Impact Assessment Approach Research Articles

Post-Construction, Hydromorphological Cumulative Impact Assessment: An Approach at the Waterbody Level Integrating Different Spatial Scales

The environmental impact assessment is a process required in many countries. It highlights future activities with a significant impact on the environment. Water, as an environmental factor, needs adequate methods for quantifying cumulative impact of hydrotechnical works. In most cases, for new developments, baseline data is collected before the beginning of the construction, but for waterworks already in place, a different approach is needed. In line with the EU Water Framework Directive (Directive 2000/60/EC), the overall purpose of the research is to develop an approach for the hydromorphological cumulative impact assessment integrating different spatial scales for existing water intakes with transversal barriers on mountain rivers in Romania. Being a research study developed for a specific issue—post-construction impact assessment, some innovative actions were required. Lack of information in the pre-construction phase was an important constraint. Customizing formulas of certain indicators established within the Romanian method for hydromorphological status assessment of rivers proved to be a practical solution to show both local and waterbody hydromorphological impact. Upscaling the impact from the local scale to the river sector and the waterbody allows awareness of the spatial extent of the impact and understanding of the importance of the thresholds of significant impact for a broader audience. In order to better highlight the approach, this paper shows practical examples. The whole chain of the drivers–pressures–state–impacts–responses (DPSIR) framework is applied in the case of two river water bodies with hydropower generation facilities in place. In addition, some recommendations for actions are provided.

A Multi-Method Approach for Impact Assessment of Some Heavy Metals on Lactuca sativa L.

Heavy metals represent a large category of pollutants. Heavy metals are the focus of researchers around the world, mainly due to their harmful effects on plants. In this paper, the influence of copper, cadmium, manganese, nickel, zinc and lead, present in soil in different concentrations (below the permissible limit, the maximum permissible concentration and a concentration higher than the maximum permissible limit) on lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) was evaluated. For this purpose, the authors analyzed the variation of photosynthetic pigments, total polyphenols, antioxidant activity and the elemental content in the studied plants. The experimental results showed that the variation of the content of biologically active compounds, elemental content and the antioxidant activity in the plants grown in contaminated soil, compared to the control plants, depends on the type and concentration of the metal added to the soil. The biggest decrease was recorded for plants grown in soil treated with Ni I (-42.38%) for chlorophyll a, Zn II (-32.92%) for chlorophyll b, Ni I (-40.46%) for carotenoids, Pb I (-40.95%) for polyphenols and Cu III (-29.42%) for DPPH. On the other hand, the largest increase regarding the amount of biologically active compounds was registered for Mn I (88.24%) in the case of the chlorophyll a, Mn I (65.56%) for chlorophyll b, Pb I (116.03%) for carotenoids, Ni III (1351.23%) for polyphenols and Ni III (1149.35%) for DPPH.

Methodology for Field Operational Tests: updating the FESTA methodology for connected and automated driving pilots

The FESTA methodology for Field Operational Tests (FOTs) was developed in 2008 to support the evaluation of advanced driver-assistance systems. It has since been updated many times, and successfully used in European and national projects. The paper describes how the methodology was extended in order to be useful for Connected, Cooperative, and Automated Mobility (CCAM) projects. The FESTA handbook was updated with more recommendations addressing automation. A micro-version of FESTA was developed for small-scale pilots. A gap analysis was performed to identify new elements for CCAM evaluation. New approaches for impact assessment were developed. Recommendations for gathering lessons learned and for sharing data, knowledge and experience have been included in FESTA. A new EU project, FAME, will take the next step in evaluating CCAM, developing a Common Evaluation Methodology.

Numerical Coefficient Reconstruction of Time-Depending Integer- and Fractional-Order SIR Models for Economic Analysis of COVID-19

In the present work, a fractional temporal SIR model is considered. The total population is divided into three compartments—susceptible, infected and removed individuals. It generalizes the classical SIR model and consists of three coupled time-fractional ordinary differential equations (ODEs). The fractional derivative is introduced to account for the subdiffusion process of confirmed, cured and deceased people dynamics. Although relatively basic, the model is robust and captures the real dynamics, helped by the memory property of the fractional system. In the paper, the issue of an adequate model reconstruction is addressed, and a coefficient identification inverse problem is solved; in particular, the transition and recovering rates, varying in time, are recovered. A least-squares cost functional is minimized for solving the problem. The time-dependent parameters are reconstructed with an iterative predictor–corrector algorithm. Its application is demonstrated via tests with synthetic and real data. What is more, an approach for economic impact assessment is proposed.

