Experiments were to study the effects of anionic polyacrylamide (PAM) on viruses and bacteria movement in soil. A water pollution problem which affects all areas with significant rainfall is soil erosion and subsequent transport of soil and all land-based pollutants. In recent year, high molecular weight polymers, such as anionic polyacrylamides (PAMs), have been used for soil erosion control and subsequent environmental problems. PAM is found to enhance infiltration. Land application of manure, sludge, and wastewater is common in many areas of the world, including the United States. Bacteria, viruses and other pathogens can be found in these waste materials. Studies must be conducts to evaluate if the use of polymers will allow water pollution constituents such as chemicals, pesticides, and microbial pathogens to reach groundwater in aquifer. / Water Resources Research Center; Civil Engineering Department of University of Hawaii at Manoa

It has long been recognised that environmental matters are important to the survival of the construction industry. Yet, in general, the construction industry continues to degrade the environment, exploiting resources and generating waste, and is reluctant to change its conventional practices to incorporate environmental matters as part of the decisionmaking process. Building development involves complex decisions and the increased significance of external effects has further complicated the situation. Cost benefit analysis (CBA) is one of the conventional tools used widely by public and private sectors when appraising projects. It sets out to measure and compare the total costs and benefits of different projects that are competing for scarce resources in monetary terms. However, there are growing concerns that the values of environmental goods and services are often ignored or underestimated in the CBA approach which has led to the overuse and depletion of environmental assets. Consequently, CBA's usefulness and relevance in this respect is increasingly controversial. Project development is not just concerned with financial return, but is also conscious of the long-term impacts on living standards for both present and future generations. Sustainable development is an important issue in project decision-making and environmental effects need to be incorporated into the evaluation process. A multi- dimensional evaluation approach attracts increasing attention around the world as the way to incorporate environmental issues in the decision-making process. This approach uses the conventional market approach to monetarise economic aspects of a development, whilst using a non-monetary approach to evaluate the environmental matters. The purpose of this thesis is to critically examine the impact of construction activities on the environment and methods of quantifying environmental matters. This thesis also evaluates the principal sustainable development determinants for modelling, and evaluating long-term environmental performance of buildings during the project appraisal stage. Projects can be assessed using an index system that combines the principal determinants of sustainable development. The four criteria as identified in this research are financial return, energy consumption, external benefits and environmental impact. The derived sustainability index combines the four identified attributes into a single decision-making tool. The attributes are each expressed in units that are best suited to their quantitative assessment. The development of a sustainability index is a way of combining economic and environmental criteria into the decision-making framework. The sustainability index has also been developed into computer software called SINDEX to be used as a benchmarking tool to aid design and the sustainability assessment of projects. SINDEX is a sustainability modelling tool used to calculate and benchmark sustainable performance of proposed buildings, new and existing facilities. Conventional project appraisal techniques measure net social gain to select a project, whilst the sustainability index measures the relative ranking of projects from a sustainable development view. Buildings have a long life, so any improvement in appraisal techniques for choosing the best option amongst the alternatives will significantly reduce their future environmental impact. As such, a methodology that embraces various criteria in relation to project development is crucial in this respect. The development of a sustainability index is a way to combine multiple criteria measured using different units. Using the sustainability index will greatly assist the construction industry to realise sustainable development goals, and thereby make a positive contribution to identifying optimum design solutions.

No description available.

