Land Use Change In Areas Research Articles

Spatiotemporal Response of Ecosystem Service Value to Land Use Change in the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration over the Past 20 Years

With rapid urbanization and human activities exacerbating threats to the degradation of various ecosystem services in modern urban agglomerations, the exploration of the state of ecological security at the scale of urban agglomerations is of great significance. This study considered the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration as the research area, based on the land use data in 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020. At the same time, the landscape ecological risk index was introduced. The land use change characteristics of the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration were analyzed by using the land use transfer matrix, the value per unit area equivalent factor method, and the bivariate spatial autocorrelation analysis method to elucidate the impacts of the changes in the ecological risk index induced by the land use transition on the value of ecosystem services. This study analyzed the land use change characteristics of the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration and elucidated the impacts of changes in the ecological risk index on the value of ecosystem services caused by land use transformation. The results showed that:① During the period from 2000 to 2020, the land use types of the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration were mainly dominated by grassland, cropland, and forest land. The construction land area had expanded significantly mainly from cropland and grassland, and the six land use types had strong cross-transformation. The total area of land use change was 6 646.05 km2. ② In terms of spatial changes, the spatial pattern of ecosystem service value in the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration had not undergone obvious transformation. However, the regional variability was significant, generally showing the distribution characteristics of high in the northwest and low in the southeast. ③From the perspective of temporal change, the value of ecosystem services in the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration showed an upward trend, with the total flow of value increasing from 186.459 billion yuan to 192.156 billion yuan, with a total value-added of 5.697 billion yuan. ④ There was a rising trend in the overall ecological risk index of the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration over the past 20 years. Low ecological risk areas and lower ecological risk areas dominated the ecological risk areas. There was a significant positive correlation between the value of ecosystem services and the ecological risk index. This study aimed to reveal the understanding of the impacts of land-use practices on ecosystem service values and ecological risks, to provide important references for regional ecological risk management and land-use policy formulation, and thus to promote the high-quality development of the ecological environment in the Yellow River Basin.

Land-Use Change Dynamics in Areas Subjected to Direct Urbanization Pressure: A Case Study of the City of Olsztyn

Urbanization is one of the most visible symptoms of global changes. This process has been driven by the evolution of life on Earth, and it gradually modifies the structure of land use. Urban development is the most apparent indicator and measure of urbanization. The demand for vacant land and sustainable spatial development plans require new methods that support decision-making in the process of changing land use in suburban areas. The aim of this study was to describe a methodology for identifying and localizing urban development boundaries with the use of fuzzy set theory, to evaluate the degree of urbanization, and to analyze the dynamics of land-use changes in areas subjected to direct urbanization pressure with the use of photogrammetric data for 2005, 2010, 2017, and 2022. A case study was conducted in the Polish city of Olsztyn. The study’s results determined the degree of urbanization of the areas in the [0, 1] range, as well as the dynamics of change in each of the twenty-four adopted forms of land use. The results indicate that the proposed methods are useful for identifying the rate and direction of urbanization, and can be applied to optimize and counterbalance the development of settlements and infrastructure.

A Study on Building Construction Trends and Land Use Change in Areas Affected by the Nuclear Power Plant Disaster in Fukushima

A Study on Building Construction Trends and Land Use Change in Areas Affected by the Nuclear Power Plant Disaster in Fukushima

