ABSTRACT One of the most important steps in solving today's environmental problems that affect both human welfare and the lives of other living things is to identify the determinants of pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours of the human species, which has the strongest impact on nature. So the aim of the study is to examine the relationship between preschool children's affinity towards nature (biophilia) and their mothers’, fathers’ and teachers’ connectedness to nature. A total of 298 children, their parents and teachers participated in the study. This research was conducted in a province located in the northwestern part of Turkey. The results indicated that there is a relationship between teachers’ connectedness to nature scores and children's affinity towards nature scores, but there is no relationship between parents’ connectedness to nature scores and children's scores. As a result of the regression analysis, it was determined that teachers’ level of connectedness to nature was a predictor of children's affinity towards nature.

Today's environmental problems have triggered ozone depletion, global warming, acid rain and a host of other environmental crises, energy crisis after environmental crisis. Therefore, the development and utilization of clean and renewable energy become the only way for future economic development, is to ease the energy supply tension and an important measure to address climate change. As a renewable energy which can be exploited and utilized, tidal energy can be an important supplement of energy supply in China. But in fact, due to cost, technical level and other practical factors, researchers on the development and utilization of tidal energy prospects are still mixed. In this paper, the basic principle, energy efficiency and environmental impact of tidal power generation are analyzed and summarized based on the research results and practical application of tidal power development in recent years, the feasibility of developing tidal power as a new energy source is also discussed. Compared with conventional power generation, it can save non-renewable resources and reduce the emission of toxic and harmful substances, which has great development potential and value.

A land remediation project involves the removal of potentially toxic chemicals from a polluted site. Lands abandoned by industry are often contaminated with heavy metals like mercury, lead, chemicals, arsenic, and other toxins like dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane biphenyls from electronic devices, and volatile organic chemicals (VOCs) from lubricants and chemicals. Risk assessment in environmental settings requires modernized systematic methodologies due to the complexity of today's environmental problems. When people eat, drink, or work in polluted environments, they put their health at risk and may even get cancer. Integrating geospatial information systems (GIS) with pollutant dispersion models makes environmental risk assessment and early warning possible. This research thus presents a GIS-based ecological risk identification and assessment model (GIS-ERIAM) for assessing risk for efficient land rehabilitation. Environmental cleanup sites' catalog information is the source of these details. With satellite imagery, GIS makes it simple to keep an eye on the environment and track the abundance of different types of plants and animals The ecological risk assessment (ERA) model can support recognition and prioritize risk management. By integrating direct and indirect environment interactions, the risk conditions of the whole ecology and its elements have been quantified and demonstrated in the study. The numerical outcomes illustrate that the recommended GIS-ERIAM model improves the performance by 98.9%, risk level prediction by 97.3%, risk classification by 96.4%, and detection of soil degradation ratio of 95.6% compared to other existing methods.

