Don't drain the swamp! Man's traditional response to swamps, marshes and bogs has been to drain them. But wetlands are not wastelands. Coastal marshes are among the world's most productive ecosystems. They make many commercial fisheries possible and protect coasts from floods and storm surges. Wetlands are pollution filters, water reservoirs. They are among the last wild places on earth, offering homes to endangered plants, birds and animals. Attitudes to wetlands are changing, but not fast enough. As scientists are documenting the wealth in wet places, governments and developers are draining them, damming them, logging them and building resort hotels where ', they once were. Destruction is usually a poor trade-off: well-managed wetlands in Louisiana are producing fortunes in seafood and timber. Waterlogged wealth examines the value of swamps and marshes, as well as the threats against them. In doing so it takes the reader to some of the world's most bizarre landscapes: the 'inland delta' of the Niger River in drought-stricken Mali; the wildlife-rich Okavango swamps of Botswana; the waterlogged Sunderban forests of India and Bangladesh, where tigers eat fish and crabs. Civilisation began around wetlands; today's civilisation has good reason to leave them wet and wild. Dr Edward Maltby is a lecturer in geography at the University of Exeter(UK). He has done extensive research on wetlands both in the North (UK, US, Canada) and the South (Fiji, Jamaica, India and the Falklands/Malvinas Islands). He is on the IUCN Wetland Programme Advisory Committee. Originally published in 1986

The Brazilian Amazon is the largest area of tropical rainforest in Latin America. Brazil is that continent's most rapidly developing country. The Amazon is at the heart of the conflict between conservation and development, between people and power, and between heritage and modernisation. In the name of development, the powerful are colonizing the forest. The greatest new threat comes from the massive hydro-electric schemes which are being pushed ahead with little regard to efficacy, the rights of the people, or the survival of the forest. Dam the Rivers, Damn the People is about two of the most affected areas, Balbina in Amazonas and the Xingu River in Para. Barbara Cummings describes the plans which the state attempted to keep secret, the extent to which these projects will destroy the forest, the consequent dispossession of the people of the forest and, above all, their growing resistance. She shows how the outcome of their fight affects us all. Originally published in 1990

The destruction of the tropical forest is one of the major problems of our time. Vast areas are rapidly becoming wastelands which support only a few tough weeds, perhaps some cattle, and the farms allowed to the poor. This book provides a vision of hope: in Latin America. Africa. And South East Asia, growing numbers of people are developing techniques specifically designed to promote the wise use and preservation of remaining forest lands. However, these grassroots strategies are often ignored in favour of grandiose schemes which inevitably fail. This pattern must be broken now or the tropical forests will be lost forever. Published in association with the Smithsonian Institution. Preface by Michael Robinson, Director, National Zoological Park. Smithsonian Institution Originally published in 1988

Estuaries exist along the edge of the oceans and seas, and are char acterized by the dilution of sea water by inflowing fresher waters. The motion and interaction of these two types of water (fresh and salt water) determine the salinity distribution within the estuary and that, in turn, affects the organisms residing there. The purpose of this vol ume is to review the status of our understanding of estuarine circu lation and how the circulation patterns affect living and nonliving resources in estuaries. For many years, the primary paradigm for estuarine circulation was the two-layered net or nontidal gravitational circulation pattern first proposed by Dr. Donald Pritchard in his studies of the James River estuary. During the last decade or so, research has focused on the many variations about this theme and the factors that control the transport processes. Many of these aspects are covered in the initial papers in this volume. Water movement, of course, is of interest be cause it transports marine organisms, sediments, and pollutants. Es tuarine circulation has a significant effect on estuarine food chains, and on the distribution and abundance of organisms, such as the American oyster, that are freely transported by the currents during larval stages. The intent is to bring together many of these topics in a single volume. This volume is dedicated to Dr. Donald W."

This volume presents research on current trends in chemical regulations - a fa- growing, complex, and increasingly internationalized field. The book grew out from a multidisciplinary research project entitled 'Regulating Chemical Risks in the Baltic Sea Area: Science, Politics, and the Media', led by Michael Gilek at Soedertoern University, Sweden. This research project involved scholars and experts from natural as well as social sciences, based at Soedertoern University, Swedish Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Karolinska Institutet, and Umea University. The project group organized a multidisciplinary research conference on chemical risk regulations, held in Stockholm, August 15-17, 2007. Most of the contributions published in this book were, in draft form, first presented at this conference. The conference, like the ensuing edited volume, expanded the geographical focus beyond the Baltic Sea area to include wider European, and to some extent also global trends. Many thanks to all project colleagues and conference participants! We are very grateful for the generous financial support received from The Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies (OEstersjoestiftelsen), The Swedish Research Council Formas, and from Soedertoern University. Without this support the present book would not have been possible. Special thanks to all of our fellow contributors, all of whom have submitted to- cal papers based on high-quality research. Many thanks also to Tobias Evers, who assisted us with technical editing. Finally, we are grateful for the professionalism shown by our editors at Springer.