Infiltration ability in the area of land use change, Bogor, West Java

The upstream of the Cisadane Watershed is included in the Mount Halimun Salak National Park area as the water catchment area. Water resource conservation is important because of land use change. Rainfall analysis was carried out to determine the rain intensity amount. Then, infiltration observations were also carried out in Ecosystem Restoration (ER) areas. ER is an area in the rehabilitation zone that requires improvement, especially in biophysical improvement. Several ER areas are in Cibunian Village and Purwabakti Village. The analysis determined the infiltration rates in the ER areas. Field surveys carried out data collection on infiltration sample measurements. Sample points were selected using Stratified Random Sampling. The results show the average rainfall in the study area is around 3950 mm/year. The results show the infiltration ability in the ER area is relatively slow. However, there are still results of rapid infiltration at several sample points. Due to limited water absorption capacity, soil characteristics with clay texture influence slow infiltration conditions. Even though the rainfall is high, surface water runoff is quickly formed. The rainfall in the Cisadane watershed should be stored to reserve water supply, especially during the dry season. In detail, water storage can be an infiltration pit, artificial water storage tanks, reservoirs, or ponds. The limited availability of water resources challenges water uses in the Cisadane Watershed. This research is essential as an initial study to find out more about the watershed hydrological system and the water demand level.

Spatio-Temporal monitoring of Qeshm mangrove forests through machine learning classification of SAR and optical images on Google Earth Engine

Mangrove forests are considered one of the most complex and dynamic ecosystems facing various challenges due to anthropogenic disturbance and climate change. The excessive harvesting and land-use change in areas covered by mangrove ecosystems is critical threats to these forests. Therefore, the continuous and regular monitoring of these forests is essential. Fortunately, remote sensing data has made it possible to regularly and frequently monitor this forest type. This study has two goals. Firstly, it combines optical data of Landsat- 8 and Sentinel-2 with Sentinel-1 radar data to improve land cover mapping accuracy. Secondly, it aims to evaluate the SVM machine learning algorithms and random forest to detection and differentiate forest cover from other land types in the Google Earth Engine system. The results show that the support vector machine (SVM) algorithm in the S2 + S1 dataset with a kappa coefficient of 0.94 performs significantly better than when used in the L8 + S1 combination dataset with a kappa coefficient of 0.88. Conversely, the kappa coefficients of 0.89 and 0.85 were estimated for the random forest algorithm in S2 + S1 and L8 + S1 datasets. This again indicates the superiority of Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-1 datasets over Landsat- 8 and Sentinel-1 datasets. In general, the support vector machine (SVM) algorithm yielded better results than the RF random forest algorithm in optical and radar datasets. The results showed that using the Google Earth engine system and machine learning algorithms accelerates the process of mapping mangrove forests and even change detection.

Topographical Gradient Characteristics of Land-Use Changes in the Agro-Pastoral Ecotone of Northern China

The agro-pastoral ecotone of northern China (AENC) is a significant ecological barrier, where the topographical features play basic roles in land-use change. In order to reveal the influence of topographical factors on land-use changes in the AENC, we used land-use transfer matrix, geo-information graphics, terrain niche, distribution index and geographical detector to explore the topographic gradient effect of land-use changes during 2000–2020 in the AENC based on remote-sensing image data from 2000, 2010, and 2020. The findings indicate that: (1) The total areas of land-use changes were 121,744 km2, accounting for 17.41% between 2000–2020. This was characterized by increasing amounts of land-use changes in the AENC. The changes in land-use were dominated by the conversions among farmland, forestland, and grassland, which were distributed widely in the mountainous regions of northern, western, and eastern margins. The expansion of construction land was derived mainly from farmland and grassland occurred in river valleys. (2) The pattern of land-use changes was divided into five types including stable type, prophase change, anaphase change, continuous change, and repeated change. Stable type accounted for 559,868.86 km2 and 80.09% of the total area. It was dominant in high altitude and complex terrain areas with terrain niches of more than 1.61. Prophase and anaphase changes accounted for 3.95% and 13.03%, respectively, which occupied to dominant positions in the 0.69–1.17 and 0.04–0.69, 1.17–1.61 terrain niches topographic gradient, respectively. Continuous and repeated changes occupied dominant positions in low altitude and flat complex areas with terrain niches of 0.04–1.17. (3) The topographic gradient effect of land-use changes in the AENC was influenced comprehensively by natural, geographical location, socioeconomic, and policy factors. Natural environmental factors and geographical location determined the topographic gradient pattern of land-use structure, while the direction of the topographical gradient pattern of land-use changes in the AENC is influenced by socioeconomic and policy factors. This research can provide a scientific reference for the development and protection of territorial space and optimal allocation of land resources in the AENC.

