Amount Of Carbon Dioxide Emissions Research Articles

Assessment of the impact of COVID-restrictions on the economy of Ukraine and the world

The object of research is the processes of reducing economic activity in Ukraine and the world during COVID-restrictions, reducing the amount of carbon dioxide emissions in 2020 compared to 2019 by country and in various sectors of the economy. The most topical researches and publications in which the given questions are covered are analyzed. Based on statistical data, the paper shows a slight decline in Ukraine's GDP in 2020. Based on the consideration of the negative impact of quarantine restrictions, it was noted that the type of economic activity (EA) such as passenger transport suffered the most. At the same time, as the production of foreign trade, the performance of retail trade and construction has improved its dynamics. Elsewhere in the world, there has also been a slight economic downturn, while China has been able to maintain a slight increase in GDP. For 2021, there is a positive outlook for economic growth. The introduction of lockdowns and quarantine restrictions has led to a simultaneous reduction in CO2 emissions worldwide and reduced the negative impact on the environment. Thanks to the data of carbon dioxide emissions monitoring, it is possible to see a significant reduction in emissions since the beginning of COVID-restrictions in 2020. At the end of the year, the level of emissions reached almost the same level as before the restrictions, but the total volume for the year decreased significantly. If to look at the sectors, the largest amount of carbon dioxide emissions decreased in the aviation sector. This also applies to the land transport sector. Peaks of falling CO2 emissions occur in April 2020. The study showed that the reduction in economic activity due to «lockdowns» and quarantine restrictions affected the fall in energy consumption, especially in the aviation and land transport sectors, and this, in turn, led to a reduction carbon dioxide. This duly explains the relationship between declining economic growth and reducing CO2 emissions. The conducted research will be of interest to relevant ministries and departments in terms of their areas of responsibility, relevant organizations dealing with environmental and economic research, specialists who study and use in practice research on socio-economic problems of society.

Synthesis of Sustainable Carbon Negative Eco-Industrial Parks

Growing climate change concerns in recent years have led to an increased need for carbon dioxide emission reduction. This can be achieved by implementing the concept of circular economy, which promotes the practice of resource conservation, emission minimization, and the maintenance of sustainable revenue streams. A considerable amount of carbon dioxide emissions is a consequence of stationary sources from industrial processes. These emissions can be reduced using carbon capture utilization and storage (CCUS) or reduced at source by using emission free renewable resources. The method developed within this work uses mixed integer linear programming (MILP) to design sustainable clusters that convert seawater (including waste brine), air, and waste carbon dioxide emissions to value-added products with sunlight as the main energy source. In this way, circular economy is employed to minimize fresh resource consumption and maximize material reuse. The potential of this work is demonstrated through a case study, which shows that an industrial park may be profitable while adhering to strict emission and material constraints.

Eco‐Friendly Alternative to Brining for Sustainable Storage of Table‐Olives Based on the Analyses Done with the Extracted Oil

AbstractDegree of quality changes in coated and uncoated reference table olives are assed based on the analyses done with the extracted oil at different storage temperatures. The results reveal that storing the table olives after coating with chitosan reduces the product and embeds energy waste. Kinetic studies show that coating delays and slows down the lipid oxidation and decreases the maximum peroxide values attained. At all storage temperatures, the amounts of phenolics retained in the olives are significantly higher in the coated samples when compared with the uncoated references. The results show that coating may also raise the tolerable storage temperature by 14 °C. Coating 10% of the total global table oil production with chitosan may lead to up to 6720 MJ of storage energy savings and 546 t of less CO2 emissions into the atmosphere.Practical Applications: Coating olives with chitosan may improve the quality of the stored oils and reduce the energy requirement of the storage process and consequently reduce the amount of carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere compared to in‐brine storage method.

