Unmitigated Scenario Research Articles

Enhanced atmospheric oxidation toward carbon neutrality reduces methane’s climate forcing

The hydroxyl radical (OH), as the central atmospheric oxidant, controls the removal rates of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. It is being suggested that OH levels would decrease with reductions of nitrogen oxides and ozone levels by climate polices, but this remains unsettled. Here, we show that driven by the carbon neutrality pledge, the global-mean OH concentration, derived from multiple chemistry-climate model simulations, is projected to be significantly increasing with a trend of 0.071‒0.16% per year during 2015–2100. The leading cause of this OH enhancement is dramatic decreases in carbon monoxide and methane concentrations, which together reduce OH sinks. The OH increase shortens methane’s lifetime by 0.19‒1.1 years across models and subsequently diminishes methane’s radiative forcing. If following a largely unmitigated scenario, the global OH exhibits a significant decrease that would exacerbate methane’s radiative forcing. Thus, we highlight that targeted emission abatement strategies for sustained oxidation capacity can benefit climate change mitigation in the Anthropocene.

Evidence from temperature analog for traditional and economic cities in Nigeria: implications for sustainable city-related actions

Responding to the threats of climate change by cities requires taking relevant actions that will communicate future conditions in reliable and effective manner for sustainable and transformational climate actions. We used the analog approach to assess the geographical shifts and changes in average temperature conditions for six traditional and economic cities under different climate scenarios (Mitigated and Unmitigated scenarios). We calculated the similarity in temperature between each pixel for the current (2021–2050) and future (2041–2070) conditions of the cities, with every pixel globally in the historical (1971–200) period. Our analysis revealed that; (1) the temperature of the cities in the current and future periods will be similar to conditions of another place on the globe during the historical period; (2) Kano city will experience even more drastic changes because of the low level of similarity to other places; (3) the new places found with similar temperature conditions are generally to the south of the corresponding cities thus indicating warming. The overall results show that the analogues of the cities are within the domain of the global tropical zone which occurs around the equator. Drawing from the interaction between cities and their analogues, we highlighted sustainable city related actions such as the incorporation of urban designs and policies to enhance human thermal comfort as adaptation and solution strategies. While future research might apply qualitative studies and additional data to support the analog results, our findings can guide the understanding and application of the analog approach into environmental issues in Nigeria and other West African countries in accordance to sustainable city goals (SDG 11).

Analyzing the Impact of Urban Planning and Building Typologies in Urban Heat Island Mitigation

Urban and building typologies have a serious impact on the urban climate and determine at large the magnitude of the urban overheating and urban heat island intensity. The present study aims to analyze the impact of various city typologies and urban planning characteristics on the mitigation of the urban heat island. The effect of the building height, street width, aspect ratio, built area ratio, orientation, and dimensions of open spaces on the distribution of the ambient and surface temperature in open spaces is analyzed using the Sydney Metropolitan Area as a case study for both unmitigated and mitigated scenarios. Fourteen precincts are developed and simulated using ENVI-met the simulation tool. The ambient temperature, surface temperature, and wind speed are extracted. The parameter ‘Gradient of the Temperature Decrease along the Precinct Axis’ (GTD) is introduced to study the cooling potential of the various precincts. In the mitigated precincts, the GTD ranges between 0.01 K/m to 0.004 K/m. In the non-mitigated precincts, the GTD ranges between 0.0093 K/m to 0.0024 K/m. A strong correlation is observed between the GTD of all the precincts, with and without mitigation, and their corresponding average aspect ratio, (Height of buildings to Width of streets). The higher the aspect ratio of the precinct, the lower the cooling potential. It is also observed that the higher the Built Area Ratio of the precincts, the lower the cooling contribution of the mitigation measures.

