For over ten years the Western Basin of Lake Erie has been plagued by significant harmful algal blooms (HABs). Lake Erie is a body of water situated between the United States of America (USA) and Canada. The lake provides water to approximately 40 million people and is a considerable source of economic value. The Western Basin of Lake Erie is highly prone to HABs due to the shallow depth and large phosphorus (P) loads received from the large area of agricultural land surrounding the lake and its tributaries. HABs cause extensive ecosystem degradation, have multiple negative health impacts, and cause significant economic losses for the tourism and fishery industries. Five products with P load reducing properties from the three nutrient control categories (biological, physical, and chemical) were chosen to determine how effective their P load reduction pathways were. Additionally, these products were analyzed to determine if they could generate positive remediation effects on the Lake Erie HAB. Of these five products, the technologies Water 3.0 and PO4 Sponge were applied to a Western Basin HAB model generated using the Stella Professional software from ISEE Systems. The two products were modeled individually and collectively to compare the application effects on the HAB model. The model results illustrate the significant reduction in P load and HAB extent that the application of these products at wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) and within waterways could have. The application of both products at multiple locations within the model showed the greatest P load reduction and nearly eliminated the HAB extent. Unfortunately, the residual P from extensive historical P loading into the lake would prevent such a significant reduction from occurring for over a decade. Current practices and regulations in the Lake Erie Basin are not stimulating P load reductions significant enough to remediate the HAB. As the Western Basin HAB continues to occur annually, the waste stream produced by the HAB remains unutilized. Implementing new and innovative technologies in the basin can generate high quality commodity streams out of the wasted biological algal matter. Meanwhile the implementation of new technologies and practices can help reduce the HAB to a smaller size that would have smaller negative impacts to the economy, health, and ecology.

This study starts from the perspective of a future increase availability of water quality data at the water treatment facility at Lovön and aims to use the existing data to identify a pattern in the role of the different sub-basin that constitute the Mälaren basin. The data are analyzed with the graphical tool of the scatterplot and a Non-linear Canonical Correlation Analysis, a variation of the classical multivariate method, that by using a neural network model is able to handle not linear relationships. From the data analysis, it is possible to identify that different areas have different contribution in shaping the water quality at the facility of Lovön, but also that this pattern of contribution is strongly affected by the season inside the analyzed year.

At a time when biodiversity is declining, there needs to be a shift in how development projects take responsibility for lost natural values. Such a change is provided by biodiversity offsetting which give project owners an opportunity to compensate for declines in natural quality. However, offsetting for biodiversity costs money and therefore a clear business case is needed. Like all types of Corporate Sustainable Responsibility (CSR) work the expected competitive advantages are dependent on the stakeholders’ knowledge of the CSR measures. The aim of this study was therefore to explain how ecological compensation is communicated to stakeholders and why communication is carried out from the perspective of the project owner in a Swedish context. Through interviews and building on theories of CSR, stakeholders, and communication, the results from the five cases herein shows that communication is regarded as very important to most biodiversity offsetting projects. How, when and to whom the communication was directed seemed to depend on the goal which was most important to the project owner. Four goals highlighted in the results were: To gain a social licence to operate; gain new knowledge and to further the indirect increase in natural values inherent in all biodiversity offsetting projects. Also, claiming legal permits for development was a goal for most of the responding organizations. The goals influenced which stakeholders became the most important to communicate with, and different communication strategies were used for the different stakeholders. Some stakeholders could clearly be grouped into general categories, e.g. legal authorities and non-governmental organizations, but this study concluded that the heterogenous character of many of the stakeholders mentioned by the participating organizations made it difficult to categorize these into specific groups.

