"Climatic Change and Water Resources in the Middle East and North Africa" is dedicated to high-priority topics related to the impact of climate change on water resources in a water scarce region. The subject is described and discussed in three main chapters and different case studies. The three main chapters are (1) Climatic changes - sources and effects on the water cycle, (2) Impact of climate change on water resources, (3) Water resources and water management. These chapters are split up into further 26 sections. A total of 64 individuals from many countries have made contributions to this book. All topics in this book are complimentary and contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the interactions between global climate change, world water cycle and water resources. A valuable and meaningful interdisciplinary mixture of topics is combined in this book which will be of great interest to many scientists.

The end result of policy-related experimental and theoretical scientific work on the abatement of atmospheric emissions is a hierarchy of computer models that can be used to analyse and predict the behaviour of pollutants on urban, local regional and global scales. Such models are required to simulate an extremely complex natural situation in which a non-linear chemistry must be included together with the vagaries of the meteorology and the terrain. This book describes recent advances in the development and application of models on all scales, and in the techniques for the estimation and verification of emissions. It includes reviews of recent work together with detailed results and provides a useful picture of the field in a European context.

Climate change is directly linked to the human activities, according to the Fourth Assessment Report of IPCC (2007). In last two decades of 20th Century, accelerated anthropogenic activities pushed up the atmospheric abundance of greenhouse gases, mainly CO2, CH4, and N2O, alarmingly which enhanced the radiative forcing of the Earth's surface and thus perturbed its heat radiation balance. As a consequence, atmospheric characteristics, such as temperature, rainfall pattern, levels of CO2 and O3 have changed significantly, affecting the farm productivity. Although rising level of CO2 may have fertilizing effect on C3 crops, but concomitant rise in atmospheric temperature, O3 level and extreme weather conditions can not only nullify the fertilizing effect of CO2, but also drastically reduce the crop production, threatening food security to burgeoning world population. Agricultural crops are not only victim of climate variability and extreme whether conditions, but also serve as a potential source of CH4 and N2O.

Therefore, in changed scenario, Kyoto Protocol (1997) has sought all signatory developed nations to cut down their emission levels as per their differential commitments to UNFCCC and developing nations to invest in less carbon emission projects to avert the process of global warming process.

In this context, the present edition, which compiles latest findings of studies carried out by the scientists on climate change and crops around the world, serves as a ready reckoner to crop scientists, atmospheric scientists, ecologists, environmentalists, research scholars and post- graduate students to update their knowledge and understanding on this issue.

This two-volume work is an effort to provide a common platform to environmental engineers, microbiologists, chemical scientists, plant physiologists and molecular biologists working with a common aim of sustainable solutions to varied environmental contamination issues. Chapters explore biological and non-biological strategies to minimize environmental pollution. Highly readable entries attempt to close the knowledge gap between plant - microbial associations and environmental remediation. Volume 1 focuses on important concepts such as biological remediation strategies to enhance soil quality at contaminated sites; synergistic influences of tolerant plants and rhizospheric microbial strains on the remediation of pesticide contaminated soil, and the role of plant types such as hyperaccumulator plants in the cleanup of polluted soils. Readers will discover mechanisms and underlying natural inherent traits of various plants and microbes for tolerating, excluding, remediating, accumulating, or metabolizing a variety of pollutants.

Remote Sensing of the Changing Oceans is a comprehensive account of the basic concepts, theories, methods and applications used in ocean satellite remote sensing. The book provides a synthesis of various new ideas and theories and discusses a series of key research topics in oceanic manifestation of global changes as viewed from space. A variety of research methods used in the analysis and modeling of global changes are introduced in detail along with numerous examples from around the world s oceans. The authors review the changing oceans at different levels, including Global and Regional Observations, Natural Hazards, Coastal Environment and related scientific issues, all from the unique perspective of Satellite Observation Systems. Thus, the book not only introduces the basics of the changing oceans, but also new developments in satellite remote sensing technology and international cooperation in this emerging field.

