Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Hazmat Storage Near Nyc Waterways Endangers Communities, Brett E. Dahlberg, Nicole Acevedo

Capstones

New York City has 520 miles of shoreline--that’s more than Miami and Los Angeles combined. These waterfronts are home to some of the city’s most polluted sites because major part of it is zoned for industrial use. Dozens of industrial plants in this area store toxic chemicals in flood zones: substances that are hazardous to our health, like Benzene, which is used in rocket fuel, toluene, a paint thinner, and lead a neurotoxin. In a flood, these chemicals can easily get caught up in moving waters and pollute entire neighborhoods.

That’s exactly what happened when Hurricane Sandy hit in 2012. …

Trends In The Environmental Health Job Market For New Graduates, Jason W. Marion, Timothy J. Murphy Phd, Anne Marie Zimeri Phd

EKU Faculty and Staff Scholarship

The question of whether the job market can support future graduates of environmental health programs remains an important and difficult question for environmental health programs, current and prospective students, parents, and other stakeholders. Our previous report using 2014 data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics demonstrated anticipated growth and higher than average pay in the profession through at least 2022 for baccalaureate degree holders (Marion & Sinde, 2015). Growth in the profession does not necessarily translate into job availability if the market is saturated with job candidates. While university programs produce graduates, local health departments (LHDs) have suffered tremendous …

Walking As Ontological Shifter: Thoughts In The Key Of Life, Bibi (Silvina) Calderaro

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

With walking as ontological shifter I pursue an alternative to the dominant modernist episteme that offers either/or onto-epistemologies of opposition and their reifying engagements. I propose this type of walking is an intentional turning towards a set of radical positions that, as integrative aesthetic and therapeutic practice, brings multiplicity and synchronicity to experience and being in an expanded sociality. This practice facilitates the conditions of possibility for recurring points of contact between the interiority perceived as ‘body’ and the exteriority perceived as ‘world.’ While making evident the self’s at once incoherence with it-self, it opens to a space beyond the …

Analysis And Research Of The System For The Prevention And Control Of Vessel-Induced Pollution In Shanghai Port, Longxue Wang

Maritime Safety & Environment Management Dissertations (Dalian)

No abstract provided.

Interpretations, Analyses And Suggestions On The Pollution Prevention Measures In The Polar Code, Hecheng Yan

Maritime Safety & Environment Management Dissertations (Dalian)

No abstract provided.

Study Of Ship Air Pollution Control In Caofeidian Port, Feng Zhu

Maritime Safety & Environment Management Dissertations (Dalian)

No abstract provided.

Understanding Household, Network, And Organizational Drivers Of Adoption Of Cleaner Cooking Fuels In Rural India, Praveen Kumar

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Adoption of evidence-based cleaner cooking systems such as Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) is a crucial first step in eventually providing a sustainable solution for household air pollution. To promote adoption of LPG in below poverty line households, we require evidence-based implementation strategies. For these strategies to be feasible and scalable, they need to be grounded in a thorough understanding of the household, network, and organizational level drivers of LPG adoption. However, systematic research on adoption of LPG by poor communities is still lacking.

The overall objective of the study was to develop a better understanding about new insights on the …

Economic Evaluation Of Coastal Land Loss In Louisiana, Stephen R. Barnes, Craig Bond, Nicholas Burger, Kate Anania, Aaron Strong, Sarah Weilant, Stephanie Virgets

Journal of Ocean and Coastal Economics

Louisiana has lost approximately 1,880 square miles of land over the past eighty years. Projections suggest that in a future without action, the next fifty years could result in the loss of 1,750 additional square miles of land area. As land loss continues, a large portion of the natural and man-made capital stocks of coastal Louisiana will be at greater risk of damage, either from land loss or from the associated increase in storm damage. We estimate the replacement cost of capital stock directly at risk from land loss ranges from approximately $2.1 billion to $3.5 billion with economic activity …

