The interurban DRAG-Spain model: the main factors of influence on road accidents in Spain

This paper presents the results of applying DRAG methodology to the identification of the main factors of influence on the number of injury and fatal accidents occurring on Spain���s interurban network. Nineteen independent variables have been included in the model grouped together under ten categories: exposure, infrastructure, weather, drivers, economic variables, vehicle stock, surveillance, speed and legislative measures. Highly interesting conclusions can be reached from the results on the basis of the different effects of a single variable on each of the accident types according to severity. The greatest influence revealed by the results is exposure, which together with inexperienced drivers, speed and an ageing vehicle stock, have a negative effect, while the increased surveillance on roads, the improvement in the technological features of vehicles and the proportion of high capacity networks have a positive effect, since the results obtained show a significant drop in accidents.

River Restoration in Spain: Theoretical and Practical Approach in the Context of the European Water Framework Directive.

River restoration is becoming a priority in many countries because of increasing the awareness of environmental degradation. In Europe, the EU Water Framework Directive (WFD) has significantly reinforced river restoration, encouraging the improvement of ecological status for water bodies. To fulfill the WFD requirements, the Spanish Ministry of the Environment developed in 2006 a National Strategy for River Restoration whose design and implementation are described in this paper. At the same time many restoration projects have been conducted, and sixty of them have been evaluated in terms of stated objectives and pressures and implemented restoration measures. Riparian vegetation enhancement, weir removal and fish passes were the most frequently implemented restoration measures, although the greatest pressures came from hydrologic alteration caused by flow regulation for irrigation purposes. Water deficits in quantity and quality associated with uncontrolled water demands seriously affect Mediterranean rivers and represent the main constraint to achieving good ecological status of Spanish rivers, most of them intensively regulated. Proper environmental allocation of in-stream flows would need deep restrictions in agricultural water use which seem to be of very difficult social acceptance. This situation highlights the need to integrate land-use and rural development policies with water resources and river management, and identifies additional difficulties in achieving the WFD objectives and good ecological status of rivers in Mediterranean countries.

Bioavailability and extraction of heavy metals from contaminated soil by Atriplex halimus

Pot experiments were performed to evaluate the phytoremediation capacity of plants of Atriplex halimus grown in contaminated mine soils and to investigate the effects of organic amendments on the metal bioavailability and uptake of these metals by plants. Soil samples collected from abandoned mine sites north of Madrid (Spain) were mixed with 0, 30 and 60 Mg ha?1 of two organic amendments, with different pH and nutrients content: pine-bark compost and horse- and sheep-manure compost. The increasing soil organic matter content and pH by the application of manure amendment reduced metal bioavailability in soil stabilising them. The proportion of Cu in the most bioavailable fractions (sum of the water-soluble, exchangeable, acid-soluble and Fe?Mn oxides fractions) decreased with the addition of 60 Mg ha?1 of manure from 62% to 52% in one of the soils studied and from 50% to 30% in the other. This amendment also reduced Zn proportion in water-soluble and exchangeable fractions from 17% to 13% in one of the soils. Manure decreased metal concentrations in shoots of A. halimus, from 97 to 35 mg kg?1 of Cu, from 211 to 98 mg kg?1 of Zn and from 1.4 to 0.6 mg kg?1 of Cd. In these treatments there was a higher plant growth due to the lower metal toxicity and the improvement of nutrients content in soil. This higher growth resulted in a higher total metal accumulation in plant biomass and therefore in a greater amount of metals removed from soil, so manure could be useful for phytoextraction purposes. This amendment increased metal accumulation in shoots from 37 to 138 mg pot?1 of Cu, from 299 to 445 mg pot?1 of Zn and from 1.8 to 3.7 mg pot?1 of Cd. Pine bark amendment did not significantly alter metal availability and its uptake by plants. Plants of A. halimus managed to reduce total Zn concentration in one of the soils from 146 to 130 mg kg?1, but its phytoextraction capacity was insufficient to remediate contaminated soils in the short-to-medium term. However, A. halimus could be, in combination with manure amendment, appropriate for the phytostabilization of metals in mine soils.