Danling Tang (Lingzis) received her Ph.D from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. She conducted research and teaching in Hong Kong, USA, Japan, and South Korea for more than 10 years; in 2004, she received 100 Talents Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences and returned to China. She was a professor of Fudan University, and now is a Leading Professor of Remote Sensing of Marine Ecology and Environment at the South China Sea Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Dr. Tang has been working on satellite remote sensing of marine ecology and environment; her major research interests include ocean dynamics of phytoplankton bloom, global environmental changes, and natural hazards.

Dr. Tang has organized several international conferences, workshops, and training, she also services as member of organizing committee for several international scientific organizations; she was the Chairman of the 9th Pan Ocean Remote Sensing Conference (PORSEC 2008), and currently is the President-elect of PORSEC Association.

The book is a thorough presentation of theoretical and applied aspects of the evaporation and evapotranspiration process supported by data from experimental studies. It is written in a way that the theoretical background of evaporation and evapotranspiration estimation is presented in a simplified manner, comprehensive to most technical readers. The book deals with details of meteorological parameters and monitoring sensors which are needed for estimating evaporation and evapotranspiration. Errors in meteorological parameter measurements are also presented. Estimation errors, strengths, weaknesses and applicability of a wide range of evaporation and evapotranspiration estimation methods are presented along with samples of application to a certain region. Application of newer simpler methods is presented. A new technology, remote sensing application to evaporation and evapotranspiration estimation, is presented. The latest interest in the subject, climate change and evapotranspiration is presented in the last chapter. This book will be beneficial to students, hydrologists, engineers, meteorologists, water managers and others.

This book explores economic concepts related to disaster losses, describes mechanisms that determine the economic consequences of a disaster, and reviews methodologies for making decisions regarding risk management and adaptation. The author addresses the need for better understanding of the consequences of disasters and reviews and analyzes three scientific debates on linkage between disaster risk management and adaptation to climate change. The first involves the existence and magnitude of long-term economic impact of natural disasters on development. The second is the disagreement over whether any development is the proper solution to high vulnerability to disaster risk. The third debate involves the difficulty of drawing connections between natural disasters and climate change and the challenge in managing them through an integrated strategy. The introduction describes economic views of disaster, including direct and indirect costs, output and welfare losses, and use of econometric tools to measure losses. The next section defines disaster risk, delineates between "good" and "bad" risk-taking, and discusses a pathway to balanced growth. A section entitled "Trends in Hazards and the Role of Climate Change" sets scenarios for climate change analysis, discusses statistical and physical models for downscaling global climate scenarios to extreme event scenarios, and considers how to consider extremes of hot and cold, storms, wind, drought and flood. Another section analyzes case studies on hurricanes and the US coastline; sea-level rises and storm surge in Copenhagen; and heavy precipitation in Mumbai. A section on Methodologies for disaster risk management includes a study on cost-benefit analysis of coastal protections in New Orleans, and one on early-warning systems in developing countries. The next section outlines decision-making in disaster risk management, including robust decision-making, No-regret and No-risk strategies; and strategies that reduce time horizons for decision-making. Among the conclusions is the assertion that risk management policies must recognize the benefits of risk-taking and avoid suppressing it entirely. The main message is that a combination of disaster-risk-reduction, resilience-building and adaptation policies can yield large potential gains and synergies.

This book summarizes the key findings of a five-year interdisciplinary research project funded by the German Federal Ministry of Research and Education (BMBF). It serves as a typical case study for a rapidly growing and developing urban center - Da Nang City, which is surrounded by remote areas characterized by increasing migration and limited development. A number of German and Vietnamese universities and international institutions participated in the project, contributing their particular expertise to assess the data-scarce region under study, two provinces in central Vietnam with a combined area of ca. 12,000 km(2).