Attracting Beneficial Insects To Your Farm: A Comparison Of Habitat Modification Strategies, Kelly Rourke

Master's Projects and Capstones

Thoughtful planning to enhance diversity in agricultural landscapes can present a multitude of ecological, cultural and economic benefits. Land managers have many options when considering which habitat modification techniques they can implement on their agri-environment schemes. This comparative analysis of 47 peer reviewed journal articles assesses which landscape enhancements are most effective in attracting beneficial insects, namely pollinators and natural enemies to pests. Through biological control, natural invertebrate predators inhibit vegetative pests that can be detrimental to croplands. The promotion of natural enemies can decrease the need for chemical use and maintenance on farms. Pollinators contribute tremendous benefits to crop …

Financial Assessment Of Agricultural Lands At Risk To Coastal Salt Marsh Migration In Relation To Climate Change Induced Sea Level Rise In Dorchester County, Maryland, Jewell Porter

International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)

The increasing rate and effects of sea level rise is a major environmental concern in the Chesapeake Bay. This paper evaluates the impacts of rising sea level on coastal salt marshes and the surrounding agricultural lands at risk in Dorchester County, Maryland to build off existing environmental monitoring work performed by NOAA’s Sentinel Site Program. The results of the spatial analysis were used to estimate monetary benefits to incentivize farmers to protect these marshes by making their land available for marsh migration to occur. Looking at three scenarios of sea level rise and marsh migration, grain crops (corn, soybeans, and …

Mapping Community Space And Place In Mto Wa Mbu, Tanzania Through Surveys And Gis, Jessica Craigg

Georgia College Student Research Events

Cities throughout the African continent have been developing at an unprecedented pace, many of them due to the influence of the tourism industry. This is particularly true in Tanzania, a country famous for its national parks and their draw to tourists who help provide money for development. However, the only way to get the whole story on how to spend this money is through the experiences and needs of the people themselves. This study focuses on a small town in northeastern Tanzania, Mto wa Mbu, situated near Lake Manyara National Park, and its people’s perceptions of the park and community. …

Quality Of Water In Relation To Diarrheal Disease Incidence In Obunga, Tianna Herman

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Kenyan cities are experiencing a serious dilemma in dealing with the large influx of people from rural parts of the country to the cities. Most people come to the city in pursuit of better opportunities and jobs. Rapid urban growth with little planning and preparation by the national and county governments has led to the development of informal settlements. These informal settlements are characterized by poor environmental conditions that predispose their residents for poor health conditions. Because of their illegal status, most residents of informal settlements in Kenya do not receive government services such as water, drainage, sewerage, and rubbish …

Solid Waste Management In The Developing World: The Role Of Local Government In Kisumu, Kenya, Rachel Schlueter

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

As the world becomes more urbanized, more waste is being produced. According to United Nations projections in 2014, 66% of the world’s population will be living in cities by 2050 with the majority of growth occurring in African cities. Managing urban waste in lower-middle income countries, such as Kenya, poses a particular challenge as income levels rise, municipal capacities are stretched, and foreign loans complicate accountability. This project sought to assess the practical role of local government when managing solid waste in the context of long-term development strategies. The objectives of this study are to first establish the current role …

The Giving Trees: The (Un)Sustainability Of Palm Oil In Indonesia, Amber Rosche

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

Palm oil is the main source of cooking oil for much of Africa, Asia and Brazil. Due to the increasingly high demand for palm oil, countries such as Indonesia and Malaysia have cleared millions of acres of tropical rainforests to create space for oil palm plantations. This deforestation has led to extreme environmental and social concerns such as the burning of peatlands, the endangerment of a number of species, including the Sumatran Tiger, rhinos and orangutans, and the displacement of native populations. Indonesia is the world’s largest consumer and producer of palm oil, producing almost half of the world’s supply …

