Are people willing to pay for river water quality, contingent valuation

Now a day’s water pollution has caused incoveriences for people whom live near the Pavana river in Pune city, India. The river water quality has deteriorated by major water quality parameters like dissolved oxygen (DO), biological oxygen demand (BOD) and phosphates level. In present study it is tried to find people’s willingness to pay (WTP) for improvement of river water quality. Contingent valuation method (CVM) was utilized for valuation of river water quality in Pavana river. Five categories of users have been chosen and then interviewed: households, farmers, fishermen, washing clothes women, bath taking people. One kilometer from each side of river was covered by researchers for sampling. Mean of willingness to pay was estimated at Rs 17.6 (45 Indian Rupees=$ 1) per family per month. This research shows CVM applicablity and the importance of river quality for Pune city and can effectively be used in developing countries.     

Environmental economics of the Khangchendzonga National Park in the Sikkim Himalaya, India

A contingent valuation survey was conducted involving local community members, domestic and foreign visitors to estimate the environmental economics of the Khangchendzonga National Park and to elicit their willingness-to-pay (WTP) for its maintenance and conservation. Using a random survey, the average WTP was US$ 8.84 for foreign visitors per visit, followed by US$ 6.20 per household per year by local community members and US$ 1.91 per domestic visitor per visit for improvement in environmental conservation. The WTP was strongly influenced by age, education and income. The present study demonstrated that the contingent valuation method (CVM) is a promising approach, however it lacks inclusion of non-monetary contributions. The WTP for environmental management by the local communities was mostly in kind or time for services. The CVM can be a useful tool for decision-makers regarding investment and policy purposes for management of biodiversity hot spots and protected areas in developing countries. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Conversion relationship of rainfall-soil moisture-groundwater in Quaternary thick cohesive soil in Jianghan Plain,Hubei Province,China

The scientific field test site of rainfall-soil moisture-groundwater conversion in Dabie Mountain Area–Jianghan Plain is located in the northern region of the Jianghan Plain, the transition zone between the Dabie Mountain Area and Jianghan Plain. It’s a great field test site to study the material and energy exchange among rainfall, soil moisture, and groundwater of the Earth ’s critical zone in subtropical monsoon climate plain areas. This paper analyzed the connection between rainfall and volume water content (VWC) of soil at different depths of several soil profiles, and the dynamic feature of groundwater was discussed, which reveals the rainfall infiltration recharge of Quaternary Upper Pleistocene strata. The results show that the Quaternary Upper Pleistocene aquifer groundwater accepts a little direct rainfall recharge, while the lateral recharge is the main supplement source. There were 75 effective rainfall events among 120 rainfall events during the monitoring period, with an accumulated amount of 672.9 mm, and the percentages of effective rainfall amount and duration time were 62.50% and 91.56%, respectively. The max evaporation depth at the upper part in Quaternary cohesive soil was no less than 1.4 m. The soil profile was divided into four zones: (1) The sensitive zone of rainfall infiltration within 1.4 m, where the material and energy exchange frequently near the interface between atmosphere and soil; (2) the buffer zone of rainfall infiltration between 1.4 m and 3.5 m; (3) the migration zone of rainfall infiltration between 3.5 m and 5.0 m; and (4) the rainfall infiltration and groundwater level co-influenced zone below 5.0 m. The results revealed the reaction of soil moisture and groundwater to rainfall in the area covered by cohesive soil under humid climate in Earth ’s critical zone, which is of great theoretical and practical significance for groundwater resources evaluation and development, groundwater environmental protection, ecological environmental improvement, drought disaster prevention, and flood disaster prevention in subtropical monsoon climate plain areas.     

