Environmental Studies Commons^™

Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, Vegetation Mapping Project [Poster], Kelly Kindscher, Hayley Kilroy, Jennifer Delisle, Quinn Long, Hillary Loring, Kevin Dobbs, Jim Drake

United States National Park Service: Publications

The Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve encompasses 10,894 acres in eastern Kansas, just north of Strong City. This park unit was created on November 12, 1996, and is the first to protect a nationally significant example of the once vast tall grass prairie ecosystem. Of the 400,000 square miles of tall grass prairie that once covered the North American continent, less than four percent remains, prin1arily in the Flint Hills. The park unit is primarily rocky upland prairies and deep-soiled prairies in the lowlands. It also contains some wet prairie ravines, riparian forests and some former cropland and restored prairie. These …

Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, Vegetation Classification [Map], United States National Park Service

United States National Park Service: Publications

Colo vegetation map of the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve in Strong City, Kansas, USA, from the Tallgrass Prairie NP Vegetation Mapping Project, created between April and June 2011. Includes a color-coded vegetation classification.

Homestead National Monument, Vegetation Mapping Project [Poster], Kelly Kindscher, Hayley Kilroy, Jennifer Delisle, Quinn Long, Hillary Loring, Kevin Dobbs, Jim Drake

United States National Park Service: Publications

Homestead National Monument was created in 1936 to celebrate the significance of the Homestead Act of 1862, which granted 160 acres of free land to claimants. This was one of the most significant and enduring events in the westward expansion of the United States. The site is the first tract homesteaded under the act by Daniel Freemen, and encompasses 184 acres in Gage County, west of Beatrice, Nebraska.

This unique site also hosts the oldest prairie restoration in the National Park system and the second-oldest tallgrass prairie restoration known. This park unit also has a small remnant of native tallgrass …

The Environmental Analysis In Ship Investment Decision-Making, Zhangzhang Ding

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Research On The Competitiveness Of China Hn Chemical Shipping Company, Yue Luan

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Fire Effects On Wildlife In Tallgrass Prairie, Maria Gaetani, Kayla Cook, Sherry Leis

United States National Park Service: Publications

Abstract

In the tallgrass prairie region of North America, grasslands are often burned on a rotational schedule to prevent the encroachment of woody species and maintain the vigor of plant communities. Although prescribed fire practitioners often consider the effects of fire on plant communities, the effects of fire on wildlife are also important. Practitioners as well as park visitors inquire about the effects of fire on birds, deer, and other animals of interest. Many wildlife species focus on vegetation structure in choosing suitable habitats, and fire can temporarily alter that structure. Wildlife species have varying habitat needs, and therefore, a …

Integrated Water Resources Management: A Theoretical Exploration Of The Implementation Gap Between The Developed And Developing Worlds, Jennifer S. Schiff

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

As part of its Millennium Development Goals, the United Nations acknowledges that solving the world's water woes requires giving one billion additional people access to safe and affordable drinking water, while also noting that this is a difficult goal to achieve considering present environmental challenges. Amidst this atmosphere of vanishing freshwater, the legislative policy community has begun to encourage diverse discourse on the topic of efficient resource management, but the form and function of such a solution present unique political and theoretical challenges for policymakers and scholars alike. The current consensus among water managers is that a multifaceted policy framework …

A Climate Action Plan For Bucknell University, Wendy Chou, Dina El-Mogazi, Dennis Hawley

Technical Reports

The accelerating pace of human-influenced climate change and our growing awareness of its negative public-health, environmental, and economic consequences compel decisive action. In recent years, many institutions of higher education have taken leadership roles to promote sustainability and climate neutrality at the campus level. In January 2008, Bucknell University became a signatory to the American Colleges and University Presidents Climate Commitment (ACUPCC). Under this agreement, Bucknell is required to prepare a comprehensive inventory of greenhouse gas emissions by May 2009, to update the inventory every other year thereafter, and to implement tangible emissions-reducing actions in the short-term (two years). The …

Northern Great Plains Network Vital Signs Monitoring Plan, Robert A. Gitzen, Marcia Wilson, United States National Park Service, Northern Great Plains Inventory And Monitoring Network, Mike Bynum, John Wrede, Joshua J. Millspaugh, Kara J. Paintner

