Nineteenth century settlers in Florida's Indian River Lagoon (IRL) region created an isolated fringe culture wholly dependent on the instable hydrological forces of the shallow lagoon system. These settlers were among the first to construct a built environment market by the dredging and filling that would define much of the twentieth century Sunshine State. There has been no period when the liminal IRL ecosystem was not without shifting barrier islands and dramatically varying salinity levels due primarily to the oceanic interchange following the opening and closing of natural inlets. This paper suggests that attempts to "restore" the lagoon will necessarily declare an arbitrary historical form to be normative for the system. The first and last chapters provide an overview of the system's origins and recent history, while the core of the paper focuses on human-environment interaction of the lagoon in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. / by Nathaniel Osborn. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2012. / Includes bibliography. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / System requirements: Adobe Reader.

Over the decades the concept of green consumption has been discussed with sustainable consumption, green behavior, eco-citizenship and sustainable patterns and lifestyles. Various environmental problems like global warming, pollution, shortage of natural resources and climate change threatened the sustainability of the environment and our survival. There is an increasing demand from scholars and society for the change of human behavior to help reduce the environmental impact. This study aims to investigate how supermarket influences the daily consumption in a sustainable way through the concept of green marketing in terms of green product management, green packaging, green promotion, green pricing, green logistics and green labeling. That means, a supermarket is not only a place to provide green products but also influence the culture of green consumption through the efforts of designing environmentally friendly facilities and strategies. In real life practice, there are constraints and challenges to encourage green consumption in the community. Through literature review, interview and surveys, the study investigates the kinds of products and facilities which have been used in Hong Kong supermarkets and consumers’ perception and knowledge of environmentally friendly products and services. Through exploration of overseas case studies, insights on common sustainable practices were identified and how overseas’ best practices can be adopted or modified in Hong Kong were discussed. The surveys with Wellcome/Three Sixty/MarketPlace by Jasons and the general public illustrate how supermarket can promote sustainable and green consumption in Hong Kong and the progress of achievement. The study ends with suggestions on how joint-efforts from the various stakeholders in the society can facilitate green consumption. These include public participation, green initiatives of supermarkets, price incentive, promotion and government’s support to encourage pro-environmental behavior. / published_or_final_version / Environmental Management / Master / Master of Science in Environmental Management

Landscape modification, especially those human-dominated changes, has been widely considered as one of the key drivers inducing the degradation of environment and ecosystem. The consequent habitat loss and fragmentation, which are closely related to ecological process, have attracted much scholarly attention. However, very few studies have systematically examined their causes and consequences at the landscape level. Integrating human activities into consideration in a holistic way remains poorly understood in particular. This thesis reports a systematic study of habitat loss and fragmentation under urbanization. This research distinguishes itself from previous works in its investigation of the spatio-temporal dynamics of causes and consequences of habitat loss and fragmentation, and its endeavor to disentangle habitat fragmentation from simple habitat loss in terms of their processes and effects. The Shenzhen River cross-border watershed, shared by Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and Shenzhen, is used as a case to illustrate how these ideas can work in practice. The study period spans from 1988 to 2008.The main contents of the study include analysis of the processes and causes of habitat loss and fragmentation, and dynamic consequences on water quality and ecosystem services for biodiversity conservation at spatial and temporal scales. Various methods are employed, mainly including conventional and newly developed landscape metrics (such as the Urbanization Isolation Effect (UIE) and Habitat Isolation Degree (HID)), a spatial statistical approach based on the Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR) model, spatio-temporal analyses and cross-border comparison. Major findings of the research are highlighted as follows. First, habitat loss and fragmentation show great spatial heterogeneity as well as temporal variation due to extensive and rapid urban sprawl in the study area. Second, by adopting the GWR model, it is found that human-related factors have played a significant role in determining not only the “amount” but also the “location” of habitat loss. Third, by using two new landscape metrics, namely the UIE and HID, both the extent (urban sprawl) and intensity (population density) of urbanization are suggested to have significant influences in habitat isolation. Fourth, water quality in the watershed is recognized to be closely correlated with habitat loss and fragmentation, and the correlations show major discrepancies between the Hong Kong and the Shenzhen sides. Moreover, by proposing a compound indicator (NP/MPS) for measuring habitat fragmentation (independent of simple habitat loss), it is found that habitat loss has exerted a bigger influence on water quality degradation than habitat fragmentation. Fifth, by integrating habitat connectivity into the evaluation of ecosystem services for biodiversity conservation, both the habitat size and connectivity are recognized to be important in explaining the degradation of ecosystem services value. Habitat size has played a dominant role in the overall change of ecosystem services value, whereas the role of connectivity (fragmentation) is more critical when the “stepping stones” sites are lost. The study provides a new framework to examine the habitat loss and fragmentation under urbanization at the landscape level. The efforts show great effectiveness in providing sound and useful information for future landscape planning, biodiversity conservation and watershed management. / published_or_final_version / Geography / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

No description available.

No description available.

published_or_final_version / Environmental Management / Master / Master of Science in Environmental Management

published_or_final_version / Urban Planning and Environmental Management / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Environmental Management / Master / Master of Science in Environmental Management

No description available.

No description available.