The National Vegetation Classification Standard applied to the remote sensing classification of two semiarid environments

The National Vegetation Classification Standard (NVCS) was implemented at two US National Park Service (NPS) sites in Texas, the Padre Island National Seashore (PINS) and the Lake Meredith National Recreation Area (LMNRA), to provide information for NPS oil and gas management plans. Because NVCS landcover classifications did not exist for these two areas prior to this study, we created landcover classes, through intensive ground and aerial reconnaissance, that characterized the general landscape features and at the same time complied with NVCS guidelines. The created landcover classes were useful for the resource management and were conducive to classification with optical remote sensing systems, such as the Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM). In the LMNRA, topographic elevation data were added to the TM data to reduce confusion between cliff, high plains, and forest classes. Classification accuracies (kappa statistics) of 89.9% (0.89) and 88.2% (0.87) in PINS and LMNRA, respectively, verified that the two NPS landholdings were adequately mapped with TM data. Improved sensor systems with higher spectral and spatial resolutions will ultimately refine the broad classes defined in this classification; however, the landcover classifications created in this study have already provided valuable information for the management of both NPS lands. Habitat information provided by the classifications has aided in the placement of inventory and monitoring plots, has assisted oil and gas operators by providing information on sensitive habitats, and has allowed park managers to better use resources when fighting wildland fires and in protecting visitors and the infrastructure of NPS lands.     

A WATERSHED APPROACH TO ECOSYSTEM MONITORING IN DENALI NATIONAL PARK AND PRESERVE,ALASKA1

ABSTRACT: The National Park Service and the National Biological Service initiated research in Denali National Park and Preserve, a 2.4 million-hectare park in southcentral Alaska, to develop ecological monitoring protocols for national parks in the Arctic/Subarctic biogeographic area. We are focusing pilot studies on design questions, on scaling issues and regionalization, ecosystem structure and function, indicator selection and evaluation, and monitoring technologies. Rock Creek, a headwater stream near Denali headquarters, is the ecological scale for initial testing of a watershed ecosystem approach. Our conceptual model embraces principles of the hydrological cycle, hypotheses of global climate change, and biological interactions of organisms occupying intermediate, but poorly studied, positions in Alaskan food webs. The field approach includes hydrological and depositional considerations and a suite of integrated measures linking key aquatic and terrestrial biota, environmental variables, or defined ecological processes, in order to establish ecological conditions and detect, track, and understand mechanisms of environmental change. Our sampling activities include corresponding measures of physical, chemical, and biological attributes in four Rock Creek habitats believed characteristic of the greater system diversity of Denali. This paper gives examples of data sets, program integration and scaling, and research needs.     

Environmental auditing: Theory and applications

The environmental audit has become a regular part of corporate environmental management in Canada and is also gaining recognition in the public sector. A 1991 survey of 75 private sector companies across Canada revealed that 76% (57/75) had established environmental auditing programs. A similar survey of 19 federal, provincial, and municipal government departments revealed that 11% (2/19) had established such programs. The information gained from environmental audits can be used to facilitate and enhance environmental management from the single facility level to the national and international levels. This paper is divided into two sections: section one examines environmental audits at the facility/company level and discusses environmental audit characteristics, trends, and driving forces not commonly found in the available literature. Important conclusions are: that wherever possible, an action plan to correct the identified problems should be an integral part of an audit, and therefore there should be a close working relationship between auditors, managers, and employees, and that the first audits will generally be more difficult, time consuming, and expensive than subsequent audits. Section two looks at environmental audits in the broader context and discusses the relationship between environmental audits and three other environmental information gathering/analysis tools: environmental impact assessments, state of the environment reports, and new systems of national accounts. The argument is made that the information collected by environmental audits and environmental impact assessments at the facility/company level can be used as the bases for regional and national state of the environment reports and new systems of national accounts.     

浙江省灾害预防与经济协调发展的系统动态学模型

本文运用系统工程原理和系统动态学方法,构造了浙江省灾害预防与社会经济协调发展的系统动态学模型,并运用该模型对浙江省进行了初步的仿真研究,以寻求适宜的防灾政策。     

DEVELOPMENT OF A NONDEGRAIATION POLICY FOR HIGH QUALITY WATERS1

ABSTRACT: The development of a nondegradation policy for high quality waters is a complex and often controversial process. This paper discusses the development of a nondegradation policy for two components of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System. Water quality in these reaches of the Delaware River is threatened by rapid growth and development and the cumulative impacts from numerous wastewater discharges and nonpoint sources of pollution. The Delaware River Basin Commission, with assistance from its member states and the National Park Service, conducted a highly public, six-year planning process to develop a nondegradation policy that protected existing water quality without impinging upon local and state economic development objectives. The resulting non-degradation policy includes such features as numeric definitions of existing water quality and measurable change; stringent point source requirements; nonpoint source requirements including watershed planning requirements; and other water quality management policies.     