Comparasion of road traffic emission models in Madrid (Spain)

Many cities in Europe have difficulties to meet the air quality standards set by the European legislation, most particularly the annual mean Limit Value for NO2. Road transport is often the main source of air pollution in urban areas and therefore, there is an increasing need to estimate current and future traffic emissions as accurately as possible. As a consequence, a number of specific emission models and emission factors databases have been developed recently. They present important methodological differences and may result in largely diverging emission figures and thus may lead to alternative policy recommendations. This study compares two approaches to estimate road traffic emissions in Madrid (Spain): the COmputer Programme to calculate Emissions from Road Transport (COPERT4 v.8.1) and the Handbook Emission Factors for Road Transport (HBEFA v.3.1), representative of the ‘average-speed’ and ‘traffic situation’ model types respectively. The input information (e.g. fleet composition, vehicle kilometres travelled, traffic intensity, road type, etc.) was provided by the traffic model developed by the Madrid City Council along with observations from field campaigns. Hourly emissions were computed for nearly 15 000 road segments distributed in 9 management areas covering the Madrid city and surroundings. Total annual NOX emissions predicted by HBEFA were a 21% higher than those of COPERT. The discrepancies for NO2 were lower (13%) since resulting average NO2/NOX ratios are lower for HBEFA. The larger differences are related to diesel vehicle emissions under “stop & go” traffic conditions, very common in distributor/secondary roads of the Madrid metropolitan area. In order to understand the representativeness of these results, the resulting emissions were integrated in an urban scale inventory used to drive mesoscale air quality simulations with the Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) modelling system (1 km2 resolution). Modelled NO2 concentrations were compared with observations through a series of statistics. Although there are no remarkable differences between both model runs, the results suggest that HBEFA may overestimate traffic emissions. However, the results are strongly influenced by methodological issues and limitations of the traffic model. This study was useful to provide a first alternative estimate to the official emission inventory in Madrid and to identify the main features of the traffic model that should be improved to support the application of an emission system based on “real world” emission factors.

Seismic Hazard and Ground Motion Characterization at the Itoiz Dam (Northern Spain).

This paper presents a new hazard-consistent ground motion characterization of the Itoiz dam site, located in Northern Spain. Firstly, we propose a methodology with different approximation levels to the expected ground motion at the dam site. Secondly, we apply this methodology taking into account the particular characteristics of the site and of the dam. Hazard calculations were performed following the Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Assessment method using a logic tree, which accounts for different seismic source zonings and different ground-motion attenuation relationships. The study was done in terms of peak ground acceleration and several spectral accelerations of periods coinciding with the fundamental vibration periods of the dam. In order to estimate these ground motions we consider two different dam conditions: when the dam is empty (T = 0.1 s) and when it is filled with water to its maximum capacity (T = 0.22 s). Additionally, seismic hazard analysis is done for two return periods: 975 years, related to the project earthquake, and 4,975 years, identified with an extreme event. Soil conditions were also taken into account at the site of the dam. Through the proposed methodology we deal with different forms of characterizing ground motion at the study site. In a first step, we obtain the uniform hazard response spectra for the two return periods. In a second step, a disaggregation analysis is done in order to obtain the controlling earthquakes that can affect the dam. Subsequently, we characterize the ground motion at the dam site in terms of specific response spectra for target motions defined by the expected values SA (T) of T = 0.1 and 0.22 s for the return periods of 975 and 4,975 years, respectively. Finally, synthetic acceleration time histories for earthquake events matching the controlling parameters are generated using the discrete wave-number method and subsequently analyzed. Because of the short relative distances between the controlling earthquakes and the dam site we considered finite sources in these computations. We conclude that directivity effects should be taken into account as an important variable in this kind of studies for ground motion characteristics.

Fusarium proliferatum isolated from garlic in Spain: Identification, toxigenic potential and pathogenicity on related Allium species

Fusarium proliferatum has been reported on garlic in the Northwest USA, Spain and Serbia, causing water-soaked tan-colored lesions on cloves. In this work, Fusarium proliferatum was isolated from 300 symptomatic garlic bulbs. Morphological identification of Fusarium was confirmed using species-specific PCR assays and EF-1α sequencing. Confirmation of pathogenicity was conducted with eighteen isolates. Six randomly selected F. proliferatum isolates from garlic were tested for specific pathogenicity and screened for fusaric acid production. Additionally, pathogenicity of each F. proliferatum isolate was tested on healthy seedlings of onion (Allium cepa), leek (A. porrum), scallions (A. fistulosum), chives (A. schoenoprasum) and garlic (A. sativum). A disease severity index (DSI) was calculated as the mean severity on three plants of each species with four test replicates. Symptoms on onion and garlic plants were observed three weeks after inoculation. All isolates tested produced symptoms on all varieties inoculated. Inoculation of F. proliferatum isolates from diseased garlic onto other Allium species provided new information on host range and pathogenicity. The results demonstrated differences in susceptibility with respect to host species and cultivar. The F. proliferatum isolates tested all produced fusaric acid (FA); correlations between FA production and isolate pathogenicity are discussed. Additionally, all isolates showed the presence of the FUM1 gene suggesting the ability of Spanish isolates to produce fumonisins.

