Land-Use Change and Bioenergy Production: Soil Consumption and Characterization of Anaerobic Digestion Plants

The exploitation of bioenergy plays a key role in the process of decarbonising the economic system. Huge efforts have been made to develop bioenergy and other renewable energy systems, but it is necessary to investigate the costs and problems associated with these technologies. Soil consumption and, in particular, soil sealing are some of these aspects that should be carefully evaluated. Agricultural biogas plants (ABPs) often remove areas dedicated to agricultural activities and require broad paved areas for the associated facilities. This study aimed to (i) assess the surfaces destined to become facilities and buildings in ABPs, (ii) correlate these surfaces with each other and to the installed powers of the plants, and (iii) estimate the consumption of soil in bioenergy applications in Italy. Two hundred ABPs were sampled from an overall population of 1939, and the extents of the facilities were measured by aerial and satellite observations. An ABP with an installed power of 1000 kW covers an average surface area of up to 23,576 m2. Most of this surface, 97.9%, is obtained from previously cultivated areas. The ABP analysis proved that 24.7 m2 of surface area produces 1 kW of power by bioenergy. The obtained model estimated a total consumption of soil by ABPs in Italy of 31,761,235 m2. This research can support stakeholders in cost-benefit analyses to design energy systems based on renewable energy sources.

Land Consumption, Ecosystem Services and Urban Planning Policies: Preliminary Results of Research Undertaken in the Tuscany Region

In the contemporaneity, the issues of land or soil consumption and of the protection of areas that, within the urban areas, provide ecosystem services (ESs) is becoming increasingly important also in relation of the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. The concept of "Ecosystem Service" appears, in this respect, a fruitful support to define the land consumption effects on the loss of functionality and of settlement quality. Following this considerations the paper presents the first results of a research developed in Tuscany and commissioned by the Regional Government. The research aims to measure the loss of ESs in connection with land use / land cover transformations, and to verify the contribution of soil consumption to these variations. The research use methodologies for elaborating of the geographical data required for territorial governance, LUCL 2010/2016 and Land Cover Flow (LCF) model and the theoretical model of the “Capacity matrix” to provide ecosystem services.

Italy Is Fragile: Soil Consumption and Climate Change Combined Effects on Territorial Heritage Maintenance

The article looks for relations between growth of expanding cities, number of catastrophes and reduction of inhabitants in inland regions. The study explores these aspects through cartographic readings aimed at highlighting the relationship between soil consumption, the abandonment of peripheral areas, and environmental risks due to floods, landslides and earthquakes. The research analyzes the whole of Italy as a case study between 1990 and 2019 to get an accurate interpretation of the relations between these phenomena. The conclusions alert us to the need to redirect Italy’s development and its resilience projects. The study outlines the need of a re-living plan for Italian inner areas. It would be the only security process really capable of taking care of the territory.

Efficacy of oral iron therapy in geophagic women with iron deficiency anaemia residing in Botshabelo, South Africa

Background: Iron deficiency anaemia is the most commonly encountered form of anaemia in females worldwide. This form of anaemia is, amongst others, associated with geophagia that is defined as the consumption of soil. The two main reasons for the association of geophagia with anaemia are that soil is thought to supplement mineral deficiency and geophagia is seen as a symptom of the anaemia. However, it is hypothesised that soil consumption interferes with iron absorption instead of supplementing it. The first line of therapy for iron deficiency anaemia is oral iron. Therefore, if soil consumption interferes with iron absorption it could interfere with oral iron therapy leading to patients being burdened with symptoms of anaemia as treatment is not effective. The aim of the study was to evaluate the efficacy of oral iron therapy in female participants afflicted with iron deficiency anaemia associated with geophagia. Methods: In this prospective randomised intervention study, 84 geophagic women with iron deficiency anaemia were divided into two groups. One group continued with soil consumption while the other stopped consumption. Oral iron therapy was administered for ten weeks at increasing therapy doses for both groups. Red cell and iron study parameters were evaluated at different time intervals to ascertain the efficacy of iron replacement therapy. Results: The group that stopped soil consumption showed a statistically significant change in haemoglobin (9.4 to 10.0 g/dL, p = 0.029), mean corpuscular volume (73.6 to 75.7 fl), mean corpuscular haemoglobin (23.7 to 24.6 pg), serum iron (22.5 to 28 μg/dL, p < 0.001, transferrin saturation (4.8 to 6.9%, p < 0.001) and total iron-binding capacity (467 to 441 μg/L, p = 0.001). These findings were contrary to the group that continued with consumption, where the statistical changes were only observed for the iron study parameters (serum iron: 21 to 28 μg/dL, p = 0.038; transferrin saturation: 4.3 to 6.9%, p = 0.011; total iron-binding capacity: 496 to 421 μg/L, p = 0.002). Nevertheless, the changes for both groups were clinically insignificant. Oral iron therapy did not correct the anaemia in geophagic females of both groups, this could be explained by two hypotheses where soil affected the gastrointestinal lining and soil directly interfered with therapy iron absorption. This is evidenced by the group that continued with consumption showing fewer changes than the group that abstained from soil consumption. These results were consistent with a case study where oral iron therapy was implemented. Conclusion: Oral iron therapy was not effective in geophagia cases of iron deficiency anaemia.