Nüfus artışı, teknolojik gelişmeler vb. birçok faktör dünyadaki enerji ihtiyacını ve tüketimini hızla artırmaktadır. Son dönemlerde kişi başına düşen enerji tüketiminin artması ciddi boyutlara ulaşmış, enerji üretiminde dışa bağımlığı azaltma ve küresel ekonomik rekabette belirleyici bir aktör olma hususları enerji üretiminin önemini artırmıştır. Bu sebeple, enerji kaynaklarına sahip olan ülkeler, ekonomik olarak diğer ülkelerden farklı bir konuma geçmiştir. Bununla birlikte, günümüzdeki çevre sorunları, fosil kaynakların tükenebilir olması veya fosil kaynaklara sahip olunmaması vb. sebepler yenilenebilir enerji kaynaklarına ilgiyi artırmıştır. AB’ye üyelik sürecinde, Türkiye ve AB ülkelerinin yenilenebilir enerji performanslarının zaman içinde değerlendirilmesi literatüre ve yapılacak çalışmalara da katkı sağlayacaktır. Bu çalışmanın amacı, yenilenebilir enerji ve ekonomik büyüme ilişkisi açısından Türkiye ve AB ülkelerinin verimlilikleri değerlendirmektir. Çalışma kapsamında yapılan literatür incelemesi sonucu yenilenebilir enerji göstergeleri ile ilgili 5 değişken belirlenmiştir. Girdi değişkenleri; CO2 Salınımı, Toplam Enerji Tüketimindeki Yenilenebilir Enerji kullanımı (YEK), İşgücü (EMP) çıktı değişkenleri; Kişi Başına GSYİH ve Toplam Enerji Arzının İçindeki Yenilenebilir Enerji Oranı (TEAYEO)’dır. Çalışmada, bahsi geçen ekonomik ve yenilenebilir enerji göstergeleri yardımıyla 2008-2015 döneminde AB ülkeleri ve Türkiye’nin performanslarındaki değişimler değerlendirilmiştir. Zaman içindeki verimliliğin gelişimini değerlendirebilmek için Malmquist Toplam Faktör Verimliliği (TFV) endeksi kullanılmıştır. Malmquist Endeksi, Veri zarflama analizi (VZA) temelli bir endeks olduğundan karar verme birimleri (KVB) arasında homojeniteyi sağlayabilmek amacıyla kümeleme analizi yapılmış ve benzer ülkeler gruplandırılmıştır. Çalışma sonucunda, 2008-2015 dönemdeki TFV ortalama değerlerine göre ülkeleri sıraladığımızda, Lüksemburg’un diğer ülkelerden kayda değer bir farkla birinci sırada yer aldığı görülmektedir. Lüksemburg’u sırasıyla Belçika, Türkiye, Bulgaristan, Hırvatistan Slovenya, Kıbrıs vd. ülkeler takip etmektedir. Türkiye’nin de ortalama TFVG değerine göre başarılı ülkelerden olduğu görülmektedir.

Problem setting. The problem of environmental security has gone beyond national borders and acquired a planetary character. If before the issue of ensuring the environmental security of countries was solely their internal affair, over time, state borders from an environmental point of view gradually lost their importance, became transparent. Analysis of recent researches and publications. The study of theoretical or some practical aspects of the legal nature of environmental safety were engaged in domestic and foreign scientists, among which are the works of: A.P. Hetman, H.V. Anisimova, G.I. Balyuk, S.A. Bogolyubova, M.M. Brinchuk, I.I. Karakash, T.G. Kovalchuk, V.V. Kostytsky and others. Target of research is to determine the essence and features of environmental safety as a legal category in terms of international law. Article’s main body. The article examines the definition of «environmental security» as a legal category. Its legal nature and its connection to international security are being established. In particular, environmental security as a legal category is considered from two points of view, as a certain state of protection of a person from threats caused by an thropogenic impact on natural objects, and as a system of legal instruments regulating the use of natural resources for their protection, as well as prevention and counteraction to threats that have a detrimental effect on the environment. Through the analysis of international legal acts, modern approaches of the international community to ensuring environmental security are determined. The international mechanism for environmental security is constantly evolving, it should be recognized that it is unfortunately not perfect and is not able to fully solve today's environmental problems, as well as to prevent an environmental catastrophe on a global scale. By concluding international agreements alone, it is impossible to ensure effective protection of all elements of the natural environment. Conclusions and prospects for the development. Therefore, it is important to consolidate the efforts of all participants in international communication in developing common approaches to solving this problem and actively using numerous international treaties and soft law instruments, best national practices, and involving civil society.

