53 research outputs found
Assessing marginal abatement cost for greenhouse gas emissions from livestock production in China and Europe - accounting for uncertainties
Climate change is probably the most challenging threat to mankind. International agreements
have acknowledged the fact that anthropogenic GHG emissions must be reduced
significantly to adhere to a maximum global warming of 2°C. The livestock sector plays a
key role in achieving this target as it is a significant source of GHG emissions. While the
livestock sector offers significant GHG reduction potential, it is currently neglected in
international and national mitigation efforts. Therefore, scientific research must guide
mitigation policy decisions with evidence of cost-efficient abatement potential that can be
achieved through various mitigation technologies.
Marginal Abatement Cost Curves (MACC) are an analytical tool for informing policy
makers about the cost-effectiveness (CE) of mitigation. MACCs provide a relatively clear
representation of a complicated issue based on their graphical design that prioritises various
mitigation options in terms of their CE of abatement and enables assessment of total GHG
reduction under a budget constraint. However, developing a MACC involves considerable
data collection, depends on various interdisciplinary information sources and the
methodology is subject to several limitations. These factors can result in uncertainties in
marginal abatement cost (MAC) results, the assessment of which is often neglected in
MACC literature.
This research shows the main GHG emission sources in livestock production and possible
mitigation options to reduce GHG emissions from these sources. After elaborating the
MACC methodology, advantages, disadvantages and limitation of the engineering MACC
are shown. This allows understanding the relevance of assessing and reporting uncertainty of
MACCs. Two engineering MACCs are developed that show the CE abatement potentials
available in the Chinese livestock sector and European Union 15 (EU-15) dairy sector in
2020, with emphasis on dietary mitigation options. The requirement of assessing CE of
abatement for individual mitigation options is highlighted by separate derivation of technical
and economic abatement potential for the EU-15 dairy sector. For the Chinese MACC, a
scenario analysis (SA) and for the European MACC, a Monte Carlo (MC) simulation are
utilised to show the relevance of assessing uncertainty in MACCs. To provide further
evidence, the overall range of CE estimates for eight mitigation options found in relevant
MACC literature is presented. This allows the generation of probability distribution
functions of CE for each mitigation option with kernel density estimation (KDE). The results from this study show the significance of livestock and dairy production related
GHG emissions in China and Europe, respectively. In China, baseline GHG emissions of
livestock production are projected to increase significantly, while these of the EU-15 dairy
production are predicted to decrease by 2020. It was found that enteric fermentation is the
largest GHG emission source from dairy production and should be focus of mitigation
policies. Both case studies showed mitigation options that offer abatement potential at high
CE. Priorities should be given to biomass gasification, breeding techniques and feed
supplements as tea saponins and probiotics for the Chinese livestock sector, and to animal
selection, reduced tillage and dietary probiotics for the EU-15 dairy sector. The scenario
analysis reveals that mid-term projections for the Chinese livestock sector are varying
strongly, and utilising key variables from different projections has a significant impact on
MAC results which changes the ranking of the mitigation options. The MC simulation shows
the contribution of some model inputs to the uncertainty of abatement at negative cost and a
high model output uncertainty regarding measure’s CE for most mitigation options.
However, the ranking of the mitigation options remains stable. The range of MAC estimates
for 8 mitigation options in the agricultural sector is high and variables like ‘study quality’ or
‘study location’ do not change this. The KDE was further used to rank the mitigations
options based on their probability of being reported as cost-negative and shows that
measures affecting soil N2O and carbon sequestration are reported to be more cost-efficient
as compared to measures focusing on manure management. Based on these finding, the
impact of study designs on MAC estimates and lack of communication uncertainty in MACC
literature are discussed.
Uncertainties that are underpinning MACC results can have significant impacts on CE and
abatement potentials. To increase utilisation of MACCs by knowledge users, MACC
research must prioritise assessment, quantification and report of uncertainties, compare
results within the scientific literature and publish data and assumption of the MACC
transparently
Developing climate-smart livestock systems in Inner Mongolia, China
‘Climate-smart’ is the term coined to define agricultural systems that are resilient to climate
change, and offer efficient emissions mitigation potential without compromising on
productivity, food security and livelihoods. As part of the implementation of such systems,
this study developed a Marginal Abatement Cost Curve (MACC) for greenhouse gas emission
mitigation for a grassland system in Inner Mongolia, China. We identified two baseline
emission scenarios and three abatement measures, namely, shorter lambing time,
prohibited grazing, and reduced stocking rates. The study region showed a high and costefficient
abatement potential of 62.5 and 32 Kilotonnes (Kt) of CO2eq for each baseline,
respectively and each Abatement measure lead to cost savings for the herders. Reduced
stocking rates provided the largest mitigation potential. Sensitivity analysis showed how
increasing input and livestock product prices have consequences for measure adoption
Human serum activates the tegument of female schistosomes and supports recovery from Praziquantel
Schistosomiasis is one of the most devastating parasitic disease in the world. Schistosoma spp. survive for decades within the vasculature of their human hosts. They have evolved a vast array of mechanisms to avoid the immune reaction of the host. Due to their sexual dimorphism, with the female worm lying within the gynecophoric canal of the male worm, it is the male that is exposed to the immediate environment and the soluble parts of the host's immune response. To understand how the worms are so successful in fending off the immune attacks of the host, comparative analyses of both worm sexes in human serum (with or without Praziquantel) were performed using scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and immunohistochemistry. Further, gene expression analyses of tegument-specific genes were performed. Following the incubation in human serum, males and females out of pairs show morphological changes such as an altered structure of the pits below the surface and an increased number of pits per area. In addition, female schistosomes presented a marked tuft-like repulsion of their opsonized surface. The observed resistance of females to Praziquantel seemed to depend on active proteins in the human serum. Moreover, different expression profiles of tegument-specific genes indicate different functions of female_single and male_single teguments in response to human serum. Our results indicate that female schistosomes developed different evasion strategies toward the host's immune system in comparison to males that might lead to more robustness and has to be taken into account for the development of new anti-schistosomal drugs
Experimental evidence for a nonparabolic interface shift on the nanoscale during the dissolution of Ni into bulk Au (111)
Non-parabolic shift of phase boundaries on nanoscale in binary systems with restricted solubility: theory and experiment
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