Dusty roads and disconnections: Perceptions of dust from unpaved mining roads in Mongolia’s South Gobi province

South Gobi province is at the center of Mongolia’s mining boom, where companies began exporting minerals over dirt-track roads in the early 2000s. This paper examines recent controversies surrounding road dust near the Oyu Tolgoi copper–gold mine, the so-called coal road from Tavan Tolgoi mines, and the Chinese border. At the time of the research, local residents, particularly nomadic herders, were concerned that dust produced from unpaved mining roads was coating the pasture, causing illnesses among livestock, and endangering their livelihoods in the region. The presence of dust rendered mining an uncomfortably intimate experience as state and corporate actors negotiated responsibility for infrastructure development. The paper builds on the concept “technologies of distantiation” to reveal the complex ways that dust from unpaved roads creates distances and disconnections between people, livelihoods, and landscapes, representing an enclosure of the pasture. Methods for the paper include interviews, focus groups, and participant observation conducted in South Gobi province and Ulaanbaatar in 2010, 2011, and 2012 as well as follow-up research carried out in spring 2015.     

山西省煤层气测井工作现状与机遇

山西省的煤层气资源量约为10.39万亿m^3,占全国总量的近1/3,其中沁水煤田和河东煤田的煤层气资源量占全省煤层气总资源量的93.4%。截至2007年底,山西省有效期内煤层气矿业权共24个,总面积25 931.65km^2。目前煤田测井队伍虽然由传统的＂老四条＂向多参数、多方法发展,并取得了较好的应用效果,但也存在测井方法少、仪器落后、解释水平低等不足。山西省是国家＂十一五＂期间煤层气地面开采的重点地区,到2010年其产能要求达到53.5亿m^3,产量达到39.5亿m^3。这将给煤田测井队伍带来新的机遇和挑战,为此应注重做好制订规范、提高研究程度、加大设备投入、加强人才培养等工作。     

沙粒不能“远走高飞”———有关“尘暴”的一条根本原理

沙与尘虽然都是岩石物理风化的产物, 但在风力作用下, 习性截然不同。拜格诺用严格的物理实验证明, 尘粒能随风远走高飞, 而沙粒却只能在地面附近跳跃前进。从北方侵袭华北平原的所谓沙尘暴, 实质上都是尘暴。对历次重大天气事件沉积物的分析, 也完全证明了这一点。因此, 尘暴物质的源头不是来自有沙, 而是有尘的地方; 从而可以使人们采取正确的治理方法。      

环渤海地区及华北平原第四纪古环境变迁机制

在青藏高原隆升背景下，环渤海地区与华北平原成为中国东部汇流盆地和堆积平原。第四纪时期阶段性河流进积，造成研究区出现构造气候旋回性的环境变迁。晚更新世以来沿海平原进入一个快速沉降阶段，在全球性冰川海平面变化叠加背景下．研究区水热对流状况以及相应的环境变迁更加剧烈和丰富。在晚全新世河流造陆过程中．河流的沉积速率超过了海平面的上升速率，陆地才得以形成。在现代海岸带依然持续构造沉降、河流输沙减少、相对海平面上升的背景下，认识不同时间尺度环境变迁机制是极其必要的。     

Threat economies and armed conservation in northeastern Central African Republic

This article, based on ethnographic and archival research in the northeastern parklands of the Central African Republic (CAR), explores the area’s history of armed conservation. Critical scholarly accounts of armed conservation practices and projects often starkly contrast the people involved in them: there are agents of the state, or state-like actors, who seek to dominate, territorialize, and discipline, often using violence to do so, and there are local populations who are dispossessed of their lands and resources without compensation and forced into new kinds of poverty, despite rhetoric and practices meant to inculcate “local participation”. The case presented here forces us to re-think these accounts. Rather than pursuing authority in the sense of expanding control over other people, people in northeastern CAR (whether putatively in favor of or opposed to conservation) are working to create and maintain access to the status of an income. To do so they engage in practices of threatening and hiding. While the means to use physical force are not equally shared, capacities to threaten and hide are widely held, and organizational and other hierarchies are unstable, making it difficult to describe any of this as a matter of domination and resistance. Expanding on literature that examines processes of green militarization (Lunstrum, 2014), the article focuses on the interactional dynamics of armed conservation to show that threats are as important as acts of physical violence, and that hiding—whether in the bush or plain sight—is critical to understanding armed conservation in an area where the state is largely seen as absent.     

