A Framework for Quantitative Assessment of Impacts Related to Energy and Mineral Resource Development     

Seth S. Haines  Jay E. Diffendorfer  Laurie Balistrieri  Byron Berger  Troy Cook  Don DeAngelis  Holly Doremus  Donald L. Gautier  Tanya Gallegos  Margot Gerritsen  Elisabeth Graffy  Sarah Hawkins  Kathleen M. Johnson  Jordan Macknick  Peter McMahon  Tim Modde  Brenda Pierce  John H. Schuenemeyer  Darius Semmens  Benjamin Simon  Jason Taylor  Katie Walton-Day 《Natural Resources Research》2014,23(1):3-17

Natural resource planning at all scales demands methods for assessing the impacts of resource development and use, and in particular it requires standardized methods that yield robust and unbiased results. Building from existing probabilistic methods for assessing the volumes of energy and mineral resources, we provide an algorithm for consistent, reproducible, quantitative assessment of resource development impacts. The approach combines probabilistic input data with Monte Carlo statistical methods to determine probabilistic outputs that convey the uncertainties inherent in the data. For example, one can utilize our algorithm to combine data from a natural gas resource assessment with maps of sage grouse leks and piñon-juniper woodlands in the same area to estimate possible future habitat impacts due to possible future gas development. As another example: one could combine geochemical data and maps of lynx habitat with data from a mineral deposit assessment in the same area to determine possible future mining impacts on water resources and lynx habitat. The approach can be applied to a broad range of positive and negative resource development impacts, such as water quantity or quality, economic benefits, or air quality, limited only by the availability of necessary input data and quantified relationships among geologic resources, development alternatives, and impacts. The framework enables quantitative evaluation of the trade-offs inherent in resource management decision-making, including cumulative impacts, to address societal concerns and policy aspects of resource development.  相似文献   

Measuring bluff erosion part 2: pairing aerial photographs and terrestrial laser scanning to create a watershed scale sediment budget     

Stephanie S. Day  Karen B. Gran  Patrick Belmont  Tim Wawrzyniec 《地球表面变化过程与地形》2013,38(10):1068-1082

Effectively managing and reducing high suspended sediment loads in rivers requires an understanding of the magnitude of major sediment sources as well as erosion and transport processes that deliver excess fine sediments to the channel network. The focus of this research is to determine the magnitude of erosion from tall bluffs, a primary sediment source in the 2880 km² Le Sueur watershed, Minnesota, USA. We coupled analyses of seven decades of aerial photographs with four years of repeat terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) to determine erosion rates on bluffs. Together, these datasets provide decadal‐scale retreat rates throughout the entire watershed and high‐resolution geomorphic change detection on a subset of bluffs to both constrain erosion rates and document how environmental conditions affect bluff retreat. Erosion rates from aerial photographs and TLS were extrapolated from 243 and 15 measured bluffs, respectively, to all 480 bluffs in the Le Sueur watershed using multiple techniques to obtain estimates of sediment loading from these features at the watershed‐scale. Despite different spatial and temporal measurement scales, the aerial photograph and TLS estimates yielded similar results for bluff retreat rate and total mass of sediment derived from bluffs, with bluffs in the Le Sueur watershed yielding 135 000 ± 39 000 Mg/yr of fine sediment. Comparing this value to the average annual total suspended solids (TSS) load determined from gauging from 2000 to 2010, we determined that bluffs comprise 57 ± 16% of the total TSS load, making bluffs the single most abundant fine sediment source in the basin. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.  相似文献   

Praying for success? Faith schools and school choice in East London     

Tim Butler  Chris Hamnett 《Geoforum》2012,43(6):1242-1253

The article discusses research undertaken in East London into perceptions of educational choice amongst a group of middle-class parents drawn from all the main ethnic groups. It focuses on the way in which faith schools are slowly being drawn into the mainstream discourse of choice and how many groups are now beginning to regard such schools as their fall back of choice when it becomes apparent that they are unlikely to get their child into a preferred non-selective secondary school (and increasingly a preferred primary school). This mainstreaming of faith schooling is driven by the attractions to such parents of these schools’ ethos, their perception of them as having a favourable social mix of ‘people like us’ and their generally high record of attainment. It is argued that this increase in demand for faith schools is leading to changes in the recruitment patterns away from primarily faith-based criteria to ones based around a more diffuse (and middle-class) ethos and educational potential. In addition, where such schools once served a wider East London geographical area, there is some evidence that they are now becoming more focused around a local ‘catchment area’ in ways similar to the same popular non-selective schools to which the same group of parents aspired.  相似文献   

Metamorphic re-equilibration and metasomatism of highly chromian,garnet-rich peridotitic xenoliths from South African kimberlites     

Tim?J.?IvanicEmail author  Ben?Harte  John?J.?Gurney 《Contributions to Mineralogy and Petrology》2012,164(3):505-520

