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Water SA
On-line version ISSN 1816-7950
Print version ISSN 0378-4738
Water SA vol.39 n.2 Pretoria Jan. 2013
Predicted impacts of land use change on groundwater recharge of the upper Berg catchment, South Africa
M AlbhaisiI; L BrendonckII; O BatelaanI, III, IV, *
IDept. of Hydrology and Hydraulic Engineering, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussels, Belgium IILab. of Aquatic Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, KU Leuven, Charles Deberiotstraat 32 - box 2439,3000 Leuven
IIIDept. Earth and Environmental Sciences, KU Leuven, Celestijnenlaan 200E, 3001 Heverlee, Belgium
IVSchool of the Environment, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide SA 5001, Australia
Land use change is a major factor influencing catchment hydrology and groundwater resources. In South Africa, the management of scarce water resources is a big concern. The study area, the upper Berg catchment, Western Cape, South Africa, contains strategic water resources. The catchment has undergone many changes in recent years, not least of all the construction of a dam on the upper reach. To reduce water loss due to evapotranspiration, non-native hill slope vegetation upstream of the Berg River Dam was cut down. It was hypothesised that recharge has been increased due to this change in vegetation. The objectives of this study were to determine land use changes in upper Berg catchment using multi-temporal Landsat images from 1984, 1992, 2002, and 2008, and to predict the impact of these land use changes on groundwater recharge. For the simulation of groundwater recharge the distributed hydrological model WetSpa was used. Forest plantations lost 72% (18.8 km2) of their areal extent between 1984 and 2008, due to deforestation as part of a plan to implement the ecological Reserve as required by national water policy; the area of barren land increased by 15.7 km2 in the same period. The high increase in precipitation, especially in the period of 2005-2009, combined with the change in land use in the study area resulted in a highly increased (278%) predicted mean groundwater recharge. Simulated groundwater recharge shows strong spatial differences for each evaluated year. The effect of the rapid clearing of non-native hill slope vegetation upstream of the Berg River Dam for the land use scenario of 2008 was tested to check if clearing is an important factor in the increase of groundwater recharge. Hence, we simulated the whole time-series from 1984-2004 (21 years) with the land use map from 2008 instead of the land use maps for 1984, 1992 and 2002. A systematic increase of about 8% per year for the 21-year period, due to the change in land use from the different years to that of 2008, is predicted , which confirms that the clearing of the non-native hill slope vegetation is of considerable importance for the increase in groundwater recharge.
Keywords: Berg catchment, ecological Reserve, WetSpa, remote sensing
Groundwater is considered to be one of the most important, and in many semi-arid areas one of the most scarce, natural resources. Over the past decade there has been an increasing focus on studies, analyses and exploration of groundwater, for the purpose of sustainable exploitation. Policy intention is to maintain a balance between demand, quantity and quality of groundwater. Land use change is a major factor affecting the groundwater system (Calder, 1993). Through history, intense human activities, including industrialisation, mining, urbanisation, agriculture, damming, etc., have resulted in significant and clear changes in the landscape with impact on the water balance of surface and groundwater systems (Bronstert, 2004).
Collecting accurate and timely information on land use is important for land use change detection (Giri et al., 2005) as a basis for predicting impact on water resources. There are various methods that can be used in the collection of land use data but the use of satellite remote sensing technologies can greatly facilitate the process (Gautam et al., 2003). Compared with traditional ground-based surveys, satellite remote sensing provides greater amounts of information on the geographic distribution of land use in a relatively cost- and time-saving way for- assessments on a regional scale (Kachhwala, 1985, Rogan and Chen, 2004; Yuan et al., 2005). Space-borne remotely sensed data may be particularly useful in developing countries where recent and reliable spatial information is lacking (Dong et al., 1997). Remote sensing technology and geographic information systems (GIS) provide efficient methods for analysis of land use issues and tools for land use planning and modelling (Star et al., 1997; Chilar, 2000). By understanding the driving forces of land use development in the past, managing the current situation with modern GIS tools, and modelling the future, one is able to develop plans for multiple uses of natural resources and nature conservation. Ringrose et al. (2005) stressed the need to map land use and land-cover change in Africa, as, already more than a decade previously, land use change was accelerating and causing widespread environmental problems. This changing pattern of land use and land cover reflects changing economic and social conditions taking place throughout the continent. Monitoring such changes is important for coordinated actions at national and international levels (Bernard et al., 1997).
Different methods have been developed for land use change detection. Yuan et al. (1998) divide the methods for change detection and classification into pre-classification and post-classification techniques. The pre-classification techniques apply various algorithms directly to time-series satellite imageries to generate 'change' versus 'no change' maps. These techniques locate changes but do not provide information on the nature of change (Singh, 1989; Ridd and Liu, 1998; Yuan et al., 1998). On the other hand, post-classification comparison methods use separate classifications of images acquired at different times to produce difference maps from which 'from-to' change information can be generated (Jensen, 2005). Although the accuracy of the change maps is dependent on the accuracy of the individual classifications and is subject to error propagation, the classification of each date of imagery builds a historical series that can be more easily updated and used for applications other than change detection. The post-classification comparison approach also compensates for variation in atmospheric conditions and vegetation phenology between dates, since each classification is independently produced and mapped (Yuan et al., 1998, 2005; Coppin et al., 2004).
In assessing land use, presence, distribution and type of vegetation type play an important role in the estimation of water yield in a catchment. Coniferous forests, for example, consume more water than deciduous forests, while shrubs and grasslands use less water than forests (Bosch and Hewlett, 1982; Brown et al., 2005). Hope et al. (2009) investigated the association between annual river yields and AVHRR remotely-sensed changes in vegetation cover in a large mountainous fynbos catchment for 18 years. From the results it is concluded that the spectral vegetation index NDVI (normalised difference vegetation index) has a negative relationship with the river yield at low altitudes. Depending on climate, vegetation is a strong determining factor for the surface hydrology. For example, Robinson et al. (2003) found no significant effect of a change in forest cover on peaks and low flows for 25 basins across northwestern Europe, while deforestation led to an increase in base flow in more temperate climates (Hornbeck et al., 1993).
Land use change also has a direct influence on the catchment hydrology (Bhaduri et al., 2000; Ott and Uhlenbrook, 2004; Tang et al., 2005). This influence can be either measured as, e.g., a change in river discharge, or predicted by hydrologi-cal model simulations. If a fully distributed model is used and combined with land use change scenarios, it allows for assessing the impact of the change on groundwater recharge, base-flow and total river discharge.
Niehoff et al. (2002) used the land use change modelling kit (LUCK) in conjunction with a modified version of the physically-based hydrological model WaSiM-ETH for flood prediction. Tang et al. (2005) applied the Land Transformation Model (LTM) in combination with the Long-Term Hydrologic Impact Assessment (LTHIA) model (Bhaduri et al., 2000). Lin et al. (2007) tested the generalised watershed loading functions model using predicted land use from the CLUE-S model (Verburg et al., 1999, 2004). McColl and Aggett (2007) tested the hydrological model HEC-HMS together with the land use forecasting model 'What if?'. In these studies land use change models have shown to provide useful information that enables assessment of the impact of future land use on the hydrology.
However, the abovementioned models do not explicitly treat the spatial variability of groundwater recharge but focus on surface hydrological processes. Klöcking and Haberlandt (2002), Batelaan et al. (2003) and Batelaan and De Smedt (2007), on the other hand, investigated impacts of land use changes on groundwater at mesoscale with a fully-distributed hydrologic model. Dams et al. (2008) assessed the impact of future (until 2020) land use change on groundwater systems by coupling a land-use change model (CLUE-S) with a water balance model (WetSpass) and a steady-state groundwater model (MODFLOW).
The objective of this study was to predict the impact of land use change on groundwater recharge using time-series land use data derived from satellite images with a distributed hydrologi-cal model (WetSpa), for the upper Berg catchment, Western Cape, South Africa. The Berg catchment was selected because it has undergone many changes in recent years; a dam was built on the river creating a new ecological system behind it; and non-native hill slope vegetation upstream of the dam was cleared. It was hypothesised that evapotranspiration would be reduced and recharge increased due to this change in land use.
Wetspa model
WetSpa (Water and Energy Transfer between Soil, Plant and Atmosphere) is a grid-based distributed hydrologic model for water and energy transfer between soil, plants and atmosphere. It was originally developed by Wang et al. (1996) and adapted for flood prediction on hourly time steps by De Smedt et al. (2000, 2004) and Liu et al. (2003, 2004, 2005).
For each grid cell, 4 layers are considered in the vertical direction, representing vegetation, root, transmission and saturated zone. The hydrologic processes considered in the model are precipitation, interception, depression storage, surface runoff, infiltration, evapotranspiration, interflow, percolation, groundwater drainage and snowmelt. The model predicts peak discharges and hydrographs, which can be defined for any location in the channel network. Runoff from different cells in the watershed is routed to the watershed outlet depending on flow velocity and wave damping coefficient by using the diffusive wave approximation method. An approximate solution, proposed by Liu et al. (2003) in the form of an instantaneous unit hydrograph (IUH), is used in the model, relating the discharge at the end of a flow path to the available runoff at the start of the flow path as a function of spatial differences of topography, soil and land use along the flow path:
t [T] is time
U(t) [T-] is the flow path unit response function
t0 [T] is the mean flow time
σ [T] is the standard deviation of the flow time.
Parameters t0 and σ are spatially distributed, and can be obtained by integration along the topographically determined flow paths as a function of flow celerity and dispersion.
A mixture of physical and empirical relationships is used to describe the hydrological processes in the model. Interception reduces the precipitation to net precipitation, which on the ground is separated into rainfall excess and infiltration. Rainfall excess is calculated using a moisture-related modified rational method with a potential runoff coefficient depending on land cover, soil type, slope, rainfall intensity, and antecedent moisture content of the soil. The calculated rainfall excess fills the depression storage at the initial stage and runs off the land surface simultaneously as overland flow (Linsley et al., 1982). The infiltrated part of the rainfall stays as soil moisture in the root zone, moves laterally as interflow or percolates as ground-water recharge depending on the moisture content of the soil. Both percolation and interflow are assumed to be gravity-driven in the model. Percolation out of the root zone is determined by the hydraulic conductivity, which is dependent on the moisture content as a function of the soil pore size distribution index. Interflow is assumed to occur in the root zone after percolation and becomes significant only if the soil moisture is higher than field capacity. Darcy's law and a kinematic approximation are used to estimate the amount of interflow generated from each cell, as a function of hydraulic conductivity, moisture content, slope, and root depth. The actual evapotranspira-tion from soil and plants is calculated for each grid cell using the relationship developed by Thornthwaite and Mather (1955), as a function of potential evapotranspiration, vegetation stage, and moisture content in the cell.