Analysis of Fukushima Daiichi unit 4 spent fuel pool using MELCOR

A spent fuel pool is a temporary storage facility designed to store the nuclear fuel assemblies removed from the reactor core. Here, the depleted fuel is vertically arranged in racks structures, accurately spaced to ensure subcriticality safety margins. Until the events occurred at the Fukushima Daiichi power plants, severe accidents in spent fuel pools had never been considered as a major safety concern, mainly because of their slow progression. However, extremely unlikely accident events, aggravated by the loss of site power, highlighted the vulnerability of nuclear fuel stored within spent fuel pools. During these accident sequences, reactor fuel rods can generate enough decay heat to vaporize the coolant around them, causing, during unmitigated scenarios, the uncovering and melting of fuel bundles after several days. In past years, new features have been introduced in the MELCOR code for the evaluation of potential risks associated to accident progression in spent fuel pools. In this paper, the accidental sequence of a loss of cooling accident in a boiling water reactor spent fuel pool is analysed with version 2.2 of the MELCOR code. The spent fuel pool of the Fukushima Daiichi unit 4 has been selected as reference. Main accident events, such as fuel uncovering, claddings oxidation, hydrogen generation, and fission products release, have been analysed assuming the unavailability of safety systems.

Projecting the Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Child Marriage

PurposeThe study projects the potential impact of COVID-19 on child marriage in the five countries in which the burden of child marriage is the largest: Bangladesh, Brazil, Ethiopia, India, and Nigeria. MethodsThe projected impact of the pandemic on child marriage is based on a Markov model. A review of empirical and theoretical literature informed construction and parameter estimates of five pathways through which we expect an elevated marriage hazard: death of a parent, interruption of education, pregnancy risk, household income shocks, and reduced access to programs and services. Models are produced for an unmitigated scenario and a mitigated scenario in which effective interventions are applied to reduce the impact. ResultsThe total number of excess child marriages in these five countries could range from 3.5 million to 4.9 million in the unmitigated scenario and from 1.8 million to 2.7 million in the mitigated scenario. The elevated risk compared with the baseline projection would continue until 2035. ConclusionsThese projections represent the impact in five countries that account for 50% of child marriages globally, implying that if similar patterns hold, we might expect the number of excess child marriages due to the pandemic to reach 7 million to 10 million globally. These estimates are necessarily subject to high levels of uncertainty because of limited evidence on the impacts in relation to child marriage and for parameter estimates. It will likely take years to understand the full impact of the pandemic. Despite these limitations, the potential for harm is unquestionably large.

Sensitivity of Total Column Ozone to Stratospheric Sulfur Injection Strategies

AbstractWe explore the impact of different stratospheric sulfur injection strategies to counter greenhouse gas induced warming on total column ozone (TCO), including high and low altitude injections at four latitudes, equatorial injections, and using a configuration with higher vertical resolution, based on a state‐of‐the‐art Earth system model. The experiments maintain global surface temperatures at 2020 conditions, while following the unmitigated future scenario. Within the first 10 years of the injection, we find an abrupt deepening of the Antarctic ozone hole by 8%–20% and changes up to 5% for other regions and seasons. The ozone hole recovery is delayed by ∼25 to over 55 years, with the fastest recovery for low‐altitude injections and slowest for equatorial injections. Mid to high‐latitude TCO increases by 15% in Northern Hemisphere winter and spring between 2010–2019 and 2080–2089 due to both increasing greenhouse gases and increasing sulfur injections. Implications for ecosystems need to be investigated.

Contrasting Response of West and East Antarctic Ice Sheets to Glacial Isostatic Adjustment

AbstractThe Antarctic ice sheet (AIS) lies on a solid Earth that displays large spatial variations in rheological properties, with a thin lithosphere and low‐viscosity upper mantle (weak Earth structure) beneath West Antarctica and an opposing structure beneath East Antarctica. This contrast is known to have a significant impact on the ice‐sheet grounding‐line stability. Here, we embed within an ice‐sheet model a modified glacial‐isostatic Elastic Lithosphere‐Relaxing Asthenosphere model that considers a dual pattern for the Earth structure beneath West and East Antarctica supplemented with an approximation of gravitationally consistent geoid changes, allowing to approximate near‐field relative sea‐level changes. We show that this elementary GIA model captures the essence of global Self‐Gravitating Viscoelastic solid‐Earth Models (SGVEMs) and compares well with both SGVEM outputs and geodetic observations, allowing to capture the essential features and processes influencing Antarctic grounding‐line stability in a computationally efficient way. In this framework, we perform a probabilistic assessment of the impact of uncertainties in solid‐Earth rheological properties on the response of the AIS to future warming. Results show that on multicentennial‐to‐millennial timescales, spatial variability in solid‐Earth deformation plays a significant role in promoting the stability of the West Antarctic ice sheet (WAIS). However, WAIS collapse cannot be prevented under high‐emissions climate scenarios. On longer timescales and for unmitigated climate scenarios, continent‐wide mass loss projections may be underestimated because spatially uniform Earth models, as typically considered in numerical ice sheet models, will overestimate the stabilizing effect of GIA across East Antarctica, which is characterized by thick lithosphere and high upper‐mantle viscosity.

