A new screening tool to assess the potential seismic risks (earthquake activity) from deep geothermal energy projects has been outlined in a recent study. The tool provides categories of seismicity risk for projects, which are dependent on factors including geological aspects, as well as social concern and location in relation to urban areas.

A new review of the potential uses of visual soil evaluation (VSE) shows how this tool can be used to indicate risks of erosion, compaction, greenhouse gas emission or storage and surface-water run-off. Assessing soils in this way is not only useful for agriculture, but has implications for the wider environment, due to the vital role that soil plays in the provision of ecosystem services, for example as a habitat for biodiversity and as a carbon sink.

In-depth soil information is increasingly required to achieve an array of environmental and economic goals. In particular, accurate estimates of soil carbon stocks are necessary to guide land-management practices and climate- related policymaking. To help meet this need, Australian scientists have developed a new sensing method to analyse cylindrical soil samples (soil cores), known as the Soil Condition ANalysis System (SCANS). By integrating a novel automated soil- core sensing system (CSS) with advanced statistical analytics and modelling, the SCANS provides a level of detail that is difficult to achieve with existing alternatives. SCANS is not only rapid, accurate and inexpensive1, but is likely to be a useful tool for farmers, land managers and policymakers, as the improved assessment of soil functions, structures and carbon stocks will facilitate more informed, sustainable decision-making.

Indium, a unique metal, is in short supply worldwide and is not recycled at the end of its life (EoL). Indium is used in a wide range of technologies, causing regions across the world that are reliant on its import — such as Europe — to be concerned about security of supply. Primary sources of indium are thought to be sufficient for medium-term needs, but with growing demand comes growing concern over long-term supply. A new study has conducted a material flow analysis and examined secondary sources of indium within European ‘urban mines’ and in-use stocks (IUS) of indium products, identifying these as potential sources of 500 tonnes of indium — if it were recycled at EoL.

A new study lists 10 factors to help create a closed-loop supply chain for critical materials. However, interviews with key actors in supply chains for photovoltaic (PV) panels and wind turbines suggest that manufacturers and recyclers hold different perspectives on these factors. The research highlights the importance of cooperation between supply-chain actors, as well as investment in technologies and infrastructure for closed-loop supply chains.

A new study explores how to weigh up the costs and benefits of technologies that extract phosphorus from livestock waste for re-use as fertiliser. Findings from a US case study suggest that recycling phosphorus in this way can cut both water pollution levels and the costs of cleaning up the mineral. However, the technologies’ long-term economic feasibility depends on the yield, quality, and market value of the recovered phosphorus.

As well as providing renewable energy, wave farms can help protect coasts against erosion by reducing the force of waves. However, it remains unknown whether they can provide this complementary service under future climate change when sea levels will be higher. A new study, based upon computer simulations, concludes that a wave farm off the south coast of Spain could indeed protect the coastline under higher sea levels, and cause the local beach to grow in size after storms.

Digital initiatives that began pre lockdown are giving the carmarker confidence that it will emerge stronger when the dust settles.

Amid the covid 19 crisis, the Global Inhouse Centre of Canadian financial services company, Sun Life Financial Asia Service Centre India, is baselining projects that can be accelerated, re-scoped and deferred.

Genpact sees over 100 clients closing their financial quarter digitally while others are doubling the pace of adoption of digital transformation.

A look at what’s going beyond the scenes in one of the largest software bot deployments in the world.

In a freewheeling discussion with ETCIO, Miao Song, Global CIO & Global VP of MARS group emphasized this different Covid-19 challenge which is new for CIOs to tackle and difficult too.

A remote consultation app at Apollo is allowing safety for both the patients and the frontline doctors while using AI to improve diagnostics.

Several of Federal Bank’s digital initiatives are finally seeing massive adoption as the Kochi-based bank works on automation and self service tools to boost profits.

TONIK Financial, Asean’s first licensed digital-only bank, is leveraging cloud to mitigate the risks of Covid-19.

