Unregulated use of chlorpyrifos (CPF) and monocrotophos (MCP) in agriculture casts adverse effects on non-target freshwater mollusc, Pila globosa and humans. Levels of CPF and MCP were assessed in the paddy field from the edible foot tissue of apple snail (Pila globosa) exposed to low (1.5 ml l⁻¹ water) and high (2.5 ml l⁻¹ water) agricultural doses for 48 h to determine human health risk associated with consumption of tissue. CPF and MCP were extracted by liquid–liquid extraction and analysed by QuEChERS method using GC–MS/MS. For low and high concentrations of CPF exposure, the pesticide residue levels in the paddy field water ranged from 4.43 to 1.08 and 5.13 to 1.53 µg l⁻¹, respectively, whereas, for low and high concentrations of MCP exposure, the residue levels in water ranged from 16.43 to 5.78 and 31.41 to 9. 27 µg l⁻¹, respectively, for 3–48 h. In the foot tissue, residues ranged from 4.36 to 15.54 µg kg⁻¹ for low-dose CPF, 7.1 to 18.05 µg kg⁻¹for high-dose CPF and from 5.28 to 12.3 µg kg⁻¹ and 8.94 to 18.21 µg kg⁻¹ for low and high dose of MCP, respectively, during 3 to 48 h of exposure. Pesticides in the tissue were lower than the recommended maximum residue limits. Estimated health risk for adults and children revealed that the estimated daily intake values did not exceed the threshold values of acceptable daily intake. Non-carcinogenic and carcinogenic health effects were less than the safe value of 1.0 and 1 × 10⁻⁶, respectively, suggesting that CPF and MCP residues from ingestion of apple snail posed low risks to both children and adults. This preliminary result suggests regular monitoring of pesticides residues in Pila globosa collected from the paddy field of India.

Wind energy is one of the potential renewable energy sources being exploited around the globe today. Accurate prediction of wind speed is mandatory for precise estimation of wind power at a site. In this study, hybrid machine learning models have been deployed for short-term wind speed prediction. The twin support vector regression (TSVR), primal least squares twin support vector regression (PLSTSVR), iterative Lagrangian twin parametric insensitive support vector regression (ILTPISVR), extreme learning machine (ELM), random vector functional link (RVFL), and large-margin distribution machine-based regression (LDMR) models have been adopted in predicting the short-term wind speed collected from five stations named as Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai, Salem, and Tirunelveli in Tamil Nadu, India. Further to check the applicability of the models, the performance of the models was compared based on various performance measures like RMSE, MAPE, SMAPE, MASE, SSE/SST, SSR/SST, and R². The results suggest that LDMR outperforms other models in terms of its prediction accuracy and ELM is computationally faster compared to other models.

Farmland not only provides human being with food and industrial materials, but also has non-market value. However, few studies have explored the impact of livelihood capital configuration and their willingness to pay (WTP) for the farmland non-market value, from farmers’ perspective. Based on the field survey data of 434 households in Jianghan Plain, China, this paper divided the research process into two stages to explore the impact of farmers' livelihood capital on their WTP by using binary logistics model and qualitative comparative analysis method of fuzzy sets (fsQCA). The results show that (1) The total livelihood capital of farmers was 2.667, with psychological capital 0.649, natural capital 0.621, social capital 0.127. 79.49% of the households were willing to pay for the farmland non-market value, and the most concentrated range of it is 50–200 yuan/hm². (2) Both social capital and psychological capital had positive impacts on farmers' WTP for the non-market value of farmland protection. (3) There were two livelihood capital configurations that could improve the WTP of farmers. When lacking of human capital, physical capital and psychological capital, the improvement in farmers’ financial capital and social capital will improve farmers’ WTP. When the natural, financial, and psychological capital are poor, the rich human capital, physical capital and social capital will also increase farmers’ WTP. In view of the results, policy implications on livelihood capital structure optimization and ecological compensation system differentiation were proposed.

The natural gross radioactivity concentrations in drinking water collected from the Reyhanlı District, Hatay, were measured. The gross alpha/beta radioactivity levels were measured in August 2021. A proportional counter was used to determine gross alpha/beta radioactivity levels in drinking waters. The activity levels of gross alpha/beta in drinking waters ranged from 0.001 ± 0.000 to 0.020 ± 0.002 Bq/L and 0.015 ± 0.003 to 0.715 ± 0.126 Bq/L, respectively, according to results obtained from the activity measurements. The results of the gross beta radioactivities were found reasonably high compared to the results of the gross alpha activity levels. The measured gross alpha/beta activity concentrations are smaller than the 0.5-Bq/L and 1-Bq/L limit values recommended by WHO and EPA. The annual effective dose and excess lifetime cancer risk parameters were calculated using gross alpha/beta radioactivity concentrations.

There are many studies on the treatment of heavy metals by manganese-oxidizing bacteria and the reaction is good; the problem of compound pollution of heavy metals in soil has been difficult to solve. In this study, the application of manganese-oxidizing bacteria in soil was studied. The tolerance of manganese-oxidizing strains (Pseudomonas taiwanensis) to environmental conditions and the treatment effect of heavy metals As, Pb, and Cd in aqueous solution were investigated, and the effect of iron-manganese ratio on the treatment effect was discussed. The results showed that the suitable pH conditions for the growth of P. taiwanensis were 5–9, and the salt tolerance was 6% (by sodium chloride). The tolerant concentrations for heavy metals As(V) and Mn(II) were 500 mg L⁻¹ and 120 mg L⁻¹, respectively. The strains were enriched by nutrient broth medium. After the logarithmic phase, the bacterial suspension was mixed with ATCC#279 medium at a ratio of 1:10, and a certain amount (10 mg L⁻¹) of Mn(II) was added. The results of As, Pb, and Cd removal in the composite polluted water phase were 22.09%, 30.75%, and 35.33%, respectively. The molar ratio of manganese and iron affected the removal efficiency of single arsenic, the highest efficiency is 68%, and the ratio of iron to manganese is 1:5. However, when the soil was treated by the same method, the results showed that not all metals were passivated, such as Cu. At the same time, for As, Pb, and Cd, the treatment effects in soil were worse than those in water, perhaps more consideration should be given to environmental conditions, such as soil moisture and temperature, when manganese-oxidizing bacteria are used to treat soil.

