Sustainability: a Dissent

Abstract:  Broadly conceived and considered in its many usages, sustainability has grave defects as a planning goal, particularly when used by conservationists: it confuses means and ends; it is vague about what is being sustained and who or what is doing the sustaining; it is uninspiring; it is little more than Pinchot-era conservation (and thus ignores the many lessons learned since then); it need not be linked to land, to the land's functioning, or to any ecological science; it need not include a moral component; it is consistent with the view of humans as all-powerful manipulators of the planet; and, in general, it is such a malleable term that its popularity provides only a facade of consensus. When sustainability is defined broadly to include the full range of economic and social aspirations, it poses the particular risk that ecological and biodiversity concerns will be cast aside in favor of more pressing human wants. Given these many defects, the conservation movement should discard the term in favor of a more alluring goal, attentive to nature and its ecological functioning. A sound goal would incorporate and distill the considerable ecological and moral wisdom accumulated since Pinchot's day while giving conservationists the rhetorical tools needed to defend the land against competing pressures. In our view, conservation would be well served by an updated variant of "land health," Aldo Leopold's ecologically grounded goal from the 1940s. Land health as an independent understanding should set the essential terms of how we live and enjoy the earth, providing the framework within which we pursue our many social and economic aims.     

Why ecosystem management can't work without Social science: An example from the California northern spotted owl controversy

It is increasingly obvious that social science, while not a sufficient condition for making ecosystem management effective, is a necessary condition. A social science typology of ecosystems is developed, applied, and shown to have substantial and unexpected implications for the practice of ecosystem management. Ecologists and environmental scientists, in particular, will find some conclusions uncomfortable. The application involves a case material from the California northern spotted owl controversy.     

施工企业安全文化的核心——保护员工的安全与健康

分析了企业安全文化的发展和施工安全的特点，围绕企业目标、市场占有率、生产成本、企业形象、经济效益等内容，论述了保护员工安全与健康是施工企业安全文化的核心     

中国可持续发展与国家安全文化战略的新对策

“可持续发展”战略的实质是社会、经济发展与资源、环境相协调的一种发展模式。值得注意，这一人类社会发展模式中跨世纪重大转变的策略，尚未引起安全与减灾科技界的普遍关注，不仅在安全减灾战略研究中很少涉及，严重的是它阻碍了安全减灾诸领域跨世纪及决策课题研究的深度，造成与国际接轨进程缓慢。为此，立足可持续发展思路，并以全新视角、系统地讨论适宜安全减灾文化战略的总体对策，可望能为中国二十一世纪安全保障及科技发展提供科学指南     

职业健康安全管理体系常见理解误区及应对方法

由于受传统安全管理思想的影响，许多企业在理解和运用职业健康安全管理方法时，常常存在着一些理解误区，影响体系运行的绩效。本文在分析、总结这些误区的基础上，提出了理解职业安全健康管理体系的正确思路和方法，以使职业安全健康管理体系能更好地为企业的安全生产服务。     

论对社会弱势群体的职业卫生与安全的法律保护

结合对“社会弱势群体”含义、产生原因的分析以及对我国社会弱势群职业卫生与安全法律保护现状的总结，本文指出了法律对社会弱势群体职业卫生与安全给予倾斜性保护的重要意义，并进一步提出了加强对社会弱势群体职业卫生与安全法律保护具体措施的设想。     

浙江省生态环境可持续发展评价指标体系的建立

生态环境的可持续发展评价是生态安全与生态建设中的重要内容。本研究应用主成分分析法，收集浙江省1990～2000年的数据，对评价指标进行初步筛选．同时采用德尔斐法进行专家咨询，得到评价指标的分层排序。最后从初选的54个评价指标中，根据主成分分析法、专家咨询法的指标筛选结果，结合有关国家及地方生态环境建设规划，建立了由40个指标组成的浙江省生态环境可持续发展评价指标体系。     

Coupling a land use model and an ecosystem model for a crop-pasture zone

This paper describes the development of a land use model coupling ecosystem processes. For a given land use pattern in a region, a built-in regional ecosystem model (TESim) simulates leaf physiology of plants, carbon and nitrogen dynamics, and hydrological processes including runoff generation and run-on re-absorption, as well as runoff-induced soil erosion and carbon and nitrogen loss from ecosystems. The simulation results for a certain period from 1976 to 1999 were then used to support land use decisions and to assess the impacts of land use changes on environment. In the coupling model, the land use type for a land unit was determined by optimization of a weighted suitability derived from expert knowledge about the ecosystem state and site conditions. The model was applied to the temperate crop-pasture band in northern China (CCPB) to analyze the interactions between land use and major ecosystem processes and functions and to indicate the added value of the feedbacks by comparing simulations with and without the coupling and feedbacks between land use module and ecosystem processes. The results indicated that the current land use in CCPB is neither economical nor ecologically judicious. The scenario with feedbacks increased NPP by 46.78 g C m⁻² a⁻¹, or 32.23% of the scenario without feedbacks, also decreased soil erosion by 0.65 kg m⁻² a⁻¹, or 23.13%. Without altering the regional land use structure (proportions of each land use type). The system developed in this study potentially benefits both land managers and researchers.     

Ecological scenarios analyzed and evaluated by a shallow lake model

We applied the complex ecosystem model EMMO, which was adopted to the shallow lake Müggelsee (Germany), in order to evaluate a large set of ecological scenarios. By means of EMMO, 33 scenarios and 17 indicators were defined to characterize their effects on the lake ecosystem. The indicators were based on model outputs of EMMO and can be separated into biological indicators, such as chlorophyll-a and cyanobacteria, and hydro-chemical indicators, such as phosphorus. The question to be solved was, what is the ranking of the scenarios based on their characterization by these 17 indicators? And how can we handle high quantities of complex data within evaluation procedures? The scenario evaluation was performed by partial order theory which, however, did not provide a clear result. By subsequently applying the hierarchical cluster analysis (complete linkage) it was possible to reduce the data matrix to indicator and scenario representatives. Even though this step implies losses of information, it simplifies the application of partial order theory and the post processing by METEOR. METEOR is derived from partial order theory and allows the stepwise aggregation of indicators, which subsequently leads to a distinct and clear decision. In the final evaluation result the best scenario was the one which defines a minimum nutrient input and no phosphorus release from the sediment while the worst scenario is characterized by a maximum nutrient input and extensive phosphorus release from the sediment. The reasonable and comprehensive results show that the combination of partial order, cluster analysis and METEOR can handle big amounts of data in a very clear and transparent way, and therefore is ideal in the context of complex ecosystem models, like that we applied.     

宁东能源化工基地核心区表层土壤酚类污染物的污染评价、空间分布及来源解析

采集了宁东能源化工基地核心区的146个表层土壤样品,检测了6种优控酚类污染物.运用单因子污染指数、内梅罗综合污染指数和致癌风险指数评价了酚类污染物的污染程度及健康风险.借助主成分分析和绝对主成分分数-多元线性回归受体模型,结合地统计学方法,对酚类污染物的空间分布及来源进行了分析.结果显示:2,4-二氯酚和2,4,6-三...