The total water balance for a raster cell is composed of the water balance for the vegetated, bare-soil, open water and impervious parts of each grid cell. This allows one to account for the heterogeneity of the land use per cell, which is dependent on the resolution of the raster cell.
For each grid cell, the root zone water balance is simulated by equating inputs and outputs:
D [L] is root depth
θ [L3L-3] is soil moisture
t [T] is time
I [UP1] is initial abstraction including interception and depression losses
V [LT1] is surface runoff or rainfall excess
E [LT1] is evapotranspiration
R [LT1] is percolation out of the root zone
F [LP1] is interflow.
Although the spatial variability of land use, soil and topographic properties within a watershed are considered in the model, the groundwater response is modelled on sub-catchment scale.
WetSpa uses a water balance equation for the saturated zone:
SGs(t) and SGs(t-1) are groundwater storage of the subcatchment at time step t and t-1 (mm)
N is the number of cells in the subwatershed
Ai is the cell area (m2)
As is the subcatchment area (m2)
EG (t) is the average evapotranspiration from groundwater storage of the subcatchment (mm)
QG (t) is the groundwater discharge (m3s-1)
RG.(t) is the percolation out of the root zone over the time interval (mm).
Groundwater or percolation out of the root zone RG.(t) is calculated based on Darcy's law and Brooks and Corey's relationship between hydraulic conductivity and effective saturation (Brooks and Corey, 1966; Eagleson, 1978):
K.[0.(t)] is the effective hydraulic conductivity corresponding to the average soil moisture content at time t (mm-h-1)
Δt is the time interval (h)
K.,s is the cell saturation hydraulic conductivity (mm-h-1)
θ. is the soil porosity (m3m-3)
θ.γ is the cell residual moisture content (m3m-3)
A is the pore disconnectedness index, determined as
A = (2+3B)/B, in which B is the cell pore size distribution index.
Groundwater discharge QGs(t) is calculated based on the simple concept of a non-linear reservoir with a storage exponent of 2 (Wittenberg and Sivapalan, 1999). The general groundwater discharge equation can be expressed as:
QGJtt) is the average groundwater flow at the subcatchment outlet (m3-s-1)
SGs(t) is the groundwater storage of the subcatchment at time t (mm)
m (-) is an exponent
m = 1 for linear reservoir and m = 2 for non-linear reservoir
Kℓ is a groundwater recession coefficient (s-1), which is dependent upon area, shape, pore volume and transmissiv-ity of the subcatchment, and can be estimated from recession portions of stream flow hydrographs if measurement data at the subcatchment outlet are available.
The WetSpa distributed model potentially involves a large number of model parameters. Most of these parameters can be assessed from field data like hydrometeorological observations, maps of topography, soil type and land use. However, comprehensive field data are seldom available to fully support specification of all model parameters. In addition, some model parameters are of a more conceptual nature and cannot be directly assessed. Hence, some parameters have to be determined through a calibration process. The model parameters that have to be determined through calibration are listed in Table 1 and their role in the different model components of WetSpa is shown in Fig. 1 (Liu et al., 2003; Liu and De Smedt, 2005; Bahremand et al., 2007). All other model parameters, i.e. spatial hydrological properties related to soil type, land use, and topography, are derived from topography or provided via lookup tables for soil and land use maps. Hydrological characteristics such as flow direction, flow accumulation, stream network, stream order, slope of land-river, hydraulic radius and sub-catchments are delineated from DEM.
Global WetSpa model parameters optimised during calibration: description, symbols, preset feasible range (Shafii and De Smedt, 2009)
Figure 1
Schematic representation of the general model structure of WetSpa: arrows represent hydrological processes, boxes represent storage zones, and symbols between brackets refer to WetSpa global model parameters to be calibrated as explained in Table 1. From: Shafii and De Smedt (2009).
Beside peak discharges and river flow hydro-graphs, the main outputs of the model are spatially distributed hydrological characteristics, such as soil moisture, infiltration rates, groundwater recharge, surface water retention, runoff, etc.
Study area and data
The WetSpa model was applied to the Berg River catchment, Western Cape, South Africa. The Berg catchment comprises 9 000 km2 and is divided into 12 quaternary catchments starting from the source of the Berg River with G10A catchment and ending at the Atlantic Ocean with G10M catchment. G10A has a surface area of 172 km2 of which 7 km2 is occupied by the lake of the Berg River Dam, which started to operate in the last quarter of 2007. The study area is the upper part of the G10A catchment covering 36.3 km2 from the source of the river until the gauging station of G10A just above the dam (Fig. 2). G10A is characterised by a Mediterranean climate with mean annual precipitation of 1 603 mm-yr-1 and mean annual potential evaporation of 1 475 mm-yr-1 (DWAF, 2007). The catchment (G10A) has a relatively high density drainage network with a mean annual runoff of 1 015 mm-yr-1 (DWAF, 2007). The study area (upper G10A) is mountainous and has an elevation ranging between 261 and 1 560 m. In contrast, the more downstream part of the Berg River catchment is relatively flat. The area is dominated by sandy loam soil and the aquifer consists of fractured sandstone (Midgley et al., 1994). Data from two meteorological stations, with daily measurements of precipitation and potential evapotranspiration from 1984 till 2009, were used in the model. The meteorological time series show that the maximum precipitation is observed in June (173 mm) and the lowest in January (3 mm). The potential evapo-transpiration varies from about 0.1 mm in June to 8.6 mm in December with a mean value of 3.2 mm. Figure 3 shows the continuous time series of the precipitation and evapotranspiration data in the catchment. The precipitation shows an increasing trend especially from 2007 until 2009; on the other hand the evapotranspiration shows no significant trend.
Figure 2
Map of the Berg River Catchment, the area in red box is G10A quaternary catchment including the study area indicated by the grey boarders (from DWAF, 2007)
Figure 3
Time series of the precipitation and potential evapotranspiration in the catchment
For the discharge gauging station a continuous daily time series from the middle of March 2008 until end 2009 is available. The highest discharge (about 281 m3-s-1) is observed in September 2009, while the lowest discharge (about 0.09 m3-s-1) is measured in March 2009. Another gauging station, operational from 1979 till 2007, is now located in the middle of the lake of the Berg River Dam. The data from this station were not used as the Berg River was severely modified by abstraction from the river and the release of some 17 MCM-yr-1 for summer irrigation from the Theewaterskloof Dam into the upper Berg River at the Berg River Syphon, upstream of the present dam (DWAF, 2007).
The report of DWAF, 2007 suggested that the two main impacts that could result from the construction of the Berg River Dam are: raising of groundwater levels in the immediate vicinity of the dam (with a potential for waterlogging), and modifying the exchange of water between the river and the groundwater system. The report concluded that the areas directly east and north of the dam may be affected by these two impacts. This leads to ignoring the effect of the dam lake on the recharge of the study area, as the lake is located outside of the borders of the study area.
A digital elevation map (DEM) was extracted from the USGS/NASA Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM). The International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) has processed these data in order to provide seamless continuous topographic surfaces. Areas with regions of no data in the original SRTM data have been filled using interpolation methods described by Reuter et al. (2007). STRM data were evaluated by ground truth elevation data of the study area provided by the South African Department of Land Affairs (DWAF, 2006). Land use maps were extracted from LANDSAT images freely available from the USGS website, (http://glovis.usgs.gov/). The images were stored in the Geographic Tagged Image-File Format (GeoTIFF). This format enables referencing of a raster image to a known geodetic model or map projection. Each band of the LANDSAT data in the GeoTIFF format was delivered as a grey-scale, uncompressed, 8-bit string of unsigned integers. Geographically, the study area is located between latitudes 33º and 34º south and longitudes 18º and 20º east. The images are located on Path Number 175 and Row Number 83. Four images were selected to extract land use maps. The selection of the images is based on the criteria:
• The images had no cloud cover over the study area
• The images were of good quality according to the USGS rating criteria
• The resolutions of the images were similar
• The images cover the same period as the meteorological data time series.
The data used for referencing include:
• Digital elevation map (DEM) from SRTM
• Aerial photos of 2007 showing land use and salient features of the study area
• Land use maps of the years 1977 and 1997 with a scale of 1:50000
• SPOT image obtained from CSIR, South Africa. This image is used to support the land use cover extraction in a combination with DEM, aerial photos and land use maps. The resolution of the image is 10 m by 10 m and date of acquisition is 03 May 2008.
Four land use maps were created by a maximum likelihood classification for the years 1984, 1992, 2002 and 2008.
Model application
The WetSpa simulation was set up with a spatial resolution of 30 m by 30 m. A threshold value of 50 pixels is used for extracting the stream network from the DEM. This threshold results in 241 extracted sub-basins, which have an average sub-basin area of 0.15 km2. For the slope grid a minimum slope of 0.01% is used in order to avoid stagnant water or extreme low velocities for the surface runoff.
Based on the soil type map, physical parameters including saturated hydraulic conductivity, soil porosity, field capacity, residual moisture, pore distribution index, plant wilting point and initial moisture are created based on the soil texture by means of an attribute lookup table. Based on the land use map, root depth, vegetation fraction, interception capacity, leaf area index (LAI) and the Manning's coefficient for different orders of rivers are assigned.
Based on the slope, soil and land use maps, a map with potential runoff coefficients and depression storage capacities is created. The impervious percentage for urban cells is hereby set equal to 70% (Bahremand et al., 2007). Then, the flow routing parameters are calculated, including flow velocity, mean flow travel time and its standard deviation from each cell to the basin outlet and to the sub-basin outlet. The grids for precipitation and potential evapotranspiration are created based on the geographical coordinates of each measuring station and the catchment boundary using the Thiessen polygon extension of the ArcView Spatial Analyst.
Results and discussion
Image classification and land use change detection
In this study, Landsat data for 4 dates were classified according to land use classes using a maximum likelihood supervised classification methodology. First, training sites, which represent homogeneous examples of prior known land cover types, were located in the images using the training data from a colour composite, normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI), land use maps of 1977 and 1997, the SPOT image and the aerial photos. The spectral characteristics of these training sites are used in the form of multivariate statistical parameters to define the classification signatures. Six classes were defined: water, urban, forest, crop land, shrub land, and barren land. Table 2 gives a description of the different classes. The classification signature files were subsequently used in the maximum likelihood classifier to automatically classify every pixel in the entire image according to land use class, for which it showed the highest likelihood of being a member. The classified images were further smoothed with a majority filter with a 3 x 3 kernel to reduce the number of misclassified pixels (RSI, 2003).
Description of land use classes of the study area as used in the image classification
The land use maps for 1984, 1992, 2002, and 2008 for the upper G10A catchment are presented in Fig. 4. From the six land use classes, only forest plantation, shrub land, barren land and crop land occur in the study area.
Figure 4
LANDSAT imagery classified land use maps of the catchment for 1984, 1992,2002 and 2008. The black line indicates the study area.
The area and the change in coverage of these four land use classes during the four intervals are presented in Fig. 5. It shows that barren land and crop land area increased while forest and shrub land declined continuously from 1984 till 2008. To further evaluate real losses and gains of the different land use classes, matrices of land use changes from 1984 to 1992, 1992 to 2002, 2002 to 2008, and 1984 to 2008 were established (Table 3).
Figure 5
Results of land use classification for 1984, 1992,2002, and 2008; the bar graph shows the area (km2) and change in area (km2) for each class of the study area.
