Vol. 5, No. 2 (2017): Regular Issue

The choice of a product according to criteria, such as price, applicability, quality, environmental safety, health etc. requires knowledge on its properties, e.g. as available in product descriptions, instructions for use, and for some categories of products, such as wall paints, in Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS). Professional experts have the abilities to analyse and assess this information, but non-expert users may lack such capabilities. Even so, they reveal their preferences through purchasing decisions. Hence, it is important to develop a research methodology to understand their decision-making. In this paper, such a methodology is developed, based on the Analytic Hierarchy Process and the use of the SuperDecisions software for the case of indoor wall paints. The outcome is a model which can be used for the purpose of analysing and understanding nonexpert users’ behaviour when selecting such an indoor wall paint.

This paper deals with short-term modelling of pollutant transport on the sea surface after environmental accidents. Using the Lagrangian approach, a two-dimensional model of pollutant flow is developed to determine the average velocity field of the flow in the presence of tidal currents and sea surface wind stress for an arbitrarily shaped coastline. This approach assumes that the main transport mechanism is convection. Short-term scenarios are considered, where diffusion effects on pollutant transport can be neglected. The hydrodynamic problem is solved by the method of discrete singularities adapted to fluid advection problems. The problem of environmental pollutant transport by sea currents is reduced to integration of the advection equations to determine the spatio-temporal properties of the spreading pollution. The model was verified through comparison of the results against natural observations on the spread of an oil spill on the sea surface following a collision between the Chinese bulk carrier Fu Shan Hai and the Cyprian container ship Gdynia near the island of Bornholm in the Baltic Sea (May 31, 2003). Satisfactory agreement was found between results of a 7-day numerical simulation and observed data. The proposed model can therefore be used for real-time prediction of short-term pollutant transport on a sea surface with an arbitrarily shaped coastline, to support decision-making processes during maritime accidents, in particular oil spills.

In this paper, we updated the existing emergy analysis framework and calculation methods of The Global National Environmental Accounting Database (NEAD) based on the fast-developed raw global environmental database and the replacements of the nations and regions. Latest GIS grid coverages for renewable flows, the processes of updating raw data necessary for tabular synthesis, and filtrating energy conversion rates and unit emergy values for translating physical flows to emergy units have been updated and standardized. This calculation methods framework incorporates a standardized template within which primary flows are calculated and aggregated into the emergy summary flows and indices. It could be used to formalize data sources, detail line items, calculate energy conversion calculations, and assign Unit Emergy Values (UEVs) to flows and will strengthen the power and credibility of comparative national emergy analysis.

Contaminated soil and groundwater are environmental hazards that pose a serious threat to human health. Across Alberta, Albertans are increasingly demanding cleanup of contaminated sites located in or close to their communities. Hydrocarbon spills that often occur during oil and gas operations result in loss of soil quality and contamination of groundwater. This may reduce transport of water and air, inhibit microbial activity, and nutrient cycling. The objective of this paper is to introduce life cycle assessment (LCA) within the existing framework of phased environmental site assessments (ESAs) in the selection of soil remedial alternatives for oil and gas well site clean ups. The ESA-LCA analysis involves processing inputs from the ESA findings to the LCA software (SIMAPRO), identifying the remedial alternatives to compare, running the LCA model using these inputs; and conducting an uncertainty analysis via Monte Carlo Simulation (MCS). A case study comparing two common soil remediation alternatives was presented to demonstrate the improved framework at a well site in Northern Alberta. The LCA results show favorable environmental impact indicators for bioventing over excavation and biopile treatment. This shows the LCA methodology as an excellent tool to compare different remediation options and can be used as a decision- making tool for authorities. An increased focus is recommended in policy discussions on understanding the long term environmental impacts of oil and gas well site remediation options.

This paper aims to investigate the driving factors of the Landfill Disposal Rate (LDR) on Italian territory and attempts to provide some policy recommendation to reduce it. Hence, we implement a two-step analysis. First, we perform a cluster analysis (CA) to 103 Italian provinces on the LDR driving factors. Second, in the light of the CA results, we implement a semi-parametric estimator in order to identify two components of the LDR distribution: the effects of the coefficients and the effects of the characteristics. The paper documents a considerable heterogeneity among the 103 Italian provinces under consideration. This emphasizes that policy makers cannot consider a unique policy recommendation to reduce landfill. Rather policy interventions must be differentiate according to such a heterogeneity.

The friction behavior of leaf-surface wax of two desert plants, Ammopiptanthus mongolicus and Reaumuria soongorica, as additives were evaluated on an aluminum-on-steel system, glycerol and molybdenum-dithiocarbamate (MoDTC) as compaire additive. A Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis system was performed to identify the composition of Ammopiptanthus mongolicus leaf wax. Scanning electron microscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy(XPS) were employed to explore the friction mechanisms of Ammopiptanthus mongolicus leaf-surface wax. The poly-alpha-olefin (PAO) containing leaf-surface wax showed a better friction reducing and wear resistance properties than that of containing glycerol and MoDTC, respectively. The results show that the leaf-surface wax of desert plants could effectively reduce the friction and wear of aluminum-on-steel sliding pairs compared with the PAO containing MoDTC, and glycerol as additives. Especially, Ammopiptanthus mongolicus showed high performance anti-wear and friction reducing properties. The excellent tribological properties were attributed to the wax composition of leafsurface fatty acid, alcohol, and esters.

This study aims to examine the impact of ownership structure on the level of accounting conservatism in Jordan by using a sample of 99 manufacturing and financial companies listed on the Amman Stock Exchange between 2005 and 2013. On the one hand, ownership structure was measured by: foreign; governmental; institutional; and concentration of ownership. On the other hand, accounting conservatism was measured by accrual-based measures. This study used the Ordinary Least Square (OLS) method was as the multiple regression analysis. It was found that three of the independent variables were significant and one was not. The study’s findings show that there is an inverse effect of governmental ownership on accounting conservatism. In contrast, the study indicates a significant and positive relationship between foreign and institutional ownership with accounting conservatism but the concentration of ownership has no effect on the conservatism. Based on these results, this paper provides some insights for the extant literature in this field and, for interested parties, conveys some conservatism policy implications. In addition, this study opens up opportunities for more in-depth research related to the accounting conservatism.