Properties of Sustainable Concrete Containing Red Mud: A Review

Concrete is an essential construction material and major component of concrete is cement. There is a huge amount of carbon dioxide emission into the atmosphere during manufacturing process of cement which has negative impact on the environment. Thus it become necessary to discover a substitute material for cement in concrete. Rapid industrialization generates a significant quantity of waste material which are causing negative effect on environment. These wastes can be a replacement for traditional material which are used in concrete like cement or fine aggregate. Red mud is waste material which generated from bauxite ore at the time of production of aluminium by the Bayer process. In this review paper, the effort is made to present the properties of concrete with red mud after studying several research papers. This paper discusses the properties of red mud concrete such as workability, compressive strength, split tensile strength, flexural strength, water absorption and modulus of elasticity. This paper shows the feasibility of partial substitution of cement in concrete by red mud. The study shows that incorporating red mud resulted increase in strengths of concrete such as compressive, split tensile and flexural strength. The water absorption of concrete decrease as increase in red mud content, it can be established that there is a possibility for using red mud in concrete as a binder ingredient for sustainable construction.

Provincial carbon emission performance analysis in China based on a Malmquist data envelopment analysis approach with fixed-sum undesirable outputs

The environmental issue has attracted ever-increasing attention from governments and academics in recent years. Environmental performance analysis is widely considered a crucial and useful tool for effectively protecting the environment and developing a sustainable society. Many analytical techniques have been used to assess carbon emission performance, among which data envelopment analysis (DEA) is prominent. However, few previous DEA-related carbon emission performance studies recognize that the total amount of carbon dioxide emissions is limited to a specific level by authorities; ignoring this fixed-sum requirement may lead to distortions and deviations in empirical results. This paper proposes an alternative Malmquist DEA approach for evaluating the carbon emission performance while considering fixed-sum undesirable outputs. For this purpose, we develop a generalized equilibrium efficient frontier DEA model with fixed-sum undesirable outputs and combine the model with the Malmquist productivity index (MPI). The proposed approach is applied to assess the carbon emission performance of 30 provincial regions in China from 2009 to 2015. Then we provide analytical results and policy suggestions regarding the provincial carbon emission performance in China.

The analysis of the relationship between CO2 level and economic growth

2019 was Earth's second warmest year since 1850. In 2019 the global mean temperature was cooler than in 2016, but warmer than any other year explicitly measured. Consequently, 2016 is still the warmest year in historical observation history. Year-to-year rankings are likely to reflect natural fluctuations in the short term, but the overall pattern remains consistent with a long-term global warming trend. This would be predicted from global warming caused by greenhouse gases, temperature increase across the globe is broadly spread, impacting almost all areas of land and oceans. Climate change" and "global warming" are often used interchangeably but are of distinct significance. Global warming is the long-term heating of the Earth's climate system observed since the pre-industrial period as a result of human activities, mainly the combustion of fossil fuel, which raises the heat-trapping greenhouse gas levels in the Earth's air. The term is often used interchangeably with the term climate change, as the latter applies to warming caused both humanly and naturally, and the impact it has on our planet. This is most generally calculated as the average increase in global surface temperature on Earth. Carbon dioxide emission is one of the main reasons for global warming. Since the Industrial Revolution, human sources of carbon dioxide emissions have been growing. Human activities such as the burning of oil, coal and gas, as well as deforestation are the primary cause of the increased carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere. In our research, let’s examine the relationship between the amount of carbon dioxide emissions and the GDP/capita in developed and developing countries.

Use of different agro-waste ashes in concrete for effective upcycling of locally available resources

