Changhyun Jun , Dongkyun Kim , Sayed M. Bateni , Sultan Noman Qasem , Zulkefli Mansor , Shahab S. Band , Farzad Parsadoust , Bahram Choubin , Hao-Ting Pai
{"title":"Prediction of earth-fissure hazards: Unraveling the crucial roles of land use and groundwater fluctuations","authors":"Changhyun Jun , Dongkyun Kim , Sayed M. Bateni , Sultan Noman Qasem , Zulkefli Mansor , Shahab S. Band , Farzad Parsadoust , Bahram Choubin , Hao-Ting Pai","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107692","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107692","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Understanding the occurrence of earth fissures in arid regions is crucial for informing land management practices and conservation strategies. In this study, we evaluate six innovative machine learning models for predicting earth-fissure hazards: the patient rule induction method, rotation forest, stochastic gradient boosting, sparse linear discriminant analysis, quadratic discriminant analysis with stepwise feature selection, and weighted subspace random forest (WSRF). By exploring the impact of various environmental factors on earth-fissure occurrence, we highlight the significant roles of land use and groundwater fluctuations in the development of earth fissures. Our findings demonstrate that afforested lands and declining groundwater levels are strongly associated with fissure occurrence. The WSRF model is the most effective in predicting diverse probabilities and providing a nuanced understanding of hazard levels. This study emphasizes the importance of considering environmental factors and selecting appropriate models for predicting earth-fissure hazards, ultimately promoting sustainable land management practices and mitigating potential risks associated with earth fissures.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107692"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142441795","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Shehanas Pazhoor , Swastik Pandey , David A. Palmer , Biraj Timilsina , Yanyan Huang , Yangcheng Zhang , Bikas Gaire , Bikram Timilsina , Rajesh Marasini , Marie K. Harder
{"title":"Towards making EIA more human-centric: Demonstration in Nepal of a values crystallization approach to capture local shared values for scoping use","authors":"Shehanas Pazhoor , Swastik Pandey , David A. Palmer , Biraj Timilsina , Yanyan Huang , Yangcheng Zhang , Bikas Gaire , Bikram Timilsina , Rajesh Marasini , Marie K. Harder","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107697","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107697","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA) are a critical component of planning and decision-making processes before projects are conducted, because they are used to forecast and inform mitigation of potential impacts on the local community, including its social, physical, and natural environments. Current EIA processes predominantly focus on issues that can be directly measured using objective methods, with mostly tokenistic inadequate use of suites of qualitative methodologies needed for identification and documentation of issues relating to community shared values. On the other hand, protests and tensions are known to easily arise which are related to such human values-based issues not being addressed. In this pragmatic study, a method is demonstrated which can bridge this gap, by capturing local community shared values in a well-defined manner and short time. The approach, called WeValue InSitu, enables local communities to construct their own bespoke group shared values statements in a specialized crystallization process, with outputs which are well-articulated proto-indicators. In this study we compare the outputs from two existing scoping reports of EIA in Nepal with the outputs from the values crystallization approach which we conducted with ten groups in a village in Nepal, and show that the latter brings out many more, and more localised, shared values of the community, and additionally reveals underlying interrelationships between values, producing conceptual maps for planning effective mitigations. Future studies can investigate whether the achievements of this method offer any advantages to existing qualitative methods in improving EIA-SIA scoping, and/or whether the hegemony of objectivism of institutions and proponents is an unsurmountable barrier.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107697"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142441796","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Zhaohong Wu , Wenyuan Hua , Congcong Gao , Jie Zhu , Liangguo Luo
{"title":"Deconstructing adoption intentions: Water-fertilizer technology in 629 households","authors":"Zhaohong Wu , Wenyuan Hua , Congcong Gao , Jie Zhu , Liangguo Luo","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107691","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107691","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study addresses the research gap in understanding the complex relationships influencing farmers' intentions to adopt new water-fertilizer technologies, particularly focusing on the interactions among these factors. The innovation of this research lies in the novel integration of Probit and adversarial interpretive structure models. This combination reveals detailed dynamics and influence rankings among factors, providing a layered understanding of their interactions. Additionally, the study bridges theory and practice by surveying 629 small-scale farmers. The analysis identifies education level as a key determinant, with each unit increase raising the likelihood of technology adoption by 6.2 %. Adequate wheat irrigation increases adoption by 11.8 %, access to extension personnel by 16.3 %, and agricultural income comprising over 50 % of household income by 20.6 %. These findings have practical significance for promoting sustainable agricultural technologies in arid regions, aiming to reduce water and fertilizer inputs while ensuring food security and minimizing production costs.