Changes in timber haul emissions in the context of shifting forest management and infrastructure

Background  

Although significant amounts of carbon may be stored in harvested wood products, the extraction of that carbon from the forest generally entails combustion of fossil fuels. The transport of timber from the forest to primary milling facilities may in particular create emissions that reduce the net sequestration value of product carbon storage. However, attempts to quantify the effects of transport on the net effects of forest management typically use relatively sparse survey data to determine transportation emission factors. We developed an approach for systematically determining transport emissions using: 1) -remotely sensed maps to estimate the spatial distribution of harvests, and 2) - industry data to determine landscape-level harvest volumes as well as the location and processing totals of individual mills. These data support spatial network analysis that can produce estimates of fossil carbon released in timber transport.     

Method‐dependent influence of environmental variables on reef fish assemblages when comparing trap and video surveys

Despite substantial survey effort and a large body of literature on abiotic and biotic factors in temperate reef ecosystems, knowledge of the complex and interactive effects of environmental variables on those communities is limited. Various survey methods have been developed to study environmental predictors of biodiversity, but there remains a gap in our understanding of how survey results are influenced by environmental factors. Here, we surveyed the fish assemblage associated with southeastern U.S. temperate marine reefs with simultaneous, paired trap, and camera gears throughout a ~50,000 km² area during 2011–2013 and assessed the influence of environmental variables on the trap‐ and video‐surveyed assemblages. Predictor variables in the multivariate general linear models included depth, temperature, month, year, location, substrate relief, percent sessile biota, biota type, and turbidity. Depth and latitude had the greatest influence on the fish assemblage for both gears. The influence of habitat variables differed between methods and percent biota explained more variation in the fish assemblage when assessed by traps, while substrate relief and biota type explained more variation in the fish assemblage when assessed by video. In general, habitat complexity was positively related to the abundance of fishes in the video survey, but there was a negative relationship in the trap survey. Differences between gears were species‐specific and the influences of environmental variables were similar for some species such as Haemulon plumierii and Hyporthodus niveatus. The methods presented here can be used to assess method‐dependent differences in fish assemblages, which is a necessary precursor to assess the effect of environmental variables on the accuracy of surveys.     

How U.S. ocean policy and market power can reform the coral reef wildlife trade

As the world’s largest importer of marine ornamental species for the aquaria, curio, home décor, and jewelry industries, the United States has an opportunity to leverage its considerable market power to promote more sustainable trade and reduce the effects of ornamental trade stress on coral reefs worldwide. Evidence indicates that collection of some coral reef animals for these trades has caused virtual elimination of local populations, major changes in age structure, and promotion of collection practices that destroy reef habitats. Management and enforcement of collection activities in major source countries such as Indonesia and the Philippines remain weak. Strengthening US trade laws and enforcement capabilities combined with increasing consumer and industry demand for responsible conservation can create strong incentives for improving management in source countries. This is particularly important in light of the March 2010 failure of the parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to take action on key groups of corals.     

Influence of discrete step size on wind setup component of storm surge

Open coast storm surge water levels consist of wind setup due to wind shear at the water surface; a wave setup component caused by wind induced waves transferring momentum to the water column; an atmospheric pressure head component due to the atmospheric pressure deficit over the spatial extent of the storm system; a Coriolis forced setup or setdown component due to the effects of the rotation of the earth acting on the wind driven alongshore current at the coast; a possible seiche component due to resonance effects initiated by moving wind system, and, if astronomical tides are present, an astronomical tide component (although the tide is typically considered to be a forced astronomical event and not really a direct part of the external wind-driven meteorological component of storm surge). Typically the most important component of a storm surge is the wind setup component, especially on the U.S. East Coast and the Gulf of Mexico shorelines. In many approaches to storm surge modeling, a constant depth approximation is invoked over a limited step size in the computational domain. The use of a constant depth approximation has received little attention in the literature although can be very important to the resulting magnitude of the computed storm surge. The importance of discrete step size to the wind setup storm surge component is considered herein with a simple case computation of the wind setup component on a linear slope offshore profile. The present study findings show that the constant depth approximation to wind setup storm surge estimation is biased on the low side (except in extremely shallow water depths) and can provide large errors if discrete step size is not sufficiently resolved. Guidance has been provided on the error that one might encounter for various step sizes on different slopes.     

Lithostratigraphy and structure of the old red sandstone of the Northern Dingle Peninsula,Co. Kerry,Southwest Ireland

The lower part of the Old Red Sandstone in the Dingle Penisula has been previously assigned to one lithostratigraphic group (Dingle Group) despite marked variations in sedimentary facies. However the apparently oldest non-marine sequence in the northwest of the peninsula has sedimentary and lithological attributes that contrast strongly with those of the late Silurian-early Devonian Dingle Group to the south. This northern sequence, here renamed the Smerwick Group, evolved independently of the Dingle Group in a separate basin of deposition. Field relationships between the two groups in the north of the peninsula are interpreted as indicating that the Smerwick Group overlies, with angular unconformity, a normal Dingle Group succession. Similarly, it is argued that the Smerwick Group overlies, with angular unconformity, the Dingle Group in the northwest of the peninsula, but there the Dingle Group is attenuated, represented only by a conglomerate unit some 10 m thick. In the absence of biostratigraphic evidence the age of the Smerwick Group is poorly constrained. Nevertheless, we propose a tectonic model that suggests that the Smerwick Group evolved within a small extensional half-graben on the northern margin of the Munster Basin. This model accounts for the stratigraphic and structural relationships observed, and implies that the Smerwick Group is of Late Devonian age.     