ESP in Spain: goals, achievements and prospects

This paper aims to describe the development of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) as specialised language study and research at tertiary level in Spain over the past twenty years. The year 1992 is chosen as a starting point because AELFE, the Association of Languages for Specific Purposes, was founded in Madrid at the time. As more members from other countries have joined in, this Association has served as an academic landmark for the development of ESP within the umbrella of applied linguistics. ESP has reflected the social changes, educational shifts, linguistic trends, and technological innovations involved in academic and professional contexts. The evolution of the specialised language practitioner’s scenarios and communicative situations has turned ESP into a lively and stimulating action, though not lacking in controversy, e.g., a general increase in the ESP teacher’s workload. Different lines of work and research have been followed from the inception of AELFE until the implementation of the Bologna agreement in our universities. The examination of such variables is conducted in the light of some quantitative and qualitative findings.

A new method for the identification of old-growth trees in National Forest Inventories: Application to Pinus halepensis Mill. stands in Spain

Old-growth trees play a very important role in the maintenance of biodiversity in forests. However, no clear definition is yet available to help identify them since tree age is usually not recorded in National Forest Inventories. To develop and test a new method to identify old-growth trees using a species-specific threshold for tree diameter in National Forest Inventories. Different nonlinear mixed models for diameter ? age were generated using data from the Spanish Forest Inventory in order to identify the most appropriate one for Aleppo pine in its South-western distribution area. The asymptote of the optimal model indicates the threshold diameter for defining an old-growth tree. Additionally, five site index curves were examined to analyze the influence of site quality on these models.

Extreme pointer years in tree-ring records of central Spain as evidence of climatic events and the eruption of the Huaynaputina Volcano (Peru, 1600 AD)

The study of pointer years of numerous tree-ring chronologies of the central Iberian Peninsula (Sierra de Guadarrama) could provide complementary information about climate variability over the last 405 yr. In total, 64 pointer years have been identified: 30 negative (representing minimum growths) and 34 positive (representing maximum growths), the most significant of these being 1601, 1963 and 1996 for the negative ones, and 1734 and 1737 for the positive ones. Given that summer precipitation was found to be the most limiting factor for the growth of Pinus in the Sierra de Guadarrama in the second half of the 20th century, it is also an explanatory factor in almost 50% of the extreme growths. Furthermore, these pointer years and intervals are not evenly distributed throughout time. Both in the first half of the 17th and in the second half of 20th, they were more frequent and more extreme and these periods are the most notable for the frequency of negative pointer years in Central Spain. The interval 1600–1602 is of special significance, being one of the most unfavourable for tree growth in the centre of Spain, with 1601 representing the minimum index in the regional chronology. We infer that this special minimum annual increase was the effect of the eruption of Huaynaputina, which occurred in Peru at the beginning of 1600 AD. This is the first time that the effects of this eruption in the tree-ring records of Southern Europe have been demonstrated.

Evaluation of reproductive success and conservation strategies for Senecio coincyi (Asteraceae), a narrow and threatened species.

enecio coincyi is a threatened endemic plant of central western Spain, with a very narrow extent of occurrence. The reproductive success and germination behaviour of this species were studied. The area of occupancy, habitat types and size of 13 known subpopulations of S. coincyi were evaluated. The number of individuals that form all these subpopulations was counted. In addition, the number of flowers and cypselas per fruit head and the number of fruit heads per individual plant were recorded in a subset of subpopulations. Germination tests were carried out to evaluate the effect of temperature and light regimes on, and possible intraspecific variation in, cypsela germination. Cypselas reached very high germination percentages (90?100%) from 15°C to 30°C. However, the germination decreased (19%) at 10°C. The light conditions assayed (16-h light photoperiod and complete darkness) did not significantly affect cypsela germination. In general, there was no intraspecific variability in germination patterns of S. coincyi cypselas. Livestock is the most important factor that can be a threat for this species. S. coincyi showed high reproductive success and, therefore, its conservation problems are not due to agents related to its reproduction, but rather to other factors such as alteration of its habitat caused by the presence of livestock.

