Towards sea surface pollution detection from visible band images

This paper presents a novel approach to water pollution detection from remotely sensed low-platform mounted visible band camera images. We examine the feasibility of unsupervised segmentation for slick (oily spills on the water surface) region labelling. Adaptive and non adaptive filtering is combined with density modeling of the obtained textural features. A particular effort is concentrated on the textural feature extraction from raw intensity images using filter banks and adaptive feature extraction from the obtained output coefficients. Segmentation in the extracted feature space is achieved using Gaussian mixture models (GMM).

Odour pollution problems within the district of the Wrekin council

This thesis is concerned with various aspects of Air Pollution due to smell, the impact it has on communities exposed to it, the means by which it may be controlled and the manner in which a local authority may investigate the problems it causes. The approach is a practical one drawing on examples occurring within a Local Authority's experience and for that reason the research is anecdotal and is not a comprehensive treatise on the full range of options available. Odour Pollution is not yet a well organised discipline and might be considered esoteric as it is necessary to incorporate elements of science and the humanities. It has been necessary to range widely across a number of aspects of the subject so that discussion is often restricted but many references have been included to enable a reader to pursue a particular point in greater depth. In a `fuzzy' subject there is often a yawning gap separating theory and practice, thus case studies have been used to illustrate the interplay of various disciplines in resolution of a problem. The essence of any science is observation and measurement. Observation has been made of the spread of odour pollution through a community and also of relevant meterological data so that a mathematical model could be constructed and its predictions checked. It has been used to explore the results of some options for odour control. Measurements of odour perception and human behaviour seldom have the precision and accuracy of the physical sciences. However methods of social research enabled individual perception of odour pollution to be quantified and an insight gained into reaction of a community exposed to it. Odours have four attributes that can be measured and together provide a complete description of its perception. No objective techniques of measurement have yet been developed but in this thesis simple, structured procedures of subjective assessment have been improvised and their use enabled the functioning of the components of an odour control system to be assessed. Such data enabled the action of the system to be communicated using terms that are understood by a non specialist audience.

Factors affecting the growth of Cladophora in relation to river pollution

Nuisance growths of Cladophora have been associated with eutrophication. A review of the literature, however, reveals a scarcity of relevant experimental growth studies. Sampling experimental streams reveals that the addition of sewage effluent to good quality water alters the flora from that dominated by Potamogetan crispus to one dominated by CLadophora. Spatial and temporal differences in biomass of taxa present are discussed in the context of accompanying physicochemical data. In laboratory batch culture, growth of unialgal C. glomerata was accompanied by elevation of medium pH - considered largely responsible for the poor growth in such culture. However, appropriate experimental conditions and indices of growth were selected and the effects of various herbicides assessed. Diquat and terbutryne were shown to possess algicidal activity towards Cladophora. A closed continuous culture apparatus was developed: growth proceeded through lag, logarithmic and linear phases. Inoculum size and medium flow rate had significant effects on growth, and were standardized. In continuous culture, specific growth rate increased linearly with increased duration of light per day, up to 24 hours, and increased light intensity, up to 6000 lux - the highest intensity tested. Comparison of field and laboratory results suggests that ammonia toxicity is attributable to the undissociated form. In the laboratory, 185 µg/1 undissociated ammoniacal nitrogen reduced specific growth rate to 50% of that at 10 µg/1 undissociated ammcniacal nitrogen. 0.077-1.057 mg/1 NO2-N had no significant effect on growth. 7.2-15.2 mg/1 NO3-N had no significant effect on specific growth rate. Neither was any nitrate/phosphate interaction significant. At 4.9 mg/1 PO4-1, specific growth rate was only 48% of that at 1.9 g/1 P04-P. The critical medium PO4-P concentration was <0.1 mg/i. Specific growth rate was reduced to 50% of that in natural water by 0.036 mgCu/l, 0.070 mgzn/1 and 1.03 mgPb/l. Metal uptake was evaluated.

