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Groundwater quality in coastal area has been an issue of interest because of excessive groundwater extraction for human use, for example, industrialization, irrigation, which can lead to saltwater intrusion. The study develops an integrated data analysis procedure based on multivariate statistics principal component analysis (PCA), hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) and redundancy analysis (RDA), to determine the effects of key environmental conditions on the formulation of groundwater pollutants. This proposed method was demonstrated by analyzing groundwater quality monitoring data collected between 2011 and 2014 from four coastal industrial areas in Changhua county of Taiwan, namely Chuansing, Xianxi, Lukang and Fangyuan industrial parks. First, different environmental conditions in each industrial region were explored by PCA. The spatial hierarchy and spatial distribution of pollutant categories were then identified using HCA with the kriging method. Finally, the effect of environmental conditions on constitutive pollutants were identified with RDA. The three environmental patterns identified from the analytical results in Chuansing, Lukang and Xianxi were the salination factor (including conductivity and general hardness (GH)), water level and redox condition (including dissolved oxygen and oxidation–reduction potential). Fangyuan industrial park had only two patterns, namely salination (including conductivity and GH) and oxygen content (including DO and depth). The pollutant category indicated high concentrations of all pollutants in Chuansing and Fangyuan, and higher concentration of SO42−, TDS, Cl− in Xianxi, and of NH3-N, Mn, Fe and TOC in Lukang. According to RDA results, salination caused the high concentrations of NH3N, Cl−, TDS in Chuansing, and of Cl−, TDS and SO42− in Xianxi and Lukang. Additionally, salination caused high concentrations of Fe in both Lukang and Fangyuan industrial parks in combination with those three pollutants. The redox condition was linked to high content of NO3− in Chuansing and Lukang, and of TOC in Xianxi. In Fangyuan industrial park, NO3− was also linked to high oxygen concentration. In summary, the combination of PCA, HCA and RDA enables the analysis of monitoring data to support policy decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human behavior altered in different socioeconomic conditions is the main contributor to deteriorating air quality, therefore changing the behavior is the goal of air policies. In this study, we propose an integrated framework to figure out the roles of socio-physical environments in promoting air quality control policies through behavioral perspectives. The study selects Changhua County in Central Taiwan, composed of 26 cities and townships, as a case study to investigate the impacts of social and economic factors and the air quality on individual's knowledge, attitude and behavioral intention. The socioeconomic and environmental factors are collected from Taiwanese official information, while the knowledge, attitude, and intention toward the policies are obtained through questionnaires. Subsequently, multivariate analysis techniques including principal component analysis and redundancy analysis are utilized to simultaneously identify the causal relationships between socio-physical environments and the knowledge, attitude, and intention in different townships. Our findings suggest that individual's knowledge, attitude, and intention toward the air polices cannot be raised simply in commensurate with the growth of the economy and the deterioration of air quality. Indeed, people living in highly urbanized regions and being well-educated, particularly in Changhua City, are less willing to take actions for air quality improvement although they are susceptible to environmental risks. On the contrary, people close to nature have more environmental knowledge, positive attitudes and more intentions to improve the air quality. The finding results will be beneficial to authorities in each city/township to organize environmental education plans corresponding to their socioeconomic conditions and behavioral patterns. Image 1 • Implement a combination of PCA and RDA to examine causality among factors. • Simultaneously evaluate behavioral perspectives toward air policies in townships. • Intention toward air policies cannot be raised simply along with economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Applying a sequence of three multivariate statistical approaches. • The greater the economic prosperity, the greater MSW composition complexity. • Kitchen waste represents a distinct pattern between urban and rural communities. • Paper waste is increased in commensurate with the growth of economy. • Plastics and glass wastes generation decline, contrasting to the expanding economy. Composition of municipal solid waste (MSW) is rapidly changed along with socioeconomic factors, especially in developing countries. Understanding the association between MSW composition and socioeconomic factors is therefore instrumental when deciding types of technologies and optimizing management strategies. In the past decades, Taiwan has gradually evolved from an agricultural society to a post-industrial society through industrialization and urbanization. This study collects a 12-year worth of self-reported dataset in Taiwan, including MSW, individual and household social-economic factors, in order to unveil their relationships. Our analysis is based on multivariate approach. The results indicate that the major socioeconomic factors that dominate the MSW composition were safety concerns, economic activities, and lifestyle. Overall, MSW composition is increasingly complex as the economy experiences more prosperity, and there is an upward trend of recyclable wastes. Moreover, kitchen waste represents a distinct pattern between urban and rural communities, coupled with the contribution of total waste. Consistent with other countries, paper waste is increased in commensurate with the growth of economy. Interestingly, contrasting to the global trend, plastics and glass wastes generation rate decline when the economy expands economic activities. This attributes mainly to the strict enforcement of recycling policies accompanied with marketing campaigns that encourage recycling and enhance consumers' green awareness. Strategies that facilitate modifying consumers' socioeconomic factors and changing consumers' behavior could play an important role in management of MSW in other developing countries. Image, graphical abstract [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]