Flood Hazard and Management in Cambodia: A Review of Activities, Knowledge Gaps, and Research Direction

Cambodia is located in one of the most severe flood-vulnerable zones in mainland Southeast Asia. Flooding is the country’s most recurrent and impactful hazard among other natural hazards. This hazard alone, observed in many river basins, has been inflicting huge damages on livelihoods, social infrastructure, and the country’s economy. This study aims to review the current status of flood hazards, impacts, driving factors, management capacity, and future research directions on floods in Cambodia. The findings of this study suggested that there is still a lack of flood-related studies on flood hazard mapping, risk and damage assessment, and future flood analysis in Cambodia. The existing related studies mainly focused on the Tonle Sap Basin and its tributaries, the Lower Mekong Basin, the whole Mekong River Basin, and some of the tributaries of the Mekong River in Cambodia. The fundamental driving factors of the current flooding in Cambodia are impacts of climate change, land-use change, water infrastructure development, and weather extremes. The applications of mathematical and statistical tests and indices, conceptual and physically-based modeling, artificial intelligence and machine learning, and remote sensing are recommended to focus on future research directions on flood in Cambodia in the areas of land-use change, existing and planned operation of water infrastructure, flood hazard and damage assessment, and flood forecasting. The outcomes from these studies and applications would improve the understanding of flood hazard characteristics, reinforce flood management, and achieve flood damage reduction.

Assessing Land Use Changes in Areas with High Risk of Human-Brown Bear Conflict in Fars Province

Assessing Land Use Changes in Areas with High Risk of Human-Brown Bear Conflict in Fars Province

Modeling geographical invasions of Solenopsis invicta influenced by land-use patterns

Research into geographical invasions of red imported fire ants (RIFAs) by anthropogenic disturbances has received much attention. However, little is known about how land-use change and the characteristics of roads with different land-use types are associated with the risk of RIFA successful invasion or remaining at the highest level of invasion (RIFA SIRH). Furthermore, it was often assumed in prior studies that the risk of RIFA SIRH had a linear association with the independent variables. However, a linear relationship may not reflect the actual circumstances. In this study, we applied linear and nonlinear approaches to assess how land-use types, distance from the nearest road, different land-use types, and spatial factors affect the risk of RIFA SIRH. The results showed that agricultural land, land for transportation usage, and areas that had undergone land-use change from 2014 to 2017 had greater odds of RIFA invasion than natural land cover. We also identified land for transportation usage and the area of land-use change from 2014 to 2017, had more than 60% of RIFA SIRH within 350 m and 150 m from the nearest road. This study provided important insights into RIFA invasions in an isolated island and the areas of control strategies implemented.

Linking Ecosystem Service and MSPA to Construct Landscape Ecological Network of the Huaiyang Section of the Grand Canal