Ecological studies on river pollution control

This collection of papers records a series of studies, carried out over a period of some 50 years, on two aspects of river pollution control - the prevention of pollution by sewage biological filtration and the monitoring of river pollution by biological surveillance. The earlier studies were carried out to develop methods of controlling flies which bred in the filters and caused serious nuisance and possible public health hazard, when they dispersed to surrounding villages. Although the application of insecticides proved effective as an alleviate measure, because it resulted in only a temporary disturbance of the ecological balance, it was considered ecologically unsound as a long-term solution. Subsequent investigations showed that the fly populations in filters were largely determined by the amount of food available to the grazing larval stage in the form of filter film. It was also established that the winter deterioration in filter performance was due to the excessive accumulation of film. Subsequent investigations were therefore carried out to determine the factors responsible for the accumulation of film in different types of filter. Methods of filtration which were considered to control film accumulation by increasing the flushing action of the sewage, were found to control fungal film by creating nutrient limiting conditions. In some filters increasing the hydraulic flushing reduced the grazing fauna population in the surface layers and resulted in an increase in film. The results of these investigations were successfully applied in modifying filters and in the design of a Double Filtration process. These studies on biological filters lead to the conclusion that they should be designed and operated as ecological systems and not merely as hydraulic ones. Studies on the effects of sewage effluents on Birmingham streams confirmed the findings of earlier workers justifying their claim for using biological methods for detecting and assessing river pollution. Further ecological studies showed the sensitivity of benthic riffle communities to organic pollution. Using experimental channels and laboratory studies the different environmental conditions associated with organic pollution were investigated. The degree and duration of the oxygen depletion during the dark hours were found to be a critical factor. The relative tolerance of different taxa to other pollutants, such as ammonia, differed. Although colonisation samplers proved of value in sampling difficult sites, the invertebrate data generated were not suitable for processing as any of the commonly used biotic indexes. Several of the papers, which were written by request for presentation at conferences etc., presented the biological viewpoint on river pollution and water quality issues at the time and advocated the use of biological methods. The information and experiences gained in these investigations was used as the "domain expert" in the development of artificial intelligence systems for use in the biological surveillance of river water quality.

Identification of industrial sources of airborne heavy metal pollution in urban areas

The research examines the deposition of airborne particles which contain heavy metals and investigates the methods that can be used to identify their sources. The research focuses on lead and cadmium because these two metals are of growing public and scientific concern on environmental health grounds. The research consists of three distinct parts. The first is the development and evaluation of a new deposition measurement instrument - the deposit cannister - designed specifically for large-scale surveys in urban areas. The deposit cannister is specifically designed to be cheap, robust, and versatile and therefore to permit comprehensive high-density urban surveys. The siting policy reduces contamination from locally resuspended surface-dust. The second part of the research has involved detailed surveys of heavy metal deposition in Walsall, West Midlands, using the new high-density measurement method. The main survey, conducted over a six-week period in November - December 1982, provided 30-day samples of deposition at 250 different sites. The results have been used to examine the magnitude and spatial variability of deposition rates in the case-study area, and to evaluate the performance of the measurement method. The third part of the research has been to conduct a 'source-identification' exercise. The methods used have been Receptor Models - Factor Analysis and Cluster Analysis - and a predictive source-based deposition model. The results indicate that there are six main source processes contributing to deposition of metals in the Walsall area: coal combustion, vehicle emissions, ironfounding, copper refining and two general industrial/urban processes. |A source-based deposition model has been calibrated using facctorscores for one source factor as the dependent variable, rather than metal deposition rates, thus avoiding problems traditionally encountered in calibrating models in complex multi-source areas. Empirical evidence supports the hypothesised associatlon of this factor with emissions of metals from the ironfoundry industry.

Textural segmentation of natural water scenes for surface pollution detection

DUE TO COPYRIGHT RESTRICTIONS ONLY AVAILABLE FOR CONSULTATION AT ASTON UNIVERSITY LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SERVICES WITH PRIOR ARRANGEMENT

Control of environmental lead pollution with particular attention to lead in food

DUE TO COPYRIGHT RESTRICTIONS ONLY AVAILABLE FOR CONSULTATION AT ASTON UNIVERSITY LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SERVICES WITH PRIOR ARRANGEMENT

Catalytic supercritical water gasification of plastics with supported RuO2:a potential solution to hydrocarbons-water pollution problem

Here we report on a potential catalytic process for efficient clean-up of plastic pollution in waters, such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (CPGP). Detailed catalytic mechanisms of RuO2 during supercritical water gasification of common polyolefin plastics including low-density polyethylene (LDPE), high-density polyethylene (HDPE), polypropylene (PP) and polystyrene (PP), have been investigated in a batch reactor at 450 °C, 60 min. All four plastics gave very high carbon gasification efficiencies (CGE) and hydrogen gasification efficiencies (HGE). Methane was the highest gas component, with a yield of up to 37 mol kg−1LDPE using the 20 wt% RuO2 catalyst. Evaluation of the gas yields, CGE and HGE revealed that the conversion of PS involved thermal degradation, steam reforming and methanation; whereas hydrogenolysis was a possible additional mechanism during the conversion of aliphatic plastics. The process has the benefits of producing a clean-pressurized methane-rich fuel gas as well as cleaning up hydrocarbons-polluted waters.

Visual pollution: advertising, signage and environmental quality

Book review - Visual pollution: advertising, signage and environmental quality, by Adriana Portella, Farnham, Ashgate, 2014, 316 pp., £70 (hardback).