A history of decompression and metasomatism is preserved in a suite of highly chromian, garnet-rich peridotitic xenoliths from the diamondiferous Newlands and Bobbejaan kimberlites, South Africa. A high proportion of the garnets and chromites in these rocks plot in the diamond-facies fields on Cr₂O₃–CaO and Cr₂O₃–MgO wt% plots, and Cr-rich compositions are found in both the harzburgitic and lherzolitic fields. Petrographic evidence suggests that the earliest known mineralogies were those of olivine-bearing, garnet-rich rocks. These were modified by a decompression event that caused recrystallization of garnets and led to orientated spinel and pyroxene inclusions in garnet. Chemical zonation within garnet is divided into (1) external re-equilibration between garnet and matrix; (2) internal re-equilibration between garnet and its inclusions; and (3) metasomatically induced zoning between garnet core and a metasomatic rim. The compositional trajectories associated with zonations (1) and (2) in Ca–Cr plots may be closely modelled by means of sliding, garnet–spinel transition reactions whose slopes vary with bulk Ca composition; at intermediate Ca compositions, the trajectories closely match the slope of the lherzolite line or harzburgite/lherzolite boundary. The decreasing Cr/(Cr + Al) of the garnet in these zonations is in agreement with the evidence for decompression given by the petrographic recrystallization features, and overall decompression of probably 10–20 kb is indicated. We speculate on the age of these events, and consider the possibility of their association with major orogenic events documented by South African crustal rocks at 2.9–2.7 Ga, and events evidenced by peridotite-xenolith Re–Os model ages at 2.8–2.7 Ga.  相似文献   

Mathematical modeling of earths dynamical systems: a primer,by Rudy Slingerland & Lee Kump. Princeton University Press,Princeton & Oxford, 2011. No of pages: 231.Price: US$30.95. ISBN 978‐0‐691‐14514‐3 (paperback).     

Tim Davies 《Geological Journal》2014,49(3):327-327

  相似文献   

Unusual double-peaked emission in the SDSS quasar J093201.60 + 031858.7     

R.S. Barrows  C.H.S. Lacy  D. Kennefick  J. Kennefick  M.S. Seigar 《New Astronomy》2011,16(2):122-127

We examine spectral properties of the SDSS quasar J093201.60 + 031858.7, in particular the presence of strong blue peaks in the Balmer emission lines offset from the narrow lines by approximately 4200 km s^?1. Asymmetry in the broad central component of the Hβ line indicates the presence of a double-peaked emitter. However, the strength and sharpness of the blue Hβ and blue Hγ peaks make this quasar spectrum unique among double-peaked emitters identified from SDSS spectra. We fit a disk model to the Hβ line and compare this object with other unusual double-peaked quasar spectra, particularly candidate binary supermassive black holes (SMBHs). Under the binary SMBH scenario, we test the applicability of a model in which a second SMBH may produce the strong blue peak in the Balmer lines of a double-peaked emitter. If there were only one SMBH, a circular, Keplerian disk model fit would be insufficient, indicating some sort of asymmetry is required to produce the strength of the blue peak. In either case, understanding the nature of the complex line emission in this object will aid in further discrimination between a single SMBH with a complex accretion disk and the actual case of a binary SMBH.  相似文献   

An oil sand pseudo-elastic model for determining ground deformation under large mobile mining equipment     

Ardeshir Dehmoobed Sharif-abadi  Tim Grain Joseph 《Geotechnical and Geological Engineering》2010,28(4):471-481

Strain softening of oil sand under dynamic loading from large mining equipment inhibits the ability of the equipment to function at optimal design performance. This paper looks at the findings of dynamic plate load tests, which effectively mimick the loading and unloading action of a shovel track pad. A pseudo-elastic model was proposed based on the results of the dynamic plate load testing to predict the deformation of oil sand under cyclic loading. Both field and laboratory cyclic plate load tests were performed on oil sand materials. The field tests were performed with different plate sizes, or footprints. The load was normalized based on the pressure stiffness concept in units of pressure per unit deformation. FLAC was used to model the field plate load test deformation with the elastic concept. The laboratory tests were performed at room temperature with more control on the load, loading rate, and cycles than possible during the field testing. Tests were conducted using a circular plate of 14.9 cm diameter, at stress magnitudes of 200, 400, 500 and 600 kPa. The plate load tests were conducted for varying loads, holding, and relaxation times of 0, 2, 5 and 10 min respectively for each magnitude of stress. The outcome of laboratory plate load tests show that after frequent cycles, the pressure stiffness (ratio of stress to deformation) converges on a plateau value of 8 kPa/mm. The proposed approach can be used to evaluate oil sands ground performance, enhancing the prediction process for ground deformation under the operation of ultra-class mining equipment.  相似文献   

西南太平洋汤加岛弧的海底火山和高温热液喷发     

Peter stoffers  周立君 《海洋地质前沿》2007,23(2):22-23

西太平洋中大多数已知的高温热液喷发都出现在洋内弧后环境中,如劳海盆、北斐济海盆和马里亚纳海沟.在弧前的海底火山上已经发现了热液喷发和相应的矿床,其中许多火山还在排气,并有释放到海底的岩浆挥发物的证据,但是只在水深超过1 km的最深的塌陷火山口发现了黑烟喷口、典型深洋中脊和弧后扩张中心.本文描述了汤加岛弧浅海底火山上首次发现的高温热液喷发和大面积的硫化物-硫酸盐烟道.  相似文献   

Graptolites; Writing in the Rocks. Fossils Illustrated Volume 1 edited by Douglas Palmer and Barrie Rickards,The Boydell Press, 1991. No. of pages: 182 (plus 138 plates). Price: £39.50 (hardback). ISBN 0–85115–262–7     

Tim Young 《Geological Journal》1992,27(1):98-99

  相似文献