Rapid urbanization and drastic land-use change have led to landscape fragmentation and ecological environment deterioration in the regions along the Grand Canal. Building an ecological network is an important means to improve the connectivity of habitat patches and carry out ecological protection and restoration of territorial space, which is of great significance to ensure regional biodiversity and ecological security. In this article, we took the Huaiyang Section of the Grand Canal (Huaiyang Canal) as the study area, used the ecosystem service assessment model, morphological spatial pattern analysis (MSPA), and the landscape connectivity evaluation method to identify ecological sources, then used the minimum cumulative resistance (MCR) model and the gravity model to extract and grade ecological corridors. Based on these, the ecological network was constructed by combining the identification method of ecological nodes and ecological breakpoints. The aim of this was to provide a reference for the ecological space optimization of Huaiyang Canal and even the entire Grand Canal, the formulation of an ecological protection plan, and the implementation of territorial space ecological restoration. The results showed that the spatial distribution of the water conservation service, soil conservation service, carbon sequestration service, and biodiversity conservation service were significantly different, and the level of ecosystem services showed a trend of continuous degradation from 1990 to 2018. There were 12 ecological source patches comprehensively identified by multiple methods, with a total area of 2007.06 km2. In terms of spatial distribution, large ecological source patches were mainly distributed in the central and western areas adjacent to the Grand Canal, while small ecological source patches were scattered in the eastern and southern border regions of the study area. The total length of ecological corridors was 373.84 km, of which the number of the primary ecological corridor, secondary ecological corridor, and tertiary ecological corridor were 9, 7, and 7, respectively, and the suitable width of the ecological corridor was 200–400 m. After optimization, the proposed ecological network was composed of 3 key ecological source patches, 9 important ecological source patches, 23 terrestrial corridors, 10 aquatic corridors, and 18 ecological nodes. Twenty-nine ecological breakpoints were key areas requiring ecological restoration. The overlap rate of the integrated ecosystem service change area and land-use change area was 99%, indicating that land-use change has a significant impact on regional ecosystem services. This study is of great significance for carrying out the ecological protection and restoration of the Huaiyang Canal and adjusting local land-use policies. It also provides a typical case demonstration for identifying an ecological network and formulating ecological restoration planning for other sections of the Grand Canal and cities along the canal.

POTENSI BANJIR LIMPASAN PERMUKAAN DI SUB DAS MERANGIN TEMBESI DAS BATANGHARI AKIBAT ALIH FUNGSI LAHAN

Abstract This study aims to: 1) determine the area of ​​land use change that occurred in the Merangin Tembesi watershed in the Batanghari watershed in 2009 and 2018. 2) determine the potential for surface runoff flooding before and after the land use change in the Merangin Tembesi sub-watershed in the Batanghari watershed in 2009 and 2018. This type of research is quantitative with a spatial descriptive approach. The method for calculating the area of ​​land use change is through calculate geometry. And in analyzing the potential for surface runoff flooding is done by using the Cook method. Based on the results of the study, it is known that 1) the area of ​​land use change that occurred in the Merangin Tembesi sub-watershed Batanghari watershed changed from 2009 to 2018, where the changes that occurred were greater to the land that was built as land use increased, namely plantations increased by 191738 ha, settlement increased by an area of ​​6758 ha, while the use of forest land decreased by 198932 ha. 2) The potential for surface runoff flooding in the Merangin Tembesi sub-watershed Batanghari watershed in 2009 and 2018 is divided into 4 classes, namely low, medium, high and very high where, in 2009 before the land use change the largest area was found in the high class namely covering an area of ​​5276,919 km², whereas in 2018 after land conversion, the potential for runoff flooding in the Merangin Tembesi sub-watershed region has increased in very high classes to 11463,40172 km².

Assessing land cover change in Namibia's Kavango East region: a multi-date object approach

Land cover change is a global issue but its effects can be particularly severe in developing countries such as Namibia, by affecting the ecological functions of ecosystems and hence the sustainability of its development. Namibia’s arid conditions, due to low rainfall and high evapotranspiration rates, coupled with annual savannah fires, have resulted in a heterogenous landscape composed of a mixture of trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants. As a result, land cover maps are often inaccurate at the pixel level. Despite their relatively high accuracy, object-based image analyses are yet to be exhaustively applied to the dry tropical forests of Southern Africa. The purpose of this study was to apply a multi-date object-based approach to land cover change, in order to determine its extent and dynamics in the heterogenous landscape of Kavango East, one of the regions with the highest forest cover in Namibia. Multi-date segmentation, mean band values and image differentiation were used to detect land cover changes in four periods (1990, 2000, 2009 and 2016). The most common land conversion for all the periods was from forest to cropland. In 1990, forests covered 58% of the land but by 2016, this had dropped to 55%. Meanwhile, cropland covered 3% of the study area in 1990 and had doubled to 6% by 2016. The novel approach used in this study has produced promising results compared to traditional methods, which are prone to errors in detecting post-classification changes. The method can therefore be recommended for long term monitoring of land cover and land use change in areas with similar environmental and biophysical conditions.