Due to the high amount of carbon dioxide emission from conventional cement production, sustainable alternative cementitious materials are preferred in the construction sector. Earlier studies were focused only on the use of industrial by-products such as fly ash, slag and silica fume as alternative cementitious materials. A comprehensive review of the use of a wide range of agro-waste ashes is highly limited. Therefore, the present review focuses on the potential of several agro-waste ashes including sugarcane bagasse ash, rice husk ash, palm oil fuel ash, corncob ash, coconut shell ash, wood ash, groundnut husk ash, cassava peel ash, wheat straw ash, elephant grass ash, rice straw ash, sugarcane straw ash, tobacco ash and bamboo leaf ash as alternative cementitious materials in concrete. Physical, chemical and morphological characteristics of different agro-waste ashes and their influences in the blended cement concrete are presented. Besides, the effects of these agro-waste ashes on workability, strength, water absorption, sorptivity, porosity, permeability, drying shrinkage, resistance to acid and sulfate attacks of blended concretes are critically compared. Agro-waste ashes consist of silica content above 50% with the exception of tobacco ash and groundnut husk ash. Addition of the agro-waste ashes reduces the slump of concrete except for palm oil fuel ash, wheat straw ash and rice straw ash blended concretes. Significant reduction in the permeability and subsequent enhancement in the durability of agro-waste blended concretes are evidently witnessed.

Environmental pressure of active fishing method: A study on carbon emission by trawlers from north-west Indian coast

Carbon footprint of fishing activities is an utmost important study at present for mitigation of climate change. It is a simplified form of life cycle assessment (LCA) which measured total amount of carbon dioxide emissions. Assessment of emission and energy utilization in fishing were neglected earlier and very minimal information are available in Indian context. The present study analyzed the fuel consumption, energy utilized and carbon emission rate of trawlers from north-west coast of India. Efficiency of different categories of trawlers i.e., single-day (SD), multi-day small (MDS), multi-day medium (MDM) and multi-day large (MDL) trawlers was estimated. SD trawlers were found to be most efficient followed by MDM, MDL and MDS. Single-day fishing was significantly different from multi-day fishing in terms of fuel efficiency, energy intensity and carbon emission rate. A total of 1769 trawlers were operated from Versova (site I), SSD (Sassoon Dock) (site II) and NFW (New Ferry Wharf) (site III). Of these, more than 50% are MDL trawlers and 76% of the total fuel consumed by MDL trawlers. Trawlers of selected sites resulted into total diesel consumption of 119 million litres per year. The carbon emission due to combustion of diesel was 0.3 million tonnes which is 1/12th of total carbon emission by Indian fishing fleet. Considering the impacts of trawlers on environment, substantial phasing out of MDS trawlers and multi-day trawlers with high installed engine horsepower is necessary. The trawling operation in north-west coast of India needs a strict regulation in terms of number and engine horsepower.

Performance of cement-stabilized sand subjected to freeze-thaw cycles

In cold regions, the integrity of the infrastructures built on weak soils can be extensively damaged by weathering actions due to the cyclic freezing and thawing. This damage can be mitigated by exploiting soil stabilization techniques. Generally, ordinary Portland cement (OPC) is the most commonly used binding material for investigating the chemo-hydro-mechanical behavior. However, due to the environmental issue of OPC producing a significant amount of carbon dioxide emission, calcium sulfoaluminate (CSA) cement can be used as one of the eco-sustainable alternatives. Although recently several studies have examined the strength development of CSA treated sand, no research has been concerned about CSA cement-stabilized sand affected by cyclic freeze and thaw. This study aims to conduct a comprehensive laboratory work to assess the effect of the cyclic freeze-thaw action on strength and durability of CSA cement-treated sand. For this purpose, unconfined compressive strength (UCS) and ultrasonic pulse velocity (UPV) tests were performed on the stabilized soil specimens cured for 7 and 14 days which are subjected to 0, 1, 3, 5, and 7 freeze-thaw cycles. The test results show that the strength and durability index of the samples decrease with the increase of the freeze-thaw cycles. The loss of the strength and durability considerably decreases for all soil samples subjected to the freeze-thaw cycles. Overall, the use of CSA as a stabilizer for sandy soils would be an eco-friendly option to achieve sufficient strength and durability against the freeze-thaw action in cold regions.