Reassessing energy deposition for the ITER 5 MA vertical displacement event with an improved DINA model

The beryllium (Be) main chamber wall interaction during a 5 MA/1.8 T upward, unmitigated VDE scenario, first analysed in [J. Coburn et al., Phys. Scr. T171 (2020) 014076] for ITER, has been re-evaluated using the latest energy deposition analysis software. Updates to the DINA disruption model are summarized, including an improved numerical convergence for the 0D power balance, limitations on the safety factor within the plasma core, and the choice to maintain a constant plasma + halo poloidal cross-section. Such updates result in a broad halo region and higher radiated power fractions compared to previous models. The new scenario lasts for ~75 ms and deposits ~29 MJ of energy, with the radial distribution of parallel heat flux q‖r resembling an exponential falloff with an effective λq=75-198 mm. A maximum halo width wh of 0.52 m at the outboard midplane is observed. SMITER field line tracing and energy deposition simulations calculate a q⊥,max of ~83 MW/m2 on the upper first wall panels (FWP). Heat transfer calculations with the MEMOS-U code show that the FWP surface temperature reaches ~1000 K, well below the Be melt threshold. Variations of this 5 MA scenario with Be impurity densities from 0 to 3∙1019 m−3 also remain below the melt threshold despite differences in energy deposition and duration. These results are in contrast to the early study which predicted melt damage to the first wall [J. Coburn et al., Phys. Scr. T171 (2020) 014076], and emphasize the importance of accurate models for the halo width wh and the heat flux distribution q‖r within that halo width. The 2020 halo model in DINA has been compared with halo current experiments on COMPASS, JET, and Alcator C-Mod, and the preliminary results build confidence in the broad halo width predictions. Results for the 5 MA VDE are compared with those for a 15 MA equivalent, generated using the new DINA model. At the higher current, significant melting of the upper FWP is to be expected.

Oil Spill Modeling for the Enbridge Line 3 Replacement Program with Response for Planning, Preparedness, and Environmental Purposes

ABSTRACT Oil spill trajectory and fate modeling and analyses were performed to support evaluation of the downstream movement, behavior, timing, and potential ecological and human health risks resulting from hypothetical releases of crude oil from the proposed Enbridge Line 3 Replacement Program. The investigation involved assessing multiple hypothetical pipeline releases into terrestrial and aquatic environments. The quantitative assessment of the three-dimensional movement (i.e. trajectory) and behavior (i.e. fate) of released oil used site-specific environmental and geographic conditions, including seasonal and hydrographic information. The main questions being addressed included: What is the expected spatial extent, timing, and magnitude of hydrocarbon contamination from an unmitigated release?How do changes in the release location and release volume affect the ultimate trajectory, fate, and number of potentially susceptible resources.How does the inclusion of modeled response options change predictions (i.e. unmitigated vs. response mitigated scenarios)? The 2-dimensional OILMAPLand and 3-dimensional SIMAP computational oil spill models were used to assess hypothetical crude oil release scenarios into the Mississippi River near Palisade, MN. Results were presented in an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and an Assessment of Accidental Releases (AAR) presented to the Minnesota Department of Commerce Energy Environmental Review and Analysis (MN DOC EERA) and the Pollution Control Administration (MN PCA) as both oral and written testimony. The findings demonstrated realistic predictions of containment and collection efficiencies following an accidental release and aided regulators in the decision-making process for the project.

Effect of non-pharmacological interventions on the COVID-19 epidemic in Saudi Arabia.

