海水淡化业发展现状及生产成本动态对比分析

为准确把握海水淡化发展及其生产成本,综述了海水淡化在全球的发展现状,对比分析了多效蒸馏法(MED)和反渗透法(RO)等技术在不同规模、年度的可比价成本组成的差异和变化趋势,通过实际案例,评价采用不同技术下淡化海水成本的主要影响因素及它们对成本的贡献率,分析典型案例在减少成本方面值得借鉴的具体措施和经验。结果表明:随生产规模扩大及技术进步,海水淡化成本逐渐降低,RO和MED在1999—2017年间成本分别降低约29.75%和36.97%;淡化成本中电力等动力费用占比近40%,固定资产投资占比约20%;在10万 m³/d级的海水淡化中,我国RO和MED的淡化成本分别比国外高出约26.85%和22.50%;我国淡化海水成本约为自来水的1.28倍,再生水的1.20倍。在未来发展中,我国可从科学投资运营、技术进步创新、完善费用结构、补齐人才短板、政府引导支持等多方面共同推进,以降低海水淡化成本。     

典型国家海水淡化水定价机制及对我国的启示

近年来,我国海水淡化技术发展较快,海水淡化产业已成为重要的海洋战略性新兴产业。但海水淡化进入市政供水仍然存在着对外供水范围窄、接收用户不足、水价偏高、产水面临亏损等问题。与作为公用事业的市政自来水相比,海水淡化水缺乏市场竞争优势。选取以色列、西班牙、新加坡、沙特阿拉伯、科威特5个将海水淡化纳入市政供水的典型国家,对其海水淡化水进行市政供水的运营经验和定价机制进行全面总结和分析,系统研究其中对我国的启示和借鉴,提出我国海水淡化进入市政供水的发展建议,为完善我国海水淡化水的定价机制提供参考依据。     

陕西省耕地利用区域差异分析

以11地市(区)2002年、2004年和2006年统计数据为基础,采用能值分析法分析陕西省区域耕地利用效益及其差异,得出关中地区能值投资率最高,陕南次之,陕北最低;净能值产出率陕南的汉中最高,关中地区次之,陕北最低;关中地区和陕北地区环境压力较大,陕南环境压力相对较小;11地市(区)的能值投资率呈现递增趋势;净能值产出率趋势递减;环境压力日趋增大。耕地利用效益关中地区和陕南较好,陕北最差。     

基于层次分析法的我国海水淡化开发利用潜力评价方法研究

海水淡化是缓解沿海地区水资源短缺的重要手段。利用层次分析法,开展了我国海水淡化开发利用潜力评价方法研究。从政策因素、社会经济因素、技术条件3个方面,构建了我国海水淡化开发利用潜力评价指标体系,对各指标影响作用权重进行了计算。以全国11个沿海省(区、市)为研究目标,对其海水淡化开发利用潜力进行了评价。研究结果表明,我国各沿海省(区、市)开发利用海水淡化的潜力由大到小分别是:河北、浙江、山东、天津、江苏、辽宁、海南、广东、广西、上海、福建。最后,结合影响我国海水淡化开发利用的主要因素,从战略定位、试点示范、财政补贴、自主创新4个方面,提出了进一步推进我国海水淡化开发利用的建议。     

海水淡化进入城市供水的定价策略研究

针对我国海水淡化进入城市供水存在的水价偏高问题,系统研究了海水淡化水定价需要考虑的内外部影响因素,综合分析产水成本、合理利润及社会接受度等因素,从考虑海水淡化厂合理收益和用户接受水平两个维度开展海水淡化对外供水的定价方案研究,提出科学采取多种成本控制措施、进一步降低海水淡化成本、建立畅通的淡化水购销渠道、完善水资源价格形成机制、制定海水淡化水价补贴政策等价格策略和建议。     