The nexus between education, economic growth and environmental quality: empirical evidence from Egypt and Morocco

This study examines the relationships between education, economic growth and environmental quality in Egypt and Morocco. Auto regressive distributed lag (ARDL) bound testing approach over the period 1990 to 2017 is used to investigate these relationships. The empirical findings show that the variables are cointegrated demonstrating that long-run relationship exists among those variables. In the short run, education has positive effects on amounts of carbon dioxide emissions in both countries. Though, in the long run, increasing literacy rates might lead to improve environmental quality. As for the effect of the economic growth, the results showed that carbon dioxide emissions increase as the GDP grows in both the long and short run for the case of Egypt but in Morocco, the GDP growth has no effect on the CO2 emissions.

Managing CO₂ Emission in the Energy Sector and Climate Policy

Aim: The article presents information on the issue of CO2 emission (called greenhouse gas) from the energy sector, along with tools enabling the deter- mination of CO2 emissivity used to manage this process and the directions of actions taken to minimize the negative impact on the climate. Introduction: CO2 is one of the substances essential for the functioning of life on Earth. On one hand, it is an important element of the carbon cycle in nature, being the basis for the synthesis of carbohydrates. On the other hand, it belongs to the group of greenhouse gases responsible for the climate change – and for this reason, it must be subject to constant control. Due to this fact, appropriate measures are taken, including changes in law, in the scope of emission, as well as the introduction of modern technological solutions aimed at monitoring and reducing CO2 emission. Activities undertaken in the area of energy, the branch of the economy generating the largest amounts of anthropogenic CO2, accounting for 41% of global emissions of this gas, are of significant importance [1]. The developed tools, allowing to calculate the amount of carbon dioxide emissions, expressed by emission indicators, allow for the assessment of the activities undertaken both in terms of ecology and economy. Methodology: The article was prepared on the basis of a review of selected literature, and reports as well as applicable legal requirements in the field of the discussed subject. Conclusions: The implemented measures aimed at the application of emission indicators in the area of energy allowed for the definition of forecasts and the determination of the directions of activities, in order to reduce the emission of CO2. The gradual implementation of new technological solutions, enabling energy production based on biomass or other renewable energy sources, allows for the reduction of the emission of this gas. However, given the constantly increasing energy demand, it is a slow process which is not sufficient to stop the observed changes. Therefore, it is necessary to take further steps, to develop more reliable and homogeneous tools that would make it possible to compare the results regardless of the place of emission or the type of fuel used. However, it should be noted that it is necessary to cover all stages of the construction and operation of the energy sector with the measures mentioned above, which generate CO2 emission, and not only the combustion process itself. Keywords: emissivity, CO2, power engineering, climate change Type of article: review article

Adaptation of Cities to Climate Change (Best Practices Review)

The authors of the article are raising current issues related to climate change and global warming. Not all the countries are responding to these processes the same way and undertake joint complex efforts to mitigate climate change impacts. The authors have analyzed the existing legislations and actions for adaptation to climate change in the EU and separate European countries. “Covenant of Mayors”, ADAPT program, Joint Programming Initiative Urban Europe are considered in detail. Informational and awareness-raising work of state and educational entities is one of the main necessary actions to mitigate climate change negative impacts. The article presents the results of the opinion poll made by the European Social Survey, “Russian Public Opinion Research Center” (JSC “VCIOM”) and the investigations of German State Development Bank KfW on how citizens perceive climate change processes, their sense of personal responsibility and personal reaction. Also a brief review of educational programs of builders, urban developers and architects in European and Russian universities is added to the article. The conclusion of the authors is as such: it is necessary to intensify legislative measures for adaptation of cities to climate change, the stronger control of the amount of carbon dioxide emissions and coordinated actions in one region are needed. It is necessary to pay careful attention to climatic education of the students – future builders and urban developers.