The freeze-thaw weathering regime at a section of the Niagara escarpment on the Bruce Peninsula,Southern Ontario,Canada

The bedrock freeze-thaw and moisture regimes at an actively eroding site on the Niagara Escarpment, Bruce Peninsula, southern Ontario, were monitored between December 1983 and April 1984, and the results compared with amounts of debris collected in an adjacent rock trap. Frost wedging in pre-existing rock fissures is the primary mechanism responsible for the observed rockfall events; hydration effects are negligible. Debris production was more closely related to the duration of the freezing leg of the freeze-thaw cycle than to intensity or to cycle frequency. Release also coincided with periods of high pore saturation (> 60 per cent) and the seepage of water from cracks and fissures. Fewer freeze-thaw cycles were recorded in the air than at 1 and 3.5 cm in the bedrock. The number of cycles that could be declared geomorphologically effective according to established temperature criteria was normally less than half the total number of freeze-thaw cycles recorded in both air and bedrock. Under the current temperature regime at the field site, few effective cycles are capable of penetrating more than 5 cm into the free face.     

Generation of Hydrogen Gas as a Result of Drilling Within the Saturated Zone

Hydrogen gas was discovered within the steel casing above standing water in a percussion-drilled borehole on the Hanlord Site in south-central Washington state. In situ measurements of the borehole fluids indicated anoxic, low-Eh (<-400 mV) conditions. Ground water sampled from adjacent wells in the same formation indicated that the ground water was oxygenated. H₂ was generated during percussion drilling, due to the decomposition of borehole waters as a result of aqueous reactions with drilled sediment and steel from the drilling tools or casing. The generation of H₂ within percussion-drilled boreholes that extend below the water table may be more common than previously realized. The ambient concentration of H₂ produced during drilling was limited by microbial activity within the casing-resident fluids. H₂ was generated abiotically in the laboratory, whereby sterilized borehole slurry samples produced 100 times more H₂ than unsterilizcd samples. It appears that H₂ is metabolized by microorganisms and concentrations might be significantly greater if not for microbial metabolism.     

Petrology and petrogenesis of the Ministers Island dike,southwest New Brunswick,Canada

The Ministers Island dike in southwest New Brunswick is a quartz tholeiitic member of the Late Triassic to Early Jurassic dike suite that outcrops along the east coast of North America. The dike's phenocryst assemblage is orthopyroxene + augite + plagioclase. The combination of petrographic, chemical (both phase and whole rock), isotopic and experimental work on representative samples from the dike places important constraints on the petrogenesis of the Ministers Island dike and by analogy on the other members of the dike suite. The petrographic, analytical and experimental results show that the Ministers Island dike magma underwent high pressure (0.8 to 1.0 GPa) fractionation of augite, followed by augite + orthopyroxene, and finally augite + plagioclase. The absence of olivine as either a phenocryst or an experimentally observed high pressure liquidus phase indicates that the magma evolved away from the Ol-Cpx-Opx-Plag pseudo-invariant point while still at high pressure and there was sufficient time for any olivine to settle out of the magma prior to emplacement of the dike. The Sr and Nd isotopic results support a metasomatised mantle source similar to EMI but with slightly more radiogenic Nd.     

The characterization of axenic culture systems suitable for plant propagation and experimental studies of the submersed aquatic angiospermPotamogeton pectinatus (Sago Pondweed)

Clonal lines of the submersed aquatic angiospermPotamogeton pectinatus were grown in three culture systems. The first, which used sucrose as a carbon source in a liquid medium, supported vigorous vegetative growth and can be used to propagate large numbers of plants in axenic conditions. In this culture system, plants were responsive to increasings photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) photon flux density (PFD) and were photosynthetically competent. However, their growth was heterotrophic and root development was poor. When these plants were transferred to a second nonaxenic culture system, which used 16-1 buckets containing artificial sediments and tap water, growth was autotrophic and plants were morphologically identical to field-harvestedP. pectinatus. The last culture system which consisted of a sand substrate and inorganic nutrient bathing solution aerated with 135 ml min^?1 ambient air enhanced to 3.0% CO₂ was axenic and supported autotrophic growth by plants that were also morphologically normal.     

Zonal and meridional circulations in the equatorialzone as deduced from the divergence field of the surface wind

The zonal and meridional circulations and their variability are examined on the basis of the surface wind data for 1950-1979. The climatological mean zonal wind and its divergence are examined in reference to the Walker Circulation. The role played by the meridional circulation in contributing to convergence of the surface wind field within the equatorial zone is emphasized. Regression coefficients are used to infer seasonal mean anomalies of divergence of the surface wind in years when the sea level pressure is 1 hPa above normal at Darwin, a condition representative of El Nino events. It is shown that anomalies in the divergence associated with the meridional wind component are primarily responsible for the heavy precipitation in the Central Pacific, while the anomalous divergence associated with the zonal wind component may cause the drought in the Western Pacific near Indonesia. A similar pattern of divergence anomalies is evident during three consecutive seasons beginning in northern summer and ending in northern winter. The reinforcement of the Hadley Circulation during El Nino episodes is noted. It is shown that the circulations over the Atlantic Ocean and Pacific Ocean are relatively uncorrelated. The interrelation between the dipole anticyclones and the meridional cir-culation over the central Pacific is discussed.