Composition and quantification of the anthropogenic and natural fractions of wastes collected from the stormwater drainage system for discussions about the waste management and people behavior

A study was made of the composition of wastes collected from the pipes of the stormwater drainage system of Sorocaba, SP, Brazil (600 thousand inhabitants). A total of 10 samples weighing at least 100 kg each were sorted into 19 items to determine the fraction that can be considered natural (earth/sand, stones, organic matter, and water, the latter determined after oven-drying the samples) and the anthropogenic fraction (the remaining 15 items, especially construction and demolition wastes and packaging). Soil/sand was found to be the main item collected (52.5 % dry weight), followed by the water soaked into the waste (24.3 %), which meant that all the other wastes were saturated in mud, whose contents varied from 6.4 % (glass) to 87.2 % (metalized plastics packaging). In general, 83 % of the collected wastes can be classified as natural, but the remaining 17 % represent 2,000 kg of the most varied types of wastes discarded improperly every day on the streets of the city. This is an alarming amount of wastes that may clog parts of the drainage systems, causing troubles for all the population (like flooding) and must be strongly considered in municipal solid wastes management and in environmental education programs. © 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.

Perspectivas de la educación ambiental en la región del Gran Caribe = Perspective on environmental education in the Wider Caribbean area

Incluye Bibliografía

Trajetória de educadores ambientais: revelando os caminhos trilhados

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Construção de políticas públicas de educação ambiental em Belém do Pará de 1997-2004

Esta dissertação aborda a temática Educação Ambiental para Sustentabilidade, procurando analisar na construção do Programa de Educação Ambiental para Belém (PEAMB), do período de 1997 a 2004, relações, processos e conteúdos que caracterizem o desdobramento de políticas públicas educacionais em relação às políticas internacionais, nacionais e estaduais. A investigação sociológica procurou seguir uma postura interdisciplinar e uma perspectiva dialética para apreender o objeto investigado por meio de revisão bibliográfica e pesquisa documental. Nessa perspectiva, foram contextualizadas, definidas e qualificadas categorias de referência para análise, a saber: Estado ampliado, políticas públicas, Educação Ambiental transformadora e emancipatória; sustentabilidade socioambiental. A Pesquisa documental envolveu o levantamento, a seleção, a coleta, o tratamento e a análise de tratados, legislações, planos, programas, projetos e relatórios construídos no âmbito internacional, nacional (do Brasil), estadual (do Pará) e municipal (de Belém-PA). Os dados constantes nos documentos foram investigados por meio da técnica da análise do discurso, considerando aspectos lingüísticos, sociológicos, políticos e psicológicos do dito e do não dito pelos sujeitos, facilitando a compreensão sobre o teor de conteúdos, intenções e ideologias. Os resultados da pesquisa foram organizados em quatro capítulos: 1. Introdução; 2. A Educação Ambiental no contexto das reformas; 3. Configurando a Educação Ambiental em Belém: ação e emoção; 4. Considerações finais: horizontes e perspectivas da Educação Ambiental em Belém. A análise leva a perceber que em Belém o processo de definição do Sistema Municipal de Educação Ambiental e do PEAMB, indica uma preocupação com os problemas atuais de insustentabilidade e procura concretizar acordos internacionais, bem como determinações nacionais, estaduais e locais que orientem ações de forma qualificadas e comprometidas com a sustentabilidade socioambiental, tendo como referência central o Tratado de Educação Ambiental para Sociedades Sustentáveis e Responsabilidade Global, proposto por Sociedades Civis Organizadas de vários países durante a ECO/92 e reafirmado pelo Governo Federal brasileiro, no Programa Nacional de Educação Ambiental, em 2005. Integração, participação popular e controle social foram elementos centrais identificados no complexo processo de construção do PEAMB, que envolveu acúmulos, confrontos e consensos entre a sociedade política e a sociedade civil, tornando peculiar e importante a experiência analisada, durante a gestão de um Governo de esquerda.