Benchmarking Analysis of Carbon Emission in China and Foreign Countries from the Perspective of Urbanization

With the further aggravation of global warming and the increasingly serious problems of ecological environment, the construction of low-carbon cities has become an inevitable choice for the global response to climate change and the sustainable development of economy and society. In order to understand the basic situation of China’s low-carbon cities more specifically, this paper selects countries with different urbanization rates to carry out benchmarking analysis with China, hoping to draw on the experience of other countries from the national level through multi-dimensional comparison, and guide the direction of China’s future urban development. Firstly, this paper selects the basic indicators such as the total amount of carbon dioxide emissions, per capita carbon emissions and carbon emissions per unit GDP of each country; Secondly, it compares the proportion of coal in energy and other indicators, and analyzes the energy structure of each country in depth; Thirdly, it compares the trend of carbon emissions in each country among 1990-2017. Finally, in order to reflect the carbon emission in the development of urbanization, this paper uses the “urbanization carbon emission index”, which is the ratio of per capita carbon emission and urbanization rate, to show the relationship between the degree of urbanization and carbon emission. Through benchmarking analysis, we can more clearly understand the overall trend of low-carbon city construction in different countries, recognize the gap between China and other countries, and better guide the development of low-carbon cities in China in the future.

STUDY OF BENTONITE USAGE IN ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY CONCRETE

Production of cement generates a huge amount of carbon dioxide emissions into the environment, utilization of pozzolanic materials in concrete is a better solution for this environmental problem. Several studies are conducted for using of pozzolanic materials such as fly ash, ground granular blast furnace slag, and silica fume as a pozzolanic material in concrete. A few studies were available on using bentonite in concrete. Bentonite is mainly clay contains rich amount of silicain which obeys the pozzolanic properties. The objective of present study is to find out the effectiveness of using bentonite and waste rubber crumb in the design mix of concrete. An experimental investigation is performed on concrete mixtures to study the effect of using bentonite as a partial replacement of cement and conducting an environmentally friendly concrete using crumb rubber in the concrete mixtures as a partial replacement of fine aggregates. Cement is partially replaced by volume (2%, 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%) with Bentonite and fine aggregate is partially replaced (5%, 20%, 25%, 30%, 40%) with crumb rubber. Slump tests were conducted to evaluate the workability of fresh concrete. Compressive strength of cubes at 7days and 28 days, splitting strength and abrasion strength at 28 days are studied and compared with conventional concrete. A part of research work addresses the effect of using bentonite and waste rubber crumb on durability of concrete. For this purpose, specimens were submerged in solution containing 50 g/l of NaOH and H2SO4. Based on the test results, the ideal percentage of mix which shows maximum compressive strength is identified. The results showed that the compressive strength of the concrete was generally increases when bentonite replaced a part of the cement and decreases with the replacement of fine aggregates by the waste crumb rubber. Although the using of bentonite and crumb rubber decreases the compressive strength. The optimal mixture from the laboratory experimental investigation is 5% reduction of cement content and 20% of fine aggregates replacement that exhibited a compressive strength of 30 MPa at 28 days. The test results substantiate the feasibility to develop environmentally friendly concrete using bentonite and crumb rubber in the concrete mixtures. فى هذا البحث ،تم دراسة استخدام البنتونیت کبدیل جزئی للأسمنت ومخلفات المطاط کبدیل جزئى للرکام الناعم فى الخرسانة الصدیقة للبیئة، تم مقارنة نتائج إختبارات قابلیة التشغیل ومقاومة الضغط و مقاومة الشد الغیر مباشر (الانفلاق) ومقاومة البرى والإستدامة بالخرسانة التقلیدیة.أوصت الدراسة بإمکانیة إستخدام البنتونیت حتى 5% کبدیل للأسمنت وإستخدام مخلفات المطاط حتى 20% کبدیل للرکام الناعم فى الخلطات الخرسانیة.

Simulation on Lighting Energy Consumption based on Building Information Modelling for Energy Efficiency at Highway Rest and Service Areas Malaysia

