Ammonia (NH₃) volatilization and greenhouse gas (GHG) emission from rice (Oryza sativa L.) fields contaminate the atmospheric environment and lead to global warming. Field trials (2013–2015) were conducted to estimate the influences of different types of fertilization practices on grain yield, NH₃ volatilization, and methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O) emissions in a double rice cropping system in Central China. Results showed that grain yields of rice were improved significantly by using slow/controlled-release urea (S/C-RU). Compared with farmers’ fertilizer practice (FFP) treatment, average annual grain yield with application of polymer-coated urea (CRU), nitrapyrin-treated urea (CP), and urea with effective microorganism (EM) treatments was increased by 18.0%, 16.2%, and 15.4%, respectively. However, the effects on NH₃ volatilization and CH₄ and N₂O emissions differed in diverse S/C-RU. Compared with that of the FFP treatment, the annual NH₃ volatilization, CH₄ emission, and N₂O emissions of the CRU treatment were decreased by 64.8%, 19.7%, and 35.2%, respectively; the annual CH₄ and N₂O emissions of the CP treatment were reduced by 33.7% and 40.3%, respectively, while the NH₃ volatilization was increased by 18.5%; the annual NH₃ and N₂O emissions of the EM treatment were reduced by 6.3% and 28.7%, while the CH₄ emission was improved by 4.3%. Overall, CP showed the best emission reduction with a decrement of 34.3% in global warming potential (GWP) and 44.4% in the greenhouse gas intensity (GHGI), followed by CRU treatment with a decrement of 21.1% in GWP and 31.7% in GHGI, compared with that of the FFP treatment. Hence, it is suggested that polymer-coated urea can be a feasible way of mitigating NH₃ volatilization and CH₄ and N₂O emission from rice fields while maintaining or increasing the grain yield in Chinese, the double rice cropping system.

Mine drainage water from the Schlenze stream, Mansfeld Region, Central Germany, which have shown an increase in heavy metal concentrations of Cd²⁺, Cu²⁺, Pb²⁺, and Zn²⁺, was used to investigate the bioremediation potential of charophytes. The removal of heavy metals by Chara subspinosa from the water was tested in single- and multi-metal additions. The uptake capacity of C. subspinosa decreased during the course of the experiment and was higher in single-metal addition than in multi-metal addition of Pb²⁺, Zn²⁺, and Cd²⁺. Accumulation of heavy metals in the carbonate encrustation of charophytes was far lower than those to which they were exposed. Cu, Cd, Pb, and Zn co-precipitated more in the encrustation of C. subspinosa exposed to single-metal approach than to multi-metal approach. The carbonate composition of charophytes was influenced by the water chemistry. Content of Na in the carbonate encrustation correlated with the Na⁺ concentration of the respective water. The toxic effect of heavy metals on photosynthesis was species-specific. Electron transport rates (ETRₘₐₓ) were higher in Chara tomentosa than in C. subspinosa. Charophytes withstand the heavy metal concentrations when diluted with river water from the Altarm cut-off lake and can therefore be used for the bioremediation of diluted mine drainage waters by co-precipitating Cd, Cu, and Zn.

For advanced water treatment, effects of pH and pure polypropylene (PP) beads packing concentration on membrane fouling and treatment efficiency were observed in a hybrid process of alumina ceramic microfiltration (MF; pore size 0.1 μm) and pure PP beads. Instead of natural organic matters and fine inorganic particles in natural water source, a quantity of humic acid (HA) and kaolin was dissolved in distilled water. The synthetic feed flowed inside the MF membrane, and the permeated water contacted the PP beads fluidized in the gap of the membrane and the acryl module case with outside UV irradiation. Periodic air back-flushing was performed to control membrane fouling during 10 s per 10 min. The membrane fouling resistance (Rf) was the maximum at 30 g/L of PP bead concentration. Finally, the maximum total permeated volume (VT) was acquired at 5 g/L of PP beads, because flux maintained higher all through the operation. The treatment efficiency of turbidity was almost constant, independent of PP bead concentration; however, that of dissolved organic materials (DOM) showed the maximal at 50 g/L of PP beads. The Rf increased as increasing feed pH from 5 to 9; however, the maximum VT was acquired at pH 6. It means that the membrane fouling could be inhibited at low acid condition. The treatment efficiency of turbidity increased a little, and that of DOM increased from 73.6 to 75.7% as increasing pH from 5 to 9.