We quantified the potential impact of different social distancing and self-isolation scenarios on the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic trajectory in Saudi Arabia and compared the modelling results to the confirmed epidemic trajectory. Using the susceptible, exposed, infected, quarantined and self-isolated, requiring hospitalisation, recovered/immune individuals, fatalities model, we assessed the impact of a non-pharmacological interventions' subset. An unmitigated scenario (baseline), mitigation scenarios (25% reduction in social contact/twofold increase in self-isolation) and enhanced mitigation scenarios (50% reduction in social contact/twofold increase in self-isolation) were assessed and compared to the actual epidemic trajectory. For the unmitigated scenario, mitigation scenarios, enhanced mitigation scenarios and actual observed epidemic, the peak daily incidence rates (per 10 000 population) were 77.00, 16.00, 9.00 and 1.14 on days 71, 54, 35 and 136, respectively. The peak fatality rates were 35.00, 13.00, 5.00 and 0.016 on days 150, 125, 60 and 155, respectively. The R0 was 1.15, 1.14, 1.22 and 2.50, respectively. Aggressive implementation of social distancing and self-isolation contributed to the downward trend of the disease. We recommend using extensive models that comprehensively consider the natural history of COVID-19, social and behavioural patterns, age-specific data, actual network topology and population to elucidate the epidemic's magnitude and trajectory.

Medical costs of keeping the US economy open during COVID-19

We use an individual based model and national level epidemic simulations to estimate the medical costs of keeping the US economy open during COVID-19 pandemic under different counterfactual scenarios. We model an unmitigated scenario and 12 mitigation scenarios which differ in compliance behavior to social distancing strategies and in the duration of the stay-home order. Under each scenario we estimate the number of people who are likely to get infected and require medical attention, hospitalization, and ventilators. Given the per capita medical cost for each of these health states, we compute the total medical costs for each scenario and show the tradeoffs between deaths, costs, infections, compliance and the duration of stay-home order. We also consider the hospital bed capacity of each Hospital Referral Region (HRR) in the US to estimate the deficit in beds each HRR will likely encounter given the demand for hospital beds. We consider a case where HRRs share hospital beds among the neighboring HRRs during a surge in demand beyond the available beds and the impact it has in controlling additional deaths.

Risk to North American birds from climate change‐related threats

AbstractClimate change is a significant threat to biodiversity globally. Here, we assessed the risk to 544 birds in the United States from future climate change‐related threats under a mitigation‐dependent global warming scenario of 1.5°C and an unmitigated scenario of 3.0°C. Threats considered included sea level rise, human land cover conversion, and extreme weather events. We identified potential impacts to individual species by overlaying future bird ranges with threats to calculate the proportion of species' ranges affected, and mapped a place‐based index of risk based on hazard (coincident threats), exposure (potential species richness), and vulnerability (potential richness of vulnerable species). Extreme weather events had the most extensive spatial coverage and contribution to risk, but urbanization and sea level rise also had disproportionate impacts on species relative to their coverage. With unmitigated climate change, multiple coincident threats affected over 88% of the area of the conterminous United States, and 97% of species could be affected by two or more climate‐related threats. Some habitat groups will see up to 96% of species facing three or more threats. Species of conservation concern also faced more threats regardless of climate change scenario. However, climate change mitigation would reduce risk to birds from climate change‐related threats across over 90% of the US.

Urban mitigation and building adaptation to minimize the future cooling energy needs

In several areas of the world, the population concentrates along the coastal regions, benefitting from the sea breeze, with warmer inland areas. However, increasing population is driving urban sprawl in traditionally low-density areas, enhancing the synergies between global and local climate change. Here we show that local climate mitigation can reduce the impacts of climate change, with the analysis of a new development area in Sydney, 50 km from the coast. With meso-scale climate modelling, we computed that by 2050 the peak summer temperature will increase by 0.8 °C and the daily average summer temperature by 1.6 °C. Mitigation with cool materials, greenery, and irrigation will lower the peak and average daily temperatures respectively by 2.2 °C and 1.6 °C with respect to the unmitigated future climate scenario. Mitigation techniques when applied in the whole Sydney area yield to cooling energy needs reductions by 6.7–8.6 kWh/m2 (13.4–19.3%) for typical residential, office, and school buildings, with a negligible heating penalty, compared to an unmitigated future scenario. Combined adaptation and mitigation can reduce the future cooling energy needs by 31.3 kWh/m2 (70%), 29.3 kWh/m2 (57.3%), and 20.9 kWh/m2 (59.4%) for typical residential, office, and school building, respectively. Our study indicates that the consolidated and widely available mitigation technologies alone cannot counteract the energy impact of both global and local climate change. A structured system of interventions at building and urban scale is necessary while developing novel and higher efficiency mitigation technologies.