Forest plantation lost 72% (18.82 km2) of its 1984 area (27.62 km2) to other classes during the study period from 1984 to 2008 (Fig. 5). 78% (14.69 km2) changed into barren land, 1% into crop land (0.28 km2) and 21% (3.85 km2) into shrub land (Table 3a-c). The loss of forest area was mainly caused by deforestation as a part of a policy to implement the ecological Reserve as required by the National Water Act (No. 36 of 1998;
RSA, 1998). The ecological Reserve refers to the quantity and quality of water required to protect the aquatic ecosystems of the water resource. The policy aims to replace the pine forest with native vegetation to decrease the evapo-transpiration and increase the recharge (DWAF, 2007). The logging started in 2007 but was not followed by planting of new vegetation; hence this has led to an increase in barren land. Table 3d shows that 8.80 km2 of forest plantations of 1984 remains forest till 2008.
Shrub land lost 81.4% (1.05 km2) of its 1984 area (1.29 km2) and turned into barren land during the study period (Table 3). 317% (4.09 km2) of shrub land class was gained from forest plantation class (Table 3a-c), resulting in a net 2.8 km2 increase in shrub land area (Fig. 5) and 0.24 km2 shrub land of 1984 remained unchanged till 2008.
Figure 5 shows that barren land had an area of 8.63 km2 in 1984, 10.17 km2 in 1992, 13.9 km2 in 2002, and 24.37 km2 in 2008, representing a net increase of 282% (15.74 km2) during the study period. Crop land gained 0.28 km2 which represents a total increase for the period of 19842008 of 245%; this increase is at the cost of forest.
Groundwater recharge determination
Calibration of the WetSpa model resulted in reasonable results for the total discharge and good results for the low flows; details are described in Albhaisi (2012). The WetSpa model was applied for the four different land use maps to predict the impact of land use change on water balance of the catchment. The available 26 years of continuous daily meteorological data, from 1984 until 2009, were split into 4 periods - one for each land use map: (i) 1984-1990 for the land use map of 1984; (ii) 1991-1997 for the land use map of 1992; (iii) 1998-2004 for the land use map of 2002; and (iv) 2005-2009 for the land use map of 2008. Groundwater recharge was summarised for each period as an 'average' map. Discussion of the different groundwater recharge maps corresponding to the different land use conditions is presented in the following paragraphs.
Land use map of the year 1984
A map of average predicted groundwater recharge for 7 years (1984-1990) is presented in Fig. 6a. The predicted yearly recharge in this period varies from 118 to 396 mm-yr1, with a mean of 241.6 mm-yr-1 and standard deviation of 56.5 mm-yr-1. Since the mean precipitation for this period is 861.4 mm-yr-1, the predicted recharge amounts to 30.7% of the precipitation. The areas of forest plantation (72% of the total area of the catchment) have values of groundwater recharge varying from 118 to 159 mm-yr-1. The area of bare land (24% of the total area of the catchment) has predicted values of groundwater recharge varying from 239 to 317 mm-yr-1. Shrub land and cropland areas comprise 4% of the total catchment area; their predicted groundwater recharge varies from 160 to 238 mm-yr-1. The area corresponding to the drainage network has the highest values of groundwater recharge, 318 to 396 mm-yr-1.
Figure 6
Average of groundwater recharge in mm/yr in the study area of the land use scenarios (a) 1984, (b) 1992, (c) 2002 and (d) 2008; notice the change in scale for the classes in 2008.
Land use map of the year 1992
By the year 1992 the area of forest plantation has decreased by 12% hence barren land and shrub land has increased by 4% and 6.5% respectively, and cropland area has increased by 1%.
Figure 6b shows the average predicted groundwater recharge for the period 1991-1997. The yearly recharge predictions vary from 130 to 504 mm-yr-1 with a mean value of 294 mm-yr-1 and standard deviation of 70 mm-yr-1. Because the mean precipitation for this period is 908.6 mm-yr-1, the predicted recharge amounts to 30.8% of the precipitation. Forest plantation area has low recharge from 130 to 202 mm-yr-1. Bare land groundwater recharge varies from 304 to 403 mm-yr-1. Cropland and shrub land have moderate values varying from 203 to 303 mm-yr-1. The highest values of groundwater recharge appear again in the drainage network areas, with values varying from 404 to 504 mm-yr-1.
Land use map of the year 2002
The area of forest plantation has decreased with 16% between 1992 and 2002 hence barren land and shrub land has increased by 10% and 5.5%, respectively, and cropland area has increased by 0.5%.
Figure 6c shows the predicted average groundwater recharge for the period 1998-2004. The yearly recharge varies between 109 and 421 mm-yr-1 with a mean of 243 mm-yr-1 and standard deviation of 55 mm-yr-1. Since the mean precipitation for this period is 883.8 mm-yr-1, the recharge amounts 25.8% of the precipitation. Forest plantation area has low values, which vary from 109 to 168 mm-yr-1. Bare land has high groundwater recharge varying between 254 to 337 mm-yr-1. Cropland and shrub land have moderate values varying from 169 to 253 mm-yr-1. The highest values of groundwater recharge appear again in the drainage network areas with yearly values between 338 and 421 mm-yr-1.
Although the vegetated area has decreased in 2002 compared to 1992, the decrease in groundwater recharge from 2002 to 1992 can be explained by the decrease of precipitation for the period of the land use scenario of 2002.
Land use map of the year 2008
Rapidly decreasing forest plantation area appears clearly in 2008, with a total loss of 51.5% of forest areas since 1984. On the other hand, during the same period, the area of bare land increased to 65% of the catchment area in 2008. Since 2002, shrub land and cropland decreased by 6% and 0.5%, respectively. Figure 3 shows an increasing precipitation in the period 2007-2009; therefore, the predicted groundwater recharge increases considerably compared with the previous periods and corresponding three land use scenarios.
Figure 6d shows the average yearly groundwater recharge for the period 2005-2009. The yearly recharge varies from 266 to 1 060 mm-yr-1, with mean value of 671 mm-yr-1 and standard deviation of 125 mm-yr-1. Since the mean precipitation for this period is 1 613.7 mm-yr-1, the predicted recharge amounts to 38.3% of the precipitation. Forest plantation areas have low values of predicted groundwater recharge, varying from 266 to 424 mm-yr-1. Barren lands have high values varying from 637 to 848 mm-yr-1. Cropland and shrub land have moderate values varying from 425 to 636 mm-yr-1. The highest values of groundwater recharge appear in the drainage network areas with values varying from 849 to 1 060 mm-yr-1.
What can be noticed from Fig. 6d is that there is a rapid increase in the predicted groundwater recharge for the land use map of 2008, which can be explained by the increase of bare land to 65% of the total area of the catchment, which means more high-potential recharge areas. On the other hand, the period 2007-2009 appears to contain very wet years, as shown by the precipitation time-series of the meteorological stations in the catchment (Fig. 3). The average amount of precipitation in the catchment from 1984 until 2004 is around 890 mm-yr-1; for the period 2005-2009 (time-series of the land use map of 2008) the average precipitation in the catchment is 1 613.7 mm-yr-1, and this can explain the rapid increase of the groundwater recharge in combination with the rapid increase of bare land area in the catchment.
Effect of land use change on groundwater recharge
Figure 7 shows the contribution of the different land use classes for the different land use maps to groundwater storage. The results of groundwater recharge determination for the upper G10A clearly shows the effect of land use change on groundwater storage (Fig. 7). The WetSpa model calculations of the mean annual groundwater recharge of the catchment for the land use maps of the years 1984, 1992, 2002 and 2008 are 241, 294, 243 and 671 mm-yr-1, respectively.
Figure 7
Groundwater recharge in mm/yr and percentage of the contribution of different land use classes for different years of the land use maps.
The contribution of the forest class in groundwater recharge decreased from 73.4% in 1984 to 23.4% by the end of 2009, as a result of deforestation. Bare class contribution increases rapidly from 23% in 1984 to 64.7% in 2008. The relative contributions of shrub land and cropland classes increase at small rates; with values of 3.4% and 0.2% in 1984 and 10.9% and 1% in 2008 for shrub land and cropland, respectively.
Beside the areal coverage and type of land use classes in the catchment, the distribution and location of these classes can affect the groundwater recharge quantity; this is the case for the land use map for the year 2002. Despite the increase in barren land area and decrease in forest area, the values of groundwater recharge have decreased compared with the year 1992. The decrease in groundwater recharge could be a result of the distribution of the shrub lands in the areas of high recharge values; these areas are the low altitude areas close to the Berg River and the areas close to the drainage network in the catchment.
As the precipitation in the period 2005-2009 is very high compared to the previous periods it is important to evaluate if the changed land use of 2008 still has an important contribution to the simulated increased recharge. Therefore, we tested if the cutting of non-native hill slope vegetation upstream of the Berg River Dam contributes significantly to the predicted increase in groundwater recharge. Hence, we simulated the whole time series from 1984-2004 (21 years) with the land use map from 2008 instead of with the land use maps for 1984, 1992 and 2002. Table 4 shows that there is a systematic increase of about 8% per year for the 21-year period, due to the change in land use from the different years to that of 2008, which confirms that the major land use change of 2008 clearly contributes to the increase in recharge.
Comparison between the average groundwater recharge in the different land use maps with the land use map of 2008
This study predicts the impact of land use change on groundwater recharge in the upper G10A catchment. The WetSpa model was applied for 4 periods each with a different land use map, resulting in mean annual groundwater recharge for the different land use conditions.
The results show considerable spatial recharge differences within the same land use map and within the same land use class. High precipitation in the very wet period of 2005-2009 leads to a very high increase (278%) in mean predicted ground-water recharge, from 242 mm-yr1 in 1984 to 671 mm-yr1 in 2008. Contradictory simulation results occur for the year 2002. Although the area of the barren lands increased compared with the year 1992, the groundwater recharge decreased from 294 mm-yr1 in 1992 to 243.2 mm-yr1 in 2002; this is a result of a combination of a slightly lower precipitation and a considerable increase in shrub land in the area.
The South African Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) started to cut down non-native hill slope vegetation upstream of the dam at the end of 2007. It is hypothesised that evapotranspiration will decline and recharge will increase due to this change in land use. A simulation test using the land use map of 2008, instead of the maps for 1984, 1992 and 2002 for the whole 21-year time series from 1984-2004 were done; A systematic increase of about 8% per year for the 21-year period, due to the change in land use from the different years to that of 2008 is predicted, which confirms that the clearing of the non-native hill slope vegetation is of considerable importance for the increase in groundwater recharge. The results- of this study confirm the assumptions underlying the DWAF policy of clearing non-native hill slope vegetation in the Berg River Catchment.
This study should be repeated in other catchments to compare the methodology for other topography, land use, and hydrometeorological conditions, in detecting the effect of land use change on the groundwater recharge. Moreover, extension of this study could take into account the impact of climate change in combination with land use change.
This project was supported by the VLIR-UOS IUC project 'Sustainable utilisation of subterranean water resources for improvement of quality of life' (VLIR IUC University of the Western Cape, South Africa) and by the FWO grants G.0443.05 'Impact of hydrology on diversity of aquatic organisms in temporary wetlands in the Cape Region (South Africa)'.
ALBHAISI M (2012) Methodology for estimation of the change in the reserve of the upper Berg catchment, Western Cape, South Africa. PhD thesis, Department of Hydrology and Hydraulic Engineering, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium. [ Links ]
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HORNBECK JW, ADAMS MB, CORBETT ES, VERRY ES and LYNCH JA (1993) Long-term impacts of forest treatments on water yield: a summary for northeastern USA. J. Hydrol. 150 (2-4) 323-344. [ Links ]
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Received 13 April 2012
Accepted in revised form 25 March 2013.
* To whom all correspondence should be addressed. +61 8 82012288; E-mail: firstname.lastname@example.com


