Environmental Indicators and Impact Assessment Commons^™

Green Strategic Planning Approach For International Shipping Activities, Xiaofang Wu, Luoping Zhang, Huan Feng

Department of Earth and Environmental Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Sustainability is a long-term and ultimate goal for international shipping, although it is slowly making progress. The shipping perspective that moves away from “port-to-port” operations to “door-to-door” services also requires international shipping to take a long-term and holistic view instead of fragmented efforts. How to achieve the long-term sustainability goal becomes a key issue for door-to-door international shipping. Hence, green strategic planning for door-to-door international shipping was proposed with green development that puts forward the eco-centric point of view as its basic theory for sustainability. This study used a strategic decision-making approach, a so-called multi-dimensional decision-making (MDDM), coupled with the …

Answering Global Warming’S Hottest Debate: A Better Way To Tax Carbon, Saleh Husseini

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Some of you are sick of hearing about it, some of you don’t really care, and the rest of you are probably the reason the first group is sick of hearing about it, but regardless of which category you fall into, one thing is certain: climate change is real and it’s already happening. With that said, I’m moving forward under the assumption that all of us here believe in science and understand this phenomenon to be largely a result of post-industrial anthropogenic activity. In which case, reducing our emissions is the only way to prevent climate change from becoming a …

A Feasibility Study On The Application Of Tvdi On Accessing Wildfire Danger In The Korean Peninsula, Kwang Nyun Kim, Seung Hee Kim, Myoung Soo Won, Keun Chang Jang, Won Jun Choi, Yun Gon Lee

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

Wildfire is a major natural disaster affecting socioeconomics and ecology. Remote sensing data have been widely used to estimate the wildfire danger with an advantage of higher spatial resolution. Among the several wildfire related indices using remote sensing data, Temperature Vegetation Dryness Index (TVDI) assesses wildfire danger based on both Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Land Surface Temperature (LST). Although TVDI has physical advantages by considering both weather and vegetation condition, previous studies have shown TVDI does not performed well compare to other wildfire related indices over the Korean Peninsula. In this study we have attempted multiple modification to …

On The Frontlines - The Fishermen Of Ibrahim Hyderi, Muhammad Haris Aslam Khan

MSJ Capstone Projects

Climate change has become a matter of recent debate for much of the world. According to a report published by a German watch, a non-governmental organization, in 2019, Pakistan among the five countries at severe risk of climate change disasters.

During the last two decades, Pakistan saw more than 141 extreme climatic catastrophes. Only in 2016, more than 566 people died due to these conditions.

A report published by Asian Development Bank in 2017 indicates Pakistan’s climate change profile. It states that more than 1,600 people have lost their lives in the super flood of 2010 alone. A loss of …

Wind Is The First Step To Winning, Martin Brannaman

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Wind energy is the way of the future, and those who don’t have it will get left behind. Wind has already proven to be useful to countries in Europe, such as Denmark, Germany, and Spain. These countries are benefited from EU policy, to help alleviate some economic stress that might come from having diversified energy sources. This diversification of energy is good for countries economically and energy wise, allows them to not be too heavily reliant upon one source. This issue is clearly on display in America who is heavily reliant on oil and coal for example, the 1973 oil …

The Wind Energy Adaptation Of Nebraska, Samuel Bogert

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The Wind Energy Adaptation of Nebraska

Today there are many things in the world that we rely on, heaters for warmth, cars for travel, and many other commodities that our way of living is dependent on. One of the most overlooked aspects of society is the need for power. Each and every American is dependent on power somehow, yet the vast majority of us do not think twice when flipping a switch. We all know that flipping a switch means the lights come on, when turning the ignition in our car we don’t think of the process behind the engine …

People And Planet First—Time Permitting, Jennifer Gilbert

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Is it just me or is there something about election time that makes politicians overly ambitious? The candidates for the 2020 presidential election are fighting to convince American voters they are the best choice. One of the most common tactics for accomplishing this is providing voters with an unattainable amount of promises for making our problems magically disappear. While these ambitions are “attention-grabbing” and somewhat successful in acquiring votes, so many of them go unaccomplished or un-addressed once the candidate enters the white house. No candidate, from any party, is immune to this infectious tendency that accompanies running a campaign. …

Positive Points Of Bernie's Green New Deal, Bailey Mullins

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The Green New Deal will help will create jobs in the energy market. Many people fear that the workers in the coal mines or oil plants will be out of job but this is actually false. The Green New Deal will create jobs in the energy market, all while switching our infrastructure to 100% renewable energy. The Green New Deal is the best way for our country to become more sustainable, modernize our energy infrastructure, and do it without costing americans jobs. First off the Green New Deal will create 20 million new job openings according to Bernie Sanders campaign …