Building consumes 40% of global energy consumption which contributes for such a majority amount of carbon dioxide emission. Enhancing the energy efficiency strategies in buildings by retrofitting through different approaches is essential for reducing end user on the amount of energy consumption and carbon footprint emission. Previous research shows that only a few studies have been conducted on retrofitting the energy performance on Rest and Service Area yet the result shows that lack of technical feasibility practice was reviewed. Hence, this paper explores the energy efficiency strategy by improving the lighting performance based on 24 hours service building at Rest and Service Area Ayer Keroh Northbound Malaysia. The simulation that was performed in lighting energy consumption was EnergyPLUS software, Autodesk Revit and RELUX Plug in tool in Revit. Preliminary study was conducted to identity the problem on energy performance at Rest and Service Area Ayer Keroh by determine the total energy consumption by sources and Building Energy Intensity [BEI]. The result shows lighting contributes to the most total load consumption due to lack of energy conservation management and energy efficiency strategy practices. The lighting simulation scenarios was created to enhance the energy consumption performance and reduced the irrelevant carbon footprint emission. The simulation in Revit and EnergyPLUS showed 17% and 49% reduction respectively on the end load of lighting energy consumption by reducing the overall time operation and daylight control dimming system.

Approach to the Proecological Distribution of the Traffic Flow on the Transport Network from the Point of View of Carbon Dioxide

Nowadays, apart from travel time and cost, more and more attention is paid to ensuring that ecological footprint of the means of transport used for a journey is as small as possible. Therefore, it is reasonable to look for methods and solutions that will allow planning communication connections according to the principles of sustainable development. The aim of the article was to present mathematical model of the proecological distribution of traffic flow into a network, together with a determination of how the amount of emissions of harmful compounds for rail transport will be calculated (based on amount of energy necessary for movement, calculated on circumference of the wheels). The model has been verified on real data. The traffic flow was distributed over a selected communication route: Warszawa—Gdansk, where the criterion was minimization of total carbon dioxide emissions. An evolutionary method implemented in Microsoft Excel was used to solve the optimization problem. For the analysis of only the fastest connections, the railway one was the optimal from the point of view of the adopted criteria. After the train capacity was exceeded, air and car connections were loaded. Based on the research, a function that represents the amount of carbon dioxide emissions in the analyzed traffic route depending on the size of the traffic flow was developed.

An integrated method of environmental analysis and system dynamics for management of mobile phone waste in Colombia

Global concern about electronic waste is growing due to the awareness of the consequences of inadequate management of this waste. The relationship between the accelerated development of telecommunications, globalization, economic growth, market conditions, environmental policies, the generation of electronic waste and the negative impact on the environment are of increasing interest for specialists in environmental science. This study aims to identify the relevant variables that influence electronic waste generation from discarded mobile phones, and the environmental implications of use and disposal of mobile telephones via a case study in Colombia, using a System Dynamics Model and the analysis of several various scenarios. The main determining factors were identified as mobile telephony line acquisitions, gross domestic product per capita, and the lifespan of mobile phones. These were shown to be the determining variables in the generation of waste of electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) in the case of mobile phones in Colombia. Secondly, the amount of carbon dioxide emissions depends on the length of usage of the phones; in 2019 the actual waste generated by the disposal of mobile phones only contributed to 10.07 CO2 tons, compared to 102,245 tons generated by their usage.

The Influence of Power Sources for Charging the Batteries of Electric Cars on CO2 Emissions during Daily Driving: A Case Study from Poland

The main sources of greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution from the transport sector are diesel- and gasoline-powered passenger cars. The combustion of large amounts of conventional fuels by cars contributes to a significant release of various compounds into the atmosphere, such as solid particles, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, and carbon dioxide. In order to reduce these pollutants in places of their high concentration (especially in urban agglomerations), the use of ecological means of transport for daily driving is highly recommended. Electric vehicles (EV) are characterized by ecological potential due to their lack of direct emissions and low noise. However, in Poland and many other countries, electricity production is still based on fossil fuels which can significantly influence the indirect emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere associated with battery charging. Thus, indirect emissions from electric cars may be comparable or even higher than direct emissions related to the use of traditional cars. Therefore, the aim of the work was to analyze the amount of carbon dioxide emissions associated with the use of electric vehicles for daily driving (City, Sedan, SUV) and their impact on the environment on a local and global scale. Based on the assumed daily number of kilometers driven by the vehicle and the collected certified catalog data (Car Info Nordic AB), the direct emissions generated by the internal combustion engines (ICE) were calculated for specific cars. These values were compared to the indirect emissions related to the source of electricity generation, for the calculation of which the CO2 emission coefficient for a particular energy source and energy mix was used, as well as reference values of electricity generation efficiency in a given combustion installation, in accordance with the KOBiZE (The National Centre for Emissions Management) and European Union regulation. Indirect emissions generated from non-renewable fuels (lignite, hard coal, natural gas, diesel oil, heating oil, municipal waste) and renewable emissions (wind energy, solar energy, hydro energy, biomass, biogas) were considered. The results indicated that for the Polish case study, indirect carbon dioxide emission associated with the daily driving of EV (distance of 26 km) ranges 2.49–3.28 kgCO2∙day−1. As a result, this indirect emission can be even higher than direct emissions associated with ICE usage (2.55–5.64 kgCO2∙day−1).