April was a month of heavy-lifting for Anand Natarajan, COO, DBS Bank India, but the company’s investments made towards building a robust tech infrastructure made pandemic substantially easier for him.

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) surveyed dozens of young stars -- some Sun-like and others approximately double that size -- and discovered that the larger variety have surprisingly rich reservoirs of carbon monoxide gas in their debris disks. In contrast, the lower-mass, Sun-like stars have debris disks that are virtually gas-free.

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Some of the mysterious grooves on the surface of Mars' moon Phobos are the result of debris ejected by impacts eventually falling back onto the surface to form linear chains of craters, according to a new study.

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Ever since the 1950s discovery of the solar wind - the constant flow of charged particles from the sun - there's been a stark disconnect between this outpouring and the sun itself. As it approaches Earth, the solar wind is gusty and turbulent. But near the sun where it originates, this wind is structured in distinct rays, much like a child's simple drawing of the sun. The details of the transition from defined rays in the corona, the sun's upper atmosphere, to the solar wind have been, until now, a mystery.

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1800s, astronomers surveying the night sky in the Southern Hemisphere noticed something strange: Over the course of a few years, a previously inconspicuous star named Eta Carinae grew brighter and brighter, eventually outshining all other stars except Sirius, before fading again over the next decade, becoming too dim to be seen with the naked eye.

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NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites caught Hurricane Newton's two landfalls in Mexico.

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Dwarf galaxies are enigmas wrapped in riddles. Although they are the smallest galaxies, they represent some of the biggest mysteries about our universe. While many dwarf galaxies surround our own Milky Way, there seem to be far too few of them compared with standard cosmological models, which raises a lot of questions about the nature of dark matter and its role in galaxy formation.

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After Tropical Depression 19W moved ashore in central Vietnam NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite passed over the system and found some powerful thunderstorms over Thailand, Vietnam and Laos capable of dropping heavy rainfall.

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Ecosystems in the Catalan coastal system in Spain are worth €2,573 million per year to local citizens, according to new research. By placing a value on ecosystems the research has provided insight into integrated coastal zone management (ICZM) in the area.

A new study highlights the economic importance of coastal and marine areas and the urgent need to develop concrete methods for assessing their value. Researchers say the need is especially strong now as climate change's impacts could reduce the economic value of coastal and marine environments.

A recent report has assessed the latest research on the adverse affects of noise on health, focusing on approaches to estimating the economic cost of noise. This information could help policy makers tasked with designing cost-effective noise reduction and management policies.

Some 'intangible' ecosystem services, such as the aesthetic and cultural value, as well as the recreational use of land, are particularly difficult to price. New research has proposed three explorative methods to value these more intangible services using landscape evaluation, statistics on level of recreational use and the price of real estate in the area.

In theory, payment for environmental services (PES) is a market mechanism but, in practice, it depends on intervention from the state or community. This is the conclusion of a new review of case studies that indicates that PES relies on public bodies and communities to act as intermediaries in the trading of services.

Transaction costs can be incurred during various phases of environmental policy making, from planning through to enforcement. A recent study has examined what influences these costs and concluded that policy selection and evaluation could benefit from a better understanding of the causes of these transaction costs.

Researchers have examined two cases of managed realignment in the UK, whereby coastal areas are deliberately flooded to recreate protective salt marshes. They demonstrated that a sequential decision support system (DSS) can be combined with an ecosystem services approach to provide a robust economic valuation of managed realignment’s benefits. For the case studies analysed, the benefits of managed realignment were found to outweigh costs in the long-term.

When natural disasters, such as earthquakes, storms and hurricanes, are reported in the media, they are often accompanied by an assessment of the cost of the disaster. While such information can be useful to help governments and international organisations target aid and recovery efforts, the details of what is included in the assessment, and the methods used, are often unclear.

A new tool allows European businesses to see how, through informed decision-making, conserving the ecosystems they depend on is not only environmentally responsible, but can also increase profits, reduce risk and boost the value of their product or services.