Environmental chemistry is a fast developing science aimed at deciphering fundamental mechanisms ruling the behaviour of pollutants in ecosystems. Applying this knowledge to current environmental issues leads to the remediation of environmental media, and to new, low energy, low emission, sustainable processes. Chapters review analysis and remediation of pollutants such as greenhouse gases, chiral pharmaceuticals, dyes, chlorinated organics, arsenic, toxic metals and pathogen in air, water, plant and soil. Several highlights include the overlooked impact of air pollutants from buildings for health risk, innovative remediation techniques such as bioreactors for gas treatment, electrochemical cleaning of pharmaceuticals, sequestration on Fe-Mn nodules, phytoremediation and photocatalytical inactivation of microbial pathogens.

This book will be a valuable source of information for engineers and students developing novel applied techniques to monitor and clean pollutants in air, wastewater, soils and sediments.

"

Carbon inventory requiring estimation of carbon dioxide emissions and removals in land-use categories for national greenhouse gas inventory and changes in stocks of carbon in projects aimed at climate change mitigation has become increasingly important in global efforts to address climate change. Hence, there is a need for a handbook that provides guidelines and methods required for carbon inventory. Carbon Inventory Methods Handbook provides detailed step-by-step information on sampling procedures, field and laboratory measurements, application of remote sensing and GIS techniques, modeling, and calculation procedures along with sources of data for carbon inventory. The unique feature of this handbook is that it provides practical guidance on carbon inventory methods for four kinds of projects, namely, 1) development, implementation and monitoring of carbon mitigation in forest, agriculture and grassland sectors, 2) national greenhouse gas inventory in agriculture, forest, and other land-use categories, 3) forest, grassland and agroforestry development and 4) commercial and community forestry roundwood production. Carbon Inventory Methods Handbook is an essential source of reference to universities and research institutions dealing with climate change, consultancy and non-governmental organizations involved in developing and monitoring land-based mitigation projects, donor agencies funding carbon mitigation projects, national greenhouse gas inventory agencies, United Nations agencies and mechanisms such as Clean Development Mechanism and Global Environment Facility, roundwood production and land reclamation project developers and managers, and forest departments.

Miao Guo's PhD thesis provides scientific insights into the environmental issues related to biocomposites based on starch-polyvinyl alcohol (PVOH) blends. The author contributes significantly to the methodological issues underlying the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) modelling approach. As well as presenting complete LCA inventories using primary data from a variety of sources, Guo develops a new modelling approach incorporating the process-oriented biogeochemistry model Denitrification-Decomposition (DNDC) into site-specific LCA studies to simulate carbon and nitrogen dynamics in the wheat agro-ecosystem. This thesis addresses important LCA data quality issues by using comprehensive sensitivity and uncertainty analyses and has resulted in a large number of publications in internationally renowned journals.

2 DANNY D. REIBLEI AND KATERINA DEMNEROVA 1 Hazardous Substance Research Center/South and Southwest, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803 2 Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology, Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague, Czech Republic On May 24, 2001, a total of 102 students and lecturers participated in an Advanced Study Institute (ASI) sponsored by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) under our direction. The Institute was focused on in situ and onsite management of contaminated sites. The objective of the Institute was to balance state of the art science with techniques for field application of a variety of technologies for in situ assessment and remediation of contaminated sites. Many of the lecturers were drawn from the ranks of the Hazardous Substance Research Centers, multi-university consortia that have been funded by the US Environmental Protection Agency to conduct research and technology transfer designed to promote risk-based management and control of hazardous substances for the nation. The Centers have made special contributions to the areas of in situ and onsite assessment and remediation of contaminated sites. Such approaches have the potential for being significantly less expensive than other assessment and remediation approaches while maintaining accuracy and effectiveness. Cost-effective remedial and management approaches that are also effective in minimizing exposure and risk to human health and the environment are a critical need throughout the world but particularly in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union where resources that can be devoted to environmental cleanup are especially limited.