United States National Park Service: Publications

Executive Summary

The condition of natural resources in parks and other units of the National Park Service (NPS) is fundamental to this agency’s mission to manage park resources “unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.” Park managers are increasingly confronted with complex and challenging resource management issues and need a broad-based understanding of the status and trends of park resources for the long-term protection of park ecosystems. The National Park Service has initiated a long-term ecological “Vital Signs” monitoring program to provide the minimum infrastructure needed to track the overall condition of natural resources in parks and to provide early …

Revised Relative Abundance Estimates And Temporal Activity Of Bats At Three Great Lakes National Parks Based On Acoustic Data, Bruce W. Miller

United States National Park Service: Publications

Abstract

In this study, Miller re-analyzed acoustic bat data collected from June-August 2003 that was part of a baseline inventory of bat species in three national parks in the Lake Superior region. While the original study presented base-line data on the presence/absence of bat species in these parks, this reanalysis provides estimates of relative abundance and temporal activity of the identified species. Using a suite of recently developed acoustic analysis tools, Miller created species specific filters. This allowed parsing of calls from non-fragmented sequences and differentiate between two species, Myotis septentrionalis and Myotis lucifugus, that were combined into a …

Niobrara National Scenic River Condition Assessment, Sunil Narumalani, Gary D. Willson, Christine K. Lockert, Paul B. T. Merani

United States National Park Service: Publications

Executive Summary

Niobrara National Scenic River spans a 122-km (76-mile) long reach of the Niobrara River in rural, north-central Nebraska. The scenic river encompasses 9,338 ha (23,074 acres) of land and water, all of which is in private ownership, except for about 320 ha (790 acres). Because the scenic river does not own land, it achieves management goals by coordinating and collaborating with federal, state, and local jurisdictions and private landowners.

The central Niobrara River Valley is often referred to as a “biological crossroads” with plant and animal species representative of northern boreal forest, eastern deciduous forest, rocky mountain coniferous …

An Investigation Into The Use Of Geospatial Technologies As Part Of Disaster Management Efforts Related To The Asian Tsunami Of 2004, Robert William Redding Jr.

Dissertations

On the 26th of December, 2004, a tsunami impacted the countries surrounding the Indian Ocean, immediately killing over two hundred and eighty thousand people, displacing another million people, and initially causing at least US$10 billion in damage. The response by the international community was swift and massive. Disaster decision-makers who led their organization's responses to the tsunami used geospatial information to support their decision-making efforts with mixed success. When describing their use of geospatial technologies during the response, a select set of disaster decision-makers provided information about how they used geospatial information, they described what worked and what did not …

Energy Security: An Australian Nuclear Power Industry, Geoff I. Swan

Australian Security and Intelligence Conference

Climate change and energy security are driving a worldwide renaissance in nuclear power. An Australian nuclear power industry has also been seriously investigated by the Australian government and its agencies. This paper provides a broad overview of the nuclear fuel cycle and the nuclear power industry. It identifies aspects that are sensitive to nuclear terrorism and nuclear weapons proliferation to help security professionals identify threats and prepare for a possible Australian nuclear power industry.

Care Local Partnerships Healthy Communities: Promising Practices (Draft), Environmental Protection Agency

Mickey Leland Center Information Portal

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Community Action for a Renewed Environment (CARE) program is a competitive grant program that offers communities an innovative way to address the risks from multiple sources of pollution in their environment. The CARE program awarded its first series of grants in 2005; to date there are 68 CARE communities.

Nepa And The Dynamics Of Public Participation In The Environmental Review Process: An Analysis Of The Northmet (Polymet) Mining Project Near Hoyt Lakes Minnesota, Amber Neumann

Political Science Theses and Capstones

Hypothesis: That comments collected from agency “experts” during the scoping phase of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process would be disproportionately represented as changes in subsequent drafts of NorthMet’s Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).

Methods: Tabular analysis of data collected from the Minnesota DNR publication of Response to the Public Scoping Projects PolyMet Mining Inc.; NorthMet Project. 2005

Results: There is an excellent cross section of comment sources represented in changes to subsequent drafts of NorthMet’s EIS. A lot of overlap exists between various types of participants and their concerns, resulting in many of the successful comments stemming from …

Geography And Capacity Of Alternative Fuel Production 1999 - 2006: The Case Of Solar And Wind, James Pace

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Access to reliable, low cost energy production is key to the wellbeing of our economy, standard ofliving, and national security. As the cost of energy from conventional resources has increased, efforts have started to convert to alternative, renewable sources of energy production. Currently, wind and solar technologies are the best options for an alternative source of energy. Data on wind and solar energy resources, the availability of incentives, and the existence of renewable portfolio standards (RPS) were used to determine the most plausible influencing factors of wind and solar energy production. Maps generated from these data point to a relationship …