A new study has proposed a method to place monetary value on green infrastructure at both a project and regional scale, which illustrates the value of investing in green infrastructure to the public and other stakeholders.

Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) schemes offer direct payments for communities and individuals in exchange for conserving areas of land reserved for conservation for their environmental qualities. The results of an Ecuadorian study highlight key aspects for designing successful PES schemes and demonstrate how investments associated with PES can also benefit poor communities.

According to a recent viewpoint article, future agri-environmental schemes (AES) can more effectively pay for the provision of ecosystem services at a landscape level if they are prepared, designed and implemented in a collaborative and coordinated manner.

Soils play a vital role in the Earth's life-support system, yet their importance and value to society is not always recognised. A recent study suggests that incorporating soils into a National Capital and Ecosystem Services framework will raise the profile of soils and enable soils to be more easily integrated into policy decisions.

A new study has developed a system to assess the potential of ecosystems to supply ecosystem services in the EU-25 plus Switzerland and Norway. It is one of the first to use historical and projected data on land use change at a continental scale to estimate the provision of ecosystem services and to assess possible trade-offs between them.

However, policies designed to improve ecosystem resilience have met with less success, potentially due to the longer timescales required to see progress in this area. The report concludes that Europe needs new policies and objectives that recognise the links between resource efficiency and ecosystem resilience if it is to move to a sustainable green economy.

There is increasing policy demand for the ‘scaling-up’ of ecosystem service valuations to a national or regional level, but available methods for doing this are limited. A new study has proposed a new scaling-up methodology and tested it by assessing the impact of climate change on European wetlands.

Valuations of water quality as an ecosystem service often fail to include related services like recreation or human health, and do not consider the effects of water quality changes due to management. Researchers have now developed a template for valuation that considers multiple services and links management actions to changes in water quality and ultimate economic value.

Researchers have developed a new approach for identifying regions that are most suitable for expanding ecosystem services. This could be used to help inform spatial planning decisions. By modelling ecosystem services’ opportunity costs in relation to agricultural revenue, the study provides a map of suitable areas of ecosystem service expansion in Eastern Europe.

Interactions between population growth, consumption and the use of natural products and services have created an unsustainable pressure on the environment. New research has provided a detailed investigation into the relationships between these three trends, providing insight into how to alleviate these pressures. It concludes they cannot be addressed by market mechanisms or technological advances alone.

Climate change will lead to an increased risk of flooding and huge economic losses if countries do not invest in appropriate adaptation measures, according to a new study. The research estimates the risks posed by flooding to cities around the world and the associated economic losses in 2005 and 2050, and suggests that flood protection must be increased to maintain the same level of risk to coastal cities.

Costs of installing, maintaining and disposing of some green wall systems may outweigh the value of some of their benefits for householders, a recent study suggests. While the researchers omitted some of the wider social benefits, they found that reductions in heating and air conditioning costs, longevity of green walls and increases in property values did not compensate for their costs. The researchers suggest that government incentives to lower set-up costs could significantly increase the walls' economic sustainability.

Bee pollination improves the shape, weight and shelf-life of strawberries, contributing a staggering €1.05 billion to the European strawberry market per year, new research suggests. By blocking bees from a set of plants, the researchers demonstrated the substantial effects of bee pollination on the quality of the fruit.

Nudges can foster greener public behaviour but they also raise some moral questions, concludes a recent analysis of behaviour-change schemes. How businesses' behaviour is influenced by consumer concerns for the environment is less clear - and may only result in 'greenwash' - the researchers suggest.

A framework to value marine and coastal zone ecosystem services, which acknowledges but transcends monetary value, has been proposed by researchers. Using this approach, coastal managers can integrate the different values placed on ecosystem goods and services by various stakeholders to assess how these values affect planning decisions.

The cost of a Mediterranean marine protected area (MPA) network could be cut by over two thirds if countries surrounding the Sea collaborate in its creation. This is the conclusion of a study that explored how the Convention on Biological Diversity’s goals to protect wildlife through MPAs could be met cost-efficiently.