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Intensive anthropogenic activities can lead to soil heavy metal contamination resulting in potential risks to the environment and to human health. To reveal the concentrations, speciation, sources, pollution level, and ecological risk of heavy metals in vegetable garden soil, a total of 136 soil samples were collected from three vegetable production fields in the suburbs of Xianyang City, Northwest China. These samples were analyzed by inductively coupled plasma- atomic emission spectrometry and atomic fluorescence spectrometry. The results showed that the mean concentrations of Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Pb, Zn, and Hg in vegetable garden soil were higher than the corresponding soil element background values of Shaanxi Province. The heavy metals studied in vegetable garden soil were primarily found in the residual fraction, averaging from 31.26% (Pb) to 90.23% (Cr). Considering the non-residual fractions, the mobility or potential risk was in the order of Pb (68.74%)>Co (60.54%)>Mn (59.28%) >Cd (53.54%) ≫Ni (23.36%) >Zn (22.73%)>Cu (14.93%)>V (11.81%)>Cr (9.78%). Cr, Mn, Ni, V, and As in the studied soil were related to soilforming parent materials, while Cu, Hg, Zn, Cd, Co, and Pb were associated with the application of plastic films, fertilizers, and pesticides, as well as traffic emissions and industrial fumes. Cr, Ni, V, and As presented low contamination levels, whereas Co, Cu, Mn, Pb, and Zn levels were moderate, and Cd and Hg were high. Ecological risk was low for Co, Cr, Cu, Mn, Pb, Zn, and As, with high risk observed for Cd and Hg. The overall pollution level and ecological risk of these heavy metals were high.

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are ubiquitous environmental pollutants. Urban surface dust is an important carrier of PAHs. To investigate the characteristics, sources, and health risk of PAHs in urban surface dust, this study collected urban surface dust samples from Xi'an, the largest city in Northwest China and one of the cities with severe smog occurrences in China. The total concentration of 16 US EPA priority PAHs (∑16PAHs) ranged from 5.0 to 48 mg/kg, with an average of 14 mg/kg. The seven carcinogenic PAHs accounted for 21 to 65 % of the ∑16PAHs. Higher levels of PAHs were found in its industrial, traffic, and mixed commercial and traffic districts. The PAHs were dominated by four-ring PAHs, and the predominant components were Fla, Phe, Chy, and Pyr. Multivariate statistical analyses showed that the PAHs originated mainly from the combustion of fossil fuel as well as coal and wood, and petroleum emission. The toxic equivalency quantities (TEQs) of urban surface dustborne PAHs ranged from 0.25 to 8.3 mg/kg, with a mean of 1.8 mg/kg. The 95 % upper confidence limit of incremental lifetime cancer risk (ILCR) due to human exposure to urban surface dustborne PAHs was 8.2 × 10(-5) for children and 7.3 × 10(-5) for adults.

Green infrastructure can be considered as all-natural, semi-natural and artificial networks of multifunctional ecological systems within, around and between urban areas, at all spatial scales. In this chapter, the authors cover how different components of green infrastructure (GI) project management relate to environmental justice (EJ) issues. Some of the key questions that they raise are: In what ways does assessing benefits of restoration using standard economic measures fall short of EJ goals? In what ways does GI implementation reinforce existing dynamics and values versus transforming them? The authors then cover a review of ecosystem services that urban waterways can provide with an emphasis on cultural services, ways of assessing ecosystems service and some case studies of applied ecosystem service assessment of benefits as well as environmental justice impacts to urban waterway communities. They explores green infrastructure using the lens of environmental justice, identifying several challenges and limitations that arise in connection with the context of restoration projects.

Consideration of biological quality has long been an important component of rating areas for conservation. Often these same areas are highly valued by people for aesthetic reasons, creating demands for housing and recreation that may conflict with protection plans for these habitats. Most methods of selecting land for conservation purposes use biological factors alone. For some land areas, analysis of aesthetic qualities is also important in describing the scenic value of undisturbed land. A method for prioritizing small islands and shoals based on both biological and visual quality factors is presented here. The study included 169 undeveloped islands and shoals ⩽0.8 ha in the Thousand Islands Region of the St. Lawrence River, New York. Criteria such as critical habitat for uncommon plant and animal species were considered together with visual quality and incorporated into a rating system that ranked the islands and shoals according to their priority for conservation management and protection from development. Biological factors were determined based on previous research and a field survey. Visual quality was determined by visual diagnostic criteria developed from public responses to photographs of a sample of islands. Variables such as elevation, soil depth, and type of plant community can be used to classify islands into different categories of visual quality but are unsuccessful in classifying islands into categories of overall biological quality.

This case study concerns the formation of the Great Lakes Wetlands Policy Consortium which was a bilateral action group formed in 1989–1990 to negotiate and coordinate environmental NGO policy positions on protection management and restoration of wetlands in the Great Lakes drainage basin. This includes the states of Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, and New York plus the province of Ontario in Canada. The major player in this case study is the Tip of the Mitt Watershed Council located in Michigan. They organized the policy consortium and obtained the grant for to do the activity and are most active with follow-up. Other actors are individual environmental advocate groups in the United States and Canada as well as regulatory agencies in both countries.