Hiroshi Komiyama's "Vision 2050" is a plan for paving a road to global sustainability. It lays out a path to a sustainable future for humanity that could realistically be achieved by 2050 through the application of science and technology. A prominent Japanese academic and leader in global sustainability, Komiyama draws upon realistic assumptions and solid scientific concepts to create a vision that makes the living standards enjoyed by developed countries today possible for all people by 2050. "Vision 2050" is built upon three fundamental principles - increased energy efficiency, recycling, and development of renewable energy sources - and the book argues for the technological potential of all three. Specifically, Komiyama envisions a three-fold increase in overall energy efficiency and a doubling of renewable energy resources by 2050. "Vision 2050: Roadmap for a Sustainable Earth" is written to address the concerned citizen as well as to inspire an exchange of ideas among experts, policy makers, industrial leaders, and the general public.

Summarizes current recycling processes, challenges, and perspectives. Offers a comprehensive review of current commercialized LIB recycling companies. Showcases an innovative closed-loop hydrometallurgical recycling process to recycle lithium cathode materials. Provides detailed modelling and economic analysis of several hydrometallurgical recycling processes. Features practical cases and data developed by the authors.

Most successful organizations recognize Maintenance Parts and Procurement as a critical success factor to Asset Management Excellence and their fundamental supply chain value proposition. This book works as a guide to all the stakeholders that influence the success of their Maintenance Parts Operation and their enterprise's bottom line. Maintenance Parts Management Excellence: A Holistic Anatomy defines the Maintenance Parts Managements role in Asset Management Excellence and expands on the importance of the Parts Inventory Planner role in an organization. It discusses how to create a unique Maintenance Parts Management Strategy for an organization and offers insights on the multiple strategies needed to create and maintain a Maintenance Parts inventory policy. The book also provides an organized overall approach to creating Maintenance Parts Management Excellence in an enterprise. Executives with an organization responsible for the construction, management, and disposal of all assets classes (plant, equipment, IT assets), consultants responsible for assignments associated with optimizing life cycle decisions for clients, maintenance, and reliability professionals within an organization, will benefit from this professional plus book. Upper-level undergraduate engineering students, as well as graduate students of management who focus on operations management and engineering graduate students addressing issues of maintenance and reliability engineering, may also be interested in this book.

A growing number of GHG emissions trading schemes are being implemented at regional or national levels. However, even as the number of different schemes grows, few linkages exist between them. Major cap-and-trade proposals are currently at important stages in their development, especially in the United States, Japan and Australia, some of which explicitly emphasize the aim of linking with other schemes. One of the strategic goals of European climate policy is linking the EU ETS with other comparable schemes. The research presented in this volume is on actual economic, political and institutional constraints and implications. It examines the role of linking trading schemes for the development of the post-Kyoto climate architecture and for increasing linkage between schemes. This essential research will be relevant to both the scientific community and for policymakers who are involved in the design of emerging trading schemes and offset mechanisms, as well as in designing the post Kyoto climate regime. This volume focuses specifically on: o Economic, institutional/regulatory and legal dimensions of linking o Implications of linking on the design of emerging trading schemes o The role of linking trading schemes for the development of the post-Kyoto climate regime

An examination of systematic techniques for the design of sustainable processes and products, this book covers reducing energy consumption, preventing pollution, developing new pathways for biofuels, and producing environmentally friendly and high-quality products. It discusses innovative design approaches and technological pathways that impact energy and environmental issues of new and existing processes. Highlights include design for sustainability and energy efficiency, emerging technologies and processes for energy and the environment, design of biofuels, biological processes and biorefineries, energy systems design and alternative energy sources, multi-scale systems uncertain and complex systems, and product design.