Tác động của bụi PM 2.5 lên gánh nặng bệnh tật liên quan đến tử vong tại Hà Nội năm 2019

Aims: The study is to evaluate burden of diseases related to mortality due to PM 2.5 exposure in Hanoi in 2019. Methods: We used the health impact assessment approach with the input data including annual mean concentration of PM 2.5 , mortality collected from A6 death registers, and the population data in 2019. Outcomes: In Hanoi, comparing to the QCVN 05:2015 (5 µg/m 3 ), the number of premature deaths attributed to PM 2.5 exposure was 2,633 cases (32.70 cases per 100,000). Years of life lost (YLL) and loss of life expectancy (LLE) due to PM 2.5 exposure were 73,353 and 833 years, respectively. When comparing to the WHO Air Quality guideline (5 µg/m 3 ), the number of attributable deaths was 4,711 (58.50 cases per 100.000). In this case, Years of life lost (YLL) and loss of life expectancy (LLE) due to PM 2.5 exposure were 139,608 and 1.617 years. Conclusion: It is needed to establish and implement a mechanism to share open air quality data from monitoring stations, together with improve the quality of health data for future research. Key words: PM 2.5 , air pollution, mortality

A critical evaluation of visibility analysis approaches for visual impact assessment (VIA) in the context of environmental impact assessment (EIA)

Visual impact assessment (VIA) concerns the identification and evaluation of the potential impacts that a proposed activity might have on the visual quality of a landscape and makes an important contribution to decision making in the environmental impact assessment (EIA) context. Visibility analysis is often used to assist in determining these impacts through a variety of approaches employing different techniques and data inputs. This paper identifies the visibility analysis approaches often used in VIA practice by reviewing a sample of VIA reports representing eleven (11) countries. The identified approaches were then evaluated for accuracy across differing landscapes through a total of 72 simulations. Analysis of variance was used to determine the sensitivity of the identified approaches to different variables within different landscape contexts. The type of digital elevation model (DEM) used was found to be the most significant variable affecting accuracy across all landscapes, while the technique used had some significance and resolution little significance.

Evaluation of IoT-Enabled Interactive UI Design Effect Based on the Discrete Mathematical Model

Today, the Internet of Things (IoT), often referred to as smart home technology, is used by many individuals in their daily life. The majority of IoT devices include a companion mobile application that consumers must install on their tablet or smartphone to operate, configure, and interface with the IoT device. Multiple kinds of IoT systems have grown in popularity alongside the growth of information engineering. The accessibility of a user interface (UI) in an IoT system is becoming increasingly crucial. This causes major issues with accuracy and evaluation time. This research suggests a discrete mathematical model for IoT-enabled interactive UI design impact assessment approach to address the concerns of low evaluation accuracy and long evaluation time in existing interactive UI design effect evaluation methods. It creates an IoT-enabled interactive UI design effect assessment index system using interactive UI design vision, hearing, and feeling. It gets IoT-enabled interactive UI design effect evaluation indexes, builds a judgment matrix, derives the weight coefficient of each evaluation index, and employs the hierarchy based on the weight coefficient produced. To complete the assessment of the IoT-enabled interactive UI design effect, the analytical approach evaluates the relative value of the seven evaluation indicators by utilizing the discrete Hopfield neural network to develop the evaluation mathematical model. The simulation results reveal that the suggested method’s IoT-enabled interactive UI design effect evaluation accuracy is greater, while the evaluation time is shorter.

