Resolving the landfill siting impasse: modelling technocratic and indigenous perspectives using GIS multicriteria approach

Increase in waste generation calls for an effective waste management as this has become a necessity for environmental sustainability. Several methods are adopted in managing waste, which include waste reduction, reuse, thermal treatment, recycling and landfilling. The landfill method is recognised as the most used of all the waste management methods in developing countries such as Ghana. However, the selection of a suitable landfill site is very difficult and tedious. This is because it involves a consideration of many factors such as environmental, topographic, economic, socio-cultural and civil engineering. This research sought to identify a suitable landfill site by applying GIS multicriteria and weighted overlay approach in the Bongo District of Northern Ghana. The analysis relied on criteria and weights provided by the technocrats and the indigenes in the district as a way of demonstrating how landfill siting impasse can be resolved by incorporating the various stakeholders. The results obtained provided clear areas for landfill sites in the study area from the technocratic and the indigenous perspectives. However, the technocratic perspective failed to include an important cultural criterion, sacred groves, as a factor. The indigenous perspective also compromised on the factor related to nearness to residential areas, and is equally not sufficient on its own. The optimal landfill sites, which meets the expectations of both the technocrats and indigenes, was identified. This perspective has produced technically favourable and socio-culturally acceptable landfill site. However, it is recommended an environmental impact assessment (EIA) be conducted to identify the full environmental and social cost of the site. It is concluded that in landfill site selection much attention be given to cultural factors in the same way as the technical factors.     

Morphometric and geological conditions for sediment accumulation in the Udava River,Outer Carpathians,Slovakia

The accumulation of sediment in river channels is a phenomenon that is not only influenced by the channel morphology, but also by the physical and geographical characteristics and the endogenous and exogenous processes taking place in the catchment. This paper presents an analysis of the impact the changes in lithological conditions have on the morphological and morphometric parameters of the Udava River channel and their relation to the channel accumulation forms representative of the river’s longitudinal profile as well as of its planform. Results document when accumulation forms occur and what is their spatial distribution within the longitudinal and cross-sectional river profiles. More resistant structures created sections with a lower degree of sedimentation, while in depression segments the degree of sedimentation was higher. With the increase in longitudinal slope, the impact of channel width on the average channel bar size increased. Also a difference in the accumulation was observed between the left and right bank which could be possibly explained by the impact of Coriolis force.     

Potential promoted productivity and spatial patterns of medium- and low-yield cropland land in China

With a continuously increasing population and better food consumption levels, improving the efficiency of arable land use and increasing its productivity have become fundamental strategies to meet the growing food security needs in China. A spatial distribution map of medium- and low-yield cropland is necessary to implement plans for cropland improvement. In this study, we developed a new method to identify high-, medium-, and low-yield cropland from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data at a spatial resolution of 500 m. The method could be used to reflect the regional heterogeneity of cropland productivity because the classification standard was based on the regionalization of cropping systems in China. The results showed that the proportion of high-, medium-, and low-yield cropland in China was 21%, 39%, and 40%, respectively. About 75% of the low-yield cropland was located in hilly and mountainous areas, and about 53% of the high-yield cropland was located in plain areas. The five provinces with the largest area of high-yield cropland were all located in the Huang-Huai-Hai region, and the area amounted to 42% of the national high-yield cropland area. Meanwhile, the proportion of high-yield cropland was lower than 15% in Heilongjiang, Sichuan, and Inner Mongolia, which had the largest area allocated to cropland in China. If all the medium-yield cropland could be improved to the productive level of high-yield cropland and the low-yield cropland could be improved to the level of medium-yield cropland, the total productivity of the land would increase 19% and 24%, respectively.     

Understanding the implications of the EU-LULUCF regulation for the wood supply from EU forests to the EU

Background

In June 2018, the European Parliament and Council of the European Union adopted a legislative regulation for incorporating greenhouse gas emissions and removals from Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (EU-LULUCF) under its 2030 Climate and Energy Framework. The LULUCF regulation aim to incentivise EU Member States to decrease greenhouse gas emissions and increase removals in the LULUCF sector. The regulation, however, does not set a target for increasing the LULUCF carbon sink, but rather includes a ‘no net debit’ target for LULUCF (Forests and Agricultural soils). For Managed Forest Land (MFL) an accounting framework with capped credits for additional mitigation against a set forest reference level (FRL) was agreed for 2021–2030. The FRL gives the projected future carbon sink in the two compliance periods 2021–2025 and 2026–2030 under “continuation of forest management practices as they were in the reference period 2000–2009”. This FRL was disputed by some Member States as it was perceived to put a limit on their future wood harvesting from MFL. Here we simulated with the EFISCEN European forest model the “continuation of forest management practices” and determined the corresponding wood harvest for 26 EU countries under progressing age classes.

Results

The simulations showed that under “continuation of forest management practices” the harvest (wood removals) in the 26 EU countries as a whole can increase from 420 million m³/year in 2000–2009 to 560 million m³/year in 2050 due to progressing age classes. This implies there is a possibility to increase absolute wood harvests without creating debits compared to the forest reference level. However, the manner in which ‘continuation of forest management’ developed with a progressing age class development over time, meant that in some countries the future harvesting exceeded 90% of the increment. Since this generally is considered to be unsustainable we additionally set a harvesting cut-off as max 90% of increment to be harvested for each individual country as a possible interpretation of sustainability criteria that are included in the regulation. Using this additional limit the projected harvest will only increase to 493 million m³/year.

Conclusions

The worry from Member States (MS) that the FRL will prevent any additional harvesting seems unwarranted. Due to differences between Member States concerning the state of their forest resources, the FRL as a baseline for harvesting works out very differently for the different Member States. The FRL may have other unforeseen consequences which we discuss. Under all scenarios the living forest biomass sink shows a decline. This can be counteracted through incentivising measures under Climate Smart Forestry.