Analysis of environmental carrying capacity with AHP in ArcGIS of Weh Island

Development of infrastucture will increase sporadic land use and tend to cause land degradation. This paper is intended to investigate the effects of land use and land cover (LULC) processes on Weh-Sabang Island, Indonesia. The duration of LULC changes is analyzed using Google Earth image and ArcGIS from 2008 to 2018. Through observations of satellite imagery detected protected area and green space area has been greatly reduced in area and transformed into built-in land which functions as a tourist area and urban built environment. The increase in land density since 2008 is due to the construction of tourist attractions in hilly areas to coastal areas around Weh-Sabang Island, and can cause changes in the morphology and typology of the city of Sabang. Through the method of calculating the Land Diversity Index, changes can be made in the number of areas that have changed in the period of the year being monitored. This paper focuses the development of an ArcGIS Weh Island map with the analytical hierarchy process (AHP). It is expected that efforts will be made to control land use changes in areas that have directly experienced land degradation, and analysis of water resources carrying capacity in Weh Island.

Impact of conservation management on land change: a case study in Guassa Community Conservation Area for the last 31 years (1986–2015)

This study investigated the impact of community conservation on land use and land cover dynamics in Guassa Community Conservation Area (GCCA), located in North Shewa Zone, Amhara Regional State, in Ethiopia. The Guassa community has a long tradition of conserving the locally known GUASSA (Festuca macrophylla) grass, which is important for the livelihoods of the community in the area for roof thatching, household uses and income generation. The objective of this study was to determine the rate of land use and land cover change (LULCC) and to identify the causes of this change in the GCCA. Satellite data were obtained from LANDSAT satellite images taken in 1986, 2003 and 2015. These images were classified with a maximum likelihood algorithm under a supervised classification method in ERDAS IMAGINE software and LULCC was analyzed using spatial analysis tools of ArcGIS 10.4 software. The local community was surveyed to determine the perception of the local community about LULCC in GCCA. The analysis determined five land cover categories: forest, bare land, farm land, shrubland and grassland. The forest land cover type constituted about 2.12% of the total area of GCCA in 1986 and increased by 1.82% from 1986 to 2003. Bare land increased over the years. Farm land at the border of GCCA decreased from 517.4 ha in 1986 to 495.09 ha in 2003 but increased to 540.8 ha in 2015. Findings from local community survey implied change of government, population growth, agricultural expansion, fire wood collection and settlement and increasing infrastructures as the major causes for the land use change of area. For sustainability of the area, it is important to strengthen and promote the traditional community conservation system which has kept the area for over 400 years.

Local validation of global biomass maps

Tropical countries without extensive ground sampling programs often use the gain-loss approach for greenhouse gas inventories. With this approach emissions are estimated as the products of estimates of areas of land use change characterized as activity data and estimates of emissions per unit area characterized as emission factors. For the special case of complete deforestation, the emission factor for the aboveground, live tree, biomass (AGB) pool can be estimated as mean biomass per unit area prior to the deforestation which, in turn, can be estimated using a single-date ground sample or a single-date biomass map.Multiple biomass maps at continental and global scales that can be considered for estimation of emissions factors have been forthcoming in recent years. However, regardless of the source of biomass data, estimates of emissions factors must still comply with the IPCC good practice guidelines for accuracy and uncertainty. For emission factors based on a biomass map, compliance requires validation of the map where validation means that independent reference data are used to ensure that the map is free from systematic error.The primary objective of the study was to illustrate methods for validating global AGB maps by assessing their conformity to reference data at the spatial scale of a sub-global validation site. For this study, validation entailed assessing the accuracy of map-based estimates of mean biomass per unit area for a sub-global, approximate 7600-km2 validation site in Minnesota, United States of America (USA). The accuracy assessment was in the form of a test of the hypothesis of whether the map-based estimate is or is not equivalent to an estimate based on independent reference data obtained from either a ground sample or a local biomass map of greater quality than the global map. Design-based, model-based, and hybrid inferential methods were used to conduct the test.The primary conclusions were threefold. First, no map exhibited systematic error; second, the model-based inferential approach produced the smallest standard errors; and third, operationally, differences between validation site estimates of mean biomass per unit area for two global biomass maps and estimates based on reference data were not statistically significantly different.