In September 2015, the world leaders gathered to endorse 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), demonstrating a paradigm shift for people and the planet build on shared values, principles, and priorities for a common destiny. In the process of consolidating the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) consultations with business representatives raised two issues related to the potential success of the goals. The first issue was to better measure and value true performance of business preconditioned by identifying the most significant impact areas. The second issue was concerned with integration of sustainability into core business strategies. Both issues lead back to the proclaimed paradigm shift built on shared values for a sustainable future as demonstrated by the SDGs and demonstrate challenges with implementation of the SDGs. Although comprehensive frameworks to help business integrate the goals have been developed, the complexity and sheer volume of the various targets and indicators hinder many companies from reporting on their performance and contributions. The textile and apparel industry, while endowed with enormous potential related to development of countries has drawn increased attention to its negative impacts along the value chain. The industry is also one of the first to integrate the SDG into their sustainability reports. However, critics point to the fact that simply linking sustainability activities to the SDGs is not enough and cherry-picking the goals that have the easiest business case will be insufficient. Thus, to address this potential discrepancy between communication and action, the aim of this study has been to investigate the perceived value of SDGs integration in sustainability reporting within the apparel industry. Through a critical discourse analysis, the study has reviewed six sustainability report by two Swedish apparel companies, Lindex and Filippa K, from 2015 to 2017. conceptual framework has been developed according to the SDG compass including two variables; communicated motives for SDG integration and methods to measure and report on goal fulfilment. The findings show that both companies are using the SDGs as a communicative tool to point to the conceptual motives which drives the sustainability work. Discursive strategies to frame the companies’ sustainability methods are made by utilizing the concept of “circularity”. The level of SDG integration differs between the companies. Lindex show discursive developments between 2015 to 2015 reflecting extended responsibility with correspondence between communication and action. While Filippa K does not show the same level of discursive maturity in terms of motive, the methods to address the sustainability issues related to circular fashion has accelerated significantly over the years comparatively to Lindex. The lack of communicated methods to address social issues is however evident. The findings further show that there is a correspondence between level of SDG integration and SDG contribution. This study corroborates with previous research arguing that the business world is more complex than something that can be assessed in a black and white dichotomy of hypocrisy versus sincerity and needs a much more sophisticated approach to the gap between promise and performance and that the SDGs have a transformative potential. It also provides insights on how the application of the SDGs can be seen through a spectrum between weak and strong sustainability depending on the maturity of a company’s sustainability management.

Energy plays a significant role in a country’s development. Usage of an improved stove that produces biochar could help to reduce the pressure of deforestation, amend soil productivity, and provide cleaner technology for cooking. In Kwale, a county located on the south coast of Kenya, firewood is still used as the primary cooking fuel followed by charcoal. This research aims to investigate the improvements for a Top-litUpDraft (TLUD) biochar-producing gasifier stove, which the users aspired through co-designing. Transformative mixed methods were used as the research design to empower the users’ involvement in the biochar and smallholder farmers in Kenya – improved use efficiency of farm-level organic resources in relation to energy, crops and soil project. Triangulation was used to process the collected data through structured user observations, a focus group discussion, and a semi-structured interview. Between two stakeholders, TLUDgasifier stove users and the manufacturer, there was a difference of opinion for the main priority. Ease of use was the main concern for the users while the manufacturer put forward energy efficiency. Further, the users desired for an increase in the stove’s dimension as its capacity to produce biochar would increase.

National access to modern energy is deemed by Malawi government as the driving force to attain social-economic development. To achieve this, optimal decisions in energy planning and investment are considered important. This study evaluates potential pathways that will inform better policy design and investment option in energy sector. The Integrated Assessment Modelling method has been used to integrate social, economic and environmental variables that affect energy systems, and further analyses potential energy pathways in relation to these earth systems. The Long-range Alternatives Energy Planning system (LEAP) has been used to run a continuous time series from 2008 to 2063 of the three energy policy pathways (scenarios) using: (1) the current Malawi National Policy and Strategies on Energy (MwNEP) (2) the United Nation’s Sustainable Energy for All strategy (SE4ALL) and (3) Business as Usual (REF) scenario. The analysis indicates an exponential growth in energy demand for both MwNEP and SE4ALL scenario with a slight higher demand in SEAll over MwNEP Scenario. In both cases Biomass remains an important energy source beyond the 2030. Thus, the SDG 7 will not be achieved by 2030. Similarly, energy demand trends in MwNEP and SE4ALL scenarios continue to grow beyond available energy stocks and generation capacity which will lead to a shortfall in energy supply. Environmentally, the GHGs emissions in MwNEP are higher than the SE4ALL scenario. This is reflected in the pro-environment policy objective pursued by SE4ALL scenario. In the medium-term LEAP analysis favours advancement of alternative renewable energies at household level like solar photovoltaic (PV) for lighting and sustainable biomass energy for cooking. In the long-run, scaling up the adoption of renewable energy in form of solar, wind and hydro-electricity to meet the energy gap. At the same time, designing and adhering to implementation of sustainable energy plans that cuts energy sources from fossil fuels and allow easy accesses to affordable renewable energies will result in a success of Malawi’s energy system.