Projections of Excessive Mortality Related to Diurnal Temperature Range Under Climate Change Scenarios: A Multi-Country Study

Background: Various retrospective studies report that a higher diurnal temperature range (DTR) increases mortality risk. This study projects the impact of DTR on future mortality across 445 communities in 20 countries. Methods: We first estimated the DTR-related mortality risk based on the historical daily time-series of mortality and of weather factors from 1985 to 2015. Next, we projected the excess deaths attributable to the DTR during the current (1985–2015) and future (2020–2099) periods using daily DTR series under four climate-change scenarios. We then calculated the future excess deaths based on two assumptions: warmer temperatures affect or do not affect the DTR-mortality risk. Findings: DTR was associated with excess mortality in our time-series analyses. Under the unmitigated scenario, the future average DTR is projected to increase in most countries (-0·4–1·6 °C), and the increasing pattern was more evident in the United States, south-central Europe, Mexico, and South Africa. The excess deaths currently attributable to DTR were estimated to be 0·2–7·4%. Furthermore, the DTR-related mortality risk increased with an increasing average temperature. Based on the positive interactive effect between DTR and temperature, the DTR-related excess deaths are projected to increase in all countries (1·4–10·3%) in 2090–2099. Interpretation: This study suggests that the DTR-related excess mortality may increase globally under climate change, and this increasing pattern may vary between countries. Our findings can contribute to both international and regional public health interventions to reduce the DTR impacts on health under climate change. Funding Statement: Ho Kim is supported by the Korea Ministry of Environment via the “Climate Change Correspondence Program” (2014001310007). Declaration of Interests: All authors report no financial relationships with commercial interests.

The uncertain future of the Antarctic Ice Sheet.

The Antarctic Ice Sheet is losing mass at an accelerating pace, and ice loss will likely continue over the coming decades and centuries. Some regions of the ice sheet may reach a tipping point, potentially leading to rates of sea level rise at least an order of magnitude larger than those observed now, owing to strong positive feedbacks in the ice-climate system. How fast and how much Antarctica will contribute to sea level remains uncertain, but multimeter sea level rise is likely for a mean global temperature increase of around 2°C above preindustrial levels on multicentennial time scales, or sooner for unmitigated scenarios.

Climate projections in Lake Maggiore watershed using statistical downscaling model

Precipitation and temperature over the Lake Maggiore watershed greatly influence its water balance. Local communities from both Italy and Switzerland rely on the watershed for agriculture, tourism and hydropower production. Accurate climate projections in this area are vital in dealing with their impacts and yet are still lacking. Future climate was assessed by applying the Statistical DownScaling Model (SDSM) and using CanESM2 predictors. Three scenarios defined by RCP2.6, RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 were adopted. Based on our results, SDSM is to a certain degree applicable for simulating precipitation and temperature in an Alpine area. Results indicate that warming from now until the end of the century will be about 2 to 3 times greater without global mitigation. Temperature is estimated to increase throughout the 21st century, with a stronger warming trend in the northeastern part of the region than in the southwestern part. The strength of the warming at the end of the century highly depends on the scenario considered, with an increase up to 1.7°C for the mitigation scenario RCP2.6 compared to 4.2°C for the unmitigated scenario RCP8.5. Seasonal precipitation is expected to change depending on the future scenarios. Most of the region is expected to display a seasonally positive precipitation change during the cold season and vice versa, resulting in a shift in the peak rainy season from autumn to winter. These findings suggest that the area might be vulnerable to global change and will provide useful insight to develop a better strategy for the management of water resources and to study the adoptive measures to manage flood disasters.

Effect of impact pile driving noise on marine mammals: A comparison of different noise exposure criteria.

