化安全管理模式