Neglecting A Wind Energy Portfolio Leaves Nebraska Behind Its Neighbors, Conner Vokoun

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Nebraska is a state that prides itself on the productivity of our land. We dutifully don our foam corn hats at Memorial Stadium and boast that Nebraska beef is what’s for dinner. But Nebraska’s land holds an untapped resource that our neighboring states are taking advantage of: wind. Nebraska must adopt a renewable portfolio to double production of wind energy in our state over the next five years. A renewable portfolio is a regulation that sets a minimum amount of power that can be produced by renewable sources, such as solar, wind, and hydroelectric. Currently, Nebraska does not have any …

Subsidize Or Suffer, Dallas Smith

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The standard for energy production and consumption in the US has historically been the use of coal or oil. In the earliest days of the industrial revolution, coal was king. For a society to achieve such a goal as the expansion and fortification of infrastructure, well, society as a whole, the means absolutely justify the ends. But what if the means of producing energy didn’t have to look like what they did over a hundred years ago? Well they don’t. The use of new renewable, sustainable energy could prove to be beneficial in many aspects, environmental health especially. By subsidizing …

Is More Investment Needed In Solar & Biogas Energy Sources In Rwanda?, Herve Christian Kabanda

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The Rwanda Third National Communication Under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change mentions that Green House Gas (GHG) emissions per capita increased from 532.39kg (2006) to 676.23kg (2015) with an annual increase of 2.46%. As of 2015, the dominant emissions are from agriculture (70.4%) followed by energy (20.11%). Urea application in agriculture have increased from 1,246,400 to 2,559,000 tons of CO2 eq. Charcoal or wood being the primary source for cooking; emissions from domestic energy use has increased from 626,800 to 741,400 tons of CO2 eq. If such trends continue severe health issues, deforestation, soil erosion and droughts …

Adaptation To Climate Change, Pascal Ntaganda

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Climate is changing rapidly. Some scientists say that the effects are now irreversible. The foundation on which government organizations, some of them being the congress in the United States, is not strong enough to stop climate change. The fact that the approaches being taken target market-based situations, makes it inefficient. Governments create solutions to reduce the impacts, as they make sure that these activities do not affect their economies. The level at which effects of climate change threaten life and resources of a country, is what stimulates the economy to adapt to the strategies set to mitigate climate change. In …

Making Renewables Profitable For Lincoln Electrical System, Jack Mensinger

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The potential for Nebraska to integrate renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind, in a financially sustainable and profitable method, has been proposed and shot down. Too many Nebraskans continue to doubt and reject renewables due to the perception that they are too expensive and the continued cost over traditional energy sources are too high. Most of Nebraska’s energy comes from coal, (63%) as of 2018, with the remainder lying primarily in nuclear (15%), and wind (14%). With the innovations and adoption of renewables by other states, what is keeping Nebraskans from joining the renewable party? The primary reason …

Facts, Not Feelings, Gannon Rush

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

“The world is gonna end in 12 years if we don't address climate change and your biggest issue is how are we gonna pay for it? ” This is a direct quote from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a sitting U.S. congresswoman. In the next few sentences, she also proceeds to say that climate change is “our generations World War II”. 70 million people died in World War II, not only is it doing disrespect to those who gave the ultimate sacrifice, but it is physically impossible to compare war to climate change. What she and others, such as Greta Thunberg and Al …

California Stream Condition Index (Csci) Score Analysis Of Streams Sampled From 1998 To 2017 In The San Francisco Bay Region, Jenna Rais

Master's Projects and Capstones

Human impacts to California’s streams have altered the state’s riparian and hydrological landscape. This is a critical issue with regard to natural resources, including ecosystem services such as water availability and water quality. Regulations have a limited amount of impact on the improvement of this landscape and can also become complicated by politics. Scientific advances have developed ways to quantify and describe the quality of streams, this includes the development of the California Stream Condition Index (CSCI) which is based on benthic macroinvertebrate (BMI) population numbers and functions. This index allows scientists to not only score the quality of a …

Don’T Give Up On Nuclear Energy, Daniel Gertner

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

The nuclear power plant failures at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl in the late 1970s and 1980s split Americans into two passionate camps. For some, nuclear plants posed serious threats to both environmental and national security, and, for others, nuclear energy remained the most viable path to clean, reliable power in the United States. But following the fervent debates of the late 20th century, the national conversation around nuclear power stagnated. A few ardent advocates and opponents notwithstanding, nuclear power left the public eye. Popular energy debates—especially among young people—now center around flashier topics like the Green New Deal, electric …