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107691"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142432382","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Impacts of cultivated land protection practices on farmers' welfare: A dual quality and ecology perspective","authors":"Kai Zou , Jiayu Tian , Yan Zhang","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107690","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107690","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Given the vital role of the quantity, quality, and ecology of cultivated lands in ensuring food security, climate resilience, and biodiversity conservation, cultivated land protection practices (CLPPs) have been applied to many regions across the world. However, the expansion of such practices faces challenges due to unknown welfare effects on the local population. This study uses data in a panel multinomial endogenous switching model at the plot level to estimate the heterogeneous impacts of different combinations of CLPPs on farmers' comprehensive welfare. Besides revealing factors influencing the adoption of CLPPs, results show that the welfare of farmers who adopted practices conducive to cultivated land quality improvement (CQI) and cultivated land ecological protection (CEP) significantly increased, by 9.59 % and 11.47 %, respectively. The welfare of joint adopters engaged in both practices (CQI & CEP) increased by 23.89 %, which was significantly higher than the other two individual practices. After a specific cost-benefit analysis, the results revealed that CQI adopters and joint adopters attained positive economic profits, while CEP adopters incurred economic losses. A combination of these two practices emerged as the optimal choice for maximizing the welfare of farmers compared with adopting each of the CQI and CEP practices in isolation. Furthermore, these welfare effects vary with such factors as <em>technology training</em>, <em>assets</em>, <em>cooperative members</em>, and <em>plot size</em>. The work is expected to contribute to evidence-based policymaking about CLPPs promotion and sustainable use of cultivated lands.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107690"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142441794","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Practices, events, and effects: Improving causal analysis with the geographic information from cultural mapping in Canada","authors":"Bruce R. Muir","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107686","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107686","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Most questions that environmental impact assessments (EIAs) aim to answer are not statistical but seek to understand the interactions between proposed projects and valued components representing local environments. Assessing causality provides critical insights into the potential impacts of project proposals, informing decisionmaking processes aimed at sustainable development. However, despite wellestablished causal analysis techniques in EIAs, these procedures are rarely adapted to incorporate the unique traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) and circumstances of Indigenous peoples. This paper modifies the stepped matrix by integrating TEK with geographic qualities from cultural mapping studies to enhance causal analyses involving events of cultural practices and project proposals. The modified procedures employ both theoretical and empirical approaches, accounting for the historical and contemporary contexts of Indigenous peoples, the spatiotemporal traits of their cultural practices, and the challenges of cultural mapping. The results demonstrate that the TEK-modified stepped matrix improves causal analysis by identifying sub-patterns, differences in geographic scales, interdependencies of cultural events, and causal networks, while refining the understandings of potential direct and indirect project-related effects, cumulative effects, and the efficacy of mitigation measures.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107686"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142427540","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Myth of the digital economy: Can it continually contribute to a low-carbon status and sustainable development?","authors":"Zihao Ma, Pingdan Zhang","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107688","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107688","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Facing global warming and looming catastrophic climate change, many countries have launched actions to change themselves and their societies to attain a low-carbon status. Digital economy purportedly offers a potential way to achieve sustainable development. However, this is still debated and a consensus is elusive. Here, we propose a novel nonlinear d curve hypothesis to describe the relationship between the digital economy and carbon emissions, whereby the digital economy can no longer contribute to carbon abatement once it is overdeveloped because of a rebound in energy consumption (i.e., the overdevelopment trap). To test this hypothesis, we used county-level panel data from China and conducted an empirical analysis with expanded STIRPAT models. Through a suite of robustness tests, we find evidence supporting our hypothesis, in that nearly 30 % of our samples (<em>N</em> = 1450 counties) had stepped into the overdevelopment trap, with this problem being most severe in eastern China. Altogether, we believe those countries relying heavily on thermal power—and more likely to suffer from a rebound in fossil energy consumption—should take a more cautious attitude towards implementing their digital economy and consider other ways to meet their carbon abatement goals.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107688"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142427539","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Encarnación González-Algarra , Eduardo Moreno , Miguel Angel Casermeiro
{"title":"Assessing awareness and perceptions of health impact assessment (HIA) among students and young professionals in Spain: An online survey","authors":"Encarnación González-Algarra , Eduardo Moreno , Miguel Angel Casermeiro","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107687","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107687","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study assesses the awareness and perception of Health Impact Assessment (HIA) among future practitioners in Spain, including health science and engineering students, and current public health and environmental professionals. Although HIA is recognised worldwide as an important public health tool, our results show that awareness of HIA varies considerably across these groups. Only 14 % (18 out of 129 respondents) reported being familiar with HIA methods. This gap highlights the need for improved educational programmes and the creation of a clear legal framework to support HIA implementation in Spain. In addition, the robust Spanish health system may mask the perceived need for HIA, creating a potential barrier to its wider adoption. By identifying these challenges, our study highlights key aspects for action, including legislative reforms and educational initiatives, to create a favourable environment for HIA practice. Our findings argue for a multidisciplinary approach to health assessment and highlight the need for future research to investigate effective strategies for integrating HIA into the Spanish health system.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107687"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142427601","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Zeyang Wei , Yi Liu , Zishu Wang , Chunyan Wang , Manli Gong , Fanlin Meng , Dan Xie
