Development Of Environmental Systems Research Articles

Evaluation of the coordinated development of economic, urbanization and environmental systems: a case study of China

The rapid development of economic and urbanization systems exerts a negative impact on environmental system. To achieve the sustainable development of a country, it is important to obtain an in-depth understanding of the interaction among economic, urbanization and environmental systems. A coupling coordination model of the three systems is constructed in this research to investigate the interactions among the three systems in China. This study determines the contribution rate of each indicator to the three systems during the studied period, then evaluates the development levels of the three systems and finally explores coupling coordination levels among them. The results show that economic scale, spatial urbanization and environmental governance are the prominent indicator in the economic, urbanization and environmental systems, respectively. The findings suggest that the policy makers need to consider these indicators for the development of the three systems. Furthermore, the development level of economic, urbanization and environmental systems in China generally shows an upward trend, while the environmental system development has been lagging behind the development level of economic and urbanization systems. The spatial difference exists chronically, but such differences are gradually decreasing as time evolves. Among these systems, the reduction of difference in urbanization system is most obvious. Although the coupling coordination level of the three systems presents an upward trend, unbalanced development of these systems in regional level still exists. The insightful implications are discussed for coordinated development.

Social and Economic Environmental System Development Efficiency Assessment (on the example of railway industry enterprises)

Purpose: purpose of the scientific article is assessment of social and ecological and economic efficiency of an environmental system development on the example of railway transport. This purpose suggests the following objectives implementation: 1) to identify social and economic components of the environmental system on the basis of the developed model and to describe their features; 2) to develop assessment indicators of managerial decision effect and efficiency on the basis of the identified components of the environmental system; 3) to develop indicators of environmental and economic assessment of the effect and effectiveness of management decisions based on identified components of the system; 4) to suggest an algorithm for implementation environmentally safe and cost-effective management decisions based on the developed assessment indicators.Methods: methodological base of the research is based on the following scientific methods: mathematical modeling, statistical analysis method, formalization.Results: the authors develop the simulation game model which allows identifying social and economic components of environmental system and to develop ecological and economic indicators of efficiency assessment on the basis of previous periods. Upon the model the authors of the article have developed the algorithm of efficient social oriented managerial decisions-making.Conclusions and Relevance: the developed game model allows assessing development efficiency of social and economic environmental system. In the development of the model the authors apply the concept of games with nature, also criterions of maximax, Laplace, Wald, Hurwitz. In addition, the model allows identifying components which influence managerial decisions, namely, environmental damages before and after implementation of a managerial decision, capital and operational costs indicators. On the basis of it the indicator and the criterion of managerial decisions risk-adjusted ecological and economic effect and efficiency assessment indicators have been developed. The algorithm of implementation of the environmentally friendly, socially oriented and cost-effective management decisions.

Brownfield Topic in the Czech Legislation

The issue of brownfields is currently a very significant factor affecting the sustainable development of the society and construction business themselves since unbuilt areas are ranked amongst the most important non-renewable sources. Despite of this undoubted significance of the topic, brownfields are hitherto not adequately supported by the Czech legislation.Due to this fact, there exists no uniform and consistent terminology and classification of this business in the Czech Republic; opinions and research approaches of various scientific and research teams are highly fragmented, and last but not least it makes education with respect to this topic of the expert community as well as general public very difficult. Currently, brownfields are discussed within land-use planning and laws and implementing Decrees (Act no. 183/2006 Coll., the Building Act, and its implementing Decree no. 500/2006 Coll.) only in general terms, and they can only be included in more general categories such as “areas for redevelopment and reuse” (brownfields intended for revitalization to the level of “environment close to nature” cannot be included), or in some cases there are very specific categories such as “pit-heap, dump, stock-pile, etc.” (future land for regeneration / redevelopment) or “old burdens and contaminated areas” (brownfields without burden and contamination cannot be included). Therefore, there is no need for consistent and good-quality land investigation using given methodology as it is the case for other topics such as development of environmental systems, environmental stability coefficient, landmarks or listed sites and buildings.

