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Principles of Exposure
Published in Jack Daugherty, Assessment of Chemical Exposures, 2020
The biosphere is the portion of the environment that includes all organisms and biological materials. Unlike the geosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere, the biosphere is not specific in location, but is the living part of the geosphere and hydrosphere. The most important chemistry in the biosphere is photosynthesis. CO2+H2O→hv{CH2O}+O2(g)
The Restructuring of the Electric Utility: Technology Forces, R&D and Sustainability
Published in Nicola Steen, Sustainable Development and the Energy Industries, 2017
Sustainable development is a key facet of a new value system emerging both in the United States and around the world, many of whose central ideas were first defined for the global community in Our Common Future, a report issued in 1987 by the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development.1 The report argued that basic questions on the environment and economics can no longer be treated separately. It noted that economic policies that have assumed the existence of an unlimited and self-restoring biosphere must now change to recognize severe ecological limits. It recommended a strategy of ‘sustainable development in which the material needs of all the world’s people are met in ways that preserve the biosphere’. Sustainability, as a concept and as an objective, has important implications for utilities and for society. This paper reviews some of the dominant trends in the move towards sustainability and their implications for the future electric utility industry. Even though this paper focuses on investor-owned utilities as they exist in the United States, its content applies to other kinds of utilities as well, since all require significant capital investment.
The Biosphere and Biogeochemical Cycles
Published in Jerome Greyson, Carbon, Nitrogen, and Sulfur Pollutants and Their Determination in Air and Water, 2020
The biosphere is defined as that part of the planet that sustains life. It encompasses the lower part of the atmosphere, the hydrosphere (the oceans, lakes, rivers, and streams), and the lithosphere (the earth’s crust) down to a depth of about two kilometers. Biogeochemical cycles are the transport pathways and the chemical and physical interactions of the elements within and among these regions of the biosphere.
Research on optimization of post-earthquake restoration planning strategy of Jiuzhaigou world heritage site based on value correlation: from the perspective of heritage site administrators
Published in Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering, 2023
According to the access criteria and objectives of planning and management of the protected areas, various objects of protection at the protected areas are of coincidence on value objects like lakes and waterfalls at the area of Jiuzhaigou Heritage Site (Table 1). Different protected areas also differ in type (Cao 2017); for example, World Network of Biosphere Reserves (WNBR) and National Park include Tibetan villages in the management and development objectives; the natural reserve definitely protects giant pandas and their habitats; and National Geo-Park emphasizes the value of geological heritages. Thus, the overall value objects of Jiuzhaigou Heritage Site, whose core includes alpine lakes, waterfalls, forests, snow peaks, karst, rare animals and Tibetan villages, are established.
Measuring just accessibility within planetary boundaries
Published in Transport Reviews, 2023
Elias Willberg, Henrikki Tenkanen, Harvey J. Miller, Rafael H. M. Pereira, Tuuli Toivonen
The planetary boundaries comprise nine ecological dimensions that define the safe operating space for humanity and demarcate the current stable state of Earth. For each dimension, the boundary represents an estimation of a safe limit of environmental degradation, the crossing of which could push the planet towards unsustainable paths. The planetary boundaries as defined by Steffen et al. (2015) are: climate change, biosphere integrity (genetic diversity and functional diversity measured as biodiversity loss), land-system change, freshwater use, biochemical flows (nitrogen and phosphorus loading), ocean acidification, atmospheric aerosol loading, stratospheric ozone depletion, and novel entities (e.g. new substances or modified life forms causing unwanted geophysical or biological consequences). The boundaries are separated into two tiers, recognising that climate change and biodiversity loss constitute the first tier of core boundaries due to their fundamental importance to all other earth systems (Steffen et al., 2015). The fundamental risk in exceeding the boundaries lies in the destabilisation of Earth’s systems, which may abruptly shift into a new state with devastating impacts for humanity, which depends on natural resources and ecosystem services. Worryingly, Steffen et al. concluded (2015) that in five of the nine dimensions (biodiversity loss, climate change, land system change, and nitrogen and phosphorus loading) the safe boundary for the planet has already been exceeded.
Impacts of sustainability and resilience research on risk governance, management and education
Published in Sustainable and Resilient Infrastructure, 2021
Linda Nielsen, Michael H. Faber
In the original formulation, the planetary boundaries concept is advocated as a framework for estimating a safe operating space for humanity with respect to the functioning of the Earth system (Rockström et al., 2009). The authors identify key Earth system processes and attempt to quantify for each process the boundary level that should not be exceeded if unacceptable global environmental change is to be avoided. Unacceptable change is defined in relation to the risk and uncertainty humanity faces in the transition of the planet from the Holocene to the Anthropocene. Drawing on research from the discipline of ecology (Carpenter et al., 2001; Folke et al., 2004; Hughes et al., 2007; Scheffer, 2009), they present evidence from local to regional scale ecosystems that incremental changes in key control variables such as biodiversity, harvesting, soil quality, freshwater flows, and nutrient cycles, can trigger abrupt system change states once a certain threshold is exceeded. Nine planetary boundaries are identified: climate change, stratospheric ozone depletion, atmospheric aerosol loading, ocean acidification, biochemical flows, freshwater use, land-system change, biosphere integrity (functional and generic diversity), and novel entities. In the updated concept outline, Steffen et al. (2015) elaborate on the scientific underpinnings of the PB framework and present the status of the control variables for seven of the planetary boundaries. The authors further claim that climate change and biosphere integrity are the ‘core’ planetary boundaries based on their fundamental importance to the Earth system.