离子交换技术在海水淡化中的应用

阐述离子交换技术在海水淡化中的应用原理和步骤,分析该技术的特点和效果,从时间和处理量的最优比重两个方面,提出离子交换技术是应用于海水淡化的最优工艺。     

基于SWOT分析的海水淡化补给京津冀水资源供给战略研究

海水淡化作为稳定、优质的增量水源,是解决京津冀水资源短缺的重要途径和战略选择,是保障区域水资源安全供给的重要举措。紧密围绕京津冀水资源安全战略,针对京津冀地区水资源短缺现状及未来发展需求,客观分析京津冀海水淡化现状,使用SWOT矩阵分析方法对海水淡化补给京津冀水资源供给进行了战略分析和选择,并从加大海水淡化科普宣传教育、加强京津冀水资源的统一调配和管理、充分释放已有海水淡化产能、建立海水淡化区域供水工程、突破大型海水淡化装备制造瓶颈、构建自主海水淡化产业链条等六方面提出对策建议。     

美国海水取水政策及其对我国海水淡化取水的借鉴

针对海水淡化工程大规模发展的海水取水问题,通过总结美国海水取水相关政策措施,结合我国海水淡化工程取水、用海等现状,从加强海水淡化工程取水口用海监管、研究出台针对海水淡化工程用海管理政策、出台有关海水淡化工程取水设施优化的技术导则等方面,提出我国海水淡化工程取水管理建议,为工程安全稳定运行与环境协调发展提供支撑。     

我国海水淡化发展现状及国际合作

全球面临着日益严重的缺水危机。海水淡化作为一种可实现水资源可持续利用的开源增量技术,已成为全球解决沿海地区和海岛淡水资源短缺危机的重要手段,需求迫切。我国海水淡化技术产业经过多年的发展,拥有了海水淡化技术出口的基础和经验,具有了一定的"走出去"实力及优势。总结了我国海水淡化技术产业发展基础及国际合作现状,并就进一步促进我国海水淡化国际合作,提出几点建议。     

天津滨海新区海水淡化发展潜力与模式分析

围绕海水淡化产业健康、有序发展,从海水淡化需求预测、技术产业基础和政策支持3个方面,分析天津市滨海新区海水淡化发展潜力;结合新区用水特点、产业结构布局和发展需求,提出淡化水以满足工业用水为主、发展联产联用模式、以科技驱动产业集聚发展模式等建议,为天津市合理制定供用水方案及科学决策海水淡化发展提供参考。     

Price transmission between products at different stages of manufacturing in forest industries

The theory of demand and supply implies a positive relationship, or “price transmission” between the prices of products at different stages of manufacturing. This relationship was investigated with quarterly prices of softwood stumpage in the US South, and national prices of forest products, from 1977 to 2002. All prices, net of inflation, were found to be nonstationary and there was no evidence of co-integration between prices. Vector autogressive models, augmented by Granger causality tests and multiplier analysis showed that there was a one-to-one permanent positive response of the southern sawtimber stumpage price to a permanent change in the national lumber price. There was also a one-third permanent positive response of the national paper price to a permanent change in the national pulp price. There was no relation between regional pulpwood prices and national pulp or paper prices. When price transmission was significant, the full adjustment took about 2 years.     

Application of an ecosystem function framework to perceptions of community woodlands

Owners, local residents, government, and conservation organisations can express divergent preferences in the development and management of local woodlands. The perceptions of these four groups were examined, in the context of three community woodlands in Eastern England, using an ecosystem function framework. In a pilot study, residents were able to allocate a relative importance to woodland ecosystem services which were then related to “regulation”, “habitat”, and “production” or “information” functions. However residents also placed importance on negative services or “dis-services” associated with the woodland ecosystem. Therefore a fifth category of “dis-services” was included in the main survey which included 84 local residents, three woodland owners, three government institutions, and six representatives from conservation groups. Each of the four groups placed greatest importance on services associated with habitat (16–39% of the total importance) and information (30–50%) functions suggesting, in this example, mutual interest in the use of woodlands as a habitat or recreational resource. By contrast a potential area of difference was the particularly high importance placed by one owner on dis-services such as fly tipping. In addition the woodland owners placed higher importance (10–20%), than local residents and conservation groups (7–9%), on the productive services of the wood. This suggests a need for communication when production-related operations affect recreation. The ecosystem function framework appears to be a useful approach for highlighting potential tensions and areas of mutual interest in the management of semi-natural ecosystems.     