Assessing habitat connectivity in environmental impact assessment: a case-study in the UK context

ABSTRACT Ecological connectivity across landscapes is vital for the maintenance of biodiversity and the processes that enable life on earth. Despite this, environmental planning decisions are usually made at the scale of individual projects, failing to account for landscape-scale impacts. Incorporating habitat connectivity analysis in Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) could provide an opportunity to address this gap. We present a novel approach to model habitat connectivity in an EIA undertaken for the Heathrow Third Runway Expansion Project, a proposed development in south-east England. Drawing on field data, remote sensing, and species-specific literature reviews, a circuit theory approach was used to assess functional connectivity across the project landscape for grass snakes Natrix helvetica and soprano pipistrelles Pipistrellus pygmaeus. Results indicated key areas for species movement and potential ‘pinch-points’ vulnerable to development impacts. We discuss lessons learnt, potential applications to inform impact assessment, mitigation design, and biodiversity net gain approaches, and further work required to mainstream connectivity analyses in EIA and decision-making.

Assessing WELBY Social Life Cycle Assessment Approach through Cobalt Mining Case Study

The interconnected nature of social, environmental, and economic sustainability aspects must be considered in decision-making to achieve strong sustainability. Social life cycle assessment (S-LCA) has been developed to better include social sustainability aspects into life cycle thinking. However, many of the current S-LCA impact assessment approaches have been developed only on a theoretical level, and thus more case studies are needed. We assess the challenges and opportunities of the S-LCA approach through a case study on cobalt mining in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Data for the case study were collected from scientific literature, reports, newspaper articles, and interview material. The applicability and possible strengths and weaknesses of the WELBY approach for the case were interpreted. The results showed that applying the WELBY approach in practice is possible, even though there is a lack of existing case studies. However, there are several challenges that must be addressed before the approach can be more widely used. The main challenge with the WELBY approach is the overestimation of impacts when adding multiple impact categories, as is recommended in the S-LCA guidelines. More case-specific severity weights should be developed to address this challenge. Moreover, the interpretation of the results from the perspective of informal work should be executed carefully. Even though the WELBY approach is promising, more methodological development is still needed to build a more ethical and reliable S-LCA methodology.

Hydrological impacts of climate change in selected ungauged sub-watersheds of Lake Tana Sub-Basin, Upper Blue Nile Basin, Ethiopia: A regionalization approach

Climate change is a global issue affecting the world's hydrology and water resources. Quantifying climate change impacts on hydrology is important for integrated water resources management. The ungauged watersheds of Lake Tana sub-basin are vital for different habitats and communities where various socio-economic activities such as irrigation, and fishing are carried out. Therefore, assessment of the impact of climate change on this sub basin is critical to settingup an integrated water resource management plan for susitnablity of livelihoods. Climate effect evaluation on ungauged catchments' hydrology using continuous hydrological modeling is difficult with the absence of adequate measured hydro-meteorological data for modeling. This study, thus, used a regionalization approach for ungauged watershed impact assessment and an HBV hydrological model for simulation of flow for different RCP scenarios and time domains. Impacts of climate change on the hydrology of the ungauged sub watersheds namely (Gilgel Abay, Gumara, Megech, and Ribb) were studied using two ensemble GCM driven by one RCM(RCA4) under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 for the 2040s (2020-2049), and 2070s (2050-2079) time domains. The following results were obtained: Summer rainfall drops for RCP4.5, and increments for RCP8.5 with a decline from March to June. Rainfall decreased under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 in the spring. It was conclude that increased flow in the dry seasons, provided water for agriculture and other uses while, a decrease flow during the rainy seasons would reduce Lake Tana's storage during the summer. Summer storage is useful for the Tana Belles Hydropower project as it, potentially influences water demand and lake's Navigation depth. In the future these changes will potentially have a severe influence on agricultural production by reducing water supply, thereby calling for the successful implementation of adaptation measures to reduce vulnerability. As the study results revealed that there would be future dry flow decreases and wet flow increases, it is therefore,important that the government, and decision-makers should plan for integrated water resources management activities where for example, wet season flow could be stored for dry season use by providing storage structures.