CHANGES OF LAND USE AND LAND COVER IN SMALL ISLANDS CASE STUDY: WEH-SABANG ISLAND, INDONESIA

Development will increase sporadic land use and tend to cause land degradation. This paper is intended to investigate the effects of land use and land cover processes on Weh-Sabang Island, Indonesia. The duration of LULC changes is analyzed using Google Earth images from 2008 to 2018. Through observations of satellite imagery detected protected area and green space area has been greatly reduced in area and transformed into built-in land which functions as a tourist area and urban built environment. Where as in the coastal areas the change from vacant land to land that was built has also become larger over the past ten years. The increase in land density since 2008 is due to the construction of tourist attractions in hilly areas to coastal areas around Weh-Sabang Island, and can cause changes in the morphology and typology of the city of Sabang. Through the method of calculating the Land Diversity Index, changes can be made in the number of areas that have changed in the period of the year being monitored. The coastal areas experience more land use changes than hilly areas, and through observations of LULC changes across Weh Island, it is expected that efforts will be made to control land use changes in areas that have directly experienced land degradation, and must consider environmental control efforts. As small island like that which happened on Weh-Sabang Island. The westernmost island of the Republic of Indonesia.

The effects of trainings in soil and water conservation on farming practices, livelihoods, and land-use intensity in the Ethiopian highlands

Smallholder farmers in the Ethiopian Highlands face increasingly difficult farming conditions. Agricultural intensification to feed the growing rural population, livestock pressure on native vegetation, and climate change converge to exacerbate soil erosion, creating a significant threat to crop productivity and rural livelihoods. Farmer trainings can be a potent strategy to increase farmer awareness of the larger causes of soil loss, help farmers adapt to or mitigate environmental challenges, and improve crop outputs and incomes. However, evaluations of farmer training programs rarely assess socioeconomic and environmental outcomes simultaneously. Our study uses multiple methods to estimate the socio-ecological effects of a soil and water conservation training program for farmers implemented by ADHENO Integrated Rural Development Association, an Ethiopian non-governmental organization. We asked: (a) did farmers use practices taught in trainings; (b) did these strategies lead to improved agricultural productivity or livelihoods; and (c) how did land-use intensity change in areas with more participation in farmer trainings? To address questions (a) and (b), our study and results are based on 449 household surveys, collected between June and August 2017, in two rural kebeles in Ethiopia in which ADHENO has been active since 2003. We used remote sensing analysis of high resolution satellite images to measure land-use change over a period of nine years, addressing question (c) for one of the kebeles. Analysis of household surveys with propensity score matching and robustness checks suggests that participation in farmer trainings predicts the implementation of four out of seven soil conservation farming methods. Participants in training sessions also had higher average incomes from agriculture than non-participants. Linear models of land-use change in the area around villages did not depict a clear relationship between participation in farmer trainings and change in land-use intensity. These results indicate that farmer trainings focusing on soil and water conservation have the potential to influence farming practices and livelihoods and have implications for soil conservation efforts in the Ethiopian Highlands. This study highlights the importance of evaluating the impacts of small, localized development interventions, of which there are many in sub-Saharan Africa, to better understand the ways in which myriad types of programs influence both land use and livelihoods.