In recent years, forward osmosis (FO) has received considerable attention due to its huge potentials in water desalination. The thin film composite (TFC) membrane used in the FO desalination consists of a bottom support layer covered by an active layer on top. Polyamide (PA) is commonly employed as an active layer forming via interfacial polymerization between m-phenylenediamine (MPD) and trimesoyl chloride (TMC) monomers. In this study, the effects that the MPD and TMC concentrations could have on the performance and anti-fouling behavior of the obtained FO membrane have been investigated. Results showed that there is a trade-off relationship between the water flux and salt rejection, which by increasing MPD concentration, the water flux was reducedو while the salt rejection was enhanced. Also, by increasing the TMC concentration, an opposite trend was observed. Using 0.20 wt.% of TMC monomer, the highest water fluxes of 21.6 LMH and 29.3 LMH were achieved in two different membrane configurations. Furthermore, higher TMC concentration caused better anti-fouling property, when PA active layer of the membrane was in a high fouling potential environment.

Phosphate, as an additive to composting, could significantly reduce ammonia emission and nitrogen loss but may also cause adverse effects on the degradation of organic matter. However, there is little information about the influence of pH change, salt content, and phosphate on different organic fraction degradation during composting with the addition of phosphate at a higher level. In this study, the equimolar phosphoric acid (H₃PO₄), sulfuric acid (H₂SO₄), and dipotassium phosphate (K₂HPO₄) were added into pig manure composting with 0.25 mol mass per kilogram of dry matter basis addition amount to evaluate the effect of H⁺, PO₄³⁻, and salinity on carbon component transformation and organic matter degradation. The results showed that both H₃PO₄ and K₂HPO₄ additives could lead to shorter duration in the thermophilic phase, lower degradation of lignocellulose, and lesser carbon loss compared to CK, even though had different pH, i.e., acidic and alkaline conditions, respectively. Besides, the addition of H₃PO₄, H₂SO₄, and K₂HPO₄ could increase the degradation of soluble protein and lipid during composting. Redundancy analysis demonstrated that the variation in different organic carbon fractions was significantly correlated with the changes of pH and the presence of PO₄³⁻, but not with SO₄²⁻ and electrical conductivity, suggesting that pH and phosphate were the more predominant factors than salinity for the inhibition of organic matter degradation. Taken together, as acidic phosphate addition produces a true advantage of controlling nitrogen loss and lower inhibition of organics transformation during composting, the expected effects may result in more efficient composting products.

Ammonia emission during composting results in anthropogenic odor nuisance and reduces the agronomic value of the compost due to the loss of nitrogen. Adjusting the operating parameters during composting is an emerging in situ odor control technique that is cheap and highly efficient. The effects of in situ NH₃ emission control were investigated in this study by simultaneously adjusting key operating parameters (such as C/N ratio, aeration rate, and moisture content) during the composting processes (C1–C9). Results showed that the average NH₃ emission concentrations for different treatments were in the order of C1 > C4 > C2 > C5 > C3 > C6 > C7 > C8 > C9. The total content of NH₃ emission (21.02 g/kg) in C9 (C/N ratio = 35, aeration rate = 15 L/min, and moisture content = 60%) was much lower than that (65.95 g/kg) in C1 (C/N ratio = 15, aeration rate = 5 L/min, and moisture content = 60%). The nitrogen loss ratio was 27.36% for C1, while 16.15% for C9. The microbial diversity and abundance in C9 and C1 were compared using high-throughput sequencing. The relationship between NH₃ emission, operating parameters, and the related functional microbial communities was also investigated. Results revealed that Nitrosospira, Nitrosomonas, Nitrobacter, Pseudomonas, Methanosaeta, Rhodobacter, Paracoccus, and Sphingobacterium were negatively related to NH₃ emission. According to the above results, the optimal values for different operating parameters for the in situ NH₃ control during kitchen waste composting were, respectively, moisture content of 70%, C/N ratio of 35, and aeration rate of 15 L/min, with the order of effectiveness from high to low being aeration rate > C/N > moisture. This information could be used as a valuable reference for the in situ NH₃ emission control during kitchen waste composting.

Medical records generated during occupational health surveillance processes have large amounts of unexploited information that can help to reduce silica-related health risks and many occupational diseases. The methodology applied in this study consists in analyzing through machine learning techniques a database with 70,000 medical examinations from workers in the energy and construction industry in Spain. First, a general unsupervised Bayesian model is built and node force analysis is used to identify the factors with the greatest impact on the worker’s health surveillance process. Second, a predictive Bayesian model is created and mutual information is employed to assess the more relevant factors affecting the medical capability of workers exposed to silica dust. The lung auscultation and the breathing exploration are the two factors that influence the most the medical capability of silica-exposed employees. Probabilistic inference shows a remarkable gender effect, where women present more resilience towards occupational diseases than men showing a higher proportion of normal results in certain key factors, such as body mass index (♀49.73%, ♂25.17%) or spirometry (♀53.73%, ♂48.91%). Finally, environmental conditions demonstrate to have a major influence on spatial variability of occupational diseases. The design of health prevention programs based on geographical variations can be crucial to the attainment of an ongoing and sustained healthier workforce with a reduction in the number of chronic workplace illnesses.

