Watershed Ecology and the Environment最新文献

A comprehensive understanding of how socioecological factors influence multiple ecosystem services (ESs) may provide stakeholders with a management tool to coordinate economic development and environmental protection. However, previous studies have focused more on the supply side compared with the demand of ESs. Furthermore, the underlying mechanisms for the changes in the supply–demand balance of ESs and their multiple drivers remain unclear. Therefore, in this study, an integrated theoretical framework was developed to assess the interactions of socioecological factors, including land use and cover, the social economy, climate, and topography, with the variations in ES supply, demand, and balance, which were mapped at the city scale in the Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB). A variance inflation factor (VIF) was employed to detect the multicollinearity of the factors, and the sum of Akaike weights was used to simplify the driving factors and identify essential driving factors. We employed variation partitioning analysis (VPA) to reveal the effects of unique and combined drivers on ES supply, demand and balance. The results revealed that undersupply cities (11.93% of the area) were concentrated within the three national urban agglomerations and increased in area from upstream to downstream, whereas oversupply cities (88.07%) were distributed mainly in the surroundings of the urban agglomerations. According to the VPA, the essential driving factors effectively explain the variation in the ES supply, demand, and balance in the YREB. More importantly, these driving factors were simplified with no significant decrease in explanatory power. In oversupply cities, the ES changes were determined based on socioeconomic factors (urbanization rate and population density), land use/land cover (cropland, woodland, and unused land), and their interactions. In undersupply cities, population density (PD) explained the majority of the variation in ESs. However, the effects of climate and topography on ESs were more prominent at the scale of all cities in the YREB. In addition, PD displayed a significant negative correlation with ES supply and balance, but was positively related to ES demand in the undersupply cities. These findings contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the effects of the interactions among socioecological factors on the supply–demand balance of ESs. This study is informative for human well-being and sustainable socioeconomic development in the region.

Hydrologic restoration at the watershed scale is a complex process that can influence other processes and conditions within the watershed and downstream systems. Given these interrelated watershed scale processes, tools like models are essential to assess the potential effectiveness of sub-watershed to regional remediation strategies for ecological restoration. The goal of Everglades restoration is to restore the quality, quantity, and timing of water to one of the most ecologically unique and complex systems. This study aimed to evaluate changes to water quality associated with hydrologic restoration efforts within the Feeder Canal Basin as identified by the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) by demonstrating, through simulations the potential effectiveness of implementing water quality remediation measures such as Best Management Practices (BMPs) and Stormwater Treatment Areas (STAs) within the WERP area. Additionally, to understand potential phosphorus sources and pre-develpoement conditions within the basin, a pre-development baseline was developed. Using the Watershed Assessment Model (WAM) various model alternatives including the WERP tentatively selected plan (TSP) were developed for a 22 year period of simulation. The implementation of both moderate and aggressive BMPs significantly reduced total phosphorus concentrations within the canal system at various levels indicating an improvement to near-field conditions. Meanwhile, not until the moderated BMPs and operation of an STA do water quality improvement become realized further downstream. The combined strategy of BMPs and STA demonstrates the integrated nature of nutrient remediation with both near and far-field benefits to the system with hydrologic restoration. This integrated strategy of water quality and hydrologic restoration can lead to a more sustainable and resilient restored ecosystem.

South Africa has a wealth of wetlands that provide a range of environmental, cultural and economic goods and services. In recognition of the importance of wetlands, South Africa has been a member of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance (also referred to as the Ramsar Convention) since 1975. Apart from this international commitment, South Africa has developed an array of environmental laws and policies that serve as instruments for protecting and managing wetlands. The study aimed to analyse the strengths and limitations of South Africa’s environmental policies and legislative framework that promotes wetland protection and management. The Constitution and nine environmental national laws with provisions relating to wetland conservation and management were thus purposefully selected and analysed qualitatively. The study found that there is no stand-alone wetland policy that protects wetlands; rather, several sectoral policies integrate objectives relating to wetland conservation in the country including those that cover agriculture, the environment, biodiversity and water. This multiplicity means there are no unified management objectives for wetlands protection and conservation. The study also found that there is a lack of harmonisation of policies and legislation, inadequate intergovernmental coordination and no integrated monitoring among the government departments involved. The study concludes that this disjointed and incoherent approach to wetlands conservation and management has weakened the effectiveness of the legal framework and this has obstructed their effectiveness in protecting this sensitive ecosystem.

The analysis of morphometric parameters plays a crucial role in understanding and managing watersheds, making it a fundamental component of hydrological investigations. This review paper talks about how important it is to objectively evaluate morphometric parameters, with a focus on the evaluation of basins' relief, linear, and areal parameters. However, it is noted that there is a lack of a distinct standard classification and implication for each parameter in some research publications. Furthermore, the range and categories of values for each morphometric parameter have not been adequately addressed in previous studies. Many papers state whether a particular parameter's resultant value is high or low without providing specific value ranges or associated implications. Also, it is emphasised that the accuracy and sources of digital elevation models (DEMs) affect how well morphometric parameter analysis works, even when DEMs with the same resolution are used. The existing literature demonstrates that determining the value of each morphometric parameter poses significant challenges. Moreover, verifying the first and second Horton's laws and assessing the correlations between morphometric parameters have been lacking in some articles. The main objective of this review article is to address these gaps by providing an in-depth study of each parameter's categorization, including the range of values, the level of input data quality, the data products generated, and the applicability of the fundamental Horton's laws. By doing so, this review aims to enhance the understanding of morphometric parameters, their value ranges, and the significance of their application in watershed analysis and management.

