Spatial distribution prediction and benefits assessment of green manure in the Pinggu District,Beijing,based on the CLUE-S model

Green manure use in China has declined rapidly since the 1980 s with the extensive use of chemical fertilizers.The deterioration of field environments and the demand for green agricultural products have resulted in more attention to green manure.Human intervention and policy-oriented behaviors likely have large impacts on promoting green manure planting.However,little information is available regarding on where,at what rates,and in which ways（i.e.,intercropping green manure in orchards or rotating green manure in cropland） to develop green manure and what benefits could be gained by incorporating green manure in fields at the county scale.This paper presents the conversion of land use and its effects at small region extent（CLUE-S） model,which is specifically developed for the simulation of land use changes originally,to predict spatial distribution of green manure in cropland and orchards in 2020 in Pinggu District located in Beijing,China.Four types of land use for planting or not planting green manure were classified and the future land use dynamics（mainly croplands and orchards） were considered in the prediction.Two scenarios were used to predict the spatial distribution of green manure based on data from 2011：The promotion of green manure planting in orchards（scenario 1） and the promotion of simultaneous green manure planting in orchards and croplands（scenario 2）.The predictions were generally accurate based on the receiver operating characteristic（ROC） and Kappa indices,which validated the effectiveness of the CLUE-S model in the prediction.In addition,the spatial distribution of the green manure was acquired,which indicated that green manure mainly located in the orchards of the middle and southern regions of Dahuashan,the western and southern regions of Wangxinzhuang,the middle region of Shandongzhuang,the eastern region of Pinggu and the middle region of Xiagezhuang under scenario 1.Green manure planting under scenario 2 occurred in orchards in the middle region of Wangxinzhuang,and croplands in most regions of Daxingzhuang,southern Pinggu,northern Xiagezhuang and most of Mafang.The spatially explicit results allowed for the assessment of the benefits of these changes based on different economic and ecological indicators.The economic and ecological gains of scenarios 1 and 2 were 175691 900 and143000 300 CNY,respectively,which indicated that the first scenario was more beneficial for promoting the same area of green manure.These results can facilitate policies of promoting green manure and guide the extensive use of green manure in local agricultural production in suitable ways.

Green Barriers： Obstacle or Stimulation ？

Most viewpoints in China consider green barrier is one kind of non-tariff barriers imposed by developed countries and is unfair to developing countries. Different from these, this paper points out that green barriers, evolving from the background of sustainable development theory and the principle of environment protection, have positive effect on ideology, international institutional arrangement and innovation stimulation. Demonstrating the rationality of green barriers, the paper puts forward that green barriers should be regarded as the stimulation for technology innovation and industrial restructure rather than obstacles. The best way to surmount the green barriers for Chinese government and enterprises is to implement circular economy and clean production so as to achieve the harmony of trade, environment and economic development.

EVALUATION OF BIM APPLICATION FOR WATER EFFICIENCY ASSESSMENT

Application of Building Information Modelling(BIM)in architecture,engineering,and construction industry is known for its productivity and efficiency.Green BIM is one of the recent applications that aids users in achieving sustainability and/or improved building performance objectives through design and analysis of digital semantic models.The focus is on the application of green BIM for water efficiency(WE)analysis in accordance with the Malaysian Green Building Index(GBI)as a sustainability assessment tool.Revit Green Project Template(RGPT)and Autodesk Green Building Studio(GBS)as two available BIM tools were selected to evaluate and compare the applicability of each method for GBI WE assessment.To resolve the limitations identified from each evaluated method,automated GBI assessment tool(AGBIA)was developed as an alternative.The AGBIA as a supporting tool was established with the use of Dynamo,a visual programming tool to compensate for the limitations faced in the investigated methods.The practicality of each method was explored using a hypothetical model in Revit to automate information correspondent to 10 water efficiency assessment points and generate reports and documents necessary for the GBI design stage certification.The final phase involves verification of results obtained from each method using the conventional GBI WE calculator.AGBIA is suitable for the green BIM users in Malaysia based on the flexibility and automation over defining and assigning green parameters that are in line with the local context,the direct link of green information to the model,as well as the detail of presented data.

Carbon emissions from buildings based on a life cycle analysis:carbon reduction measures and effects of green building standards in China

Carbon emissions from buildings account for approximately half of China’s total social carbon emissions.Focusing only on the carbon emissions of building operation tends to neglect the carbon emissions of other related parts of the building sector,thus slowing down the progress of carbon peaking in the building sector.By applying life-cycle analysis to calculate carbon emissions throughout the building’s life cycle,the performance of carbon emissions at each stage of building materials,construction,operation and end-of-life demolition can be identified,so that carbon reduction strategies in building design can be selected..This paper constructed a method for calculating the carbon emissions of green buildings in whole-building life cycle,and conducted a summary analysis of the carbon emissions of 33 projects that were awarded green building certification.The study found that the Chinese Assessment Standard for Green Buildings has a significant effect on reducing the carbon emissions of buildings in whole-building life cycle.Compared with the current average operational carbon emissions of buildings in China,the carbon intensity of green public buildings is 41.43%lower under this standard and the carbon intensity of green residential buildings is 13.99%lower.A carbon correlation analysis of the provisions of the current Chinese Assessment Standard for Green Buildings was conducted,comparing the changes in the carbon intensity of buildings before and after the revision of the standards.The study concluded that the new version of the standards has a greater impact on public buildings than residential buildings,the requirement of carbon emission reduction in the production stage of building materials is strengthened in terms of carbon emission during the whole-building life cycle.This study addresses the current problem of unclear carbon emission reduction effect of green buildings.