In Vino ‘No’ Veritas: impacts of fraud on wine imports in China

China is one of the largest wine importing countries in the world and is poised for continued import growth in the future. Increased wine purchases throughout China have given rise to persistent fraud where fake wines are packaged and sold with counterfeit contents and labels. For exporting countries like France, counterfeit wines displace market share, damage foreign brand reputation, and cause distrust in consumers who are aware of counterfeiting problems throughout the country. We examine the impact of fraudulent wine events (as measured by negative media reports) on Chinese wine demand differentiated by supplying country. We employ the Rotterdam demand system and a switching regression procedure to estimate import demand and compare results across different media variable specifications. Results consistently show that negative reports disproportionately affect French wine regardless of how the media variable is specified. This is not surprising because most fraudulent events involve French wine counterfeits.     

An evaluation framework for earthquake-responsive land administration

In recent years earthquakes and their secondary hazards have claimed the largest number of lives of all large natural disasters. Some of the world’s most earthquake-prone zones are also areas of high population density. The impact is magnified by vulnerability factors including non-enforcement of building codes, knowledge gaps, urban poverty and poor governance capacity to manage and reduce earthquake risks. Poor security of land tenure and property rights increases the vulnerability of people and affects their ability to respond to natural disasters.Earthquake recovery and reconstruction provides very significant challenges for land agencies, with these challenges differing from one country to the next due to differences in the local context. Drawing on contrasting case studies in Haiti, Nepal and New Zealand this paper identifies the common post-earthquake land administration functions and challenges that may apply to many contexts. These lessons provide land agencies and other key stakeholders with a summary of the challenges an earthquake poses for land administration at different post-disaster stages. We also discuss the policy and regulatory, institutional, operational and preparedness lessons for land administration. From these lessons we propose a framework for evaluating the earthquake-responsiveness of a land administration system. This framework can be used by a land agency in an earthquake prone region, or where an earthquake has recently occurred, to assess what challenges to land administration might occur in the event of an earthquake, and the preparedness of their land administration system.     

Agrarian Poverty,Nutrition and Economic Class – A Study of Gujarat,India

This paper analyses poverty and calorific undernourishment in the Indian state of Gujarat, where high and market‐led industrial growth has resulted in rapid economic improvement. The study is carried out through a combination of secondary and survey‐based data. We conclude that the neoliberal agenda of uncontrolled, outward‐looking growth has not resulted in significant reduction of poverty or malnourishment in rural areas. Furthermore, while land ownership is officially used as a proxy for wealth distribution, class position appears a better predictor of poverty status in the rural areas than landownership per se. At the policy level, there is a need to revive the agrarian economy and create new non‐agricultural assets, and the primary focus in the state must shift to the distribution of created assets rather than a single‐minded focus on growth.     

Does sustainable agricultural growth require a system of innovation? Evidence from Ghana and Burkina Faso

This paper tests the ‘systems of innovation’ hypothesis for a selection of crops in Ghana and Burkina Faso that have shown significant growth in production over an approximately 20-year period. The question is whether such growth can only occur if supported by a system of innovation. Using two indicators (a common understanding on objectives and priorities, and a high level of interactivity), we find little evidence for the existence of anything that might be considered a high functioning system of innovation.     