Spatial distribution of dengue incidence and socio-environmental conditions in Campinas, São Paulo State, Brazil, 2007

This study aimed to analyze the spatial distribution of dengue risk and its association with socio-environmental conditions. This was an ecological study of the counts of autochthonous dengue cases in the municipality of Campinas, São Paulo State, Brazil, in the year 2007, aggregated according to 47 coverage areas of municipal health centers. Spatial models for mapping diseases were constructed with Bayesian hierarchical models, based on Integrated Nested Laplace Approximation (INLA). The analyses were stratified according to two age groups, 0 to 14 years and above 14 years. The results indicate that the spatial distribution of dengue risk is not associated with socio-environmental conditions in the 0 to 14 year age group. In the age group older than 14 years, the relative risk of dengue increases significantly as the level of socio-environmental deprivation increases. Mapping of socio-environmental deprivation and dengue cases proved to be a useful tool for data analysis in dengue surveillance systems.

Metacommunity structuring in stream networks: roles of dispersal mode, distance type, and regional environmental context

Within a metacommunity, both environmental and spatial processes regulate variation in local community structure. The strength of these processes may vary depending on species traits (e.g., dispersal mode) or the characteristics of the regions studied (e.g., spatial extent, environmental heterogeneity). We studied the metacommunity structuring of three groups of stream macroinvertebrates differing in their overland dispersal mode (passive dispersers with aquatic adults; passive dispersers with terrestrial adults; active dispersers with terrestrial adults). We predicted that environmental structuring should be more important for active dispersers, because of their better ability to track environmental variability, and that spatial structuring should be more important for species with aquatic adults, because of stronger dispersal limitation. We sampled a total of 70 stream riffle sites in three drainage basins. Environmental heterogeneity was unrelated to spatial extent among our study regions, allowing us to examine the effects of these two factors on metacommunity structuring. We used partial redundancy analysis and Moran's eigenvector maps based on overland and watercourse distances to study the relative importance of environmental control and spatial structuring. We found that, compared with environmental control, spatial structuring was generally negligible, and it did not vary according to our predictions. In general, active dispersers with terrestrial adults showed stronger environmental control than the two passively dispersing groups, suggesting that the species dispersing actively are better able to track environmental variability. There were no clear differences in the results based on watercourse and overland distances. The variability in metacommunity structuring among basins was not related to the differences in the environmental heterogeneity and spatial extent. Our study emphasized that (1) environmental control is prevailing in stream metacommunities, (2) dispersal mode may have an important effect on metacommunity structuring, and (3) some factors other than spatial extent or environmental heterogeneity contributed to the differences among the basins.

Spatial Variation in Morphometry in Vanzosaura rubricauda (Squamata, Gymnophthalmidae) from Open Habitats of South America and its Environmental Correlates

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

As ações em educação ambiental realizadas por Organizações Não-Governamentais no estado de São Paulo: alcances e limitações

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

A dimensão política da educação ambiental em investigações de revistas brasileiras de ensino de ciências

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Os projetos político-pedagógicos dos cursos de pedagogia e os temas ambientais: o caso das Universidades Federais brasileiras

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Educação e sustentabilidade: relações possíveis

Considering the defi nition of Environmental Education as a human development process that seeks the transformation of the relationship between society and environment, this paper – collectively written by the members of the research group – discusses the theoretical framework of our studies, understanding them not as ’straitjackets’ that force us to repeat and reproduce predetermined analysis, but as a pathway, a method to interpret reality, a method to look for the essence of the studied phenomena, the real world. The theoretical framework we present helps us, therefore, to overcome the fragmented feature of the construction of knowledge proposed by methodologies in whose epistemological axis are located empiricism, positivism and idealism, as well as to fi nd out the laws of the phenomena whose study concerns us. It also helps us to capture in detail the details of the problems, to analyze their evolution and track the connections between phenomena that surround them. That is the Historical, Dialectical and Materialistic method formulated by Marx and those who came after him, also known as the philosophy of praxis. Based on this reference, we discuss here the relationship between environmental education and sustainability, bringing the concepts of sustainable development and sustainability into the debate, concluding that for the critical perspective explained here, environmental education for sustainability is a process that joins theory and practice for the transformation of the relationships between societies and the environment. This is the critical dimension of environmental education as we comprehend it.

Interpretando reflexões de futuros professores de Física sobre sua prática profissional durante a formação inicial: a busca pela construção da autonomia docente

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)