Agenda: Shifting Baselines And New Meridians: Water, Resources, Landscapes, And The Transformation Of The American West, University Of Colorado Boulder. Natural Resources Law Center

Shifting Baselines and New Meridians: Water, Resources, Landscapes, and the Transformation of the American West (Summer Conference, June 4-6)

The Center’s 29th annual conference will focus on the changes in the West resulting from rapid population growth, development, disrupted historical weather patterns and the effects of those changes on land, water, and energy resources. Speakers and panelists will address the adaptability of the legal and political institutions and how the transformation of the West may foreshadow fundamental changes to these institutions.

The agenda includes panel discussions that will address:

• Water for the 21^st Century —the big questions in Western water and rethinking Western water law.
• The Future of Energy —practical and sophisticated solutions to overcome the energy …

Sozialpolitik Nach Verursacherprinzip : Beispiele Der Anwendung Aus Arbeit, Gesundheit, Sucht, Schule Und Wohnen, Isidor Wallimann

Books

Sozialpolitik nach Verursacherprinzip explores the application of the polluter pays principle to a variety of social policies. It specifically examines possibilities in labor, health, addiction, education, and housing policies.

Modeling Environmental Justice: A Comparative Analysis Of Multiple Environmental Metrics, Trevor K. Fuller

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Environmental justice, the study of interactions between environmental disamenities and socioeconomic conditions, has been a focus of policy debates and research since the late 1970s. To date, environmental justice research has relied heavily on a few selected metrics, including, but not limited to, Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), Treatment, Storage, and Disposal Facilities (TSDF), and Super.fund site Jocations. In this study, I will examine the efficacy of these environmental quality datasets, as well as that oflocal blood-lead level data (in children), to predict observed socioeconomic conditions and compare these results to an emerging metric, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI). Based on …

Greening The Campus: Contemporary Student Environmental Activism, Ashley Dawson

Publications and Research

In November 1992, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) issued a report entitled "World Scientists' Warning to Humanity." Written by UCS Chair Henry Kendall and signed by 1,700 of the worlds leading scientists, including the majority of Nobel laureates in the sciences, the report's admonition was conveyed in the strongest terms.

Multifunctional Rural Landscapes: Economic, Environmental, Policy, And Social Impacts Of Land Use Changes In Nebraska, Twyla M. Hansen, Charles A. Francis, J. Dixon Esseks, J. Allen Williams Jr.

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The conversion of farmland near cities to other human uses is a global trend that challenges our long-term capacity to provide food, fiber, and ecosystem services to a growing world population. If current trends continue in the United States, the population will reach 450 million by the year 2050. At the same time, an accelerating change in land use will reduce today’s two acres per person of farmland to less than one acre per person. This is scarcely enough to produce food for our domestic population, without any food available for export – even assuming advances in technology. We need …

Spatial And Seasonal Variation In Wildlife-Vehicle Collisions, Jonathan M. Conard, Philip S. Gipson

The Prairie Naturalist

To understand seasonal variation in the number of wildlife-vehicle collisions and the influence of land cover type on collision distribution we counted road-kill carcasses for 84 weeks along a 40 km route on two state highways in northeastern Kansas. We noted land cover type adjacent to each road-kill and tested the null hypothesis that road-kills were distributed randomly with respect to land cover type. Wildlife-vehicle collisions were not distributed randomly in relation to land cover availability. Instead, collisions occurred more often then expected adjacent to riparian areas and less often than expected adjacent to agricultural fields. Wildlife-vehicle collisions varied seasonally …

Water, Development, And State Security In South Asia: Scenarios For China And India, Ray Chandrasekara, John M. Polimeni

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

Conflict over water resources is rare and has not occurred for thousands of years. However, the dynamics in South Asia are changing so rapidly that a conflict in the not-so-near future may be unavoidable. Water shortages could have the nonlinear effects of food shortages, political instability, migration problems, and diminished economic growth. All of these factors, caused by water shortages, could be a driver of conflict in the region, causing territorial disputes. Global instability would be sure to follow as both the U.S., attempting to protect their national security interests, and China, reacting as the regional power, tries to intervene. …

Leftist Populism And Sustainable Development In Latin America, Carina Kjelstad

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Sustainable development still remains the best option to secure a viable future. Why are some leaders more prone to implement sustainable development policies than others, and does the leaders' political orientation affect such decision-making? Leaders are often faced with constraints that make them choose policies that do not necessarily lead to sustainability from an ecological point of view. This thesis addresses these issues by examining two case studies that involve an analysis of the sustainable development policies implemented by President Lula in Brazil and President Chavez in Venezuela and the constraints that have hindered them in doing so.