Guidelines to drawing ecologically sound boundaries for national parks and nature reserves

Ecological approaches to drawing boundaries for parks and reserves are developed, described as 15 guidelines. The five abiotic guidelines are designed with the principle objective of maintaining drainage basin integrity. The ten biotic guidelines are designed to reduce as little as possible the natural diversity of populations in both the total natural area and in the communities directly traversed by the boundary line. Three of the biotic guidelines apply to maintaining community diversity, the remainder to species diversity. These guidelines are applied to a 2500-km² potential national park in a montane environment in the southwest Yukon Territory. They were successful in generating the conclusion that boundaries in the subalpine best satisfy the guidelines in this environment.     

Forest service experience with interdisciplinary teams developing integrated resource management plans

The National Forest Management Act and National Environmental Policy Act require the use of an interdisciplinary team (ID team) to do integrated resource planning for the National Forests and the concurrent environmental analysis. A survey sent to all National Forest planning officers (82% response) reveals the composition of the ID teams used in integrated resource and land management planning. More than half the National Forests ID teams met NEPA and NFMA compositional requirements. National Forest planners recount their experiences with these ID teams. Despite frustrations with many aspects of the ID teams, the planners strongly support the idea that ID teams are an important part of the land-use planning process and think that their use leads to better National Forest integrated resource plans.     

National parks south of the border

This paper appraises, in the context of the current debate concerning national parks for Scotland, factors that may have contributed to the achievement of national park purposes in England and Wales. Voluntary support, presumptions and resources are seen as crucial to the achievement of those purposes; while the few extra powers available to the national park authorities and the plan making process are seen to be of some importance. In contrast, it is argued that the much‐debated nature of the administrative authority has had little effect on the extent to which park purposes are achieved.     

Restoring naturalness to national parks

National park resource management planning requires ecological information describing the objectives to be achieved. This information must be quantitative and unambiguous. Since most acts creating United States national parks, beginning with the Yellowstone National Park Act of 1872, specify that these parks should be maintained in a natural condition, resource management objectives for each national park must be defined in terms of quantitative standards of naturalness. Such quantitative standards of naturalness do not yet exist for any national park in the United States. Although this article focuses on US national parks, the same problem exists in national parks, reserves, and wilderness areas throughout the world. The physical evidence needed to develop quantitative standards of naturalness is rapidly disappearing because of the effects of management fires, wildfires, decomposition, successional changes, and other disturbances. Therefore, a nationwide rescue ecology program is recommended to recover as much remaining ecological information as possible before it is lost. This information is essential for developing quantitative standards to restore naturalness to national parks.     

External threats: the dilemma of resource management on the Colorado River in Grand Canyon National park,USA

The United States Congress established Grand Canyon National Park in 1919 to preserve for posterity the outstanding natural attributes of the canyon cut by the Colorado River. In some cases National Park Service attempts to maintain Grand Canyon's natural environment have been thwarted by activities outside the park. One of the most obvious external threats is Glen Canyon Dam, only 26 km upstream from the park boundary. Constructed in 1963, this gigantic dam has greatly altered the physicochemical and biological characteristics of 446 km of the Colorado River in Grand Canyon National Park. The river's aquatic ecosystem has been greatly modified through the loss of indigenous species and the addition of numerous exotics. We consider this anexotic ecosystem. The riparian ecosystem has been less modified, with addition of a few exotics and no loss of natives—this we consider anaturalized ecosystem.The great dilemma now faced by park managers is that, after 20 years of managing resources along a river controlled by Glen Canyon Dam, the Bureau of Reclamation has proposed major changes in operational procedures for the dam. Scientists and managers from the National Park Service, Bureau of Reclamation, and cooperating federal and state resource management agencies are using a systems analysis approach to examine the impacts of various Colorado River flow regimes on aquatic, riparian, and recreational parameters in the park. This approach will help in the development of management alternatives designed to permit the most efficient use of that river's natural resources without their destruction.