Analyzing spatial patterns of urban carbon metabolism and its response to change of urban size: A case of the Yangtze River Delta, China

Abstract Rapid urbanization with land use and cover change (LUCC) is making a substantially increasing contribution to global carbon emissions. Understanding the spatial processes and transitions mechanism of urban carbon metabolism system by LUCC could help local governments in regional spatial planning. Taking 13 cities in the Yangtze River Delta of China as examples, we quantitatively analyzed and mapped the spatial processes of urban carbon metabolism by LUCC from 1995 to 2015 in the region and investigated the relationships between urban size growth and urban carbon metabolism rate by LUCC (MLUCC) using panel data regression analysis. A higher MLUCC showed a larger negative impact on the urban carbon metabolism system by per unit area of land use change. We found that the highest negative carbon transitions were shifted from Shanghai to cities in the South Jiangsu Province. And the dominant negative carbon transitions and positive ones came from land use transfer into and out the industrial land and transportation land. The results of the panel model regression analysis showed the growths of urban population and land both correlated positively with MLUCC. Further, we controlled the economic growth and urban form changes on the relationship between urban size growth and MLUCC, and the results suggested both the benefits from compromising economic growth and optimizing urban form were overshadowed by the negative impact of urban size growth. The study provided a robust methodology for assessing urban carbon metabolism and provided new insights into land use controls to develop low carbon cities.

Effects of golf course management on subsurface soil properties in Iowa

Abstract. Currently, in the USA and especially in the Midwest region, urban expansion is developing turfgrass landscapes surrounding commercial sites, homes, and recreational areas on soils that have been agriculturally managed for decades. Often, golf courses are at the forefront of conversations concerning anthropogenic environmental impacts as they account for some of the most intensively managed soils in the world. Iowa golf courses provide an ideal location to evaluate whether golf course management is affecting the quality of soils at depth. Our study evaluated how soil properties relating to soil health and resiliency varied with depth at golf courses across Iowa and interpreted relationships of these properties to current golf course management, previous land use, and inherent soil properties. Systematic variation in soil properties including sand content, NO3, and soil organic matter (SOM) were observed with depth at six Iowa golf courses among three landform regions. Variability in sand content was identified between the 20 and 50 cm depth classes at all courses, where sand content decreased by as much as 37 %. Highest concentrations of SOM and NO3 were found in the shallowest soils, whereas total C and P variability was not related to golf course management. Sand content and NO3 were found to be directly related to golf course management, particularly at shallow depths. The effects of golf course management dissipated with depth and deeper soil variations were primarily due to natural geologic conditions. The two abovementioned soil properties were very noticeably altered by golf course management and may directly impact crop productivity, soil health, and water quality, and while NO3 may be altered relatively quickly in soil through natural processes, particle size of the soil may not be altered without extensive mitigation. Iowa golf courses continue to be developed in areas of land use change from historically native prairies and more recently agriculture to urban landscapes. As soils are continually altered by human impacts, it is imperative that we monitor the changes, both physical and chemical, in order to establish management practices that maintain environmental sustainability and productivity.

Variation and changes in land-use intensities behind nickel mining: Coupling operational and satellite data

Case studies of nickel mines in New Caledonia revealed significant differences among mining sites even though the mines host the same type of nickel laterite ore deposit and employ the same open-cut mining method. The intensity of land use change was evaluated as the area of land use change per unit of metal contained in extracted ores. Among the six mines studied, the lowest intensity of 0.00177 [m2/kg] is very close to the reference value of 0.0018 [m2/kg] provided by the nickel industry, whereas the highest-impact mine has an intensity approximately ten times greater, at 0.0191 [m2/kg]. This wide variation is attributed to the different operational stage of each mine. It means careful and continuous monitoring of such changes is necessary. We also evaluated historical changes in land use intensity, and found a decreasing trend, which may be the result of technological developments in the downstream sector. Our results show that the use of a single, representative intensity value can be misleading. Instead, it is necessary to analyze mine-specific changes. Historical data are also useful for analyzing the impacts of technological improvements over time. Both forms of analysis are feasible by coupling satellite imagery with operational data.