Effects Of Predator Removal On Upland Nesting Ducks In North Dakota Grassland Fragments, Kristen D. Chodachek, Michael J. Chamberlain

The Prairie Naturalist

Low nest success rates in the Prairie Pothole Region are attributed mainly to changes in the predator community coupled with reductions in availability of suitable nesting cover. We evaluated effects of removal of mammalian predators on pair density and nest success of ducks nesting on 259 ha sites in northeastern North Dakota during 2001 and 2002. We monitored pair density and duck nests on 10 sites with removal and 10 sites without removal. Overall nest success for both years was greater on trapped (53.4%) than nontrapped sites (28.7%). Pair densities were not affected by predator removal, but did increase across …

Spatial Autocorrelation Of Deer-Vehicle Accidents In Vigo County, J. Scott Horn

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Deer-vehicle accidents (DV As) are a problem in many areas. They cause millions of dollars in property damage, personal injury, and loss of life each year. This thesis examines whether DVAs in Vigo County, Indiana during the year 2000 were spatially autocorrelated; and whether DV As selected by deer habitat were spatially autocorrelated. Specifically using Moran's I to test for spatial autocorrelation this study determined if and to what degree spatial autocorrelation existed among these DVAs. A Moran's I value of .0023 shows that the accidents occurred randomly. These DV A data were then used to plot a map which …

A Recommendation For An Enhanced Fujita Scale (Ef-Scale)

United States Department of Commerce: Staff Publications

Background

National Weather Service (NWS) personnel who are responsible for rating tornadoes have expressed frustrations in applying the Fujita Scale in a consistent and accurate manner. Weak links in a structural system or a slow-moving storm sometimes lead to an overrating of a tornado event. Several technical articles suggest that wind speeds associated with some descriptions of damage are too high. For example, a 260 mph wind speed is not required to completely destroy a well constructed house and blow away the debris. The damage occurs at significantly lower wind speeds. Minor et al. (1977) and Phan and Simiu (2003) …

Ten Suggestions To Strengthen The Science Of Ecology, Gary E. Belovsky, Daniel B. Botkin, Todd A. Crowl, Kenneth W. Cummins, Jerry F. Franklin, Malcolm L. Hunter, Anthony Joern, David B. Lindenmayer, James A. Macmahon, Chris R. Margules, J. Michael Scott

Papers in Ecology

There are few well-documented, general ecological principles that can be applied to pressing environmental issues. When they discuss them at all, ecologists often disagree about the relative importance of different aspects of the science’s original and still important issues. It may be that the sum of ecological science is not open to universal statements because of the wide range of organizational, spatial, and temporal phenomena, as well as the sheer number of possible interactions.We believe, however, that the search for general principles has been inadequate to establish the extent to which generalities are possible.We suggest that ecologists may need to …

Sozialpolitik Anders Denken. Das Verursacherprinzip – Von Der Umweltpolitischen Zur Sozialpolitischen Anwendung, Isidor Wallimann, Esteban Piñeiro

Books

The “polluter pays” principle in environmental law assumes that the actor would reduce or avoid adverse effects of his actions if he had to bear the consequences of those actions (internalization of effects). Such internalization can generally be done in two ways: either by avoiding or eliminating the harmful effects or by wearing the financial consequences of the injury. It is therefore on the one hand to have an incentive effect, on the other to a compensatory effect.

Pineiro and Wallimann apply these societal cost principles from the environmental world to the social realm, where social problems can be seen …

Environmental Studies Senior Seminar 2003: Invasive Species, Kyle Hegamyer, Byron Deluke, Allyson Ladley, Lucas Nagy, Brian Webb, Steve Nash, Matthew Rose

Environmental Studies Senior Seminar Projects

The class of 2003 was the first to graduate with Environmental Studies degrees from the University of Richmond. At that time, the Senior Seminar was a two-semester class, ENVR 391 and 392. It was taught by a pair of professors; Stephen P. Nash, Journalism, and Peter D. Smallwood, Biology. Students chose the problem of invasive species for their focus. With tremendous help from the staff of the Virginia chapter of The Nature Conservancy, and from Delegate James Dillard, the students proposed legislation to help Virginia deal with this environmental problem. Students wrote opinion pieces for local papers throughout Virginia in …