Abstract In pursuit of counteracting today's environmental problems, corporate management will have to implement organizational changes factoring in sustainability, which is why it is important to understand exactly what leads managers to initiate these changes. It has been established that managers' personal values are critical for their behavior and that threats to these values can mobilize managers to change their actions. However, when confronted with environment‐related threats, managers may face value conflicts and various tensions between their aim to implement sustainable changes and their desire to fulfill business requirements of their job positions. Only recently have researchers begun to investigate the underlying beliefs that may lead managers to initiate organizational change toward sustainability. Borrowing theoretical assumptions from the domain of health psychology (from the well‐established health belief model), the present conceptual article develops an environmental belief model that specifies when exactly threats lead managers to initiate organizational change. The environmental belief model proposes that environment‐related threats trigger change (i) when managers believe that their firms are susceptible to these threats, (ii) the threats are considered as serious for the company, (iii) the perceived benefits of the change outperform (iv) the perceived barriers, and when there is (v) an external cue (e.g., an information campaign). All these propositions are supported with empirical findings from business contexts. Besides theoretical advancement on the role of environmental threats as precipitators of organizational change, the model provides guidance on how to frame environment‐related threats that will mobilize managers for organizational change toward sustainability.

A Educação Ambiental é um processo educacional no qual se objetiva despertar na sociedade a preocupação individual e coletiva para questões ambientais. Deve possibilitar o acesso à informação de forma clara e objetiva e contribuir com o desenvolvimento de uma consciência crítica em relação aos problemas ambientais contemporâneos. Este artigo teve como objetivo realizar um mapeamento da Educação Ambiental em cursos de Graduação em Instituições de Ensino Superior Privadas do Estado de São Paulo. Para tanto, realizou-se uma pesquisa e análise minuciosa nas Grades Curriculares em 12 instituições, totalizando 593 cursos, englobando as diversas áreas do conhecimento e modalidades. Observou-se que 36,4% dos cursos analisados continham disciplinas com a temática Educação Ambiental. Quando se analisou por modalidades, percebeu-se que a Educação Ambiental possui uma maior representatividade entre os cursos de Licenciatura (58,7%). Já entre os cursos de Bacharelado e Curta Duração, esse valor foi de 33,8%; dado interessante e muito importante, visto que, é em cursos de Licenciatura que se formam profissionais que irão disseminar o conhecimento e as ideias nos espaços escolares

Today there can be no doubt about the main force behind our ongoing planetary emergency: the exponential growth of the capitalist world economy, particularly in the decades since the mid–twentieth century. The mere critique of capitalism as an abstract economic system, however, is insufficient in addressing today's environmental problems. Rather, it is necessary also to examine the structure of accumulation on a world scale, coupled with the division of the world into competing nation-states. Our planetary problems cannot realistically be addressed without tackling the imperialist world system, or globalized capitalism, organized on the basis of classes and nation-states, and divided into center and periphery. Today, this necessarily raises the question of imperialism in the Anthropocene.

Environment plays a very significant role in human civilization. Human beings have close relations with the biosphere in which they live. The whole environment and ecology consisting of earth, air, water, plants and animals provide the necessary and sufficient conditions for sustaining human life. The last few centuries have been dominated by human beings, and are referred to by some scholars as ‘anthropocene’, or a period of human domination over the planet. This domination has impacted the planet, leading to the rapid depletion of wildlife and their habitat. In the last few decades, growing human populations and their consumption levels, accompanied by greater need for water, electricity, metal, food, housing and other luxury items has led to the quick erosion of other species. This loss of species has been guesstimated by various scholars at anywhere between one per hour to one per day. Although human beings are considered the most intelligent life form on earth, they are responsible for most of the damage done to planet earth. Developing countries as well as developed countries alike are all suffering from environmental pollution. Therefore, today environmental problems have been the object of discussion everywhere from village to parliament.

