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The increasing flow of traffic passing through cities on a daily basis, especially those cities that have a difficult situation with bypass, raises concerns about the air quality in sections of the transport corridors, as well as in the city as a whole. Heavy metal pollution is a serious environmental concern, especially in urban and suburban areas where vehicle emissions contribute to air and soil pollution. The aim of the study is to assess the extent of heavy metal contamination in snow samples collected at dif...

Well-aerated soils are essential for methane (CH4) uptake from the atmosphere, acting as significant sinks for this greenhouse gas, which has a global warming potential 25 times greater than that of carbon dioxide (CO2). These soils contain methanotrophic bacteria, which oxidize CH4 and thereby reduce atmospheric methane concentrations. The potential of soils to assimilate CH4 depends on factors such as soil type and moisture regime. This study investigates the ability of clay soil Cambic Calcisol to assimilate CH...

Soil moisture, soil temperature, nutrient availability, and land use practices affect the GHG emissions from soils. In this study, the aim is to determine and analyse GHG emissions from agricultural soils in five monitoring sites. The mobile spectrophotometer Picarro G2508 is used for the quantification of N2O, CH4, and CO2 soil flux across five monitoring sites used for agricultural production during the growing seasons from 2017 to 2023. Findings reveal significant variations in GHG emissions across the monitori...

Reducing GHG emissions from soil is crucial for mitigating climate change, promoting sustainable agriculture, protecting ecosystems and biodiversity, ensuring food security, and improving public health. The effectiveness of GHG mitigating strategies may vary depending on local conditions, soil type, and agricultural practices. It is recognized that conventional farming practices may lead to increased GHG emissions compared to more sustainable farming systems. Therefore, the aim of this study is to research the GHG...

In order to reduce the impact of agricultural activity on global warming and promote sustainable land management, it is necessary to implement management practices that reduce GHG emissions from agriculture. Conventional soil tillage produces favorable conditions for the growth of seeds and plants, but it is an energy and labor-intensive method that alters the soil to an unfavorable condition, while reduced soil tillage decrease the use of energy resources, GHG emissions from the soils, and improves the soil quali...

Particulate air pollution from transport in cities, especially from cars, involves a variety of harmful compounds, including fine iron and heavy metals, which can persist in the air for long periods of time, increasing harmful effects on human health and creating a risk of environmental pollution. In Europe, more and more attention is being given to the chemical composition of dust not only their concentration in cities. The aim of the study was to determine which parts of the Jelgava city have the highest polluti...

Land reclamation is an improvement of land, which reduces the adverse effects of climate conditions and ensures the sustainable use of natural resources. Latvia is in humid soil area, which means that soils are formed under wet conditions. During the spring and autumn, these soils are wetted and unsuitable for land treatment. The installation of drainage systems shall ensure the reception of excess humidity and its removal from agricultural land, which makes it possible to process the land and to carry out economi...

Balanced development of ecosystem services in regions is one way of achieving the UN's sustainable development goals. Ecosystem services are divided into three main groups: First delivery services. Nature supplies us food and drinking water, raw materials and alternative energy sources. Thanks to natural biodiversity, we can grow a variety of vegetables and fruit, gather berries and mushrooms in the woods, and fish in the sea, rivers and lakes. Nature also supplies drinking water, which is the source of life for e...

The pollution, climate changes, loss of biodiversity and other factors have an impact on human health and is one of reasons to develop and try to come closer to the goals of sustainable development. The Agenda 2030 requires innovations and switch from linear economy to resilient and circular economy. To achieve sustainability there is a need for education for sustainable development. This term is actual already for two decades but still integration of education for sustainable development in study programs is a pr...

The achieving of 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is closely linked to sustainable soil management to provide food, fibre, fuel, to avoid land degradation, to promote land restoration, water regulation, nutrient cycling and to ensure habitat for biodiversity. Organic soils can be a carbon sink or a carbon source depending on land use and land use management. Agricultural production on organic soils is considered as an important source of anthropogenic CO2 and N2O emissions. Long-term plans to...