text:
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text:
The Lindenwood University Speaker Series will present Adam Steltzner, lead NASA engineer for the Mars Curiosity rover landing, at 7 p.m. on March 25, 2014, in the university's Lindenwood Theater. Tickets are required but are free and available at the Lindenwood Box Office. His talk is titled, "How Curiosity Changed My Life."
The Lindenwood Theater and the box office are located in the J. Scheidegger Center for the Arts at 2300 West Clay Street in St. Charles. As lead engineer for the August 2012 Curiosity rover landing, Steltzner's job was to make sure the rover landed safely. Steltzner was also among the scientists and engineers featured on the NOVA episode "MARS Dead or Alive," which chronicled the process that ultimately delivered the rovers Spirit and Opportunity to Mars in 2004.
His team designed, built, and flew the systems that slowed the new rover from a speed of 15,000 miles per hour and delivered it safely to the planet's surface.
"There are very few days when I don't have a moment or two to think as hard as I possibly can," said Steltzner. "I like that."
Steltzner, who has a bachelor's degree from the University of California at Davis and a master's degree from the California Institute of Technology, says today's engineers must think critically to extend their skills and influence outside their area of specific expertise.
For more information about the 2013-14 Lindenwood University Speaker Series, visit www.lindenwood.edu/academics/speakerseries.