基于大样本14 C测年资料的 华北平原沉积速率研究*

华北平原是我国研究程度较高的地区,历年来积累了大量的¹⁴ C测年资料。从这些资料中尽可能地提取沉积速率的信息,并进而研究华北平原沉积速率的变化及其与流域自然和人文环境变化之间的关系,是一个有重要意义的问题。利用华北平原456个地点的¹⁴ C年龄与样品埋深资料,计算出了各个样品所在层位沉积以来的平均沉积速率(R_T),以此来近似反映各地点的平原沉积速率,并据此建立了R_T随时间的变化关系。从古至今, R_T有明显的增大趋势。以点群的上包线反映各时代的平原最大沉积速率,该指标可以反映华北平原的主体即黄河下游冲积平原的沉积速率。发现了最大平均沉积速率随时间变化过程中的4个突变点,分别为10000aB.P. , 5000aB.P. , 3000aB.P. 和1400aB.P. 。4个突变点将上包线分成5条折线,由此可以将近4万年以来的变化分成5个阶段。从古至今,5条折线的斜率增大,反映了平原沉积的加速过程; 并对4个突变点的成因进行了解释。阶段1,阶段2和阶段3沉积速率的加速是由自然原因造成的; 阶段4和阶段5沉积速率的加速则是由自然和人为原因共同造成的。从456个地点的¹⁴ C年龄与样品埋深资料中提取了距今4万年以来华北平原的平均沉积速率的信息,计算出平均沉积速率为0.9mm/a。按此求出,近4万年以来华北平原的沉积总厚度为36m。     

三江平原沼泽湿地格局变化及影响因素分析

为揭示湿地变化剧烈区湿地格局变化过程及规律,利用GIS和RS技术,结合地学信息图谱与空间自相关方法,对1954-2010年三江平原沼泽湿地格局变化及其影响因素进行研究。结果表明:1954-2010年三江平原沼泽湿地面积逐渐减少,88.7%的沼泽湿地丧失,湿地斑块数量呈先增加后减少的趋势;三江平原沼泽湿地的空间聚集性逐渐降低,且空间格局由集中连片分布转变为零星散布;降雨量减少、气温升高及径流量减少,是造成沼泽湿地减少的主要原因之一,地形地貌影响到沼泽湿地的丧失程度,以海拔20~80 m的沼泽湿地面积丧失最多。三江平原沼泽湿地的丧失同时受农业开发、居民点分布、湿地保护区建设影响,距居民点越近,沼泽湿地面积丧失呈指数增加,距保护区越近,沼泽湿地面积丧失越多。     

Drought impacts on long-term hydrodynamic behavior of groundwater in the tertiary–quaternary aquifer system of Shahrekord Plain, Iran

Shortage of water resources in arid and semi-arid areas causes water supply to be one of the most important subjects and major concerns within NGO and governments’ policies in recent years. The Shahrekord Plain aquifer system is located in a semi-arid area and acts as a key source of water supply. Groundwater management in this area is thus very important. Although change in the climatological factors is not possible, long-term fluctuation studies can help in managing the available water resources to overcome from drought or decrease its negative impact. The hydrodynamic study of the aquifer system coupled with the drought indices in each region can be useful in making decisions related to the hydro-ecosystem management of that region. In this article, hydrodynamics of the aquifer system of the Shahrekord Plain coupled with the ratio of P/PET as a drought index, are assessed on the long term. In Shahrekord Plain aquifer, there is a short-term seasonal fluctuation, which is increased by overexploitation during the dry season, when water is needed for irrigation. The hydrodynamic behavior of the plain aquifer on the long term is changing. This fluctuation at first is a function of time. Secondly, it is spatially dependent. Groundwater behavior is directly sensitive to the variation of drought index, both seasonally and on the long term.     