Environmental Challenges In Central And Eastern Europe, Bernhard Hennig

Superfund Research Center Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Collective Litigation Of Environmental Rights In Colombia: An Empirical Study, Ángela María Páez-Murcia, Everaldo Lamprea-Montealegre, Catalina Vallejo-Piedrahita

Public Administration Faculty Research

This paper presents the results of an empirical study that systematized environmental judicial opinions handed down by Colombia’s highest administrative Court —Consejo de Estado— over a 17-year period (1998-2015). Thanks to a research grant, the authors and a team of coders systematized, using state-of-the art content analysis methodologies, more than 250 opinions handed down by Colombia’s highest administrative Court. The results presented in this paper show the most important trends of collective environmental litigation in Colombia: types of plaintiffs and defendants; type of environmental resources involved in the case; plaintiffs’ success rates; most litigious regions and cities; overall effects of …

Murray Energy Corporation V. Mccarthy, Sarah M. Danno

Public Land & Resources Law Review

Holding that the widespread effects of environmental regulation on the coal industry constituted sufficient importance, the Northern District of West Virginia ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to conduct analysis on employment loss and plant reduction resulting from regulatory effects. In admonishing the EPA’s inaction, the court ruled that the Agency had a non-discretionary duty to evaluate employment and plant reduction. Furthermore, the court held that the EPA’s attempt to put forth general reports in place of required evaluations was an invalid attempt to circumvent its statutory duty.

Nitrogen Sustainability: Impediments To Action And Communication, Eric E. Jorgensen

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

“Sustainability” is widely used to imply the presence of explicit consideration of environmentally friendly needs and that high societal-value is placed on those needs. However, it is abundantly clear after 30 years that talking about sustainability and achieving it are two entirely different things. The core concept underlying sustainability is that current human practices and activities be conducted so as to not degrade prospects for future generations. With nitrogen, conflicts about sustainability in-theory and sustainability in-practice are close to the surface because of nitrogen’s central role in food production and economic activity. Measures of nitrogen inputs commonly range as high …

What’S In Your Body Of Water? Reducing The Psychological Distance Of Pharmaceutical Pollution Through Metaphor In Risk Communication, Alexandra Z. Millarhouse

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Aquatic pharmaceutical pollution poses ecotoxicological risks to the environment and human health. Consumer attitudes and behavior represent a significant source of pharmaceutical compounds found in water. Thus, understanding public perceptions of aquatic pharmaceutical pollution and developing effective risk communication techniques are critical to engaging society in the type of widespread change necessary for addressing the presence of pharmaceuticals in water. This mixed-methods study applies conceptual metaphor theory in conjunction with construal level theory of psychological distance to assess how metaphoric framing affects perceptions of aquatic pharmaceutical contamination across four principal dimensions of psychological distance (geographic, social and temporal distance and …

Environmental And Climate Justice Along The Brahmaputra River In Northeast India, Costanza Rampini

Faculty Publications, Environmental Studies

The glaciers of the Himalayas are the source of all of Asia’s major rivers and are crucial to Asia’s water supply, economies, and livelihoods. The Himalayan region is uniquely vulnerable to the impacts of anthropogenic climate change, while also becoming one of the most dammed regions in the world. This case study explores the unequal distribution of the impacts of climate change and dam building along the Brahmaputra River in Northeast India. It examines how the combined impacts of these two processes negatively affect local communities and explores environmental and climate justice issues. In discussing climate change impacts and hydropower …

Evaluating Trophic Rewilding As A Conservation Technique, Aaron Sieve

Biology: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

The focus for this paper is to define specifically trophic rewilding, determine its efficacy as a conservation technique, and explore ways to lessen one of its key limitations. Trophic rewilding is the conservation technique whereby an extirpated keystone species or ecosystem engineer is reintroduced into a degraded habitat to restore ecological function by triggering trophic cascades. The technique is evaluated through analysis of the concepts of trophic cascades and ecosystem engineers. Key limitations of trophic rewilding are that a lack of population control in reintroduced may cause issues, that many times not enough is known about trophic cascades to be …