From Colonizing Contract to Decolonizing Covenant: The Case for Ecological Justice in Maquiladoras and a New Covenantal Approach to Christian Environmental Ethics Ilsup Ahn Introduction Today's environmental problems are deeply connected with many structural and global activities of multi‐national companies, corporations, and their overseas branches and sub‐contractors. For example, the case of Bhopal disaster in 1984—which killed more than 8,000 people in Bhopal, India, in just the first few days following the leak of methyl isocyanate gas and other chemicals—was directly related to the U.S.‐based company Union Carbide. The much publicized environmental disaster in Amazon rainforests and rivers in Ecuador and Peru—which resulted in massive environmental pollution and damage between 1964 and 1992—was also directly related to the U.S.‐based energy company Texaco (Texaco was later acquired by Chevron in 2001). Both Union Carbide and Texaco operated their factories and plants legitimately in these countries based on international business agreements which they procured from the governing authorities of the countries. In recent decades, as David Pellow points out in his book, Resisting Global Toxics, increasing volumes of hazardous chemical wastes have been shipped from Europe, the United States, and Japan to nations in Latin America, the Caribbean, South and South‐East Asia, and Africa without any legal violations. The ever expanding economic globalization has legally rendered many poor southern nations vulnerable to various environmental hazards and health insecurities because of their economic situation. As Pellow correctly analyzes, the global waste trade not only reveals global environmental racism and inequality, but also parallels the domestic racist and classist culture and ideology within northern nations such as the United States. Given that a neo‐liberalized global economy and its international commerce and politics have rendered the natural environment increasingly vulnerable to its irreversible level of destruction on a global scale, particularly in the Global South, this study attempts to respond theologically to the ecological destruction caused by many multi‐national companies of the Global North and their overseas branches and local sub‐contractors. In this study, I particularly focus on the important consideration that the widespread destruction of the natural environment in the poor southern nations is legitimately exerted through various bilateral or multi‐lateral contracts and agreements between the contracting parties, which include not only multi‐national companies and corporations based in the First World countries, but also the business owners and the governing authorities of the Third World countries. It is my first argument that any international business contracts or agreements which would compromise or violate environmental justice should not be morally legitimized even if they are legally ratified. Given that the large‐scale environmental destruction is often caused by the unscrupulous activities of multi‐national companies which legitimately run their businesses on the basis of contract and agreement, we should first investigate the origins and scopes of the philosophical justification of contract and agreement. In this study, I attempt to do this by critically engaging the major thinkers of the Western social contract theory, which include Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Jean Jacques Rousseau, and other contemporary philosophers such as John Rawls. Through this critical investigation, I develop the main argument of this study that the fundamental paradigm of contract and agreement should be radically transformed from its traditional liberal form to the religiously inspired covenant type. While the liberal paradigm of contract and agreement largely discriminates against the unspoken voices of the environment, resulting in the compromise of environmental justice, the covenant model proactively includes the marginalized voices of the nature, including land, water, and air, thus enhancing environmental justice. In comparing the liberal model of contract and the covenantal agreement, I will also critically compare their pairing ideologies: “mutual benefit” for the liberal contract paradigm and “deep care” for the covenant model. The purpose of this critical investigation and comparison is, then, to advocate environmental justice by claiming that all international business contracts and agreements as well as national and domestic ones should be reoriented to a new covenantal style, departing from the conventional liberal model. In developing this key argument, I will also discuss the practical relevance of this argument by critically analyzing a well‐known...

Today's environmental problems adversely affect all living beings around the world. Gradual environmental pollution, which consumes natural things and changes climatic conditions, also causes acid rain. The cause of this adverse effect is directly related to anthropocentrism. Despite all these things, human beings continue to destroy and consume nature for their own interests. However, humans are part of nature, like all other creatures. Invariably, human beings cut the branch they are sitting on. Because of this reason, bioculture which is a cultural structure based on the sustainability of life, should be implemented in all segments of the society. Obviously, the destruction of the bioenvironment is inevitable in a society deprived of such a cultural structure. Education is the key concept for the creation of this structure.