{"title":"Does the China's integrated environmental zoning regulation serve an effective approach for industrial restructuring?","authors":"Zeyang Wei , Yi Liu , Zishu Wang , Chunyan Wang , Manli Gong , Fanlin Meng , Dan Xie","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107682","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107682","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>China's Integrated Environmental Zoning (IEZ) policy, initiated in 2021, targets industrial restructuring by enforcing specific regulations for each Integrated Environmental Unit (IEU) regarding spatial arrangement, emissions, and technological efficiency, among others. However, firms, as the fundamental operational units, may react differently to IEZ interventions, potentially causing unpredictable socioeconomic side effects. This study employs an agent-based model to assess the impacts of IEZ on industrial outputs, emissions, efficiency, and spatial layout in Hebei Province. The findings reveal that (1) IEZ fosters sustainable industrial growth (12.1 %) and cuts SO<sub>2</sub> emissions by 9.6 % by 2030 compared to the baseline scenario, primarily through the elimination of non-compliant industries and consistent technological advancements; (2) IEZ significantly suppresses air-pollution-intensive industries and considerably boosts low-emission sectors like equipment manufacturing, but has limited effects on water-pollution-intensive industries; (3) IEZ encourages firm transfers and agglomeration within IEUs, with intra-city transfers being the predominant form of industrial spatial restructuring (accounting for 90.9 %). This study suggests enhancing water pollution efficiency regulations within the IEZ and facilitating inter-city industrial transfers to optimize provincial industrial layout.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107682"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142358270","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Comprehensive evaluation of CCUS technology: A case study of China's first million-tonne CCUS-EOR project","authors":"Ling Miao, Lianyong Feng, Yue Ma","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107684","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107684","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>CCUS, an emerging technology for reducing carbon emission, plays a crucial role in achieving the goal of carbon neutrality. CCUS technology exemplified by CO<sub>2</sub> enhanced oil recovery (EOR) is gradually progressing from project demonstration to large-scale application. However, the commercial application still faces uncertainties in economic cost, energy efficiency and environmental benefits. This paper takes China's first million-tonne CCUS-EOR project (Qilu Petrochemical-Shengli Oilfield CCUS-EOR project) as an example, and establishes a comprehensive research framework for evaluating CCUS from the three dimensions of energy, environment, and economy, based on economic viability, energy input-output analysis, and carbon input-output analysis. The results demonstrate that during the project lifecycle, when the average oil price is $90/bbl, the project's NPV is $56.09 million, the project's IRR is 13.4 %, the payback period is 8.34 years, and the threshold oil price for the project to be economically profitable is $81.52/bbl. Furthermore, the Energy Return on Investment (EROI) of the project is 9.09, which considerably superior to that of the Shengli Oilfield's non-EOR, and the net energy output is approximately 18,472.57 kilobarrels. The Carbon Return on Investment (CROI) of the project is 4.12, with significant environmental benefits, and the cumulative net carbon emission reduction is approximately 8078.55 kilotonnes. Furthermore, the trends in EROI and CROI of the CCUS-EOR project demonstrate nearly opposite trajectories. The variation trends in EROI emerge N-shaped curve, while that of CROI emerge S-shaped curve. In summary, the Qilu Petrochemical-Shengli Oilfield CCUS-EOR project exhibits notable advantages in terms of energy efficiency and environmental benefits. However, the threshold oil price for triggering economic profitability is relatively high, which may pose certain economic risks to investors during periods of low oil price.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107684"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-09-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142358212","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Chen Enshan , Stefan van de Spek , Frank van der Hoeven , Manuela Triggianese
{"title":"Evaluate user satisfaction for urban design of railway station areas: An assessment framework using agent-based simulation","authors":"Chen Enshan , Stefan van de Spek , Frank van der Hoeven , Manuela Triggianese","doi":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107685","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.eiar.2024.107685","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Aims</h3><div>Railway station areas can play a crucial role in promoting sustainable development if integrated with cities and be fluctuation-responsive through effective urban design. However, during the design stage, assessing the station areas' performance, of which user satisfaction is indicative, is challenging due to methodological limitations. Agent-based simulation (ABS) is promising as it can link spatial features with agents' behavior features. This research questions to what extent ABS can help assess the urban design of station areas.</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>This paper adopts the user pyramid as the theoretical framework, which outlines five types of user needs: safety, speed, ease, comfort, and experience. The paper selects indicators linking satisfaction and spatial features at the district and building levels. These indicators are measured in the simulation of the station system using digital tools, including MassMotion and Python scripts. The theory, indicators, and tools, in combination, serve as an assessment framework. Rotterdam Central Station is used as a case to demonstrate how the framework works.</div></div><div><h3>Results</h3><div>The framework is capable of assessing design alternatives by identifying changes in user satisfaction. It can be applied on the district level (at a scale of 250 m) with substantial details to inform design decision-making, and it is useful during the design stage when only limited data is available. This paper strengthens the scientific knowledge of railway station areas through the multidisciplinary literature review that translates user needs for urban design use, and it advances the digital means to visualize user satisfaction affected by design.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":309,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Impact Assessment Review","volume":"110 ","pages":"Article 107685"},"PeriodicalIF":9.8,"publicationDate":"2024-09-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142358235","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}