Much of the existing research analyses on emissions and climate policy are dominantly based on emissions data provided by production-based accounting (PBA) system. However, PBA provides an incomplete picture of driving forces behind these emission changes and impact of global trade on emissions, simply by neglecting the environmental impacts of consumption. To remedy this problem, several studies propose to consider national emissions calculated by consumption-based accounting (CBA) systems in greenhouse gas (GHG) assessments for progress and comparisons among the countries. In this article, we question the relevance of PBA’s dominance. To this end, we, firstly, try to assess and compare PBA with CBA adopted in greenhouse gas emissions accounting systems in climate change debates on several issues and to discuss the policy implications of the choice of approach. Secondly, we investigate the convergence patterns in production-based and consumption-based emissions in 35 Annex B countries for the period between 1990 and 2015. This study, for the first time, puts all these arguments together and discusses possible outcomes of convergence analysis by employing both the production- and consumption-based CO₂ per capita emissions data. The empirical results found some important conclusions which challenge most of the existing CO₂ convergence studies.

Erroneous information considering Chironomidae and Chaoboridae accumulation was given in Figure 4 published in Luoto et al. (2017).

In degradation of total petroleum hydrocarbon, 35 isolates belonging to 11 genera were sanitized and 3 isolates as well as their consortium were initiated to be able to raise in association with petroleum hydrocarbon as sole source of carbon under in vitro circumstances. The isolated strains were grounded on internal transcribed spacer (ITS) rDNA sequence analysis. The fungal strains with the utmost potentiality to reduce petroleum hydrocarbon without emerging antagonistic activities were Aspergillus niger, Penicillium ochrochloron, and Trichodema viride. For fungal growth on petroleum hydrocarbon, P. ochrocholon gained weight of 44%, A. niger 49%, and T. viride 39% within the first 30–40 days. As compared to the controls, these fungi accumulated significantly higher biomass, produced extracellular enzymes, and degraded total petroleum hydrocarbon and A. niger strongly degraded total petroleum hydrocarbon with a degradation of about 71.19%. These observations with GC-MS data confirm that these isolates displayed rapid total petroleum hydrocarbon biodegradation within a period of 60 days and the half-life showed that A. niger was the shortest with t1/2 = 21.280 day⁻¹ corresponding to the highest percent degradation of 71.19% and first-order kinetic fitted into the present study. By multivariate analysis, five main factors were identified by factor analysis (FA). The first factor (F1) of the fungi species accounts for 20.0% which signifies that fungi species controls the degradation of petroleum variability and hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) as a dendrogram with five observations and three variables shows two predominant clusters order cluster 1 > 2.

High specific surface area activated carbon prepared from endocarp of Jerivá (Syagrus romanzoffiana) (ACJ) was used for ciprofloxacin (CIP) antibiotic removal from aqueous effluents. The activated carbon (AC) was characterized via scanning electron microscope, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, N₂ adsorption/desorption, and pH value at the zero-charge point. Avrami kinetic model was the one that best fit the experimental results in comparison to the pseudo-first-order and pseudo-second-order kinetic models. The equilibrium data obeyed the Liu isotherm equation, showing a maximum adsorption capacity of 335.8 mg g⁻¹ at 40 °C. The calculated thermodynamic parameters indicate that the adsorption of CIP was spontaneous and endothermic at all studied temperatures. Also, the free enthalpy changes (∆H° = 3.34 kJ mol⁻¹) suggested physical adsorption between CIP and ACJ. Simulated effluents were utilized to check the potential of the ACJ for wastewater purification. The highly efficient features enable the activated carbon prepared from endocarp of Jerivá, an attractive carbon adsorbent, to remove ciprofloxacin from wastewaters.

