Development Of Environmental Index Research Articles

Spatialization of breeding values of Brangus animals associated with climatic, physical, and socio-economic factors.

This study was realized to analyze the combinations of climatic, physical, and socio-economic variables on distribution of breeding values for performance characteristics and scrotal circumference of Brangus cattle. Records of 84,703 Brangus animals, born from 2000 to 2010 distributed in 65 farms in Brazil were used. The characteristics analyzed were average daily gain from birth to weaning and from weaning to yearling (WW and YW), visual scores of conformations (WC and YC), muscle score (WM and YM), precocity score (WP and YS), and size score (WS and YS) at weaning and yearling and scrotal circumference (SC) at yearling. Components of (co)variance estimated through the animal model employing methodology to AIREML. Mean estimates of direct heritability obtained for visual scores at weaning (WC 0.16, WM 0.16, WP 0.19, and WS 0.22) were lower than those obtained at yearling (YC 0.28, YM 0.26, YP 0.24, and YS 0.40). WW had heritability greater than YW (0.27 and 0.12) and a heritability of 0.36 obtained for SC. Canonical, discriminant, and cluster analyses were performed in the SAS® 9.4 program. Three clusters of genetic values averages per farm were formed according to climatic, physical, and socio-economic variables. Brangus animals are from states of RS, PR, SP, MG, GO, MG, and MS. The highest breeding values were strongly related to thermal amplitude and municipality area. Spatial distribution of the breeding value of Brangus animals can help in the development of environmental indices, genetic evaluations, and the choice of animals for certain environments.

Environmental Index for Palm Oil Mill

Palm oil mill has been regarded as a profit making industry for the past decades. Besides revenue from the palm oil production itself, the abundance of biomass could generate high economic return to the palm oils mill by converting it to value added products. However, the palm oil industry currently suffered various criticisms and negative reports from the international non-government organizations on the environmental issue. This paper presents the development and the applicability of environmental index (EI) for palm oil mill in order to enhance the competitiveness of the industry. The methodology will include the index development and identify area of weaknesses (hotspot). The index will be able to identify performance of the mills in Environmental aspect against benchmarks and differentiate every mills performance. By this, the mills can easily identify its hotspot and take necessary steps to improve. The system will also benefit the marketing team to market its products (CPO, PKO etc.) to niche markets that seek uptake from mills with lowest footprints (Carbon, water, energy etc.). The results can be used not only to evaluate the performance of an operating process against standard benchmarking but also to establish the best environmental practices among palm oil industry. It is anticipated that the development of environmental index will be an important instrument for supporting sustainable operation for palm oil mill.

Regional and Environmental Classifications of the 27 EU Countries

This paper puts forward a theoretical framework for regional classifications and rankings based on the development of environmental indices. This framework can be used to classify European Union countries according to the extent to which they are influenced by supply-side (producer) and demand-side (consumer) responses to their specific bundle of economic and environmental attributes. This kind of classification is useful because it provides information about the relative attractiveness to producers and consumers of the combination of economic and environmental attributes indigenous to each region. It, therefore, has implications for the design and focus of the regional and environmental policies of the European Union. The analysis identifies 4 groups of countries with similar characteristics (high productivity, low productivity, high amenity, low amenity) and the appropriate mix of environmental and regional policies for each one of them.

Using penalty functions to evaluate aggregation models for environmental indices

The purpose of indices is to summarize a large volume of information into a single number that is easy to understand and interpret. Environmental indices provide a composite picture of an environmental condition derived from a series of observed measurements and parameters. They are used as communication tools by regulatory agencies to characterize the state of a specific environmental system (air, water, and sediments) and to study the impact of regulatory policies on various environmental management practices. In the development of environmental indices, a few issues and problems have been encountered arising as a result of the abstraction of information and data. These problems are referred to as characteristic properties that include ambiguity, eclipsing, compensation and rigidity. These characteristic properties have long been identified and interpreted in Boolean (e.g., Yes/No) or qualitative (e.g., low, medium, high) terms. In this paper, we propose a new approach to describe the above stated characteristic properties on a continuous scale to evaluate and compare the behavior of various aggregation models. Our approach is based on developing penalty functions for each characteristic property. A water quality index example by Swamee and Tyagi (2000) is used to explain our approach. A detailed case study for a developing microbial risk index is also provided to show how the proposed approach can be extended to complex hierarchical systems. Results show that it is possible to improve aggregation models for index development. Future research directions to improve index development are also discussed.

