No abstract

Plastic derived from the petrochemical industry with a high molecular weight constitutes about 9-13% of total solid waste. Since the industrial revolution, the use of plastic has increased manifold without improving its adequate management as a waste. Most of the plastic waste produced in the world is mainly from packaging industry followed by building and construction. Plastic is a non-degradable deadly pollutant to degrade environmental quality and are known to remain in water and soil for years without making any change in their structure. Due to enormous generation, open burning of plastic is also preferred due to the lack of resource in the developing countries thus releasing toxic gases thereby causing air pollution. Plastic disturbs the balance of the environment by acting as physical barrier leading to the drainage of the drains, degrading soil properties, and are often ingested by the organisms ultimately leading to their death. Thus, it becomes more important to manage the plastic pollution keeping in view its detrimental impacts on the environment.

No abstract

No abstract

<p>Groundwater is a major source of water supply over most regions, accounting for nearly one-third of all water abstraction globally. However, due to overreliance on this resource, many aquifers around the United States have experienced rapid depletion, while some aquifers have seen increasing water levels due to extensive recharge efforts. It is essential to have a comprehensive understanding of the rate at which groundwater storages are changing to assess the potential availability of groundwater in the future. In this work, we estimate groundwater storage changes across more than 1000 watersheds over the US from a proposed algorithm for baseflow extracted using streamflow and precipitation observations. We also study the spatial and temporal variations in the characteristic of baseflow recession. We compare the storage change estimated from baseflows with those obtained from the estimates from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) and observations from monitoring wells. The results help in validating the application of the proposed baseflow-based storage estimates in different aquifers and climatic regions. The proposed approach is simple and computationally efficient for estimating baseflows and groundwater storage changes in poorly-gauged watersheds.</p>