The Dirty Clean Fuel, Sawyer Krivanek

Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies

Hydraulic fracking began nearly 80 years ago and was initially headlined as a brand new, fuel efficient alternative to coal and oil. Natural gas has been disguised as a clean fuel, when in reality it is just another dirty, polluting, environmentally harmful fossil fuel. The detriments of fracking heavily outweigh the benefits, and it needs to be banned on public and private lands. Natural gas has been viewed as a cleaner alternative to coal and oil, so immediately fossil fuel industries took advantage of that narrative. Consumers, eager for cleaner alternatives, have been tricked into buying into the fracking fad. …

Rain Gardens: The Return Of Ecosystem Services, Katie Dehaan

Honors Theses

In the modern world impervious surfaces, especially in urban areas, abound. These include roads, highways, sidewalks, parking lots, and roofs that have replaced permeable surfaces, mainly open land, forests, and wetlands. Rainwater runs off of these surfaces collecting pollutants on its way to permeable areas. Rain gardens collect and process rainwater. Native plants with deep root systems process large volumes of rainwater and the microorganisms living in the soils and roots can process pollutants. The purpose of my research was to find out what variables affect species presence or absence in rain gardens. Species presence or absence at the time …

Air Quality And Environmental Justice: An Analysis Of County-Level Data In The United States, Alyssa Tittle

Honors Theses

This paper analyzes the relationship between air pollution and poverty and race/ethnicity at the county level in the United States. Using air pollution data from the Environmental Protection Agency and population characteristics data from the Census Bureau to model relationships in RStudio, results show that race/ethnicity, population, and median value of owner-occupied housing units are the most statistically significant variables associated with air quality.

Employing Earth Observations And Artificial Intelligence To Address Key Global Environmental Challenges In Service Of The Sdgs, Wenzhao Li

Computational and Data Sciences (PhD) Dissertations

Earth Observation (EO) data provides the capability to integrate data from multiple sources and helps to produce more relevant, frequent, and accurate information about complex processes. EO, empowered by methodologies from Artificial Intelligence (AI), supports various aspects of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This dissertation presents author’s major studies using EO to fill in knowledge gaps and develop methodologies and cloud-based applications in selected SDGs, including SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), SDG 14 (Life below Water) and SDG 15 (Life on Land). For SDG 6, the study focuses on spatiotemporal water recharge …

Modeling Lake Temperature Response To Climate Change In The Alaskan Arctic, Thomas Balkcom

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This thesis study focuses on simulating lake temperature and ice duration for four lakes at the Arctic Long-Term Ecological Research site, near the Toolik Field Station in Alaska. Model projections were driven by the representative global climate model outputs under different carbon emission scenarios. Results show that my simple lake model can reproduce historical lake temperature and ice duration observations, indicating the reliability of the model for future projections. Model projections show that JuneSeptember lake temperatures would increase by 4.3-5.8 °C from the historical period with most progressive carbon emission scenarios, but by 0.7-2.2 °C in the conservative scenarios. Results …

2020 Comprehensive Conservation And Management Plan: Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment, Ivy Mlsna

PREP Reports & Publications

The Piscataqua Region Estuaries Partnership (PREP), one of 28 National Estuary Programs supported by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), is updating their Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan (CCMP) for the 2020-2030 timeframe. A broad, risk-based, qualitative, planning-level climate change vulnerability assessment was conducted concurrent with this update, as directed by the Funding Guidance for this program.

Hunters And Their Perceptions Of Public Access: A View From Afield, Joseph J. Fontaine, Alexis D. Fedele, Lyndsie S. Wszola, Lindsey N. Messinger, Christopher J. Chizinski, Jeffery J. Lusk, Karie L. Decker, J. Scott Taylor, Erica F. Stuber

Nebraska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit: Staff Publications

Declining hunter participation threatens cultural traditions and public support for conservation, warranting examination of the forces behind the downward trajectory. Access to lands for hunting, an often-cited reason for non participation, may play a critical role in the retention and recruitment of hunters. Meeting the access needs of a diverse hunting constituency requires understanding how hunters use and perceive access opportunities, particularly public-access sites. Given that perceptions of access are entirely place based and degrade with time, traditional postseason survey methods may fail to adequately quantify the value of public access to the hunting constituency. To overcome the potential limitations …

