Energy expansion and security in the current world scenario focuses on increasing the energy generation capacity and if possible, adopting cleaner and greener energy in that development process. However, too often this expansion and planning alters the landscape and human influence on its surroundings through a very complex mechanism. Resource extraction and land management activity involved in energy infrastructure development and human management of such development systems have long-term and sometimes unforeseen consequences. Although alternative energy sources are being explored, energy production is still highly dependent on fossil fuel, especially in most developing countries. Further, energy production can potentially affect land productivity, land cover, human migration, and other factors involved in running an energy production system, which presents a complex integration of these factors. Thus, land use, energy choices, infrastructure development and the population for which such facilities are being developed must be cognizant of each other, and the interactions between them need to be studied and understood closely. This study strives to analyze the implications of linkages between the energy industry, urbanization, and population and especially highlights processes that can be affected by their interaction. It is found that despite advancement in scientific tools, each of the three components, i.e., population growth, urbanization, and energy production, operates in silos, especially in developing countries, and that this complex issue of nexus is not dealt with in a comprehensive way. coal was the main source of energy and saw a large growth in the usage ratio. Coal was followed by oil, natural gas, hydropower, and renewable energy. Even though renewable energy was least among all energy sources in this period, its growth rate was much faster than at any other time in history. In the year 2011, expenditures for energy supply were more than 6 trillion USD, which accounts for approximately 10% of the world gross domestic product. Out of this world energy expenditure, the shares for Europe, North America, and Japan were about 25%, 20%, and 6%, respectively [5]. The International Energy Agency estimates that, in the year 2013 alone, the total primary energy supply (TPES) was 1.575 × 10 17 Watt-hour or 13,541 Millions of Tonnes of Oil Equivalent (Mtoe) [6]. There are other issues regarding energy consumption, for example, in the year 2014, the world's primary energy supply was 13,541 MTOE; however, final energy consumption in terms of fuel was only 8328 MTOE, i.e., 29.5% less than the total supply. One of the major reasons for this difference is because part of the energy is being consumed for products such as lubricants, asphalt, gasoline, and petrochemicals, which have chemical energy content but are not used as fuel. It is reported that the world population increased by 27% from 1990 to 2008, and the average per capita energy use also increased by 10%. For the same period 1990-2008, while overall ener...
Along with rapid population growth in Vietnam, there is an increasing dependence on groundwater for various activities. An Giang province is known to be one of the agricultural intensification areas of The Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD). This study aimed to evaluate the spatiotemporal variation of groundwater quality for a period of ten years from 2009 to 2018 in An Giang. The weighted groundwater quality index (GWQI) was developed based on the fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (Fuzzy-AHP) for assigning weighted parameters. The results show that that shallow wells in the Northeast and Southeast regions of An Giang were mostly categorized under "bad water" quality with high arsenic (As) concentration over the years partly due to huge amounts of sediment deposition in monsoon season. Overall, the reason for the poor groundwater quality in An Giang was the combined effect of both natural and human activities. On the other hand, we detected high values of GWQI links with high As concentration in areas where people extract more groundwater for irrigation. Temporal variation of GWQI suggested that groundwater quality at eight wells has improved from 2009 to 2018 in the wet season as compared to the dry season. The reason behind the improvement of groundwater quality during wet season was the decrease in river discharge, which causes less deposition of suspended solids near the flood plains. Moreover, the filling of unused wells can reduce the movement of pollutants from unused wells to groundwater aquifers. Although there was not sufficient evidence to show the relationship between As and sediment concentration, the temporal reduction trend in river discharge and suspended solids was detected in An Giang. The understanding of groundwater quality can help policymakers protect and manage limited water resources in the long-term.Geosciences 2019, 9, 330 2 of 23 of usages [6,7]. The disadvantages of the AHP method include the uncertainty and ambiguity in expressing opinions, as the method depends on the decision maker's knowledge and experiences during the decision-making process. Moreover, among other factors, the AHP method does not contain feedback loops [8].The fuzzy set was first developed by Zadeh in 1965 [5] and combined with Saaty's priority theory to reduce human ambiguity [9,10]. Later, the Fuzzy-AHP was further developed in order to overcome the uncertainty and ambiguity of criteria weights in deterministic and inflexible classifications [11]. Using the Fuzzy-AHP can provide a fuzzy number-interval judgment values rather than fixed or exact values [2]. This approach reduces uncertainty in assigned relative weight. As a result, the Fuzzy-AHP has been successfully used in many actual decision situation making such as energy alternatives selection [12,13], supplier selection [14], environmental sustainability evaluation [7], and water quality assessment [15][16][17]. Baghapour et al. [15] conducted the Fuzzy-AHP with fuzzy ordered weighted averaging (FOWA) for developing of the groundwater quality index (GWQI). They...
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