This research examines ways to assess the built environment (BE) for its impacts on the ecosystems and its sustainability in terms of social, economic and environmental aspects on an urban scale. The examination is based on the argument, acknowledged in the literature, that urbanisation is one of the leading causes of unsustainable development, and that the BE makes a significant contribution to this. In order to accomplish this, urban dynamics are identified and mapped with respect to the built environment, and the relationship between urbanisation, the built environment, and the ecosystem is closely examined. The thesis argues that the common denominator in all efforts to move closer to sustainability is an effective assessment method, which not only quantifies the impacts but also informs and educates. The current methods used for assessment of the impacts of BE are found to be inadequate. An appraisal of contemporary assessment methods addressing sustainability and environmental issues at micro (individual building) and macro (urban system) levels is conducted to understand the mechanics of assessment theories. Based on this, a framework for a new assessment system which has the potential to overcome some of the observed weaknesses of the existing ones is proposed. Using multi-criteria analysis principles, this system uses ecological footprint and spatial analysis as its operational engine. It is then applied to a part of the Sydney Central Business District (CBD) for an integrated sustainability assessment. The ecological footprint of the building stock, transport, roads, waste disposal and water supply is calculated as a measure of the environmental impact of the built environment. In addition to this, ???return on investment??? (rental return on construction costs) as a measure of the economic aspect, embodied energy as a measure of material consumption, and ???proximity to facilities??? as a measure of the social benefit of the building stock, are calculated to assess the study area performance on these aspects. These are used to compute an integrated sustainability index for the study area. Various attributes of the built environment, such as total constructed area, height of building, road density etc., are analysed against the ecological footprint to understand the patterns of relationships between urban morphology and the state of sustainability.

Extraction, production, utilization and disposal of material resources have been undertaken continuously for much of human histories. Unavoidably, all of these activities have disturbed our environment, and subsequently have been harmful to humans and ecosystems in this and future generations. Due to time lag associated with both environment impact and the effects of measures taken to reduce this impact, existing approaches (i.e. monitoring and reacting) do not give sufficiently rapid feedback for effective environmental management. With regard to the complexity and concern related to environment-health chain effects, there is currently no environmental tool or approach that can provide comprehensive information and indicators covering all major environment and health themes, to enable decision makers to make informed judgements about regional policies and plans, relating to the sustainable use and disposal of material resources. Consequently, there is a need for developing a new approach by taking account of a multidisciplinary concept used in this thesis. Substance Flow Analysis (SFA) has been mainly applied in order to provide input information for Health Risk Assessment (HRA). The SFA approach provides the quantity of the substance that is transported (flows) and stored in the system (stock), and of which sub-system, flow, and process is the greatest concern. The HRA approach provides estimates of human health risk associated with site, activity and facility. An environmental fate and transport model is another key knowledge area incorporated into the HRA process. An integrating method of SFA, environmental fate and transport, and HRA is developed and illustrated by a case study of cadmium in Australia. This thesis shows that this new integration of existing stand-alone methods can provide holistic information and useful indicators covering all significant economic activities, environment, flows, and health risk assessment for selected substances. This enables better decision making on the use and disposal of substances at a range of levels in the economy, from corporations to regions and nations.

The conservation of biological diversity has become one of the most important goals of managing forests in an ecologically sustainable way. In this thesis, I report a comprehensive study designed to examine the long-term effects of commercial logging and high-intensity fire, and the ability of Population Viability Analysis (PVA) models to predict these effects to aid in the conservation and management of multiple species. Initially, I compared the abundance of small mammals (A. agilis, R. fuscipes, A. swainsonii), and lizards (L. delicata, L. guichenoti, E. heatwolei), in sites with different disturbance histories: 18-19 yearold logging regrowth, 28-29 or 33-34 year???old clearfelling regrowth and unlogged forest. All sites had previously been burnt by bushfires. No evidence of long-term effects of logging or fire was found for A. agilis, R. fuscipes, L. delicata or L. guichenoti, and there were not enough data to make conclusions for A. swainsonii and E. heatwolei. Then the effects of a hazard-reduction burn were investigated. There was variation between the species in the effects of the burn, with interactions between year, aspect and burning for A. agilis and R. fuscipes, and interactions between year, disturbance and topography for the Lampropholis species. A. swainsonii became extremely scarce in the forest after the burn and E. heatwolei were generally unaffected. Next, PVA metapopulation models were used to predict the likely abundance and patch occupancy of these species based on historical data. Retrospective testing showed the models were accurate for all species, but best for A. agilis and R. fuscipes. Lastly, PVA modelling was used to rank management options; no management action, a hazard-reduction burn in 2005 or a logging event in 2005. The models predicted that future management is likely to result in the extinction of A. agilis, R. fuscipes and L. guichenoti by 2010. However, no one management scenario was most detrimental to all species. The current management regime for this forest involves commercial logging on a 40-year cycle and regular hazard-reduction burning. PVA modelling predicts that A. swainsonii and L. delicata are at the greatest risk of extinction under this regime, but that it is also likely to lead to the extinction of A. agilis, R. fuscipes and L. guichenoti in the near future. The results of this research indicate that the conservation of multiple species under one management regime is unlikely to be successful.