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I haven't managed to read the whole thread yet, so hope i'm not doubling up an old post.
I've been collecting toilet roll tubes for weeks, and our bunny loves it when we set them up like bowling pins, and drop treats inside. He pulls them all down, and when he runs away, we set them up again, so he has lots of fun! We stick in his ordinary food pellets as well as a few treats, he doesn't seem to mind if it's not an extra special reward.


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new construction at recreational transferium in Den Oever
|municipality Hollands Kroon
|Benjamin Robichon
|project team:
|Lard Joordens, Giacomo Garziano
|Den Oever
|plot size:
|approx. 250 m²
|start design:
|October 2015
The company has been commissioned to build a viewing tower at the planned new recreational transferium situated on the N99 near to Den Oever.
The viewing tower is part of the recreational transferium that forms the starting point of the Wieringen recreational network. The tower will fulfil a dual function as besides being a viewing tower, the spot also marks the entrance to North Holland.
The area surrounding Den Oever can be subdivided into four identities. To the south-west, the site looks towards the uplands of the former Wadden island of Wieringen which is a vast flat landscape. To the north-west of the site lies the fishing village of Den Oever. The view to the north-east is of the Afsluitdijk that separates the Wadden Sea and the IJsselmeer. Finally, the Robbenoord and Dijkgat forests lie to the south-east. These identities form the basis of the viewing tower.
The various identities can be experienced while climbing the tower. You take a walk in a vertical direction, as it were, during which the various areas are explained by means of so-called 'rooms' on intermediate levels. Those rooms, each of which is oriented towards a specific area, provide information and an atmosphere that is in keeping with the view. The walk ends at a height of approximately 25 m where there is a 360-degree panoramic view. Besides providing protection, the volume above this point also creates the opportunity to provide visitors with information.


