Little research on perfluorinated compounds (PFCs) has been conducted in rural areas, although rural PFC sources are less complicated than in urban and industrial areas. To determine the levels and geographical distribution of 17 PFC compounds, samples of soil, surface water, and groundwater were collected from eight rural areas in eastern China. The total PFC concentrations (∑PFCs) in soils ra...

Zhang Y., Feng M.M., Yang J.Y., Zhao T.N., Wu H.L., Shi C.Q., Shen Y. (2015): Effects of soil cover and protective measures on reducing runoff and soil loss under artificial rainfall. Soil & Water Res., 10: 198–205. The hazards from wind, sand, and soil erosion caused by human activities, such as residue slopes in abandoned urban mines, have resulted in a vicious circle of environmental degrada...

Urban community gardens worldwide provide significant health benefits to those gardening and consuming fresh produce from them. Urban gardens are most often placed in locations and on land in which soil contaminants reflect past practices and often contain elevated levels of metals and organic contaminants. Garden plot dividers made from either railroad ties or chromated copper arsenate (CCA) p...

INTRODUCTION To promote rational and sustainable use of soil resources and to maintain the urban soil quality, it is essential to assess urban ecosystem health. In this study, the microbiological properties of urban soils in Beijing and their spatial distribution patterns across the city were evaluated based on measurements of microbial biomass carbon and urease and invertase activities of the ...

Urban soil quality is often degraded and a challenging substrate for trees. This study was conducted to assess the impacts of biochar (BC), biosolids (BS), wood chips (WC), compost (COM), aerated compost tea (ACT), and a nitrogen plus potassium fertilizer (NK) for improving three typical urban soils and tree sapling growth. Across the three soil types, the most significant changes in soil prope...

Lake Minnetonka, located in southeastern Minnesota, U.S.A., is currently experiencing increased eutrophication due to excessive phosphorus (P) loading in runoff from agriculture and urban areas. This phenomenon has been exacerbated by the isolation of wetlands in the surrounding watershed from the surface water drainage network. In order to determine if rerouting surface water through these wet...

Chromite ore processing residue occurs at over 130 sites in Hudson County, New Jersey. Many of these sites are in urban residential areas. This waste is a result of 70 years of chromate and bichromate chemical manufacturing. At least 15% of the sites contain total chromium concentrations greater than 10,000 mg/kg, with hexavalent content ranging from about 1 to 50%. Continuing leaching of this ...

In this paper we analyse the profile of land use and population density with respect to the distance to the city centre for the European city. In addition to providing the radial population density and soil-sealing profiles for a large set of cities, we demonstrate a remarkable constancy of the profiles across city size. Our analysis combines the GMES/Copernicus Urban Atlas 2006 land use databa...

1 2 Since the middle of the last century, global surface air temperature exhibits an increasing trend, 3 with nocturnal temperatures increasing at a much higher rate. Proposed causative mechanisms 4 include the radiative impact of atmospheric aerosols on the nocturnal boundary layer (NBL) 5 where the temperature response is amplified due to shallow depth and its sensitivity to potential 6 desta...

Prior research by Pitt (1987) examined runoff losses from paved and roofed surfaces in urban areas and showed significant losses at these surfaces during the small and moderate sized events of most interest for water quality evaluations. However, Pitt and Durrans (1995) also examined runoff and pavement seepage on highway pavements and found that very little surface runoff entered typical highw...