This study involves the climate change impact assessment of wheat producers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. An extensive farm survey of 150 farms was designed. From study area, three districts, namely, Chitral, D.I. Khan, and Peshawar, were selected through multistage sampling process. Yield simulation from Crop model DSSAT (Decision Support System for Agro Technology Transfer) was used for socio-economic impact assessment. Future climate scenarios were generated by selecting five GCMs from latest CMIP5 family with two RCPs 4.5 and 8.5, at two carbon concentrations of 499 ppm and 571 ppm, respectively. Yield simulations were analyzed for each GCM. Results of crop model revealed that wheat yield will increase in district Chitral, while in D.I. Khan and Peshawar, yields would be reduced due to climate change. For socio-economic impact assessment, TOA-MD (Trade-Off Analysis for Multi-Dimensional Impact Assessment) version 6 was used. Climate change impacts on poverty, net farm returns, and per capita income were calculated for different scenarios. The analysis was carried out on per-farm basis. The economic model results revealed that climate change has negative impact on wheat producers in D.I. Khan and Peshawar while making wheat producers better off in Chitral. The number of losers ranged from 54 to 66.21% and 50 to 61.99% in D.I. Khan and Peshawar, respectively. Losers are the farmers who would be economically worse off under perturbed climate. With current climate, the observed poverty rate would be 34 to 49 in D.I. Khan while 21.26 to 34.03 in Peshawar. The study recommended need for adaptation strategies to overcome the vulnerabilities of climate change.

From the perspective of river basin refined management and pollution control of water bodies, a transboundary river basin and its regional pollutant sources are identified and the typical status of discharging processes of different pollutant sources are screened. Then organic connection which can comprehensively reflect and dynamically characterize the discharge of transboundary water pollutants is constructed. In addition, the integrated prediction (IP) model of the transboundary river basin and its regional water pollutants discharge is established. Finally, the dynamic simulation of typical status characteristics of the transboundary river basin and its regional pollutant sources discharge as well as the tempo-spatial changing pattern of pollutant discharge intensity is conducted in this paper. This paper selected the Songhua River basin as an example where planting, industry, household (urban living and rural living), and livestock and poultry are the main pollutant sources. The dynamic simulation of water pollution discharge in Songhua River basin during the 13th Five-year Plan and its tempo-spatial changing trend analysis are conducted by employing the established IP model of transboundary river basin water pollution discharge. The results show that during the 13th Five-year Plan, through comprehensive management and control of pollutant sources in Songhua River basin, the discharge amounts of different pollutant sources (planting, industry, household, livestock, and poultry) present an overall decreasing trend and the main pollutants discharge intensity decreases significantly year by year. It is demonstrated that pollution discharge in Songhua River basin is controlled effectively.

Leakage of hydrocarbon fuel (light nonaqueous-phase liquid, LNAPL) from petroleum processing facilities and storage tanks may result in significant subsurface contamination. Remediating the contaminated areas represent considerable challenges, especially when remediation resources are limited and site data are incomplete. A reasonable management strategy under this scenario may be to identify sites where LNAPL recovery operations should be located that would provide the largest LNAPL recovery initially while minimizing the LNAPL remaining in the subsurface (entrapped and residual LNAPL), which may serve as future sources for groundwater contamination. To accomplish this objective, we use estimates of subsurface recoverable and total LNAPL specific volumes and LNAPL transmissivities to generate GIS maps that can be combined to highlight locations where to develop LNAPL recovery operations. When the approach is applied to a LNAPL-contaminated area in Iran, we were able to narrow the locations for potential LNAPL recovery operations. Specifically, we combine maps of the LNAPL specific yield, an introduced term, and the LNAPL transmissivity where the LNAPL specific yield is the ratio of the recoverable to total LNAPL specific volumes. The LNAPL specific yield is a relative measure of the amount of LNAPL that potentially can be recovered while minimizing residual LNAPL in soils. The approach can be applied to sites where the recoverable and total LNAPL specific volumes and LNAPL transmissivities can be estimated using data from boreholes in the contaminated area.