The international conventions on environments, i.e., biodiversity (United Nations Convention on Biodiversity - UNCBD), land degradation (United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification - UNCCD), and climate change (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change - UNFCCC) stipulates country-level policies, programs, and actions in sustaining environmental well-being. This study attempts to connect the three conventions ratified into national regulations in Indonesia. The connection is framed to develop indicators and their attributes for measuring health or risk levels of watershed functions and services to the present challenges. The risk assessment is formulated based on a set of risk components and indicators developed with referring to Ministry of Forestry Regulation No. 60/2014 about the classification of watershed health conditions, Ministry of Forestry Regulation No. 29/2009 about biodiversity, and Ministry of Environment and Forestry Regulation No. 7/2018 about climate change risk assessment. The formulation grouped the risk indicators into biophysical, socio-economic, and governance. The risk assessment is applied to the Way Khilau watershed of Lampung, Indonesia, to measure the risk levels and identify the contributing indicators that should be considered for designing adaptation options. Under the current conditions, the Way Khilau watershed has a score of about 123.25 or 0.77, which will be exacerbated by future climate change. The risk level can reach a score of 138 or 0.89, nearly approaching the upper threshold. This risk level urges the policymakers and stakeholders to take adaptation actions to maintain the functions and services of the Why Khilau watershed.

Sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB), a diverse taxonomic group of anaerobic microorganisms that oxidize sulfur compounds as terminal electron acceptors, drive the key biogeochemical process of sulfate reduction. However, little is known about the diversity of SRB in tropical coastal habitats. Thus, the goal of this study is to explore and compare the community diversity of the Ashtamudi and Vembanad estuaries and evaluate the sedimentary sulfate reduction rate. The microbiome profiling of SRB was carried out using Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) techniques (Illumina sequencing) based on gene amplification of the dissimilatory sulfate reductase (dsr) enzyme to confirm the diversity and dominant taxa of SRB. The diversity of SRB represented by the Shannon alpha diversity index of the Ashtamudi estuary (6.55) was two-fold that of the Vembanad estuary. In the Vembanad estuary, the marine zone (4.09) harboured more diversity than the freshwater zone (1.825). Higher diversity and lower abundant taxa in the Ashtamudi estuary pointed out the presence of a rare biosphere that has not yet been studied. It was interesting to note that both estuaries have the same SRB phylum diversity. At the level of species, however, there was a noticeable difference. This differential diversity of SRB has an apparent influence on methane production during the breakdown of organic matter in addition to sulfate reduction. Several species of SRB have an important role in the biodegradation of persistent pollutants and the removal of heavy metals.

Zinc oxide/activated carbon from Thapsia transtagana stems (ZnO/ACTTS) composite demonstrated good photocatalytic properties for removing methyl orange (MO) dye from aqueous solution. This study utilized the chemical activation method using phosphoric acid to prepare activated carbon, which was then used to synthesize the ZnO/ACTTS composites by the hydrothermal technique at different percentages of the amount of ZnO (15, 30, 50 and 75 %). XRD, FTIR, and SEM-EDX were used to characterize the produced composite materials. The photocatalytic degradation of the catalysts was investigated for the degradation of MO dye from aqueous solution. The effects of zinc oxide content, pH of solution, and catalyst dosage were studied. Experimental results indicate that the ZnO/ACTTS (75 %) composite with exhibited good activity under acid pH conditions with an optimal catalyst dosage of 0.5 g/L. Photodegradation kinetics followed a pseudo-second order kinetics. ZnO/ACTTS composite will be a catalyst to degrade a wide range of dyes from the textile industry in the aquatic medium.

Microplastics (MPs) have been identified as emerging contaminants and have received global attention because they pose a severe threat to wildlife and the human food chain. In recent years, many studies related to the sources, distribution, and effects of MPs in marine, terrestrial, and wastewater environmental compartments have been reported, whereas a comprehensive overview of the presence and characteristics of MPs in unique coastal wetland ecosystems is still lacking. Therefore, this review summarizes the accumulation and sources of MPs in coastal wetlands, as well as their effects on these ecosystems, based on environmental monitoring and laboratory results published in the literature. First, the accumulation of MPs in coastal wetlands is briefly reviewed. Second, the sources of MPs in coastal wetlands are discussed. Third, the ecological effects of MPs on coastal wetlands are summarized. Finally, this review presents gaps in the MPs research and provides an outlook for future research in this field.

Due to the dual impacts of anthropogenic disturbances and climate change, tidal hydrodynamics of estuaries have been intensively investigated for their potential to increase flood risk and devastate coastal habitats and human communities. Climate change leads to rises in sea levels, which can amplify regional tides and increase tidal ranges. This study takes the estuarine area of the Pearl River (PRE), one of the fastest-developed estuaries in China, as an example to explore the effects of land cover changes and sea level rise on tidal dynamics. Annual mean tidal levels were collected at 26 major hydrological stations from five major rivers/waterways. To better understand the temporal changes in tidal levels, we analyzed the trends and periodic patterns through linear regression and Complex Morlet wavelet analyses. For the main Pearl River outlet, where conversion of agricultural land to urban use had been primarily taking place, the tidal level changes were significantly affected by increased built-up areas and decreased cultivated land areas. On the other hand, in the middle to upper reaches of the Xi River and Shunde-Hengmen Waterway, we observed decreased tidal levels with decreases in the agricultural lands. No significant correlations were found between annual mean tidal levels and land cover changes downstream of the main rivers. Instead, the tidal level changes at locations close to the coastline were more related to sea level rise, with an average of 0.002 m per year increase. This study highlighted the importance of human activity and sea level rise impacts on tidal dynamics. A systematic understanding of the tidal changes in the estuary is expected to help enhance mechanisms of estuarine hydrology, which could serve as the basis for improving the management and practice of coastal regions in coping with climate change and estuary protection.