This may be the book to guide advocates and citizens through our complex environmental laws. . . . Not a critique of the pollution laws, this is a detailed summary of their provisions, such as who is responsible for administration; criteria and schedules to be met; citizens' right to bring suit; and the like. Not easy reading, it beats hacking through the language of the laws themselves. "Library Journal"

"Pollution Law Handbook" is a comprehensive yet accessible guide to eight major federal statutes concerned with controlling pollution. Written for attorneys and their corporate clients concerned with environmental matters, the handbook is designed to help the reader fully comprehend both the general intent and the essential provisions of each statute--many of which seem convoluted, confusing, and unduly complex in their original statutory text. The eight statutes selected for inclusion are those which provide the principal authority for regulating air, water, and land pollution, and toxic waste.

The population explosion that began in the 1960s has been accompanied by a decrease in the quality of the natural environment, e.g. pollution of the air, water and soil with essential and toxic trace elements. Numerous poisonings of people and animals with highly toxic anthropogenic Hg and Cd in the 20th century prompted the creation of the abiotic environment, mainly in developed countries. However, the system is insufficient for long-term exposure to low concentrations of various substances that are mainly ingested through food and water. This problem could be addressed by the monitoring of sentinels - organisms that accumulate trace elements and as such reflect the rate and degree of environmental pollution. Usually these are long-lived vertebrates - herbivorous, omnivorous and carnivorous birds and mammals, especially game species. This book describes the responses of the sentinels most commonly used in ecotoxicological studies to 17 trace elements.

This volume entitled "Radionuclides and Heavy Metals in Environment" contains the Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) "Monitoring of Natural and Man-Made Radionuclides and Heavy Metal Waste in Environment" that was held at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JlNR), Dubna, Russia from 3 October to 6 October, 2000. Originally, it was planned to held the ARW in 1999, the year when NATO was celebrating its 50th anniversary. Few days before opening it had to be postponed because of problems in issuing visa for all the colleagues who intended to participate. The ARW was organized and conducted by the co-directors Prof. Vladimir P. Perelygin, Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna, Russia and Dr. Peter Vater, Philipps Universitat, Marburg, Germany. The JlNR was chosen as the host institute of ARW because of the lack of contact and real co-operation between the former Soviet Union (FSU) countries specialists in ecology and their Western well experienced colleagues. The selection of this location and supplementary funds provided by Russian Foundation on Basic Research, Moscow, Russia, and the JINR, Dubna., Russia made it possible to attain a rather large number of participants and observers from FSU countries. The JlNR provided to all the participants of the workshop an effective car/minibus transportation Moscow-Dubna-Moscow and a rather good accommodation in Dubna."

There are few more sensitive or important policy areas in the world today, and that means this book is a hugely relevant and timely one. Written by practice-oriented political scientists from various universities in Europe and the rest of the world, this book is a testimony to both policy and the evolution of policy analyses over the last 25 years. On the basis of empirical observations all contributions have attempted to develop new conceptual perspectives for environmental policy analyses which furthermore can be generalized and applied to other policy fields.

The twelve chapters of this volume aim to provide a complete manual for using noble gases in terrestrial geochemistry, covering applications which range from high temperature processes deep in the Earth's interior to tracing climatic variations using noble gases trapped in ice cores, groundwaters and modern sediments. Other chapters cover noble gases in crustal (aqueous, CO2 and hydrocarbon) fluids and laboratory techniques for determining noble gas solubilities and diffusivities under geologically relevant conditions. Each chapter deals with the fundamentals of the analysis and interpretation of the data, detailing sampling and sampling strategies, techniques for analysis, sources of error and their estimation, including data treatment and data interpretation using recent case studies.

Subject of the book is Uranium and its migration in aquatic environments. The following subjects are emphasised: Uranium mining, Phosphate mining, mine closure and remediation, Uranium in groundwater and in bedrock, biogeochemistry of Uranium, environmental behavior, and modeling. Particular results from the leading edge of international research are presented.