Geological variation in S-wave velocity structures in Northern Taiwan and implications for seismic hazards based on ambient noise analysis

Ambient noise analysis in Northern Taiwan revealed obvious lateral variations related to major geological units. The empirical Green’s functions extracted from interstation ambient noise were regarded as Rayleigh waves, from which we analyzed the group velocities for period from 3 to 6 s. According to geological features, we divided Northern Taiwan into seven subregions, for which regionalized group velocities were derived by using the pure-path method. On average, the group velocities in mountain areas were higher than those in the plain areas. We subsequently inverted the S-wave velocity structure for each subregion down to 6 km in depth. Following the analysis, we proposed the first models of geology-dependent shallow S-wave structures in Northern Taiwan. Overall, the velocity increased substantially from west to east; specifically, the mountain areas, composed of metamorphic rocks, exhibited higher velocities than did the coastal plain and basin, which consist of soft sediment. At a shallow depth, the Western Coastal Plain, Taipei Basin, and Ilan Plain displayed a larger velocity gradient than did other regions. At the top 3 km of the model, the average velocity gradient was 0.39 km/s per km for the Western Coastal Plain and 0.15 km/s per km for the Central Range. These S-wave velocity models with large velocity gradients caused the seismic waves to become trapped easily in strata and, thus, the ground motion was amplified. The regionalized S-wave velocity models derived from ambient noises can provide useful information regarding seismic wave propagation and for assessing seismic hazards in Northern Taiwan.     

淮北平原浅层地下水埋深区域分布特点

利用淮北平原180个浅层地下水观测点实测埋深资料,在绘制区域多年平均地下水埋深、枯水年、丰水年地下水埋深等值线图的基础上,分析各年型浅层地下水埋深分布特点,同时对大埋深站点分布情况进行专项分析。得出淮北平原浅层地下水多年平均为2.48 m,且西北深、东南浅的分布结论,可为合理高效开发利用淮北平原浅层地下水提供一定参考。     

Groundwater resources in the North China Plain

Shallow groundwater is a major object of exploitation in the North China Plain. About 20 billion m³/yr of fresh groundwater and about 20 billion m³/yr of surface water are available. Present water demand is about equal to or exceeds the utilizable water resources in the North China Plain. Strict economy of water use is needed along with strengthened water control, a restructured development plan, and artificial recharge.     

Geochemical and mineralogical evidence for Sahara and Sahel dust additions to Quaternary soils on Lanzarote,eastern Canary Islands,Spain

Africa is the most important source of dust in the world today, and dust storms are frequent on the nearby Canary Islands. Previous workers have inferred that the Sahara is the most important source of dust to Canary Islands soils, with little contribution from the Sahel region. Soils overlying a late Quaternary basalt flow on Lanzarote, Canary Islands, contain, in addition to volcanic minerals, quartz and mica, exotic to the island’s bedrock. Kaolinite in the soils also likely has an exotic origin. Trace‐element geochemistry shows that the soils are derived from varying proportions of locally derived basalt and African dust. Major‐element geochemistry, clay mineralogy and interpretation of satellite imagery suggest that dust additions to the Canary Islands come not only from the Sahara Desert, but also from the Sahel region.     

