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Abstract: The purpose of this paper was to investigate how atmospheric air pollutants and meteorological conditions affect atmospheric visibility and turbidity. Meteorological parameter and anthropogenic air pollutant values were recorded during 2004 and 2005 at the Wuchi weather station and the Sha-lu environmental quality database station at the Taichung Harbor near the Taiwan Strait. Local weather conditions (temperature, relative humidity and solar radiation) and airborne pollutant (PM10, SO2, NO2, CO and O3) concentrations were used to analyze the relative effects of atmospheric air pollutants and meteorological conditions on atmospheric visibility and turbidity. Based on the analytic results, air pollutant concentrations significantly influence visibility and atmospheric turbidity. Wind speed is an important meteorological parameter that affects atmospheric turbidity parameters at the same atmospheric air pollutant concentrations throughout the periods of observation. At wind speeds of greater than 7m/s, the turbidity factor βVis is below 0.3 and visibility is greater than 6.5km. Under very turbid conditions, βVis >0.4, the wind velocity is below 5m/s, regardless of the atmospheric pollutant concentration. When visibility is ≥11km, the PM10 concentration is predicted to be below 150μg/m3 and the atmosphere is regarded as clear. Under very turbid conditions, the PM10 concentration exceeds 250μg/m3. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: It is essential to forecast the variation of storm surge in coastal areas during the typhoon attacks. Conventional investigations of storm surge often used the method of numerical hydrodynamic models or empirical formula. In this paper, the back-propagation neural network (BPN) is applied to predict the short-term typhoon surge and surge deviation in order to overcome the problem of exclusive and nonlinear relationships. The observations obtained during three typhoons of Taichung harbor in Taiwan are verified by the present model. From the comparison with numerical methods, it can be found that the short-term storm surge and surge deviation can be efficiently predicted 1 to 6h ahead using BPN. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Enhancing energy and environmental systems through sustainable development, in particular integrating concepts of circular economy and cleaner production are important for the emerging needs of humankind. In recent years, the developments in alternative sources of renewable energy counterparts has been prompted to substitute the nonrenewable fossil fuel consumptions towards clearner environment. However, environmental problems arising currently must be carefully addressed and to be solved to conserve the energy, water and other environmental resources for the future. This article highlights the recent developments on alternative energy sources that mainly focus on energy and environmental sustainability, that has been discussed on "The 4th International Conference on Alternative Fuels & Energy (ICAFE–2019)", which was held at Taichung City, Taiwan on October 18–21, 2019. Additionally, it provides useful insights from some of the papers published on a virtual special issue (VSI) of the Bioresourse Technology Journal. The highlighted research works in this review can be used as route-map towards sustainable development and energy efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In other studies the Integrated Process Rate (IPR) method was widely used to analyze the impact of various physical and chemical processes and their relative significance on PM 2.5 in pollution episodes for specific sites; however, sources of pollution and their effect in planning emission control strategies were not considered. Using results of a brute force source sensitivity (BFSS) method may complement IPR. This paper integrates CMAQ-IPR and BFSS to examine the causes of a PM 2.5 episode on Jan 15, 2010 across two air quality monitoring stations in Taichung, Taiwan (Shalu, a rural station and Situn, an urban station). Two pollution deterioration events (time intervals) were observed and simulated. When only CMAQ-IPR was used for simulation, the results revealed most pollution (>60%) was from local sources at the Situn Station. The two deterioration intervals differed however, as interval 1 showed a contribution from local emissions (49%), vertical advection (41%) and aerosols processes (10%). Interval 2 at Shalu Station was categorized as a downwind monitoring station, where emission from the grid constituted only 37%, and the majority of pollutants travelling by horizontal advection (56%), and to some extent, aerosols process (6%). Simulation by integrating IPR and BFSS (including diesel vehicles, gasoline vehicles/motorcycles, construction/road dust, iron/steel industries, and power plants around Taiwan) rendered to the type of physical or chemical process in which pollutants went through and its impact on the concentration of PM 2.5 in the air quality monitoring station, which helped planning of emission control measures. Simulation results indicated improvement of PM 2.5 concentrations in Situn and Shalu would be limited (only 0.2–4.2% contribution to deteriorating PM 2.5 levels at the stations) even the emissions of the power plants and iron/steel industries in whole Taiwan were under control. However, by controlling the emissions of diesel vehicles, gasoline vehicles/motorcycles, and construction/road dust in whole Taiwan, the improvent is much enhanced (49–79% contribution to deteriorating PM 2.5 levels at the stations), but it cost a lot. Nonethless, the improvement was quite significant by controlling the local emissions (around the monitoring station) of diesel vehicles, gasoline vehicles/motorcycles, and construction/road dust for Situn Station as they accounted for 72–85% of these three sources contribution to deteriorating PM 2.5 levels at the station. For Shalu Station, it required a wide area of controlling the emissions from diesel vehicles, gasoline vehicles/motorcycles, and construction/road dust because there was 22–53% of these three sources contribution to deteriorating PM 2.5 levels at the station from horizontal or vertical advection. Image 1 • Combination of BFSS and IPR is applied in the development of control strategies. • Improving Situn (urban) PM 2.5 requires only controlling the nearby specific sources. • Improving Shalu (rural) PM 2.5 requires a wide area of controlling emission sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]