Abstract There is only a scant possibility of today's environmental problems being solved solely by technical means, with no account being taken of the social or economic aspects. Thus, three generally recognized dimensions of sustainable development have been devised: ecological, social and economic. However, the basis for them is moral reflection regarding humankind's responsibility for nature. Is this all? Perhaps we should also include technical, legal and political dimensions. All of them are important and all of them are characterized in this paper. Since they are connected with one another, examples of the degree to which they can overlap are also discussed. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

Self-Regulatory Institutions for Solving Environmental Problems: Perspectives and Contributions from the Management Literature

Environmental scholars and practitioners are calling for the democratization of science and expertise. Two of the earliest and most influential arguments toward this end come to us from Silvio Funtowicz and Jerome Ravetz, with their now famous discussion of “postnormal science,” and Alvin Weinberg, with his well-known distinction between “research” and “trans-science”. Such positions, however, prove highly problematic. First, while calling for the opening of some questions to nonscientists, they likewise continue to uphold and justify a closed position of science for others. Second, these arguments fail to highlight how prominent fact/value conflation is in such fields as the environmental sciences (through such concepts as “ecological integrity,” “ecosystem health,” etc.). This article seeks to redress these problems by shifting attention away from discussions of “science” to that of “expertise,” and in doing this, to provide an alternative way of thinking about how to resolve today's environmental problems.

The economical and international dimensions of the environmental problems, environmental problems in the Black Sea region and the role of the voluntary organizations

Abstract Today's environmental problems are associated, to a great extent, with the industrialized world's consumption of goods and services. Consumption leads to different kinds of environmental impacts from all parts of a product's life cycle: raw material extraction, production, use, recovery, and final disposal, including transportation throughout the cycle. Working with products embraces many different environmental problems, instruments and mechanisms, stakeholders, various policy areas, etc. The current structure of industry and the considerable amount of international trade requires a strategy that takes these conditions into account in advancing sustainable production and consumption. The European Union has developed an Integrated Product Policy, built on life cycle thinking, in order to reduce resource use.The Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) was commissioned by the Swedish Government in 2001 to develop the Integrated Product Policy (IPP). The aim of IPP is to minimize the impact of products on human health and the environment throughout their life cycles, from cradle‐to‐grave, to improve sustainable production and consumption, and advance the government's environmental quality objectives. SEPA studied how instruments and mechanisms can work together and be made more effective, and what new instruments and mechanisms might be needed to achieve the goals laid down in IPP. This paper presents the results of the study.

Environmental issues have become more and more complex as a result of human beings' unmindful exploitation of non-renewable natural resources. Man is the real culprit for all the evils of today's environmental problems. It is because of his progress and greed he damaged the fragile environment to an irreparable extent. Population explosion, wrong development strategy, and industrial pollution are considered as series of problems. Due to selfish motive he started to establish more and more polluting industries rather than eco-friendly industry. As a result, nature has also reacted very badly, which is beyond the imagination of his supreme knowledge. Loss of food production, species extinction, global warming, changing sea currents, and ozone layer depletion are a few incidents of nature's anger towards the human beings' unfriendly attitude. Therefore, the need of the hour is to do something innovative in industrial production, disposal of waste, and marketing of finished products. Our conscious efforts towards this end may bring better (quality) life and sustained future.

Previous articleNext article No AccessNew Biological BooksEco-Pioneers: Practical Visionaries Solving Today's Environmental Problems. Steve Lerner Charles F. WursterCharles F. Wurster Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Quarterly Review of Biology Volume 75, Number 2Jun., 2000 Published in association with Stony Brook University Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/393449 Views: 1Total views on this site Copyright 2000 The University of Chicago PressPDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Briefly Noted: Eco-Pioneers: Practical Visionaries Solving Today's Environmental Problems

/ Many of today's environmental problems are regional in scope and their effects overlap and interact. We developed a simple method to provide an integrated assessment of environmental conditions and estimate cumulative impacts across a large region, by combining data on land-cover, population, roads, streams, air pollution, and topography. The integrated assessment technique identified nine distinct groups of watersheds. Relative cumulative impact scores were highest around major urban centers, but there was not a simple or predictable spatial pattern overall. We also point out the potential applications of this approach that include distinguishing between areas in relatively poor versus good condition, identifying areas that may be more vulnerable to future environmental degradation, and identifying areas for restoration.KEY WORDS: Cluster analysis; Cumulative impact; Geographic information systems; Landscape ecology; Remote sensinghttp://link.springer-ny.com/link/service/journals/00267/bibs/24n4p553.html</HEA