Search results for "Disposal"

No till soil organic carbon sequestration could be overestimated when slope effect is not considered

2020

Abstract No tillage (NT) soil management has been considered a strategy for the implementation of environmental sustainability and a possible tool of soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration. Considering the wide range of data on SOC change after NT application in relation to conventional tillage (CT) in different studies, further researches are needed over a diverse range of soil and climate before a proper estimation of the benefits can be provided by the NT. A data set composed of cereal cropping system studies, comparing the SOC content under CT and NT was compiled from the literature using the scientific repositories “Scopus” and “Science direct”. This aims to i) discriminate and quanti…

A review of soil carbon dynamics resulting from agricultural practices

2019

Abstract Literature related to the carbon cycle and climate contains contradictory results with regard to whether agricultural practices increase or mitigate emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs). One opinion is that anthropogenic activities have distinct carbon footprints – measured as total emissions of GHGs resulting from an activity, in this case, “agricultural operations”. In contrast, it is argued that agriculture potentially serves to mitigate GHGs emissions when the best management practices are implemented. We review the literature on agricultural carbon footprints in the context of agricultural practices including soil, water and nutrient management. It has been reported that the ma…

Nutrient mitigation under the impact of climate and land-use changes: A hydro-economic approach to participatory catchment management

2020

Abstract Excessive nutrient loadings into rivers are a well-known ecological problem. Implemented mitigation measures should ideally be cost-effective, but perfectly ranking alternative nutrient mitigation measures according to cost-effectiveness is a difficult methodological challenge. Furthermore, a particularly practical challenge is that cost-effective measures are not necessarily favoured by local stakeholders, and this may impede their successful implementation in practice. The objective of this study was to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of mitigation measures using a methodology that includes a participatory process and social learning to ensure their successful implementation. By …

Specific detection of cyclobutane pyrimidine dimers in phytoplankton DNA by a non-radioactive assay based on T4-endonuclease V digestion.

2001

The effect of artificial and natural UV irradiation on DNA in marine phytoplankton Isochrysis galbana monoculture was investigated. The presence of cyclobutane pyrimidine dimers (CPDs) in unlabelled I. galbana DNA was detected by a non-radiometric alkaline filter elution assay after T4-endonuclease V digestion. The quantity of CPDs was estimated by alkaline agarose gel electrophoresis. Precise determination of the amount of DNA in the presence of I. galbana pigments was achieved by oxazole yellow homodimer (YOYO) dye. T4-endonuclease V-sensitive sites frequency (ESS/kb), measured after exposure to 2-40 kJ m(-2) of artificial UV light, increased in a dose-dependent manner. Twelve hours after…

Determination of pharmaceutical residues and assessment of their removal efficiency at the Daugavgriva municipal wastewater treatment plant in Riga, …

2017

Pharmaceutical products (PPs) belong to emerging contaminants that may accumulate along with other chemical pollutants in wastewaters (WWs) entering industrial and/or urban wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). In the present study, the technique of ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography coupled to Orbitrap high-resolution mass spectrometry (Orbitrap-HRMS) was applied for the analysis of 24 multi-class PPs in WW samples collected at different technological stages of Daugavgriva WWTP located in Riga, Latvia. Caffeine and acetaminophen levels in the range of 7,570–11,403 ng/L and 810–1,883 ng/L, respectively, were the predominant compounds among 19 PPs determined in the WW. The results i…

The influence of rainfall time resolution for urban water quality modelling

2010

The objective of this paper is the definition of a methodology to evaluate the impact of the temporal resolution of rainfall measurements in urban drainage modelling applications. More specifically the effect of the temporal resolution on urban water quality modelling is detected analysing the uncertainty of the response of rainfall–runoff modelling. Analyses have been carried out using historical rainfall–discharge data collected for the Fossolo catchment (Bologna, Italy). According to the methodology, the historical rainfall data are taken as a reference, and resampled data have been obtained through a rescaling procedure with variable temporal windows. The shape comparison between ‘true’…

Rapid and improved identification of drinking water bacteria using the Drinking Water Library, a dedicated MALDI-TOF MS database.

2021

Abstract According to the European Directives (UE) 2020/2184 and 2009/54/EC, which establishes the sanitary criteria for water intended for human consumption in Europe, water suitable for human consumption must be free of the bacterial indicators Escherichia coli, Clostridium perfringens and Enterococcus spp. Drinking water is also monitored for heterotrophic bacteria, which are not a human health risk, but can serve as an index of bacteriological water quality. Therefore, a rapid, accurate, and cost-effective method for the identification of these colonies would improve our understanding of the culturable bacteria of drinking water and facilitate the task of water management by treatment f…

Rare earths release from dissolving atmospheric dust and their accumulation into crystallising halite. The dead-sea example

2023

: The industrial extraction of Y and lanthanides (hereafter defined as Rare Earth Elements, REE) often requires the achievement of leaching procedures removing these metals from primary rocks and their transfer in aqueous leachates or incorporated in newly forming soluble solids. These procedures are the most dangerous to the environment in relation to the composition of leachates. Hence, the recognition of natural settings where these processes currently occur, represents a worthy challenge for learning how to carry out similar industrial procedures under natural and more eco-friendly conditions. Accordingly, the REE distribution was studied in the brine of Dead Sea, a terminal evaporating…

2018

Abstract Sediment microbes have a great potential to transform reactive N to harmless N2, thus decreasing wastewater nitrogen load into aquatic ecosystems. Here, we examined if spatial allocation of the wastewater discharge by a specially constructed sediment diffuser pipe system enhanced the microbial nitrate reduction processes. Full-scale experiments were set on two Finnish lake sites, Keuruu and Petajavesi, and effects on the nitrate removal processes were studied using the stable isotope pairing technique. All nitrate reduction rates followed nitrate concentrations, being highest at the wastewater-influenced sampling points. Complete denitrification with N2 as an end-product was the ma…

Nitrous oxide from integrated fixed-film activated sludge membrane bioreactor: Assessing the influence of operational variables

2017

The influence of the main operational variables on N2O emissions from an Integrated Fixed Film Activated Sludge University of Cape Town membrane Bioreactor pilot plant was studied. Nine operational cycles (total duration: 340 days) were investigated by varying the value of the mixed liquor sludge retention time (SRT) (Cycles 1–3), the feeding ratio between carbon and nitrogen (C/N) (Cycles 4–6) and simultaneously the hydraulic retention time (HRT) and the SRT (Cycles 7–9). Results show a huge variability of the N2O concentration in liquid and off-gas samples (ranged from 10−1μg N2O-N L−1to 103μg N2O-N L−1). The maximum N2O concentration (1228 μg N2O-N L−1) in the off-gas sa…