This monograph provides, for the first time, a most comprehensive statistical account of composite sampling as an ingenious environmental sampling method to help accomplish observational economy in a variety of environmental and ecological studies. Sampling consists of selection, acquisition, and quantification of a part of the population. But often what is desirable is not affordable, and what is affordable is not adequate. How do we deal with this dilemma? Operationally, composite sampling recognizes the distinction between selection, acquisition, and quantification. In certain applications, it is a common experience that the costs of selection and acquisition are not very high, but the cost of quantification, or measurement, is substantially high. In such situations, one may select a sample sufficiently large to satisfy the requirement of representativeness and precision and then, by combining several sampling units into composites, reduce the cost of measurement to an affordable level. Thus composite sampling offers an approach to deal with the classical dilemma of desirable versus affordable sample sizes, when conventional statistical methods fail to resolve the problem. Composite sampling, at least under idealized conditions, incurs no loss of information for estimating the population means. But an important limitation to the method has been the loss of information on individual sample values, such as the extremely large value. In many of the situations where individual sample values are of interest or concern, composite sampling methods can be suitably modified to retrieve the information on individual sample values that may be lost due to compositing. In this monograph, we present statistical solutions to these and other issues that arise in the context of applications of composite sampling. Content Level Research

This is an edited collection of peer-reviewed papers presented at the Ninth International Conference of the Society for the Advancement of Kinanthropometry. Defined as the relationship between human body structure and function, kinanthropometry is an area of growing interest, and these proceedings will be of use to students, academics and professionals in the areas of ergonomics, sports science, nutrition, health, and other allied fields. The assembled works represent the latest research findings across kinanthropometry, moving the discipline forward and promoting good practice and the exchange of expertise.

The theory of biophilia posits that there is an innate connection between all the species that share Earth's biosphere and that this connection is inherently collaborative as organisms work together to ensure survival as opposed to competing for resources and territory. As threats to the environment increase in frequency and scale, applying a scientifically rigorous lens to the biophilia theory becomes crucial to ensuring survival. Examining Biophilia and Societal Indifference to Environmental Protection is a pivotal reference source that explores the relationship between nature, humanity, and mindfulness. The book is broken into three sections with the first section introducing the reader to biophilia and examining how this phenomenon results in human awe for nature. The second section investigates the value of biophilia and covers human exploitation of nature, including how this has changed the regard for children and elders. The final section outlines a practical approach to restoring nature and renewing faith in one another. While highlighting a broad range of topics including mental health, natural disasters, and taxonomy, this book is ideally designed for biologists, activists, engineers, policymakers, government officials, academicians, researchers, and students.

The focal main objective of the book is to constitute a meaningful linkage among research problems, geoinformation methods and corresponding applications. The research goals, related both to theoretical and practical issues, derive from multidisciplinary fields such as archaeology, history, geography, landscape planning, environment, geoinformation science, geology and geomorphology. All the aforementioned scientific areas have the spatial dimension in common, i.e. the vast amount of spatially referenced data. Their research issues can be addressed and analysed with geoinformation technology; though, the researchers should get familiar to the range of available geoinformation methods. The book provides description of a variety of research problems issues and technological ?solutions?approaches that can be used to support processes of data capturing, mapping and analysis. These techniques and concepts are illustrated on numerous practical examples. along with specific examples, where these have been applied. The current structure of the book includes the following four chapters: introduction, data capturing and mapping, analysis and modelling, and study cases. In the following we provide a more detailed content of each chapter listing the main topics included within the selected articles.

This volume comprises a collection of four special lectures, six general reports and 112 papers presented at the Sixth International Symposium of Geotechnical Aspects of Underground Construction in Soft Ground (IS-Shanghai) held between 10 and 12 April 2008 in Shanghai, China. The Symposium was organised by Tongji University and the following themes were covered: 1. Analysis and numerical modelling of deep excavations 2. Construction method, ground treatment, and conditioning for tunnelling 3. Case histories 4. Safety issues, risk analysis, hazard management and control 5. Physical and numerical modelling 6. Calculation, design methods, and predictive tools This volume provides a valuable source of information on the the state-of-the-art in geotechnical engineering associated with the design, construction and monitoring of tunnels and excavations in soft ground, and will be of interest to academics and professionals involved in these areas.

As the growth of the world's population requires the continued search for residential space, the urbanization of natural lands is an inevitable process, but that process does not have to be one that is accomplished without regard for environmental quality. This book presents the unique perspective of naturbanization, the urbanization of protected and highly valued natural spaces that are geographically removed from current urban centers. It discusses the search and selection of new residential spaces, economic planning and policy in such areas, environmentally sensitive construction, and public investment in infrastructure to make the areas more accessible and habitable.

Specifically, the book analyzes naturbanization as it is occurring in National Parks located along the European Union borders. Recent declarations have made the parks more accessible to development and consequently they are serving as models for ways to reach workable solutions and encourage the sort of economic development that will satisfy both developers and environmentalists

This volume provides an overview of the determinants of the release of and exposure to airborne nanoparticles. Whether intentionally manufactured or unintentionally generated during industrial processes, the release of nanoparticles can result in significant worker exposure, which must be dealt with adequately by means of dedicated risk assessments to ensure workplace health and safety. The book extensively discusses a number of measurement and modelling strategies available for this purpose. It also reviews the health hazardous potential of nano-sized particles and fibres, and follows the flow of engineered nanomaterials from production and use to disposal and the environment. It appeals to a wide readership, from specialists already working in the field to newcomers aiming to gain insights into this topic.