Landfills (dumps) are places where the end of the life cycle of products can be found - useful material is dumped away from the sight creating contaminant flows around. Another problem is huge unexplored potential of resources recycling - we have limited knowledge also on useful elements and materials that are buried. The solution to overcome the limitations that provide remote sensing and traditional geodesy, proximal sensing techniques could be used. ?Near surface geophysics? with operation at or just below the ...

The growing demand for bio-based products worldwide provides opportunity for Central and Eastern European countries to increase agricultural and wood production. Nevertheless, increase in bio-based production is restricted by emission reduction targets set by climate policies. Meanwhile, the changes in Common Agricultural Policy after 2020 offer each Member State to develop targeted and regional specific policies to meet socio-economic and environmental targets at national scale. Sustainable land management requir...

Anthropogenic activities disrupt hydrological regime (e.g. lake water level, river flow), and water quality changes due to pollution and affect ecosystems by disrupting the cycles of substances and water cycle. The composition of natural surface waters can be altered for a many reasons, for instance climatic, geographic as well as anthropogenic. Agriculture depends on a use of fertilizers, a use of pesticides, and a transport which turn agricultural land into a nonpoint source of surface water pollution. The agglo...

Majority of world inhabitants are living in cities as well as many inhabitants in Latvia choose to move to cities to look for wellfare. Living in a city with a high density of buildings, cars, and factories, the risk of air pollution increases. Air pollution from the transport, industry, and energy sectors affect the health of the urban population. In cities, air is often contaminated with dust containing various chemical elements, including heavy metals, which, even in low concentrations, can be hazardous to huma...

Nitrous oxide N2O is one of the major contributors to global warming and ozone depletion in the stratosphere. Management of agricultural soils is the largest source of N2O emissions in agricultural sector, therefore simultaneous and accurate measurement of N2O concentration is necessary. Nitrous oxide emission is formed within nitrification and denitrification processes in agricultural soils. The agricultural sector is one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions in Latvia as it accounted for 24.6 % of t...

Population growth in coastal areas worldwide call for new challenges to be solved. Blue growth initiatives are elaborated and developed in order to prevent sea resources depletion unsustainably by fishing, mining, transportation, tourism, and waste. The EU Water Framework Directive (2000/60/EC), EU Groundwater Directive (2002/118/EC) as well as EU Waste Framework Directive (2006/12/EC) are the legislative tools that base the pillars for more detailed action plans that prevents contamination spread, promote clean-u...

Soil provides many ecosystem services, therefore sustainable soil management, soil protection and ability to deliver ecosystem services are major concern worldwide. The growing demand for food and fiber, increases pressure on delivery of other ecosystem services provided by soil, namely water purification and regulation, carbon sequestration and regulation, nutrient cycling and provision of habitat for biodiversity. In this context, Functional Land Management framework was developed to optimise rather than maximiz...

The development of the agricultural industry and increasing demands for bio-based products adds pressure on natural resources, such as water and soil. Soil is non-renewable resource and provides many ecosystem services, namely food and biomass production, water purification, nutrient cycling, carbon sequestration and habitats for biodiversity. The simultaneous achievement of socio-economic and climate policy objectives is challenging and requires careful management of soils as a pivotal resource. In Latvia, the ke...

Climate change mitigation is a relevant topic in now days. One of the main sources of greenhouse gases (GHG) and air pollutants (including ammonia) emissions that promoting climate change is agriculture sector. Considerable part of GHG and ammonia emissions from agriculture in Baltic region is forming in dairy farms. The aim of the research is to estimate differences between conventional and organic dairy farms in context of GHG and ammonia emissions, taking into account livestock feeding and manure management pra...

The European Union has set a target to cut its greenhouse gas emission levels by 80% to 95% until 2050, if compared to 1990. Agricultural soil is an important carbon store and food provider in the world as well as greenhouse gas emission reducer via carbon sequestration. In order to assess the climate change mitigation effectiveness of the measures, it is necessary to obtain statistically significant data before and after the implementation. The greenhouse gas measurements from soil are commonly determined using s...