text:
You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake.By Matt on April 12th, 2012
Posted In: Blog
"Again and again across the centuries, cosmic discoveries have demoted our self-image. Earth was once assumed to be astronomically unique, until astronomers learned that Earth is just another planet orbiting the Sun. Then we presumed the Sun was unique, until we learned that the countless stars of the night sky are suns themselves. Then we presumed our galaxy, the Milky Way, was the entire known universe, until we established that the countless fuzzy things in the sky are other galaxies, dotting the landscape of our known universe.
Today, how easy it is to presume that one universe is all there is. Yet emerging theories of modern cosmology, continually reaffirms the improbability that anything is unique…"
-Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson
"The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. From it we have learned most of what we know. Recently, we have waded a little out to sea, enough to dampen our toes or, at most, wet our ankles. The water seems inviting."
-Dr. Carl Sagan
More strange-yet-oddly-inspiring videos can be found at http://www.symphonyofscience.com/


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Latest Leak Shows NSA Can Collect Nearly Any Internet Activity Worldwide Without Prior Authorization
from the the-NSA-should-really-stop-issuing-denials dept
The newest NSA leak has just been posted at the Guardian and it gives credence to Snowden's earlier claim the he could, "from his desk," wiretap nearly anyone in the world. US officials, including NSA apologist/CISPA architect/Internet hater Mike Rogers, denied Snowden's claim, with Rogers going so far as to call the former NSA contractor a liar. The documents leaked today seem to indicate otherwise.
A top secret National Security Agency program allows analysts to search with no prior authorization through vast databases containing emails, online chats and the browsing histories of millions of individuals, according to documents provided by whistleblower Edward Snowden.Greenwald isn't kidding about the "broad justification." The slides tout the breadth of the search program, which provides results other programs can't. As is stated in the opening slides, XKeyscore allows agents to pull up tons of data (in search of "anomalies") and work backward to refine the results. The justification for these broad searches is available via a pulldown menu, as can (sort of) be seen in this screenshot, which gives agents a variety to choose from. (From the list, it appears that anything ending with "outside the US" is fair game.)
The NSA boasts in training materials that the program, called XKeyscore, is its "widest-reaching" system for developing intelligence from the internet.
[T]raining materials for XKeyscore detail how analysts can use it and other systems to mine enormous agency databases by filling in a simple on-screen form giving only a broad justification for the search. The request is not reviewed by a court or any NSA personnel before it is processed.
XKeyscore utilizes a variety of plugins to allow searches, including email addresses, phone numbers, IP addresses, full logs of every DNI session and machine-specific cookies. This gives agents an advantage other surveillance programs don't.
The purpose of XKeyscore is to allow analysts to search the metadata as well as the content of emails and other internet activity, such as browser history, even when there is no known email account (a "selector" in NSA parlance) associated with the individual being targeted.The slides warn that the data collected will be too large to parse (or even store for a great length of time). It recommends harvesting first and "selecting" second, in order to refine the results (using a "Strong Selector"). Agents are directed to look for "anomalous events," some of which seem a bit troubling.
Analysts can also search by name, telephone number, IP address, keywords, the language in which the internet activity was conducted or the type of browser used.
One document notes that this is because "strong selection [search by email address] itself gives us only a very limited capability" because "a large amount of time spent on the web is performing actions that are anonymous."
These "anomalies" are common enough that plenty of non-terrorists will be getting a second look from agents utilizing this program. And again we see the NSA's instant distrust of anyone using encryption. This is one of the hazards of "collecting it all" and then working backwards. It's easy to make common behavior look suspicious if you start at an end assumption and connect the dots in reverse.
- E.g., Someone whose language is out of place for the region they are in
- Someone who is using encryption
- Someone searching the web for suspicious stuff
Also troubling are some of the suggested applications of the search program shown in the slide deck, including "show me all the VPNs startups in Country X" and "show me all exploitable machines in Country X."
On top of this, there's the sheer breadth of the program.
The quantity of communications accessible through programs such as XKeyscore is staggeringly large. One NSA report from 2007 estimated that there were 850bn "call events" collected and stored in the NSA databases, and close to 150bn internet records. Each day, the document says, 1-2bn records were added.Because of the massive size of the data haul, metadata is retained and stored longer while more specific data is released. This still allows agents to perform broad searches to gather as much data as possible while relying on the stored metadata to put other connections together. Once they have the connections, the shallow search can be better utilized with the "strong selectors."
The XKeyscore system is continuously collecting so much internet data that it can be stored only for short periods of time. Content remains on the system for only three to five days, while metadata is stored for 30 days. One document explains: "At some sites, the amount of data we receive per day (20+ terabytes) can only be stored for as little as 24 hours."
The data harvested isn't solely relegated to foreign communications, no matter what the pulldown menu says. The power of the database pretty much guarantees the inadvertent collection of data on American citizens. This is exacerbated by the fact that some web traffic will be indeterminate in origin or termination. This leads to violations of the few laws that do pertain to NSA data collection, something the NSA documents admit is a problem. Of course, as Snowden pointed out, there's always a solution.
In recent years, the NSA has attempted to segregate exclusively domestic US communications in separate databases. But even NSA documents acknowledge that such efforts are imperfect, as even purely domestic communications can travel on foreign systems, and NSA tools are sometimes unable to identify the national origins of communications.Speaking of "justification," the slides claim that over 300 terrorists have been caught using XKeyscore. And the NSA has responded to the Guardian's leak with the usual claims that everything here is legal and audited, etc., which, again, doesn't make it right or even constitutional. It just makes it what it is: the end result of more than a decade's worth of expansion, secret law interpretations and compliant administrations.
Moreover, all communications between Americans and someone on foreign soil are included in the same databases as foreign-to-foreign communications, making them readily searchable without warrants.
Some searches conducted by NSA analysts are periodically reviewed by their supervisors within the NSA. "It's very rare to be questioned on our searches," Snowden told the Guardian in June, "and even when we are, it's usually along the lines of: 'let's bulk up the justification'."
Filed Under: metadata, nsa, nsa surveillance, search, surveillance, xkeystone