Umphlett Qci Dec 2019, Natalie A. Umphlett

HPRCC Personnel Publications

Highlights for the Basin

Temperature and Precipitation Anomalies

Soil Moisture Conditions

Agriculture

Energy

Infrastructure

Temperature

Precipitation

Interpreting Potential Groundwater Policies Through Modeling Of Market And Non-Market Benefits And Costs, Grant H. West

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Current policies leveraging financial incentives and improved irrigation efficiency to mitigate groundwater scarcity have not proven to curtail trends of resource depletion. Groundwater benefits cannot be appropriately valued solely on market forces, and so deeper policy consideration is warranted under a framework that considers the importance of groundwater across all its values to society. Understanding time preferences for groundwater management and preferences for alternative policies is vital to inform efficient policies. Furthermore, climate change remains politically controversial yet has important consequences for critical groundwater resources and their sustainable long-term management. Proliferating policy narratives concerning climate change could influence the way …

Effects Of Environmentally Relevant Concentrations Of Microplastic Fibers On Pacific Mole Crab (Emerita Analoga) Mortality And Reproduction, Dorothy Horn, Elise F. Granek, Clare Steele

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

Microplastics are ubiquitous in marine systems; however, knowledge of the effects of these particles on marine fauna is limited. Ocean-borne plastic debris accumulates in littoral ecosystems worldwide, and invertebrate infauna inhabiting these systems can ingest small plastic particles and fibers, mistaking them for food. We examined the effect of microplastic fibers on physiological and reproductive outcomes in a nearshore organism by exposing Pacific mole crabs (Emerita analoga) to environmentally relevant concentrations of microsized polypropylene rope fibers. We compared adult gravid female crab mortality, reproductive success, and embryonic developmental rates between microfiber-exposed and control crabs. Pacific mole crabs exposed to polypropylene …

Spatio-Temporal Assessment Of Headwater Streams In The San Bernardino National Forest, Jose Angel Mora

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

As the demand for freshwater resources increases due to increasing human populations, degradation of available resources, and climatic changes it will become increasingly important to understand the factors that impact the physicochemical characteristics of surface water resources over space and time. This study assessed a headwater stream over the course of a year in the San Bernardino National Forest that serves as both surface and groundwater resources for the Santa Ana River Watershed region, the largest and most populated watershed in Southern California. Streams were monitored bi-weekly during dry periods and weekly during wet periods from April 2018 through April …

Long-Term Aerosol Trends And Variability Over Central Saudi Arabia Using Optical Characteristics From Solar Village Aeronet Measurements, Mohammed Al Otaibi, Ashraf Farahat, Bassam Tawabini, M. Hafidz Omar, Emad Ramadan, Abdelgadir Abuelgasim, Ramesh Singh

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

Natural and anthropogenic aerosols over the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) play a major role in affecting the regional radiation budget. The long-term variability of these aerosols’ physical and optical parameters, including aerosol optical depth (AOD) and Ångström exponent (α), were measured at a location near central KSA using the Solar Village (SV) AERONET (Aerosol Robotic Network) station during the period December 1999–January 2013. The AERONET measurements show an overall increase in AOD on an annual basis. This upward trend is mainly attributed to a prolonged increase in the monthly/seasonal mean AOD during March–June and during August– September. In contrast, …

Using Paleosols To Reconstruct Past Environments Before, During And After Periods Of Anatomically Human Migration At Gona, Ethiopia, Kevin Takashita-Bynum

Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal

Environmental change is thought to have driven dispersals of Anatomically Modern Humans (AMH) out of Africa, yet the precise landscape context of these migrations remains unclear. Furthermore, river-based archives of paleoenvironment during periods of dispersal are scarce. Gona, an area in northeastern Ethiopia with one of the most continuous records of East African Paleolithic and Neolithic archaeology, contains abundant Middle to Late Pleistocene river deposits interbedded with volcanic ash. This study examines the physical and chemical changes of 11 fossilized soils (paleosols) extracted from Gona’s paleoanthropological sites that range in age from the Middle to the Late Pleistocene (~380-11 ka). …

Modeling Response Of Water Quality To Land-Use And Climate Change In Lake Auburn, Me, Nicholas Messina

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Lake Auburn, Maine, USA, is a historically unproductive lake that has experienced multiple algal blooms since 2011. The lake is the water supply source for a population of ~60,000. We modeled past temperature, and concentrations of dissolved oxygen (DO) and phosphorus (P) in Lake Auburn by considering the watershed and internal contributions of P as well as atmospheric factors, and predicted the change in lake water quality in response to future climate and land-use changes. A stream hydrology and P-loading model (SimplyP) was used to generate input from two major tributaries into a lake model (MyLake) to simulate physical mixing, …