Burundi : Water Scarcity, Isabel Salas

Global Public Health

Burundi is located near the African great lakes region of East Africa. This country is one of the poorest and hungriest countries throughout the world because of this they are facing multiple problems with communicable disease. These families are seeing a reduction in the amount of water available to them and based on this they are receiving water from external sources such as wells and lakes. Most of the water throughout Burundi is contaminated with Phytoplankton which increase cholera outbreaks in this area. It has also been shown that uranium impacts the water throughout the wells and lakes. Both of …

Social Justice In Social-Ecological Systems: Resilience Through Stakeholder Engagement, Frederick I. Lauer

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Successful management of social-ecological systems (SES) is predicated on quality collaborative exchanges between project stakeholders and management. The Southwest Crown of the Continent Collaborative (SWCC) Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program (CFLRP) provided an opportunity to explore landscape scale collaborative management and SES outcomes. Global change and future uncertainty of landscapes prompted the SWCC to employ restoration treatment alternatives throughout 1.4 million acres of forests, most of which are publicly held. The SWCC currently monitors environmental and economic variables, with plans to monitor social variables. This thesis formalizes a proposed framework to investigate SES resilience, and explores public engagement as an …

Addressing Antibiotic Resistance From Farm-Raised Fish Imported To The United States, Nicholas Ali

Bard Center for Environmental Policy

Misuse of medically important antibiotics in animal production threatens the effectiveness of drugs that are vital in combating disease and infections. Recently, the FDA implemented regulations to limit the use of and access to veterinary drugs. However, these regulations only affect domestic production operations. Because over 90% of seafood consumed in the U.S. is imported from countries with different regulatory standards and because the U.S. has an import inspection rate of less than 1%, antibiotic resistance stemming from imported aquaculture is still a risk that is not sufficiently accounted for. This research investigates how the U.S. has reacted to the …

Urban Dwellers Experiences Regarding Loss Of Natural Environments Due To Rapid Urbanization, Erica Montanye

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Little is known about how residents of rapidly growing cities are impacted by the loss of natural environments. Large cities are expanding at an exponential rate, reducing the presence of, and access to, natural environments for urban dwellers. Many benefits to human health regarding the presence of natural environments near where people live and work are known, but impacts of the loss of natural environments for urban dwellers are unknown. The purpose of this qualitative investigation was to understand residents' experiences regarding the loss of natural environments and related impacts. Attention restoration theory and place attachment were the theoretical lenses …

The Last Best Hope: Are Voluntary Conservation Agreements Effective Tools For Protecting Imperiled Species?, Sophie B. Tsairis

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Candidate Conservation Agreements with Assurances, or CCAAs, are little known, voluntary conservation agreements that protect imperiled wildlife on private lands. These agreements have emerged over the past decade and have had mixed results in providing adequate protections for candidate species.

Landowners, private industries, state and federal agencies, and environmental nonprofits, are using CCAAs as tools to eliminate the need for an endangered species listing. An Endangered Species Act listing can lead to land-use uncertainty for private landowners and this threat is the main incentive to enroll in a CCAA. When landowners enroll in CCAAs they are agreeing to provide specific …

Understanding Community Character As A Socio-Ecological Framework To Enhance Local-Scale Adaptation: An Interdisciplinary Case Study From Rural Northwest Connecticut, Joanna Wozniak-Brown

Antioch University Full-Text Dissertations & Theses

Around the world, municipalities are facing new challenges, not the least of which is climate change. This is especially true for rural communities that, for a variety of reasons, will be disproportionately affected by the climatic changes and accompanying policies or programs.

This dissertation, written in manuscript-style, integrates climate change and social-ecological scholarship to address the unique character of rural communities, to communicate the complexity of rural identity through the term "rural character"; and to empower rural communities to incorporate adaptation strategies into their daily municipal operations and planning.

Specifically, this dissertation seeks to answer the following questions: What is …