Faced with a loss of 50% of the world's wetlands plus increasing stress on the remaining wetlands (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2005), it is time to review the eight previous case studies for lessons learned and any wetland management innovations that could be applicable to other wetland systems and other regions of the world. The focus of this final chapter will be to address these issues as well as to offer any guidance for sustainable wetland management from an international perspective.

The East India–Bangladesh region has a rich history of coastal mangrove and swamp forest systems. But these same areas are under stress from land conversion and population explosion. This case study traces the development of an urbanized wetland in east Kolkata, India, and follows its multifunctional utilization for water quality treatment, aquaculture, garbage-fed agriculture, and urban wetland park. A crucial question for such urbanized wetland systems is whether they can be sustained in the face of mounting land conversion pressure plus other environmental stresses.

This case study addresses the different roles of NGOs in management to two of the most important coastal estuaries in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. These two biosphere reserves sustain an estimated 24,000 Caribbean flamingos that migrate between Ria Celestun (wintering site) and Ria Lagartos (breeding site). Both sites are also wintering sites for thousands of migratory waterfowl, which explains much of the international interest. Both sites are at the Neotropical edge and illustrate management issues typical of subtropical North and Central America. Although the Mexican government agencies play the dominant role in day-to-day management of these two biosphere reserves; international, national, and regional NGOs play major roles in research management decisions as well as management support. It should be noted that Amigos de Sian Ka'an, a regional Mexican NGO, collaborates in the management of the Sian Ka'an Biosphere Reserve on the Caribbean side of the Yucatan Peninsula, but the author is much more familiar with the other two estuaries, Ria Celestun and Ria Lagartos.

This chapter takes a look at wetland conservation in the Mediterranean and more specifically at a Ramsar wetland site in Greece – the Axios River Delta complex. The delta complex actually includes three rivers, the Axios, Loudias, and Aliakmon rivers, but for the purposes of this chapter is referred to as the “Axios Delta”. The questions here to be examined is what has been the recent impact of European wetland conservation policy expressed by the Grado declaration, MedWet, and Greece's wetland policy on a specific wetland area? The other issue is what specific roles did the WWF Greece-sponsored project (the NGO in this case) play in wetland management policy affecting the Axios River Delta area?

In parts of sub-Saharan Africa, as well as South America, India, and southeast Asia, interior riverine wetlands are stressed or altered by dams and reservoir projects for hydroelectric, irrigation, and flood control “benefits” (Dugan 1988, Nelson et al. 1989, Scudder 1989). Resultant impacts from hydroelectric alteration and lack of flooding downstream affect both biodiversity and human use of floodplain wetlands for agriculture, fiber, and medicinal plant usage (Duggan 1988, Mathooko and Kariuki 2000, Tockner and Stanford 2002).

Wetlands in Latin America and the Caribbean have sustained human activity since pre-Columbian times (Davidson and Gauthier 1993, Lugo 2002, Smardon 2006), but it is only recently that wetland protection policies have been addressed (Davidson and Gauthier 1993, Castro 1995). In 1985 the International Waterfowl and Wetlands Research Bureau (IWRB), with support from other agencies, coordinated the first comprehensive survey of Neotropical wetlands of international importance. This work resulted in the publication of the Directory of Neotropical Wetlands (Scott and Carbonell 1986), which lists and describes wetlands in each Latin American and Caribbean country. This directory was used as a baseline for identifying wetlands in Central America, with emphasis on those wetlands of importance to humans as well as high biological diversity.

This is a story of a very large coastal wetland complex bordering the North Sea plus three countries in Europe. Intertwined with a multi-jurisdictional management issues is the role of several NGOs most notably the Society for the Preservation of the Wadden Sea. This case study will present the wetland resource, the various threats to the resource, a three-country institutional context, and finally the role and history of the NGOs involved.

The visual quality of the landscape is an important element in the quality of life. The views of the countryside, and the “fit” of man's developments to the natural environment, are the factors that determine the sense of place that a person experiences in their daily activities. This sense of place is very closely related to the perceived identity or image of the community in the minds of both residents and visitors. In tourist areas, this image may directly impact the local economy. In an image study of a major commercial highway landscape in the rural New York, U.S.A., vineyard region, a strategy was developed to maintain this sense of place using both design and management techniques. The objectives included: (1) providing a pleasant visual environment reflective of the region; (2) accommodating future development and traffic activities; (3) using cost-effective design and existing management methods. The primary issue dealt with in this study was that of coordinating multiple parties with varying objectives, incentives, resources and power, i.e. State, county and local governments and jurisdiction in the study area, along with many corporate and individual landowners. Participation of each was encouraged through multiple reviews, meetings and an open-house workshop. A visual simulation technique using color Xerox was tested to present the design concepts. The study resulted in a conceptual design for the study area, design guidelines for the landowners, preliminary zoning adjustments for local governments, and an implementation strategy for over-all coordination and realization of the design. Potential roles were outlined for each of the parties involved, and suggestions were made on involving more of the community.

When Is the Pig in the Parlor?: The Interface of Legal and Aesthetic ConsiderationsAuthor(s): Richard C. SmardonSource: Environmental Review: ER, Vol. 8, No. 2 (Summer, 1984), pp. 146-161Published by: Forest History Society and American Society for Environmental HistoryStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3984192Accessed: 25/05/2010 11:35