The exploitation of thallium (Tl) resources through mining poses a significant threat to ecological systems and human health due to its high toxicity and ready assimilation by human body. We report the first assessment of the pollution, spatial distribution, source, and ecological-health risks of potentially toxic elements (PTEs) in Tl mining area of southwest Guizhou, China. Spatial distribution maps for PTEs were visualized by ArcGIS to identify their distribution trends. We use the enrichment factor (EF), correlation analysis, and principal component analysis to identify likely sources of seven PTEs mining area. The wider risk assessment was evaluated using the geoaccumulation index (Igₑₒ), potential ecological risk index (RI), human non-carcinogenic risk (HI), and carcinogenic risk (CR). The results revealed the PTEs content in the study area identifies direct mining, metal production, and domestic pollution sources. In addition, the distribution of PTEs was also affected by the topography, rain water leaching, and river dispersals. The main elements of concern are Tl and As, while Cd, Cr, Cu, Pb, and Zn do not show significant enrichment in the area despite associations with the ore deposit. Risk assessment identifies strong pollution and ecological risks and poses unacceptable human health risks to local residents, especially for children. The ecological risk in the study is identified to be predominantly from Tl (74.32%), followed by As (8.57%) and Cd (7.32%). The contribution of PTEs to the non-carcinogenic risk of humans in the study area is exclusively from As and Tl, while the carcinogenic risk is dominated by As, and the other elements pose no significant risk to human health.

Polysilicon production wastewater (PPW) is characterized by complex composition, high chemical oxygen demand (COD) concentration and poor biodegradability. An integrated process comprising of ferrate(VI) oxidation and biological aerated biofilter (BAF) was developed at lab scale for treating PPW with an initial COD of 3630 mg/L, biochemical oxygen demand (BOD₅) of 350 mg/L, suspended solids (SS) of 440 mg/L, and turbidity of 430 nephelometric turbidity units (NTU). Firstly, the potassium ferrate(VI) (K₂FeO₄) microcapsules were synthesized by using the phase separation method in cyclohexane, and ethylcellulose was used as the microcapsule wall materials (WM). The stability could be enhanced greatly when ferrate(VI) was encapsulated in the microcapsules with a mass ratio of K₂FeO₄:WM of 1:4 in the air compared with pure K₂FeO₄. The microcapsules exhibited sustained release behaviour and higher oxidation efficiency than pure K₂FeO₄. The microcapsules were used to pretreat PPW. Under the oxidation conditions of pH 6.0, microcapsule dosage 5.0 g/L and reaction time 70 min, the removal efficiency of COD, suspended solids (SS) and turbidity reached 55.1%, 61.3% and 74.2%, respectively. Subsequently, the oxidation effluent was subjected to BAF treatment. Under a hydraulic residence time of 48 h and a gas:water ratio of 6:1, the final effluent values of COD, SS and turbidity were 308 mg/L, 35 mg/L and 28 NTU, respectively, corresponding to total removal of 91.5%, 92.0% and 93.5%, respectively. Thus, this work demonstrates the feasible and potential application of encapsulated ferrate(VI) samples in the degradation of various toxic effluents.

The removal of greenhouse gas (GHG) emission from bitumen used in the construction of flexible pavement by iron-polyphenol complex nanoparticles (Fe-PNPₛ) has been examined in the study. Laboratory studies indicated the removal of carbon dioxide (CO₂) with Fe-PNPₛ is a function of the amount of additive (Fe-PNPₛ). From the experimental data, it was found that the reduction of CO₂ increases with increasing amount of additive up to a dosage of 4% (by weight of bitumen) without severely changing the basic engineering properties of the bitumen. The reduction of GHG is due to the conversion of the CO₂ to a mixture of hydrocarbon in the presence of Fe-PNPₛ. The characterization of the additive by SEM, FTIR, UV, and XRD indicated the formation of the Fe-PNPₛ. The analysis of the basic engineering properties of bitumen such as penetration value, softening point of the bitumen, flash point, fire point, and ductility in the presence of additive as well as without the additive were studied and reflected a noticeable effect in the reduction of the CO₂. The reduction of GHG by Fe-PNPₛ minimizes the environmental impact and saving energy by increasing the yield of hydrocarbons.