     

The influence of rainfall and land use patterns on soil erosion in multi-scale watersheds: A case study in the hilly and gully area on the Loess Plateau,China

Soil erosion has become a major global environmental problem and is particularly acute on the Loess Plateau (LP), China. It is therefore highly important to control this process in order to improve ecosystems, protect ecological security, and maintain the harmonious relationship between humans and nature. We compared the effects of rainfall and land use (LU) patterns on soil erosion in different LP watersheds in this study in order to augment and improve soil erosion models. As most research on this theme has so far been focused on individual study areas, limited analyses of rainfall and LU patterns on soil erosion within different- scale watersheds has so far been performed, a discrepancy which might influence the simulation accuracies of soil erosion models. We therefore developed rainfall and LU pattern indices in this study using the soil erosion evaluation index as a reference and applied them to predict the extent of this process in different-scale watersheds, an approach which is likely to play a crucial role in enabling the comprehensive management of this phenomenon as well as the optimized design of LU patterns. The areas considered in this study included the Qingjian, Fenchuan, Yanhe, and Dali river watersheds. Results showed that the rainfall erosivity factor (R) tended to increase in these areas from 2006 to 2012, while the vegetation cover and management factor (C) tended to decrease. Results showed that as watershed area increased, the effect of rainfall pattern on soil erosion gradually decreased while patterns in LU trended in the opposite direction, as the relative proportion of woodland decreased and the different forms of steep slope vegetation cover became more homogenous. As watershed area increased, loose soil and craggy terrain properties led to additional gravitational erosion and enhanced the effects of both soil and topography.     

滇中引水工程昆明段岩溶水发育规律及对隧洞工程的影响

可溶岩区地下岩溶水对隧洞造成很大的威胁,如引起隧洞涌水、突水、突泥等。本文通过地质调查、勘探、抽水试验,分析滇中引水工程昆明段地下岩溶水发育规律及分布特征,为滇中引水工程以及今后地下隧洞工程设计和施工提供依据。调查分析显示,滇中引水工程昆明段岩溶在二叠系、石炭系、泥盆系可溶岩中均有分布,主要呈带状分布于地下水排泄基准面附近及断陷盆地、断裂沟谷内,其次在新构造运动控制的断裂地段及岩性变化造成的不同微水文地质单元交界处;在二叠系灰岩中,地下水分层排泄,石炭系、泥盆系中发育有落水洞,形成地下岩溶通道;在1900～2150m高程段岩溶发育密集,该高程区为岩溶地下水的主要径流区,对隧洞影响最大,存在涌水、突水、突泥、岩溶塌陷、遭遇岩溶空腔的隐患。     

春运人口流动透视的转型期中国城市网络结构

基于春运人口流动大数据,选取对外联系度、优势流、城市位序-规模分析等方法对转型期中国城市网络特征进行分析。结果显示：① 城市网络层级结构中蕴藏着位序-规模规律,但与理想的帕累托分布有所区别,城市规模彼此差异相对较小;② 空间距离与城市等级在城市网络联系中发挥支配性作用,保证了城市网络的层级性与有序性;③ 中国城市网络核心联系呈现“两横三纵”特征,该特征与铁路大动脉的空间分布高度吻合;④ 东部地区城市网络联系更加密切,而西北、西南地区则相对稀疏,基本上以“胡焕庸线”为界,而“兰新线”是突破这一限制的潜在力量;⑤ 中国东北地区未形成明显的区域性中心,城市联系形成带状网络;⑥ 华北与华南地区的“灯下黑”现象值得警惕,缓解这一问题的可行办法是核心城市功能的对外疏散,加强核心城市与周边城市之间的联系;⑦ 带状区域发展或许将成为未来中国区域经济发展的流行模式和中坚力量。总体上看,针对于揭示转型期中国城市网络结构特征,春运人口流动数据具有一定的研究价值,是城市与人口研究领域一个值得深入挖掘的重要数据源。     

淮河流域水文随机方法的径流图化(英文)

Theoretical difficulties for mapping and for estimating river regime characteristics in a large-scale basin remain because of the nature of the variable under study: river flows are related to a specific area, i.e. the drainage basin, and are hierarchically organized in space through the river network with upstream-downstream dependencies. Another limitation is there are not enough gauge stations in developing countries. This presentation aims at de-veloping the hydro-stochastic approach for producing choropleth maps of average annual runoff and computing mean discharge along the main river network for a large-scale basin. The approach applied to mean annual runoff is based on geostatistical interpolation proce-dures coupled with water balance and data uncertainty analyses. It is proved by an applica-tion in the upstream at Bengbu in the Huaihe River Basin, a typical large-scale basin in China. Hydro-stochasitic approach in a first step interpolates to a regular grid net and in a second step the grid values are integrated along rivers. The interpolation scheme includes a con-straint to be able to account for the lateral water balance along the rivers. Grid runoff map with 10 km × 10 km resolution and the discharge map along the river with the 1 km basic length unit are the main results in this study. This kind of statistic approach can be widely used be-cause it avoids the complexity of hydrological models and does not depend on the meteoro-logical data.     

元谋干热河谷近50 a降水量时间序列的DFA分析

干热河谷是一类特殊的退化生态系统区域,降水对河谷景观格局的变化起着十分重要的作用.基于消除趋势波动分析法(DFA)分析了元谋地区近50 a降雨量变化趋势,同时也对1978～2006年进行了滑移分析.结果表明,元谋地区年均降水量序列至少在50 a的时间尺度上具有微弱的Hurst效应,即具有较弱的长期持续性及较强的随机性.区域植被覆盖率的变化能对该区域降雨量的动力学变化趋势做出有效的解释.