Regulators in Europe and in the United States have developed sound exposure criteria. Criteria range from broadband levels to frequency weighted received sound levels. The associated differences in impact assessment results are, however, not yet understood. This uncertainty makes environmental management of transboundary anthropogenic noise challenging and causes confusion for regulators who need to choose appropriate exposure criteria. In the present study, three established exposure criteria frameworks from Germany, Denmark, and the US were used to analyse the effect of impact pile driving at a location in the Baltic Sea on harbor porpoise and harbor seal hearing. The acoustic modeling using MIKE showed that an unmitigated scenario would lead to auditory injury for all three criteria. Despite readily apparent variances in impact ranges among the applied approaches, it was also evident that noise mitigation measures could reduce underwater sound to levels where auditory injuries would be unlikely in most cases. It was concluded that each of the frameworks has its own advantages and disadvantages. Single noise exposure criteria follow the precautionary principle and can be enforced relatively easily, whereas criteria that consider hearing capabilities and animal response movement can improve the accuracy of the assessment if data are available.

The implications of the United Nations Paris Agreement on climate change for globally significant biodiversity areas

Climate change is already affecting species and their distributions. Distributional range changes have occurred and are projected to intensify for many widespread plants and animals, creating associated risks to many ecosystems. Here, we estimate the climate change-related risks to the species in globally significant biodiversity conservation areas over a range of climate scenarios, assessing their value as climate refugia. In particular, we quantify the aggregated benefit of countries’ emission reduction pledges (Intended Nationally Determined Contributions and Nationally Determined Contributions under the Paris Agreement), and also of further constraining global warming to 2 °C above pre-industrial levels, against an unmitigated scenario of 4.5 °C warming. We also quantify the contribution that can be made by using smart spatial conservation planning to facilitate some levels of autonomous (i.e. natural) adaptation to climate change by dispersal. We find that without mitigation, on average 33% of each conservation area can act as climate refugium (or 18% if species are unable to disperse), whereas if warming is constrained to 2 °C, the average area of climate refuges doubles to 67% of each conservation area (or, without dispersal, more than doubles to 56% of each area). If the country pledges are fulfilled, an intermediate estimate of 47–52% (or 31–38%, without dispersal) is obtained. We conclude that the Nationally Determined Contributions alone have important but limited benefits for biodiversity conservation, with larger benefits accruing if warming is constrained to 2 °C. Greater benefits would result if warming was constrained to well below 2 °C as set out in the Paris Agreement.

Spring Snow‐Albedo Feedback Analysis Over the Third Pole: Results From Satellite Observation and CMIP5 Model Simulations

AbstractThe snow‐albedo feedback is a crucial component in high‐altitude cryospheric change but is poorly quantified over the Third Pole, encompassing the Karakoram and Tibetan Plateau. Here we present an analysis of present‐day and future spring snow‐albedo feedback over the Third Pole, using a 28 year satellite‐based albedo and the latest climate model simulations. We show that present‐day spring snow‐albedo feedback strength is primarily determined by the decrease in albedo due to snow metamorphosis, rather than that due to reduced snow cover in the Karakoram, but not found in Southeastern Tibet. We further demonstrate an emergent relationship between snow‐albedo feedback from the seasonal cycle and that from climate change across models. Combined with contemporary satellite‐based snow‐albedo feedback from seasonal cycle, this relationship enables us to estimate that the feedback strength for the Karakoram with a relatively high glaciated area is −2.42 ± 0.48% K−1 under an unmitigated scenario, which is much stronger than that for Southeastern Tibet (−1.64 ± 0.48% K−1) and for the Third Pole (−0.89 ± 0.44% K−1), respectively. Moreover, it is noteworthy that the magnitude of the constrained strength is only half of the unconstrained model estimate for the Third Pole, suggesting that current climate models generally overestimate the feedback of spring snow change to temperature change based on the unmitigated scenario.

Regional development and climate change mitigation modelling of municipal solid waste emissions in the middle east

AbstractThis study adapts a climate change mitigation model to assess impacts of municipal solid wastes in the Middle East and North Africa region, taking into account the future development of integrated waste management infrastructure involving collection, treatment and disposal. Mitigated and unmitigated disposal scenarios including waste growth reduction are used to estimate disposal methane emission changes at regional and subregional level. This study shows that unmitigated regional emissions by 2050 could rise to 296 542 GgCO2eq from a current level in 2015 of 128 184 GgCO2eq additionally decreasing annually by up to 8.75% falling to 10.16% due to waste characterisation changes as developing countries in the region progress to developed country status. A further annual rise, due to hotter drier climate conditions experienced as desertification, of up to a range of 1.70% increasing to 2.29% is also demonstrated. The findings enable regional planners to better assess and develop plans for implementation of integrated waste management policies.