An important portion of the large northern permafrost soil organic carbon (SOC) pool might be released into the atmosphere as greenhouse gases following permafrost thawing and subsequent SOC decomposition under future warming conditions, resulting in a warming amplification known as the permafrost carbon feedback. Improved knowledge about the amount, composition and distribution of the permafrost SOC pool is essential when assessing the potential magnitude and timing of the permafrost carbon feedback. This study investigates and compares the SOC storage, composition and distribution in two contrasting permafrost environments: a lowland tundra area in NE Siberia (Tiksi study site), and an alpine area in the Russian Altai Mountains (Aktru Valley study site). Soil pedons were sampled down to 1 m depth and analyzed for key soil properties, i.e., DBD, water content, coarse fraction content, %OC, %IC, C/N ratios and δ¹⁵N values. These soil properties are upscaled by vertical subdivisions based on land cover classes. The role of geomorphology in the accumulation and distribution of SOC in the alpine study site is tested by using a landform and a combined land cover-land form upscaling approach. The estimated mean SOC storage in the upper meter of soils in the alpine site is 3.5 ± 0.8 kg C m¯² compared to 21.4 ± 3.2 kg C m¯² in the lowland tundra site (95% confidence intervals). The inclusion of geomorphology in the upscaling in some cases allows identification of SOC hotspots and areas with very low SOC storage within former land cover classes, therefore improving the landscape SOC storage distribution in the area. The much lower SOC stocks in the alpine site of Aktru Valley can be largely explained by the presence of extensive unvegetated areas in high altitudes (60%), the occurrence active layers deeper than the active soil formation, the enhanced SOM decomposition due to coarse grained, well-drained non-frozen soils, and the negligible occurrence of peatlands and buried organics. Instead, the lowland tundra site in NE Siberia presents important amounts of relatively undecomposed SOM in the permafrost layer. Thus, under future climate warming, alpine permafrost environments such as Aktru Valley may become a net C sink due to an upward shift of vegetation zones and an increase in plant productivity and soil development. Contrarily, lowland tundra areas such as Tiksi may become important C sources since the small increase in C uptake by photosynthetic plants will be outweighed by the thawing and subsequent decomposition of the much larger permafrost SOC pool.

Rapporten ämnar undersöka bottensediment bärgade från ett område i västraGotlandsbassängen i Östersjön. Östersjön är ett ansträngt bräckvattenhav medutbredda övergödningsproblem, döda bottnar och hotad biologisk fauna. Söktaresultat berör fosforhalt, förekommande metaller, mineralsammansättning,kornstorleksfraktioner samt organisk halt för ett projekt där målet ärsedimentbärgning för betongindustrin och brytning av fosfor som arbetar motövergödning med kretslopp och cirkulär ekonomi. Detta uppnås med följandeanalysmetoder: ICP-MS, XRD, TGA och laserdiffraktometer tillsammans med RISE CBI. Analyserna visade att sedimentet är ett finsediment med en hög organisk halt ochkan klassificeras som postglacial siltgyttja och innehåller 1,63 mg/kg TS fosfor.Förekommande mineral är albit, kvarts och glimmer. Metaller som påträffades var,men inte uteslutande kisel, 214000 mg/kg TS, aluminium 80600 mg/kg torrt sediment(TS) och järn 49900 mg/kg TS. Under diskussionen hanteras renings-ochseparationsprocesser för fosfor och metaller, av vilka Bio-P metoden ochhyperackumulerande växter tas upp. / This project aimed to investigate sediment salvaged from an area in the westernGotland basin of the Baltic Sea. The Baltic Sea is a stressed brackish water sea withextensive eutrophication problems, so-called dead zones and threatened fauna. Theresults relate to phosphorus content, prevalent metals, mineral composition, grainsize distribution, and organic content. This work is part of a project where the goal isphosphorous recovery for concrete and phosphorus mining with circulation andcircular economics to better the current situation in the Baltic sea. The physical andchemical properties of the sediments were investigated using the following analyticalmethods: ICP-MS, XRD, TGA and laser diffractometer together with RISE CBI.The results show that the sediment is a postglacial silt gyttja, with a phosphorouscontent of 1.63 mg / kg of dry sediment (DS). Existing minerals are albite, quartz andmica. Elements found were, but not exclusively silica, 214000 mg/kg DS, aluminium80600 mg/kg DS and iron 49900 mg/kg DS. Relevant purification and separation processes for phosphorus and metals, of which the Bio-P method and hyper-accumulating plants are two, are discussed.