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One last post before it's Puppy Time. T-15 hours and we'll be dog owners once again. (sigh)
Anyway, earlier in the week it was Pedro that was cracking us up, and today it's Juan Carlos (7 yrs old). I was going through his Friday folder which contains all of his graded work from the week and I came across this little gem in which he has to list 10 mammals. I was there that day, helping some of the kids with this worksheet. He had one mammal left to go and told me he was going to put "naked mole rat", a totally acceptable mammal. I left him to finish up and went on to the next kid.
I should have checked his work. (you can click to enlarge)
Not "naked mole rat". No, no. He ended up writing "naked male" You can see the teacher's obvious confusion-the double question marks and the arrow pointing to #4, "people", which would obviously included all naked males (and clothed ones for that matter).
Oh my. I've been laughing all night thinking about what she must have been thinking when she read it.
("peking bird" was also a mystery-maybe he meant "Peking duck"? or a "pecking bird"? Who knows)
Have a great weekend!


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About a13coach
So is this Techdirt report categorized as a press release? Is Techdirt going to get a summons? :)
I think they just want the students to parrot back what they taught them via lectures, the book they required, their class discussions. i.e. the teachers do not want to have to work any harder than they are.


text: Situated in the heart of the maritime Scottish lowland village of Annan - St James Smokehouse is ideally located to procure the finest and freshest quality salmon from the nearby clear, fast flowing waters of Western Scotland. The salmon is transported to the St. James smokehouse within hours of harvesting from the rugged seas of the Western Coast of Scotland. Each filet is hand-rubbed with a cure of natural sea salt and demerara brown sugar. No artificial additives or flavors are ever added.


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Last weekend my nephew turned ONE. Oh how time flies. He's such a big handsome boy now. My brother and SIL held the small birthday party at their home, inviting family and friends. Enjoy the pictures.
Aida. I asked my SIL if there was any theme, she just said anything blue. So I had a baby boy in blue sitting on a football, since my bro is a football fanatic. Sib baik tak dengki soh letak flag Liverpool or Arsenal. Hehehee.
Have we had enough candy yet?


text:
Are you a local business?
Don't go it alone. We're here for you and so are many other local business owners. Build relationships, learn, and be heard. (learn more about membership in our network)
Member Login
Chamber members & businesses can find and promote events, and network within their local community. Login to update, track, and summarize all relevant data regarding the Chamber of Commerce.
Advocacy & Public Policy
Make your voice heard! We increase our power when we come together around shared vision, concerns and values. Learn more about the work we do to promote the interests of local business owners who care deeply about our places.


text:
I'm at an AEI Panel on big government and food trucks. It promises to be an area where Tim Carney and Matt Yglesias could agree for days. I'll have thoughts after, but blogging will be light for a few hours.
I'll also be recording a podcast this afternoon with my old boss, Matt Lewis, at the Daily Caller's offices. Lots of content to come!