Health impact assessment of air pollution in Lisbon, Portugal

ABSTRACT Background: Lisbon has about 500,000 inhabitants and it’s the capital and the main economic hub of Portugal. Studies have demonstrated that exposure to Particulate Matter with an aerodynamic diameter<2.5 μm (PM2.5) have strong association with health effects. Researchers continue to identify new harmful air pollutants effects in our health even in low levels. Objectives: This study evaluates air pollution scenarios considering a Health Impact Assessment approach in Lisbon, Portugal. Methods: We have studied abatement scenarios of PM2.5 concentrations and the health effects in the period from 2015 to 2017 using the APHEKOM tool and the associated health costs were assessed by Value of Life Year. Results: The mean concentration of PM2.5 in Lisbon was 23 μg/m3 ± 10 μg/m3 (±Standard Deviation). If we consider that World Health Organization (WHO) standards of PM2.5 (10 μg/m3) were reached, Lisbon would avoid more than 423 premature deaths (equivalent to 9,172 life years’ gain) and save more than US$45 million annually. If Lisbon city could even diminish the mean of PM2.5 by 5 μg/m3, nearly 165 deaths would be avoided, resulting in a gain of US$17 million annually. Conclusion: According to our findings, if considered the worst pollution scenario, levels of PM2.5 could improve the life’s quality and save a significant amount of economic resources. Implications: The manuscript addresses the health effects and costs of air pollution and constitutes an important target for improving public policies on air pollutants in Portugal. Although Portugal has low levels of air pollution, there are significant health and economic effects that, for the most part, are underreported. The health impact assessment approach associated with costs had not yet been addressed in Portugal, which makes this study more relevant in the analysis of policies aimed to drive stricter control on pollutants’ emissions. Health costs are a fundamental element to support decision-making process and to orientate the trade-offs in investments for improving public policies so that to diminish health effects, which can impact the management of the local health services and the population’s quality of life, especially after the pandemic period when resources are scarce.

Critical evaluation of ecosystem changes from an offshore wind farm: producing natural capital asset and risk registers

Offshore wind infrastructure modifies benthic habitats, affecting ecosystem services. A natural capital approach allows risks to nature-based assets and ecosystem benefits to be assessed. The UK Natural Capital Committee produced guidance for conducting natural capital assessments to aid decision making processes. Development of an asset register and risk register are key components of this methodology. The former provides an inventory of NC stocks, and the latter considers the likelihood of changes and the scale of their impact on delivery of ecosystem services. In this study, suitability of the methodology in a marine environment context was critically evaluated. Natural capital stocks before and after installation of Greater Gabbard offshore wind farm were compared and risks to delivery of ecosystem services were assessed. It was demonstrated that incorporating an assessment of impacts on natural capital assets in planning and management decisions (as an extension to traditional environmental impact assessment approaches) could further facilitate sustainable use of marine ecosystems. For example, by preventing access to bottom-trawl fisheries activities, wind farms may promote recovery and increase value of seabed natural capital assets. By also introducing aquaculture systems loss of food provision (from reduced fishing activity) could be offset whilst allowing benthic natural capital assets to recover. Natural capital assessment is relevant to the marine context. However, application of the Natural Capital Committee’s methodology was constrained by the limited coverage of standard benthic sampling tools. Given the scale of wind energy plans across the marine environment it is recommended that these shortcomings are appropriately addressed.

A critical review and normalization of the life cycle assessment outcomes in the naval sector. Articles description

Most of the actual industrial research efforts are aimed at reducing environmental burdens associated with human activities in the context of sustainable development. This trend has become increasingly prevalent in the naval transportation sector shown by a growing number of scientific publications dealing with life cycle assessments of maritime-related activities. However, the life cycle assessment framework provides practitioners with a variety of alternatives for conducting the analyses, giving room for defining key factors, such as functional units, system boundaries, and impact assessment methods, among others. This lack of standardization resulted in a wide range of assumptions and findings that are seldom comparable. The goal of this review is providing a systematic literature analysis, focusing on the characteristics of life cycle assessments dealing with the environmental impacts of various maritime vessel categories. In the first part, a qualitative analysis of the available scientific literature has been performed, providing a bibliometric analysis and a general overview of the characteristics of the studies (i.e., life cycle impact assessment methodologies, background data, and software tools used). The outcomes of the bibliometric analysis are then summarized and discussed to understand current practices and future trends in this field, providing the basis for the normalization phase of the results. The second section of the paper offers advice for naval practitioners on how to perform results normalization to produce comparable analyses. Two approaches for normalization have been proposed in the frame of this study: an “horizontal” one, which is based on vessel features and allows a comparison among different vessel typologies, and a “vertical” one that enables to fairly compare vessels of the same category to one another. In addition, each section reports the outcomes of greenhouse gas-related impact categories, which have been subjected to the proposed normalization procedure, along with the order of magnitude of the results for each life cycle phase. The overall work provides an overview of LCA impact results as well as a collection of procedures and recommendations for future life cycle assessments based on specific vessel types, in terms of functional unit selection, system boundary definition, impact assessment approach, presentation of the outcomes, and normalization basis.