Use of bauxite refining residue to reduce the mobility of heavy metals in municipal waste compost. Due to the adverse environmental impact of landfills and the lack of space for nearby population centres an unprecedented interest has developed in waste recycling with the objective to reduce the volume of waste disposed. Generally organic matter represents the largest fraction in the domestic waste stream including food, garden and paper waste. In the past efforts have been made to process this organic fraction into muniapal compost.However contamination of the compost with heavy metals has in many cases resulted in the lack of suitable markets and subsequent closure of compost facilities. A study was undertaken and aimed at reducing the concentration and mobility of heavy metals in municipal compost. Bauxite refining residue ha; a high capacity to immobilise metals in soils through precipitation, cation exchange and chemisorption (Fe- and Al- oxides). The first step in the study was to assess the metal adsorption capacity of red mud by equilibrating red mud with metal solutions. Metal removal from solution proved very high. Subsequently, the effect of red mud addition to municipal compost was studied in relation to metal mobility. In particular the interaction of metals with the mobile soluble organic fraction, the humic and fulvic acids, was investigated. It was found that most metals remained in the insoluble humin fraction and the metals in solution remained complexed to the soluble organic fraction. Red mud appeared to be able to adsorp fulvic and humic acids and thus indirectly immobilise the metals in solution. Red mud did not appear to be able to transfer metals from the organic fraction to the mineral red mud fraction. ft was kypothesised that, in order for the metals to be adsorped to red mud, the red mud needed to be present in the organic waste prior to composting. Metal adsorption to red mud is a rapid chemical reaction while metal complexation to the organic fraction takes a number of weeks, since it must be sufficiently oxidised to contain functional groups. In order to verify this hypothesis, an installation with seven incubators was developed which allowed composting to be undertaken under computer controlled conditions and monitored for temperature, airflow and carbon dioxide respiration. The incubators were filled with 10 kg of a mixture of grass clippings and sawdust. The first incubator functioned as a control. The contents of the rest of the incubators were spiked with the following metals: Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni, Pb and Zn. In addition the contents of the 3rd - 7th incubators were amended with an increasing percentage of red mud, respectively 10,20,25,30 and 40 % by weight. After the mixture was composted, the metal mobility was reduced by approx. 80 - 99 %, depending on the metal. The mobility was assessed as leachable and plant available in relation to the total metal content. Red mud did not affect the composting process if < 40% red mud was added. The next step was to compost municipal organic waste in a pilot plant (capacity 5 m3) using batches with and without red mud. Mixed waste was collected from 150 households and the glass, metal and plastic fractions were removed bx- manual sorting. The rest was composted. The red mud - compost had a relatively lower metal content and a reduced metal mobility compared to compost without red mud. The red mud - compost also had a 300 times higher pH buffer capacity and 90%less soluble organic matter. The addition of red mud prior to composting was found to reduce the concentration and mobility of metals in compost, improve the quality of compost as a soil conditioner, increased the resistance of the organic fraction against further breakdown and this process thus adds value to both red mud and organic waste.

Thesis (M. S.)--Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008. / Committee Chair: Spyros G. Pavlostathis; Committee Member: Ching-Hua Huang; Committee Member: John A. Pierson.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009. / Committee Chair: Jae-Hong Kim; Committee Member: Joseph hughes; Committee Member: Michael Bergin; Committee Member: Seung Soon Jang; Committee Member: Vernon Snoeyink.

Thesis (Ph.D)--Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009. / Committee Co-Chair: Huang, Ching-Hua; Committee Co-Chair: Kim, Jae-Hong; Committee Member: Li, Qilin; Committee Member: Mulholland, James; Committee Member: Wine, Paul; Committee Member: Yiacoumi, Sotira. Part of the SMARTech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Collection.