The role of streams in the global carbon budget was for a long time neglected, since they were considered passive transporters of carbon from land to sea. However, studies have shown that streams are often supersaturated in carbon dioxide (CO2), making them sources of carbon to the atmosphere. The main sources of stream CO2 are in-stream mineralization of organic matter and transport of carbon from the catchment. The catchment derived CO2 could both be of biogenic (respiration) or geogenic (weathering) origin. Most studies regarding the topic rely on measurements carried out in forest-dominated catchments, while agricultural streams are under-represented. The objective of this study was to examine partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) in streams in catchments dominated by agriculture. This was done to increase the knowledge about agricultural influence on stream pCO2, and to provide a basis for planning mitigation strategies for reducing CO2 emissions from the agriculture sector. Sampling was performed in ten streams draining agriculture-dominated catchments around Uppsala, Sweden, from June to November 2017. Measurements of pCO2 were carried out with floating chambers, equipped with CO2 sensors. Nutrients, organic carbon, discharge and different chemical variables were also measured. For correlation tests, the method Kendall’s Tau was used. Catchments were delineated in a geographic information system (GIS) and the CORINE Land Cover dataset was used to examine land use. Stream specific median pCO2 varied from 3000 to 10 000 μatm. In some streams, pCO2 exceeded 10 000 μatm, which was outside of the sensor’s measurement range. Values of pCO2 were high compared to similar studies in forested catchments, which could indicate that occurrence of agriculture in the catchment increases stream CO2. Correlation was found between pCO2 and discharge, with negative correlation in five streams and positive correlation in two. Negative correlation was found between pCO2 and pH and percentage of dissolved oxygen, respectively. No significant correlation was found between pCO2 and fraction of agricultural land use, nutrients or organic carbon. Further studies are needed to examine the sources of CO2, since it is possible that a large part of the CO2 has a geogenic origin. The floating chamber method should be revised to reduce the sensor’s sensitivity to condensation and cold temperatures, and to increase the measuring range.

Brackish water ecosystems such as mangroves are among the most biodiverse in the world. The mangroves located in the Gulf of California, Mexico are not an exception. This sea has been studied several times due to its biodiverse coastal ecosystems, one of these sites being “Marismas Nacionales” or National Marshes in the southeast area of the Gulf, which was the focus of the thesis. Local fishing communities have been present in the area since pre-Hispanic times and the area became recognized for their abundant oyster, shrimp, and finfish yields during the XX century. Overexploitation of fisheries in Mexico and national financial crisis opened the door to neoliberal policy and law reforms which affected directly and still affect the subsistence, economy and political power of the fishers in the area. Because of the neoliberal reforms, shrimp aquaculture became an important economic activity in and around the region of Marismas Nacionales by the end of the 1980s. By the 1990s international and national protection, instruments were implemented to revert the damages and pressures created by overexploited fishers, as well as by the new aquaculture practices introduced in the ecosystem, giving Marismas Nacionales the status of the biosphere reserve. The figure of biosphere reserve has reverted the damages in the ecosystem while preserving the communal land inside of it. Nevertheless, since the biosphere reserve does not cover the whole ecosystem, the political boundaries of the biosphere reserve have also been detrimental for the ecosystem and local fishers’ land tenure that remained outside of it, creating an inside/outside effect. The study was done considering the perspectives of the actors involved, mainly the fishers in the area through semi-structured interviews gathered using a snowball method, through second-hand sources collection and literature review. The analysis was done through the political ecology and political economy perspectives to examine the conflicts that were found. The neoliberal laws from the period between 1986 and 1992 have not stopped the depletion of fisheries in the Marismas Nacionales ecosystem. Additionally, with the combination of a lack of formal credit schemes leading to an exploitation by permit holders and middlemen; fishers, in particular, free fishers, in the Marismas Nacionales ecosystem have become vulnerable, as well as scapegoats for the shortcomings of the flawed policies. The most affected fishers inside Marismas Nacionales ecosystem where found outside the limits of the biosphere reserve, demonstrating the deficiencies of the biosphere reserve. Additionally, I claim that conservation instruments and areas around Mexico could potentially become part of a process of primitive accumulation which could end up in privatizing those areas as seen in other places around the world. Moreover, shrimp aquaculture seems to benefit from the conservation policies. Further research is advised in regulatory processes and conservation law schemes, as well as an accurate implementation in the Marismas Nacionales wetlands, that considers all those implicated.