Surface Characterisation of Estonian Oil Shale Semi-Coke

Oil shale is a low-grade fossil fuel that has been used in Estonia mostly for electricity and shale oil production. The conventional use of oil shale results in a vast amount of carbon dioxide emissions urging to find alternative ways for sustainable utilisation of oil shale and develop new technologies. Since oil shale contains relatively high amount of organic matter it should be suitable for producing porous carbonised material (semi-coke) that has high surface area and can be used as an adsorbent in various applications. The aim of this research is to determine the effect of thermal treatment conditions on the specific surface area (SSA) of semi-coke. Estonian oil shale from Ojamaa underground mine was pyrolysed in a batch reactor using different temperatures in the range of 550 to 900 °C and atmospheres (N2 and CO2). The surface properties (BET SSA, pore volume and pore size distribution) of obtained samples were studied using N2 adsorption. The results showed that when the pyrolysis temperature was raised in N2 environment, larger SSA of the sample was obtained – it increased from 12 m2/g (pyrolysed at 550 °C) to 31 m2/g (pyrolysed at 900 °C). At higher temperatures the increase of pores less than 5 nm in diameter was also noticed. The semi-coke samples prepared in N2 environment had larger SSA compared to the ones prepared in CO2.

Impacts of wind erosion and seasonal changes on soil carbon dioxide emission in southwestern Iran

Wind erosion is one of the main drivers of soil loss in the world, which affects 20 million hectare land of Iran. Besides the soil loss, wind erosion contributes to carbon dioxide emission from the soil into the atmosphere. The objective of this study is to evaluate monthly and seasonal changes in carbon dioxide emission in four classes i.e., low, moderate, severe and very severe soil erosion and the interactions between air temperature and wind erosion in relation to carbon dioxide emission in the Bordekhun region, Boushehr Province, southwestern Iran. Wind erosion intensities were evaluated using IRIFR (Iran Research Institute of Forests and Ranges) model, in which four classes of soil erosion were identified. Afterward, we measured carbon dioxide emission on a monthly basis and for a period of one year using alkali traps in each class of soil erosion. Data on emission levels and erosion classes were analyzed as a factorial experiment in a completely randomized design with twelve replications in each treatment. The highest rate of emission occurred in July (4.490 g CO2/(m2·d)) in severely eroded lands and the least in January (0.086 g CO2/(m2·d)) in low eroded lands. Therefore, it is resulted that increasing erosion intensity causes an increase in soil carbon dioxide emission rate at severe erosion intensity. Moreover, the maximum amount of carbon dioxide emission happened in summer and the minimum in winter. Soil carbon dioxide emission was just related to air temperature without any relationship with soil moisture content; since changes of soil moisture in the wet and dry seasons were not high enough to affect soil microorganisms and respiration in dry areas. In general, there are complex and multiple relationships between various factors associated with soil erosion and carbon dioxide emission. Global warming causes events that lead to more erosion, which in turn increases greenhouse gas emission, and rising greenhouse gases will cause more global warming. The result of this study demonstrated the synergistic effect of wind erosion and global climate warming towards carbon dioxide emission into the atmosphere.