Local impacts of industrial tree plantations: An empirical analysis in Indonesia across plantation types

The values ascribed to industrial tree plantations are often controversial. Hence knowledge of their perceived impacts is important for improving their integration in rural landscapes. In 2016 we conducted household surveys with 606 respondents living in villages adjacent to acacia, teak and pine plantations across three islands in Indonesia (Java, Borneo, Sumatra). Results show that perceptions toward pine and teak plantations tend to differ from those toward acacia pulpwood plantations in several ways. Pine and teak plantations are perceived to have a higher number and variety of benefits and services, a higher number of positive impacts, a better environmental record, and to present more opportunities to local people for use of plantation land and products for improving rural livelihoods. In addition, we find that villagers around acacia pulpwood plantations tend to seek economic development and infrastructure to open up remote areas, yet their expectations were often only partially met. Recommendations from our analysis include: the role of the State in plantations must be clarified and potentially reinforced; the role of institutions as intermediaries is fundamental; and contributions by communities to design of management plans should be accommodated.     

Upstream demand for water use by new tree plantations imposes externalities on downstream irrigated agriculture and wetlands*

Large‐scale tree plantations in high rainfall upstream areas can reduce fresh water inflows to river systems, thereby imposing external costs on downstream irrigation, stock and domestic water users and wetland interests. We take the novel approach of expressing all benefits and costs of establishing plantations in terms of $ per gigalitre (GL) of water removed annually from river flows, setting upstream demands on the same basis as downstream demands. For the Macquarie Valley, a New South Wales sub‐catchment of Australia’s Murray‐Darling Basin, we project changes in land and water use and changes in economic surpluses under two policy settings: without and with a policy requiring permanent water entitlements to be purchased from downstream parties, before plantation establishment. Without the policy, and given a high stumpage value for trees ($70/m³), upstream gains in economic surplus projected from expanding plantations are $639 million; balanced against $233 million in economic losses by downstream irrigators and stock and domestic water users for a net gain of $406 million, but 345 GL lower mean annual environmental flows. With the policy, smaller gains in upstream economic surplus from trees ($192 million), added to net downstream gains ($138 million) from sale of water, result in gains of $330 million with no reduction in environmental flows. Sustaining the 345 GL flow for a $76 million (406–330) reduction in gains to economic surplus may be seen to cost only $0.22 million/GL; but this is much lower than the market value of the first units of that water to agriculture and forestry.     

Underpayment of Small Producers of Coffee and Cocoa in Sierra Leone

Fieldwork shows that many Sierra Leonean producers do not receive the official producer price for their coffee and cocoa, due to the concentration of buying stations, credit relations, the small quantities offered for sale, and the lack of marketing knowledge of the numerous and unorganized farmers. To the traders underpayment may seem economically justifiable to a certain extent, but to the farmers it means poverty and debt. A new village marketing centre project aims at remedying this situation and has already led to higher prices. Although no longer allowed to take their "just" share from the producers, traders are still willing to deal with the new centres.     

Malaria incidence and agricultural efficiency in Uganda

The cost of accessing healthcare can be a major determinant of disease prevalence, which in turn has short‐ and long‐term welfare implications on poor households. In response, governments in developing countries often resort to subsidizing the cost of drugs, which, while perhaps easier to administer, may not always be the most effective way of addressing healthcare cost. In this regard, we analyze the impact of different types of household level health expenses on disease incidence and agricultural production efficiency. We use data from the 2006 Uganda National Household Survey, which covered approximately 7,400 households. The results suggest that a 10% increase in consultation, medicine, and hospitalization expenses would reduce malaria incidence respectively by 35.6%, 20.5%, and 21.3 %, which translates into a 1.1%, 0.6%, and 0.6 % decrease in agricultural inefficiency, respectively. The results indicate that helping poor households meet expenses for consultation through subsidies or eliminating consultation fees has a larger impact on malaria incidence and agricultural productivity among poor rural households than subsidizing the cost of medical drugs, the most common avenue chosen by developing country governments in the fight against the disease.