A new curb lane monitoring and illegal parking impact estimation approach based on queueing theory and computer vision for cameras with low resolution and low frame rate

The rapid development of the internet of things (IoT), sensing technologies, and machine learning and deep learning techniques, along with the growing variety and volume of data, have yielded new perspectives on how novel technologies can be applied to obtain new sources of curb data to achieve cost-effective curb management. This study presents a new computer vision–based data acquisition and analytics approach for curb lane monitoring and illegal parking impact assessment. The proposed “rank, detect, and quantify impacts” system consists of three main modules: 1) hotspot identification based on rankings generated by local spatial autocorrelation analysis, 2) curb lane occupancy estimation leveraging traffic cameras and computer vision techniques, and 3) illegal parking traffic impact quantification using an M/M/∞ queueing model. To demonstrate the feasibility and validity of the proposed approach, it was tested and empirically validated using field data collected from three case study sites in Midtown Manhattan, New York City (NYC)—one of the most complex urban transportation networks in the world. Different types of curb lane occupancy, including parking and bus lanes, and different frequencies of illegal parking (high, moderate, low) were investigated. The proposed method was proven to be effective even for low resolution and discontinuous video feeds obtained from publicly available traffic cameras. All three case study sites achieved good detection accuracy (86% to 96%) for parking and bus lane occupancy, and acceptable precision and recall in detecting illegal parking events. The queueing model was also proven to effectively quantify link travel time with the appearance of illegal parking events of different frequencies. The proposed “rank, detect, and quantify impacts” system is friendly for large-scale real-time implementation and is highly scalable to help evaluate the impact of other modes such as bike or mobility-on-demand (MOD) services. It can also be easily adopted by other cities to provide transportation agencies with effective data collection and innovative curb space management strategies.

A New Scenario-Based Approach for Water Quality and Environmental Impact Assessment Due to Mining Activities

Water quality assessment and its monitoring are necessary for areas of mining activities. In Malaysia, the mining industry is the backbone of the manufacturing and construction sectors. This study used spatio-temporal water quality modeling along a reach with mining activities during high and low discharges at Sungai (river) Lebir and Sungai Aring, situated in Gua Musang, Kelantan, Peninsular Malaysia. The objective was to assess the spatio-temporal environmental impact of mining activities during the wet and dry seasons. Data were collected at different locations along the reach. Point and non-point sources were near the mining site. Overland flow calculation at the mining site was found with the widely used SCS (Soil Conservation Service) curve number method. Several scenarios were analyzed, such as baseline, worst-case, and with-mitigation. The study revealed that baseline values of all parameters were either in a natural condition or slightly polluted, except for aluminum. All parameters were estimated at a high concentration from the mining site to downstream during the worst case of the wet season. Whereas, during the worst case of the dry season, no significant differences were observed compared to baseline values. In the with-mitigation scenario, parameter concentrations were improved and similar to baseline values. Overall, the scenario selection was helpful in the environmental impact assessment. Furthermore, this study will be significant in pre- and post-mining assessment and environmental clearance.

AI Ethics as Applied Ethics

The need to design and develop artificial intelligence (AI) in a sustainable manner has motivated researchers, institutions, and organizations to formulate suggestions for AI ethics. Although these suggestions cover various topics and address diverse audiences, they share the presupposition that AI ethics provides a generalizable basis for designers that is applicable to their work. We propose that one of the reasons the influence of current ethical codes has remained modest, may be the conception of the applied ethics that they represent. We discuss bioethics as a point of reference for weighing the metaethical and methodological approaches adopted in AI ethics, and propose that AI ethics could be made more methodologically solid and substantively more influential if the resources were enriched by adopting tools from fields of study created to improve the quality of human action and safeguard its desired outcomes. The approaches we consider to be useful for this purpose are the systems theory, safety research, impact assessment approach, and theory of change.