The 9th Highway and Urban Environment Symposium (9HUES) was held in Madrid, Spain, from 9-11 June 2008. HUES is run by Chalmers University of Technology within the Alliance for Global Sustainability (The AGS). HUES was initiated by Professor Ron Hamilton at Middlesex Polytechnic (now University) in the early 1980s and had the title "Highway Pollution." The initial aim was to measure and assess challenges in highway pollution, with a strong emphasis on urban photochemical smog, ozone formation and particle release. After the first symposium, the emphasis on air pollution issues continued through to Munich in 1989 where diesel particulate issues and the relevance to health through measurements of PM10 emerged. The focus on air quality issues was also strengthened. In parallel, the symposium started to receive an increasing number of scientific contributions from the area of urban run off, indeed to the extent that the title of the symposium was changed to "Highway and Urban Pollution." Since then the importance of science in support of policy became increasingly important as a key aspect of the symposium. 9HUES was held at TRANSyT- Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, Spain to provide a professional and scientific forum on global examples of the science required to support pathways to a positive and sustainable future in the highway and urban environment."

Hardbound. The theory and practice of measuring consumer demand for environmental quality is comprehensively and practically reviewed in this book. It was perceived that there was a significant need for a book that was both theoretically rigorous yet could address the question of how to actually measure this demand. The volume is divided into two sections. The first section develops theoretical tools and covers the principal methods for measuring demand for environmental goods. The second part of the book is concerned with implementing theory for specific classes of environmental effects.

International concern in scientific, industrial, and governmental communities over traces of xenobiotics in foods and in both abiotic and biotic environments has justified the present triumvirate of specialized publications in this field: comprehensive reviews, rapidly published research papers and progress reports, and archival documentations. These three international publications are inte grated and scheduled to provide the coherency essential for nonduplicative and current progress in a field as dynamic and complex as environmental contamina tion and toxicology. This series is reserved exclusively for the diversified litera ture on "toxic" chemicals in our food, our feeds, our hornes, recreational and working surroundings, our domestic animals, our wildlife and ourselves. Tre mendous efforts worldwide have been mobilized to evaluate the nature, pres ence, magnitude, fate, and toxicology of the chemicals loosed upon the earth. Among the sequelae of this broad new emphasis is an undeniable need for an articulated set of authoritative publications, where one can find the latest impor tant world literature produced by these emerging areas of science together with documentation of pertinent ancillary legislation. Research directors and legislative or administrative advisers do not have the time to scan the escalating number of technical publications that may contain articles important to current responsibility. Rather, these individuals need the background provided by detailed reviews and the assurance that the latest infor mation is made available to them, all with minimal literature searching."

This book presents a holistic view of climate change by examining a number of energy and transportation technologies and their impact on the climate. High-quality technical research results from specific test-cases around the globe are presented, and developments in global warming are discussed, focusing on current emissions policies from air and maritime transport to fossil fuel applications. Novel technologies such as carbon capture and storage are investigated together with the corresponding process and systems analysis, as well as optimization for mitigating CO2 emissions. Water resources management, waste water treatment, and waste management issues are also covered. Finally, biomass, hydrogen and solar energy applications are presented along with some insights on green buildings. Energy, Transportation and Global Warming is of great interest to researchers in the field of renewable and green energy as well as professionals in climate change management, the transportation sector, and environmental policy.

Twenty million people have been exposed to Chernobyl radionuclides through the Dnieper River aquatic pathways. This book presents a 20-year historical overview and comprehensive study results of the aquatic environment affected by the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident. During this time, many water quality management practices and countermeasures were enacted. The book presents in-depth analyses of these water remediation actions, using current science and mathematical modeling, and discusses why some were successful, but many others failed. The chapter entitled Where Do We Go From Here? incorporates a comprehensive discussion of the planned New Safe Confinement (NSC) structure to cover the Chernobyl plant. The book closes with a summary and conclusions drawn from these analyses, making it a valuable reference tool for the future.

The risks of current air pollution in world-cities seem to have vanished under the dazzling atmosphere of international competitiveness and growing higher standards of living. Yet, the trend for air pollution persists. This book presents the bewildering contradiction between successful economic regional growth and environmental degradation that leads to human ill health.