Listeriosis

Listeriosis is caused by the Gram-positive bacillus Listeria monocytogenes, whose natural habitat is the soil. Consumption of soft cheeses, other dairy products, meat products, seafood, and vegetables is the principal route of infection. Patients at particular risk include those who are immunocompromised, very young, or very old. Pregnant women are also at risk, although they develop only mild disease, but the bacteria can be transmitted to the child either in utero or during birth, causing serious systemic disease. The disease varies from a mild, influenza-like illness to fatal septicaemia and meningoencephalitis. Purulent, localized infections of any organ are sometimes seen. Aside from supportive care, the usual treatment of choice is high-dose intravenous ampicillin, which must be administered for at least 2 weeks. The prognosis is poor, with mortality of up to 30%. Prevention depends upon those that are vulnerable avoiding high-risk foods. There is no vaccine.

URBAN GEO BIG DATA

<p><strong>Abstract.</strong> The paper deals with the general presentation of the Urban GEO BIG DATA, a collaborative acentric and distributed Free and Open Source (FOS) platform consisting of several components: local data nodes for data and related service Web deploy; a visualization node for data fruition; a catalog node for data discovery; a CityGML modeler; data-rich viewers based on virtual globes; an INSPIRE metadata management system enriched with quality indicators for each dataset.</p><p>Three use cases in five Italian cities (Turin, Milan, Padua, Rome, and Naples) are examined: 1) urban mobility; 2) land cover and soil consumption at different resolutions; 3) displacement time series. Besides the case studies, the architecture of the system and its components will be presented.</p>

Secolarizzazione, memoria e nuovi revivals: la difficile riscrittura del presente

The architectural project of re-use, in a context full of historical, cultural and environmental values ​​such as the Alpine one, must inevitably confront with the list of conceptualizations elaborated during the twentieth-century modernity. First of all we have to think about memory which is the main raw material of architecture and its history, a theme on which the culture of restoration has been built, and on which the rhetoric of re-use has been shaped in recent times, with the gradual addition of other contemporaneity values such as soil consumption, sustainability, zero growth. The theme of memory seems in some cases to negotiate the one of secularization, a term that often comes to coincide with modernity. The modernity that has standardized and flattened the Alpine territory, raising questions about the meaning of the “encounter”, its ability to question prejudices, beliefs, and consolidated rhetorics. The “encounter” that takes place in the moment in which the contemporary urban culture succeeds in crossing landscape and Alpine architecture issues, creating disorientation, reopening the eyes of the observer and rebooting history by questioning the present. The “rewriting of the existent” therefore raises issues that are difficult to make explicit, such as the recognition and critical knowledge that are the basis of design responsibility. This is accompanied by the threat caused by a prescriptive approach which, in light of the aspects of control and of technological and environmental management of the mountain context, can lead to the drift of the practice which must be avoided only through the assumption of risk linked to the design itself.

Quantifying Urban Sprawl With Spatial Autocorrelation Techniques Using Multi-Temporal Satellite Data

This study deals with the use of satellite TM multi-temporal data coupled with statistical analyses to quantitatively estimate urban expansion and soil consumption for small towns in southern Italy. The investigated area is close to Bari and was selected because highly representative for Italian urban areas. To cope with the fact that small changes have to be captured and extracted from TM multi-temporal data sets, we adopted the use of spectral indices to emphasize occurring changes, and geospatial data analysis to reveal spatial patterns. Analyses have been carried out using global and local spatial autocorrelation, applied to multi-date NASA Landsat images acquired in 1999 and 2009 and available free of charge. Moreover, in this paper each step of data processing has been carried out using free or open source software tools, such as, operating system (Linux Ubuntu), GIS software (GRASS GIS and Quantum GIS) and software for statistical analysis of data (R). This aspect is very important, since it puts no limits and allows everybody to carry out spatial analyses on remote sensing data. This approach can be very useful to assess and map land cover change and soil degradation, even for small urbanized areas, as in the case of Italy, where recently an increasing number of devastating flash floods have been recorded. These events have been mainly linked to urban expansion and soil consumption and have caused loss of human lives along with enormous damages to urban settlements, bridges, roads, agricultural activities, etc. In these cases, remote sensing can provide reliable operational low cost tools to assess, quantify and map risk areas.