Exceptionally well-preserved vegetal remains from the Upper Cretaceous of "Lo Hueco", Cuenca, Spain

Vegetal remains are considered labile structures that quickly become decayed in ecosystems. However, certain lignified tissues (woody plants) can largely resist decomposition, becoming sometimes exceptionally well preserved. At the Upper Cretaceous site of ?Lo Hueco? (Cuenca, Spain), those woody remains (trunks and branches) with resinous material in the inner tracheids and parenchyma cells that were buried rapidly under anoxic conditions experienced a low degree of maturation, becoming exceptionally well preserved. Those woody remains deposited under oxic conditions (subaerial or sub-aquatic exposure) were more intensely biodegraded and subsequently carbonified, partially or completely mineralized in gypsum and covered by a ferruginous crust. These two modes of preservation are scarce, with silicification or carbonification processes much more common, and both can be considered as ?exceptional preservation?. Other vegetal remains, such as carbonified leaves, stems and roots, were collected in the site. The different modes of preservation depend directly on: depositional micro-environment (sandy distributary channel, muddy flood plain); and type (trunk, branch, stem, leave, root) and state (presence or absence of resinous material) of the material. The great abundance and diversity of fossils in ?Lo Hueco? identify it as Konzentrat-Lagersta¿tten, sequentially formed by alternated events of flooding and drying depositional events, but the exceptional quality and rarity of determinate vegetal macroremains preservation suggest that certain deposits of this site can be considered as conservation deposits.

Effect of the application of jasmonic acid and benzoic acid on grafted watermelons yield under greenhouse conditions in the southeast of Spain for mitigation of stress

One of the main problems of watermelon crops in Sou theast Spain is the thermal difference because of c limatic conditions that appear during the first stages of the crop. The objective of this work was to evaluate the effect of inducing the systemic acq uired resistance (SAR) and the induced systemic resistance (ISR) through the application of jasmonic ac id (JA) and benzoic acid (BA), respectively, to counter the abiotic stress. We assessed two treatments of JA and BA, T1 (500 mg·kg-1 + 500 mg·kg -1 ) and T 2 (2000 mg·kg -1 + 2000 mg·kg -1), as well as a control test using an experimental design of randomized blocks with four replications. The results obtained for kg·m -2, fruits/m², kg/plant and fruits/plant did not show statistically significant differences. However, we obtained statistically sig nificant differences in the average fruit weight co mpared with the control test in the two experiments carried out in 2009 and 2010. The results showed that there was no metabolic cost in the plants when applying the assessed treatments of JA and BA.

Geochemical monitoring in the Hontomín (Burgos, Spain) injection site: preliminary results and perspectives

CO2 capture and storage (CCS) projects are presently developed to reduce the emission of anthropogenic CO2 into the atmosphere. CCS technologies are expected to account for the 20% of the CO2 reduction by 2050. One of the main concerns of CCS is whether CO2 may remain confined within the geological formation into which it is injected since post-injection CO2 migration in the time scale of years, decades and centuries is not well understood. Theoretically, CO2 can be retained at depth i) as a supercritical fluid (physical trapping), ii) as a fluid slowly migrating in an aquifer due to long flow path (hydrodynamic trapping), iii) dissolved into ground waters (solubility trapping) and iv) precipitated secondary carbonates. Carbon dioxide will be injected in the near future (2012) at Hontomín (Burgos, Spain) in the frame of the Compostilla EEPR project, led by the Fundación Ciudad de la Energía (CIUDEN). In order to detect leakage in the operational stage, a pre-injection geochemical baseline is presently being developed. In this work a geochemical monitoring design is presented to provide information about the feasibility of CO2 storage at depth.

Construction Cost Estimates for Residences in Spain: practical application of the Pcr.5n model

The construction cost estimation systems in Spain are undeveloped and, hence, infrequently used by technicians and professionals in the building sector. However, estimation of an approximate real cost prior to the execution of the work is compulsory under current legal regulations (Technical Building Code). Therefore, the development of research projects on construction cost estimation models such as the one described and demonstrated in this talk is extremely interesting.

Analysis of the impact of charging of PHEV and EV in Spain

This paper studies the effect of different penetration rates of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and electric vehicles (EV) in the Spanish electrical system. A stochastic model for the average trip evaluation and for the arriving and departure times is used to determine the availability of the vehicles for charging. A novel advanced charging algorithm is proposed, which avoids any communication among all agents. Its performance is determined through different charging scenarios.