Successfully classroom-tested at the graduate level, Linear Control Theory: Structure, Robustness, and Optimization covers three major areas of control engineering (PID control, robust control, and optimal control). It provides balanced coverage of elegant mathematical theory and useful engineering-oriented results.

The first part of the book develops results relating to the design of PID and first-order controllers for continuous and discrete-time linear systems with possible delays. The second section deals with the robust stability and performance of systems under parametric and unstructured uncertainty. This section describes several elegant and sharp results, such as Kharitonov's theorem and its extensions, the edge theorem, and the mapping theorem. Focusing on the optimal control of linear systems, the third part discusses the standard theories of the linear quadratic regulator, Hinfinity and l1 optimal control, and associated results.

Written by recognized leaders in the field, this book explains how control theory can be applied to the design of real-world systems. It shows that the techniques of three term controllers, along with the results on robust and optimal control, are invaluable to developing and solving research problems in many areas of engineering.

Nature Across Cultures: Views of Nature and the Environment in Non-Western Cultures consists of about 25 essays dealing with the environmental knowledge and beliefs of cultures outside of the United States and Europe. In addition to articles surveying Islamic, Chinese, Native American, Aboriginal Australian, Indian, Thai, and Andean views of nature and the environment, among others, the book includes essays on Environmentalism and Images of the Other, Traditional Ecological Knowledge, Worldviews and Ecology, Rethinking the Western/non-Western Divide, and Landscape, Nature, and Culture. The essays address the connections between nature and culture and relate the environmental practices to the cultures which produced them. Each essay contains an extensive bibliography. Because the geographic range is global, the book fills a gap in both environmental history and in cultural studies. It should find a place on the bookshelves of advanced undergraduate students, graduate students, and scholars, as well as in libraries serving those groups.

This book provides an up-to-date synthesis of the understanding of the interaction between the emission of nitrogen, its deposition and impact on the most important components of natural and semi-natural ecosystems. The work consists of contributions from internationally renowned research scientists. Individual chapters deal with the factors and processes related to nitrogen deposition and soils, non-forest vegetation communities, forest ecosystems, and surface waters. The assessment of these impacts is discussed in terms of setting critical loads. The book is aimed at researchers, advanced course students and policy makers/advisors involved with aspects of the impact of air pollution.

The crucible of innovation in wildlife and habitat conservation is in southern Africa where it has co-evolved with decolonization, political transformation and the rise of development, ownership, management and livelihood debates. Charting this innovation, early chapters of this volume deal with the traditional 'fines and fences' conservation that occurred in the colonial and early post-independence period, with subsequent sections focussing on the experimentation and innovation that occurred on private and communal land as a result of the break from these traditional methods. The final section deals with more recent innovations in the sector, focussing on building and strengthening the relationships between parks and society. Importantly, the book provides a data-rich summary of experimentation with more inclusive models of conservation in terms of ecological, social, political and economic indicators. Published with the Southern African Sustainable Use Specialist Group (SASUSG) of IUCN.

Futures in Mechanics of Structures and Materials is a collection of peer-reviewed papers presented at the 20th Australasian Conference on the Mechanics of Structures and Materials (ACMSM20, University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia, 2 ? 5 December 2008) by academics, researchers and practicing engineers mainly from Australasia and the Asia-Pacific region. The topics under discussion include:

- Composite structures and materials

- Computational mechanics

- Earthquake and wind engineering

- Fire engineering

- Geomechanics and foundation engineering

- Mechanics of materials

- Rehabilitation of structures

- Reinforced and prestressed concrete structures

- Reliability and sustainability of structures

- Shock and impact loading

- Steel structures

- Structural dynamics

- Structural health monitoring

- Structural mechanics

- Timber engineering

Futures in Mechanics of Structures and Materials will be a valuable reference for academics, researchers and practicing engineers working in structural and material engineering and mechanics.

At the intersection of environmental science and human biology this book deals with dry ecosystems - aridity, droughts, wind and its influence on soils and regulation - the societies affected by these ecosystems, and the inventiveness of those living under these conditions. These environments are the basis of nomad existence, of irrigated agriculture and of the first civilisations dependent on streams. Changes in the modern epoch, the ever-increasing technology and demographic development show that environmental degradation and the socio-economic situation cannot be explained by just one factor. This book tries to answer the question whether long-lasting development is possible in dry environments.