江汉平原大气污染源分析

通过选择不同的环境功能区布置大气干湿沉降样点,分析重金属污染元素和有机氯农药的颗粒态与溶解态指标,计算季沉降通量和年沉降总量,了解其随季节变化的规律,分析比较不同地貌条件、不同城市及不同污染源区对其沉降的源贡献。结果表明:大气对江汉平原重金属的输入途径以降水为主;重金属元素颗粒物在平原区的沉降通量略高于岗丘地区;武汉市高于其他城市;工业污染源区明显高于一般农田区;三类污染源区相比,颗粒态为烟尘>化工尘>交通尘,溶解态为化工尘>交通尘>烟尘(个别元素除外),且大气降水中的营养元素N、K、Fe在化工工业区较为富集,而P的沉降在烟尘和化工工业区则受到一定程度的抑制。两种主要有机氯农药不同异构体间的组分关系表明本区环境中近期仍有林丹输入。     

山东鲁北平原地下水资源与可持续利用

鲁北平原目前区内供水水源以黄河客水和地下水为主。最新均衡计算结果为:浅层地下水开采资源量37 03×108m3 a,深层地下水开采资源量2 62×108m3 a。据山东省水资源可持续利用总体规划报告,现状年需水量约74×108m3 a,2010年需水量为93×108m3 a,2030年需水量为109×108m3 a,现状年供需基本平衡,远景供水不足。浅层地下水易采易补,更新能力强,应以合理调控水位为中心,优先开采浅层地下水,充分发挥浅层地下水资源的供水功能,尤其是东阿—齐河—商河—利津沿黄地区更应加强开发浅层水的力度。浅层水为可持续利用的地下水资源量。深层地下水更新能力弱,应严格限制其开发利用。在德州、滨州漏斗中心区,建议实施部分封井,调减开采量。实行地表水与地下水联合调度,优化水资源开发结构,适当增加地表水引用量,实施含水层的恢复工程,遏制地面沉降等环境问题的继续发展,走全面、协调、可持续发展的路子。     

鲁北平原第四纪沉积特征及地面沉降模式分析

地面沉降地质灾害在鲁北平原发展日益严重,制约着重大工程建设和社会经济发展。本文通过分析区内第四纪沉积展布特征,结合二等水准测量数据和分层沉降标数据与地面沉降规律,揭示鲁北平原区地面沉降机理和沉降模式,为同类型地区进行参考借鉴。①鲁北平原地面沉降主要贡献层为中更新统地层,滨州140～320m地层沉降量约占总沉降量的62%。②依据沉积相、沉积成因、地层结构、地面沉降驱动机制等因素,鲁北平原地面沉降可分为山前冲积、洪积平原模式、黄河泛滥冲积平原模式、三角洲冲积、海积平原模式三种模式。     

Regional indirect economic impact evaluation of the 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake

Disaster loss estimates are helpful for managing post-disaster reconstruction and for designing disaster-risk mitigation strategies. However, most of these estimates in China merely consider direct losses, and only a few include indirect economic losses. As the most destructive earthquake since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the Wenchuan Earthquake that occurred in 2008 resulted in direct economic damages reached Chinese Yuan (CNY) 845 billion (US $124 billion). The aim of the study was to estimate indirect economic losses caused by the Wenchuan Earthquake in Sichuan Province through the Adaptive Regional Input–Output (ARIO) model, which can reflect disaster-related changes in production capacity, ripple effects within the economic system, and adaptive behaviors of economic actors. The results showed that indirect economic losses in the production and housing sectors were estimated at 40% of the direct economic losses, i.e., approximately CNY 300 billion; moreover, the model predicted an 8-year reconstruction period. Several factors contributed to these losses, including significant damages to key sectors, financial constraints on reconstruction, post-earthquake investment instability, and limits in reconstruction capacity. Active government support policies post-earthquake are a useful strategy to mitigate the adverse economic impact of an earthquake in developing countries.     

汶川地震后成都平原地面塌陷特征及对策

汶川地震后两年,成都平原多个县区出现地面塌陷。就地质环境而言,成都平原不具备自然地下空洞引发大型地面塌陷的地质条件。现有地面塌陷均为人为地下空洞在自然或人为因素下引发。汶川地震缩短了产生地面塌陷的时间,致使成都平原在地震后两年内较高频率发生小规模地面塌陷。