The objective of this research is to investigate the effluent water quality of a treatment plant in Turkey fed from surface and groundwater, according to water quality index (WOI) and health risk assessment (HRA). In order to achieve this goal, the quality of the influent and effluent water of the treatment plant was monitored monthly from January 2017 to January 2019. Water quality parameter results were compared with the Turkish drinking water standards and the World Health Organization (WHO), revealing that all parameters were within approved limits. Principal component analysis (PCA) was applied to determine the water quality parameter impacts in the overall quality of water and the most attractive parameters were trace elements, heavy metals, NH₃-N, NO₃, and TKN. To evaluate water quality and the impacts on human health, WQI and HRA, including hazard quotient (HQ) and hazard index (HI), were used. The WQI values were calculated by taking into account PCA results. WQI results demonstrated that the influent and effluent of water treatment plant values have a small number of WQI ranking that expressed the water category was “excellent” for drinking purpose. Finally, metal contamination in influent and effluent waters was assessed and the associated health risks to rural populations were estimated for different age groups, children and adults in the service area of the treatment plant. The health risk assessment with similar to WQI results, the acute, sub-chronic, and chronic risks of trace elements was “negligible” level, i.e., to a level affecting 1 person in 1,000,000 inhabitants.

Renewable fuels are desirable as alternate fuels with ignition quality equivalent to diesel and its combustion parameters, but unsuitable for direct operation in diesel engines as fuel because of their higher viscosity. Hence, fuel and engine-based modifications are being developed to improve the performance, emission and combustion behaviour of the compression ignition engines. The higher viscosity of fuel oil does not let it vaporize even after it is being injected into the combustion chamber. Therefore, converting the higher viscosity of vegetable oil into biodiesel improves the atomization resulting in better combustion. Issues related to the use of biodiesel as working fuel are its oxidation stability and performance. In this study, safflower oil, neem oil and corn oil are used as fuel oils. The experimental results displayed a significant increase in the brake thermal efficiency of 28.25% for corn oil methyl ester (COME). HC and CO emissions are lower with corn oil methyl ester. At full load, the smoke emission reduces slightly with corn oil methyl ester about 58% opacity respectively, but it is still lower than diesel having 66.2% opacity.

Laboratory snow melting experiments were conducted with actual late-winter snow samples, collected just before the final snowmelt, in two similar northern Swedish cities, Luleå and Umeå, to investigate releases of the selected heavy metals (HM) (Cu, Pb, Zn, and Cd) and 16 USEPA PAHs from melting snow. Metal concentrations were determined in three fractions: total, dissolved, and truly dissolved (defined as the fraction passing through a 3-kMWCO ultrafilter). Total HM concentrations in snowmelt were rather high at both sites and reflected the accumulation of pollutants in the roadside snowbanks over a period of about 5 months: Cd = 0.43, Cu = 303, Pb = 41.9, Zn = 817 (μg/l), and TSS = 2000 (mg/l) in Luleå samples and Cd = 1.87, Cu = 905, Pb = 165, Zn = 3150 (μg/l), and TSS = 4800 (mg/l) in Umeå samples. The difference between metal and TSS concentrations at the two sites of similar characteristics was attributed to a smaller volume snowbank in Umeå. The dissolved HM concentrations represented relatively small fractions of the total concentrations (0.3–6.9% in Luleå and 0.01–3.1% in Umeå). The truly dissolved fraction represented 71–90% of the dissolved fraction in Luleå and 74–98% in Umeå. At both sites, the dissolved fractions exhibited preferential elution from the laboratory snow piles. The PAHs studied (16 US EPA PAHs) were mostly particulate bound, with only 5–12% of the total burden contributed by the meltwater, and most dissolved concentrations below the reporting limits. PAH concentrations in the Luleå samples were about one-third to one-fourth of those in Umeå. In general, the releases of PAHs from the snowbank were delayed, compared with releases of meltwater, and showed similar release patterns as TSS.