Stochastic environmental research risk assessment

In a briefly approach, sustainability can be defined as the ability to achieve economic prosperity while protecting the natural systems of the planet, and providing a higher quality of life for its people. Nowadays it is a prime and very active area of research, fundamental for human development. Several concepts based on economics, social and environmental concerns have been considered in the development of sustainability indices. The sustainability concept is, not only but necessarily, dependent on “quantification of the environment health”, necessary to determine its effectiveness in achieving or increasing the environmental capacities of ecosystems, as well as to compare alternative plans and policies, to influence decision-makers. Environmental indices are a very important tool for the analysis of some environmental assessment factors, providing quantitative criteria and synthesizing the available information. A good index should be simple to use, transparent, and expandable across other issues. In particular, environmental indices are a useful tool for several audiences, to aid environmental decision making and to allow the media to keep score of and reduce complex information to a smaller, more easily retained, amount of information [Hardi, P., DeSouza-Huletey, J.A., 2000. Issues in analyzing data and indicators for sustainable development. Ecol. Model. 130, 59–65]. The goal of this work is the development of environmental indices, based on stochastically simulated scenarios, using probabilistic approaches. This study was applied to assess the impact of particulate air contamination on the Setúbal Peninsula ecosystems (South of Lisbon, Portugal).

Focusing regional and environmental policies in the EU through the development of environmental quality indices

This paper puts forward a theoretical framework to assist the formulation and implementation of regional policy based on the development of environmental indices. This framework can be used to classify European Union countries according to the extent to which they are influenced by supply-side (producer) and demand-side (consumer) responses to their specific bundle of economic and environmental attributes. This kind of classification is useful because it provides information about the relative attractiveness to producers and consumers of the combination of economic and environmental attributes indigenous to each region. It therefore has implications for the design and focus of the regional and environmental policies of the European Union. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

A Review of Thermal Comfort Studies in Japan

More than 50 papers on thermal comfort are presented in various meetings and symposia every year in Japan. Topics covered by these papers include comfort zone, the effect of fluctuating air movement and asymmetric thermal radiation on human responses, the dynamic analysis of human responses, psy chological and behavioral aspects of thermal comfort, and the development of environmental indices, to name a few. This paper briefly reviews these investi gations.

Developing indicators of environmental quality: The experience of the council on environmental quality

In the late 1960s there was great interest in the U.S. environmental field for duplicating the success economists had in developing statistical indicators. This article traces the history of the development of environmental indices at the Council on Environmental Quality from initial research aimed at preparing one or at best a few indices of environmental quality to the most recent effort which aims to organize indicators showing conditions and trends on a wide variety of environmental topics. The Council intends to distribute the findings periodically. The report may be viewed as a briefing book for policymakers. Criteria used in selecting and developing indicators —relevancy, selectivity, availability of data, changes over time, statistical quality, and scope of coverage — are discussed. A key purpose of this effort is to improve the quality of data available for making national environmental policies. Appendixes included are: (1) a bibliography of works dealing with the general problems of developing, using, and evaluating environmental indicators; (2) a selection of over 100 U.S. Federal periodical reponts on specific aspects of environmental conditions; and (3) a comprehensive framework for identifying topics and selecting meaningful and useful environmental indicators to be used as the report outline.

Indicators of Environmental Quality

Indicators of Environmental Quality: An Overview.- Why Environmental Quality Indices?.- Uses of Environmental Indices in Policy Formulation.- Urban-Environmental Indicators in Municipal and Neighborhood Policy Planning and Decision Making.- The Uncommunicative Scientist: The Obligation of Scientists to Explain Environment to the Public.- Evaluation of Natural Environments.- Indicators of Environmental Quality of Urban Life: Economic, Spatial, Social, and Political Factors.- Establishing Priorities Among Environmental Stresses.- Pollutant Burdens in Humans: A Measure of Environmental Quality.- Aquatic Communities as Indices of Pollution.- Plants as Indicators of Air Quality.- Biochemical Indicators of Environmental Pollution.- Use of Sense of Smell in Determining Environmental Quality.- Development of Environmental Indices: Outdoor Recreational Resources and Land Use Shift.- A Water Quality Index - Crashing the Psychological Barrier.- Indices of Air Quality.- Statistically Based Air-Quality Indices.- Indicators of Environmental Noise.- Developing a Soil Quality Index.- Environmental Indices for Radioactivity Releases.- Plant Indicators in Ecology.