Assessment and Forecast of Urban Sustainability Based on Dynamic Indicators

At present, environmental issues associated with rapid economic development are becoming critical concerns that arouse government’s and people’s particular attention. A large amount of influencing factors and especially their complicated interactions have always thrown confused insights into assessing the dynamic evolvement and sustainable development of urban economy–resource–environment (ERE) system and programming the developing strategies. According to connotation and framework of sustainable development, this study proposes a hierarchical multi-level method to evaluate the urban sustainability in Chongqing city of China suffering from depletion of resource and degradation of environment. Integrated assessment results indicate that the current ERE system of Chongqing is not sustainable; environment development mode is more effective to sustainable development of urban ERE system. Under the considerations of development features and regional differences, as well as regular discipline on urbanization, a coordinated combination of environmental, resource and technology modes is believed to realize sustainable development of ERE system.

The Combined Approach When Assessing and Mapping Groundwater Vulnerability to Contamination

In early 1980’s, the Italian scientific community, together with a number of institutional decision-makers, realized how urgent it was to protect natural and environmental resources. They agreed that an adequate level of scientifically organized knowledge allows the accurate planning and development of environment systems through the management and direction of the effective development process, but without stopping it. Since the special VAZAR1 project was first set up in 1984, as part of the GNDCI-CNR2 scientific context it has been the cardinal center point of Research National Program “Aquifer Vulnerability Assessment”. The problem of groundwater contamination was examined in this program for the very first time in Italy in an organic and extensive manner as a key for forecasting and prevention purposes. The Italian approaches to assessing and mapping groundwater vulnerability to contamination are essentially based on two main methodologies: 1) the GNDCI Basic Method [1,2] a HCS type approach that can be used for any type of Italian hydrogeologic situation, even where there is a limited number of data. A unified legend and symbols are also defined for each hydrogeologic level. 2) The SINTACS method [2,3], a PCSM developed for use prevalently in areas with a good data base coverage. The methodological approaches described in this paper now make up the Italian standard which has been dealt with in the recent very important Italian Law (152/993) and which are now ratified in the national guidelines [4] produced by ANPA, the Italian National Agency for Environment Protection. The methods, besides Italy [5] have been applied in several other Countries [6–10] and others.

The Italian way to prevent groundwater contamination risk

In the early 1980's the Italian scientific community, together with a number of institutional decision-makers, realized how urgent it was to protect natural and environmental resources. They agreed that an adequate level of scientifically organized knowledge allows the accurate planning and development of environmental systems through management and direction of the actual development process, without hindering it. Since the special project was first set up in 1984, as part of the GNDCI-CNR (National Group for the Defence against Hydrogeologic Disasters, of the Italian National Council of Research) scientific context, it has been the cardinal point of Research Line 4 “Assessment of Aquifer Vulnerability”. The problem of groundwater contamination was examined in this project for the very first time in Italy in an organic and extensive manner as a key for forecasting and prevention purposes. The Italian approaches to assessing and mapping groundwater vulnerability to contamination are essentially based on two main methodologies:- The GNDCI Basic Method a HCS (Hazard Contamination Source) type approach that can be used for any type of Italian hydrogeologic situation, even where there is a limited amount of data. A unified legend and symbols are also defined for each hydrogeologic level.- The SINTACS [Soggiacenza (depth to groundwater); Infiltrazione (effective infiltration); Non saturo (unsaturated zone attenuation capacity); Tipologia della copertura (soil/overburden attenuation capacity); Acquifero (saturated zone characteristics); Conducibilità (hydraulic conductivity); Superficie topografica (Slope)] method, a PCSM (Point Count System Model) developed for use prevalently in areas with good data base coverage. The methodological approaches described in this paper now make up the Italian standard which has been set in the recent very important Italian Law (152/99) and which has now been ratified in the national guidelines produced by ANPA, the Italian National Agency for Environment Protection. In this paper the structure of the Research Line, the progress obtained by the 21 Research units (over 100 researchers) in 20 years of activity, the results gained etc. are briefly highlighted.