Promoting new energy vehicles (NEVs) is considered to be one of the most effective ways to solve the increasingly serious problems of energy security and environmental pollution. Under the background of a gradual decline in the use of subsidy policy, the dual-credit policy (DCP), as a market-incentive environmental regulation, has been introduced to the process of policy development. This is of great significance in promoting NEVs and upgrading of the automobile industry. Based on data for 56 listed companies related to NEVs from 2012 to 2019, this study investigated the impact of the DCP on total factor productivity (TFP) under the framework of the propensity score matching difference-in-differences (PSM-DID) and further analyzed the mechanisms by how the DCP impacted on TFP. In addition, the heterogenous impacts of different firms were investigated. The results reveal three key findings. (1) After using instrumental variable to overcome endogenous problems and carrying out a series of robustness tests, the DCP can significantly improve firms’ TFP, and this effect is increasing annually. (2) The results of the mechanism analysis show that technological innovation, reputation enhancements, and the reduction of manager motivation have promotional effects on firms’ TFP. Besides, environmental tax can reduce the contribution of research and development (R&D) innovation to TFP. (3) In terms of regional and market structural levels, the promotional effect of the DCP on firms’ TFP in the eastern region is greater than that in the midwestern region. Furthermore, it has no significant effect on competitive firms, but plays a significant role in the improvement of oligopolistic firms’ TFP. This study supported the Porter Hypothesis that flexible market-incentive environmental regulation is likely to trigger positive productivity effects, and provided an empirical basis and latest information for promoting the accuracy and effectiveness of the DCP implementation.

This experimental research was conducted to study the combined effect of agricultural by-product wastes on the properties of concrete. The coconut shell ash (CSA) was utilized to substitute cement content ranging from 0 to 20% by weight of total binder and sugarcane bagasse ash (SCBA) to substitute fine aggregates (FA) ranging from 0 to 40% by weight of total FA. In this regard, a total of 300 concrete specimens (cylinders and cubes) were prepared using 1:1.5:3 mix proportions with a 0.52 water-binder ratio. The study investigated the workability, density, permeability, and mechanical properties in terms of compressive and splitting tensile strengths. Additionally, the total embodied carbon for all mix proportions was calculated. It was observed that with an increase in CSA and SCBA contents, the workability, density, and permeability reduced significantly. Due to CSA and SCBA being pozzolanic materials, a gain in compressive and splitting tensile strengths was observed for certain concrete mixes, after which the strength decreased. The increase in embodied carbon of SCBA increased the total embodied carbon of concrete; however, it can be said that C15S40 which consists of 15% CSA and 40% SCBA is the optimum mix that achieved 28.75 MPa and 3.05 MPa compressive and tensile strength, respectively, a reduction of 4% total embodied carbon.

Diet is an important exposure pathway of phthalate esters (PAEs) for humans. A total of 174 food samples covering 11 food groups were collected from Xi'an, a typical valley city in Northwest China, and analyzed to assess the occurrence and exposure risks for PAEs in the food. Twenty-two PAEs were detected. The sum of the 22 PAEs (∑22PAEs) varied between 0.0340 and 56.8 µg/g, with a mean of 3.94 µg/g. The major PAEs were di-iso-butyl phthalate (DiBP), di-n-butyl phthalate (DnBP), bis(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), di-iso-nonyl phthalate (DiNP), and di-iso-decyl phthalate (DiDP), which were associated mainly with the usage of plasticizers. Bio-availability of the PAEs in the combined gastro-intestinal fluid simulant of digestion was higher than that in the single gastric or intestinal fluid simulant. Bis(2-methoxyethyl) phthalate exhibited the highest bio-availability in each of the three simulants. Bio-availability of the PAEs was negatively correlated with the molecular weight and octanol–water partition coefficient of the PAEs and positively correlated with the solubility and vapor pressure of the PAEs. The estimated daily intake (EDI) of PAEs based on national and municipal food consumption data was lower than the reference dose (RfD) of the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the tolerable dairy intake (TDI) of European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), except for the EDI of DnBP and DiBP being higher than the TDI of EFSA. Grains and vegetables were the major sources of human dietary exposure to PAEs. The hazardous quotient for human dietary exposure to PAEs was less than the critical value of 1 and the cancer risk of butyl benzyl phthalate and DEHP was in the range of 10–¹¹-10–⁶, suggesting relatively low health risks. The results indicated that human exposure to DnBP, DiBP, DEHP, DiNP, and DiDP in food is considerable and a health concern.

This paper examines the impact of earthquake risk on the lending behavior of local Chinese banks. The results show that when facing earthquake risk, banks will adjust their lending behavior, including decreasing the amount of loans and mortgage loans and increasing credit loans and loan loss provision, but the effect only exists for banks without inter-provincial branches or that are located in cities with a higher population density. In general, earthquake risk cannot significantly affect the performance of banks, but it can deteriorate the performance of banks that have not adjusted their lending behavior.