514 Using text mining approaches to identify research trends – an exploratory analysis of Miami Clinical and Translational Science Institute publications from 2013-2021

OBJECTIVES/GOALS: The goal of this project was to perform an exploratory analysis of the research themes of scientific publications from the Miami Clinical and Translational Science Institute using text mining techniques and using bibliometric characterization and network analysis to further assess research trends. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: Publications were identified from the Web of Science database using Miami CTSI grant numbers as search criteria for the period 2013-2021 and KL2 scholar publications. Following data pre-processing, topic modeling was performed using the Latent Dirichlet Allocation algorithm and cluster analysis in the R programming language. The resulting themes will be further analyzed by employing a citation-based impact assessment approach to identify trends over time. Network analysis of publications will be performed using the VOSviewer package to visualize publication networks using citation and co-authorship relations within each major theme and their evolution over time. Findings will be evaluated for alignment with institutional research strategy. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: About 400 CTSI publications from 2013-2021 to date were used for analysis. Twenty topics and five major research themes were identified among the Miami CTSI publications – neuroscience, cancer, community and public health, metabolics, and HIV/infectious diseases. Top keywords within each topic were aligned with the most frequent author-assigned keywords for that topic. The CTSI research themes were also well-aligned with the institutional vision for research and focus areas. Trends using citations and networks for each research theme are currently being analyzed and results will be included in the overall findings post analysis. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE: Text mining was successfully used in identifying topics and research themes for clinical and translational research publications of the Miami CTSI, and in combination with bibliometric characterization, will be helpful in shaping CTSI strategy and alignment with the universitys research priorities.

A system dynamic approach for reservoir impact assessment on groundwater aquifer considering climate change scenario

With its arid and semi-arid climate, Iran claims about one-third of the world's average annual precipitation. Accordingly, the present study investigated whether an effective water resources management (WRM) strategy (both groundwater and reservoir resources) could reduce groundwater drawdown while simultaneously providing secure enough water for preservation of agricultural activities and rural settlements. For this purpose, a comprehensive system dynamics (SD) model incorporating reservoir, surface-water, and groundwater resources was developed. Then, the model was implemented for the Nesa plain in Bam County, Iran, as an example. In this plain, the construction of a dam to supply drinking water to the cities of Bam and the Bam Industrial Zone had devastated the environment and human communities in the downstream areas, leading to the depopulation of as many as 104 villages in the Bam region. The results of the SD model revealed that the artificial recharge of the plain groundwater aquifer along with the management of the operation of the wells and increasing productivity would be very effective. In order to estimate future precipitation data, the SDSM statistical exponential microscale model was used to microscale the large CanESM2 scale model under two scenarios of RCP4.5 and RCP8.5. The continuation of the current trend of the groundwater resources in the plain during the next 20 years will also cause a drop in water level of 8.3 m compared with the existing situation and a reduction of 41 m compared with the long-term average of 1980. Based on this modeling effort, upon releasing 60% of river flow, surplus to downstream demand, for recharging aquifer through artificial recharge projects, the rate of water table fall will decline significantly over a 20-year period and the amount of negative aquifer water balance would most likely improve from 65.5 to 35.17 million cubic meters annually.

Ecological Planning of Manufacturing Process Chains

Production planning is a critical step for the implementation of sustainable production. It is necessary to consider energy and resource efficiency in all planning phases to promote sustainable production. In this paper, an approach for environmental impact assessment in all phases of process chain planning supported by process models is presented. The level of detail of the assessment is determined based on the level of detail of the planning phase. During the assessment, consumption of energy and resources is considered. This approach aims to align planning phases with the objective of sustainable production. In rough planning, the approach allows the selection of an ecologically favorable process chain. In detailed planning, process parameters can be selected based on their ecological sustainability. The approach can be integrated into the planning of process chains in order to consider ecological factors throughout all planning phases. The approach is evaluated by using an exemplary use case. The results indicate that rough planning under the consideration of uncertainties can form a reasonable prediction about resource efficiency for possible manufacturing routes. By systematically selecting a resource-efficient process chain, energy savings of up to 21% can be achieved for the presented use case.

A geochemical approach for source apportionment and environmental impact assessment of heavy metals in a Cu–Ni mining region, Botswana

A geochemical approach for source apportionment and environmental impact assessment of heavy metals in a Cu–Ni mining region, Botswana