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Finding it hard to get a job in today's economy?
Have you thought about silicone?
No, we're not talking implants. We're talking bracelets.
U.S. & World
Just as Lance Armstrong did for cancer, two Florida entrepreneurs are hoping to do the same for the unemployed by creating yellow wristbands that can be used to promote their joblessness -- but not in a demeaning way, of course.
The wristbands are yellow, just like the Livestrong bracelets, but have "Laid Off Need A Job.com" printed on them.
So for just $3 (plus another buck for shipping), the creators say the bracelets will help people advertise themselves to potential employers anywhere they go. You can also buy five for $14 or 10 for $25, which should cover most of your officemates who also recently got laid off. Or you can buy them in bulk and go into business on your own, selling them at a mark-up at flea markets and whatnot.
But will the Scarlet Letter of joblessness work? Hard to say.
If you're wearing it while ordering off the dollar menu at McDonald's, then yes, it probably will.
But if you're using your last remaining dollars at a strip club, well... that's another story.
Just make sure you keep that resume handy.


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Earrings Nudo
- Description
- Shipping & Returns
We make your return shipping easy: use the pre-addressed TNT return label included in your order.
If you prefer, you may ship the return package at your own cost, using a courier of your choice.
Discover all details on how to return in the Customer Care area.
According to Roman philosopher, Pliny the Elder, the word topaz was born from its association with the island of Topazos, in the Red Sea. Another theory suggests the word as stemming from the Sanskrit tapas meaning 'heat, fire'. Presenting a glassy polish, the coloured crystals of topaz are actually transparent. Different varieties may include yellow topaz with hues ranging from gold to orange known as sherry or imperial, and the mesmerising blue topaz.


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Tag: propane
Turning Crude Oil Into Fuels
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Have you ever wondered where the fuels that power our vehicles comes from? Or, have you thought about how they turn syrupy black crude into the clear gasoline and fuels that drive our society? Well, ponder no more. Yo...


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Raw materials are crucial to Europe's economy. They form a strong industrial base, producing a broad range of goods and applications used in everyday life and modern technologies. Reliable and unhindered access to certain raw materials is a growing concern within the EU and across the globe. To address this challenge, the European Commission has created a list of critical raw materials (CRMs) for the EU, which is subject to a regular review and update. CRMs combine raw materials of high importance to the EU economy and of high risk associated with their supply.
The list of CRMs should help
The Commission carries out a criticality assessment at EU level on a wide range of non-energy and non-agricultural raw materials. The 2017 criticality assessment was carried out for 61 candidate materials (58 individual materials and 3 material groups: heavy rare earth elements, light rare earth elements, platinum group metals, amounting to 78 materials in total). In 2011, 41 materials were assessed, while 54 materials were assessed in 2014.
The main parameters used to determine the criticality of the material for the EU are
The new list includes 9 more new materials than the 2014 list: baryte, bismuth, hafnium, helium, natural rubber, phosphorus, scandium, tantalum, vanadium. This brings the number up to 27 raw materials which are now considered critical by the Commission. 3 of these are entirely new to the list: bismuth, helium, phosphorus. The other 17 critical raw materials are included in the CRM table below. For the first time, individual assessment results are available for the 3 grouped metals: HREEs (heavy rare earth elements), LREEs (light rare earth elements), and PGMs (platinum group metals).
All raw materials, even when not classed as critical, are important for the EU economy.
|2017 CRMs (27)
|Natural graphite
|Silicon metal
|Natural rubber
|Coking coal
|Phosphate rock
*HREEs=heavy rare earth elements, LREEs=light rare earth elements, PGMs=platinum group metals
The EU's industry and economy are reliant on international markets to provide access to many important raw materials since they are produced and supplied by third countries. Although the domestic production of certain critical raw materials exists in the EU, notably hafnium, in most cases the EU is dependent on imports from non-EU countries.
China is the major supplier of critical raw materials, accounting for 70% of their global supply and 62% of their supply to the EU (e.g. rare earth elements, magnesium, antimony, natural graphite, etc.). Brazil (niobium), USA (beryllium and helium), Russia (palladium) and South Africa (iridium, platinum, rhodium and ruthenium) are also important producers of critical raw materials. The risks associated with the concentration of production are in many cases compounded by low substitution and low recycling rates.
Countries accounting for largest share of global supply of CRMs
Countries accounting for largest share of EU supply of CRMs


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NBC's Brian Williams spoke with Mitt Romney's running mate, Paul Ryan, at the Republican National Convention in Tampa. When asked about Republican platforms on abortion and whether or not there should be exceptions for rape or incest, Ryan said most women are asking about economic growth and the education of their children.
TAMPA, Fla. -- Paul Ryan acknowledged that more factors than just President Obama contributed to the closing of a General Motors plant in his hometown at the height of the auto industry's troubles in 2008.
Despite appearing to assign the president sole blame for the decision to place a Janesville, Wis., GM plant on standby during his speech Thursday night at the Republican National Convention, Ryan made some clarifications, while still chiding Obama for making a promise to help keep the plant open.
"The point about the plant in my hometown, President Obama came there and campaigned in the plant in 2008. And he said this plant will be here for another 100 years," Ryan said in an interview with NBC's Brian Williams. "He got elected. He put his policies in place. The plant's empty. Nobody works there anymore."
Paul Ryan may have gotten a rock star reception on Wednesday at the Republican National Convention, but the White House pushed back aggressively about the veracity of his entire speech. NBC's Chuck Todd reports.
Ryan left the door open that other factors may have contributed to the factory, which produced SUVs, closing down.
"Well, I think really what got the plant was $4 gas," Ryan said. "A lack of an energy policy, and that-- that pre-dates the Obama years. We need a better energy policy in this country."
The seven-term Wisconsin congressman then returned to his role of campaign attack dog Thursday night when asked about the auto bailout, which President Obama pushed for and Mitt Romney opposed.
"We had a political bankruptcy and what happened is the Obama administration put themselves in the position of picking winners and losers," he said, "and I don't think that was one in keeping with the rule of law."
Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan addresses the 2012 RNC.


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This week offers a time-travel thriller, an Easter romp for the kids, and a Best Picture winner re-released with all the bad words cut out.
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Jake Gyllenhaal stars as a soldier who must repeatedly relive the last eight minutes of another man's life in order to prevent a terrorist attack that could kill millions. In theaters everywhere, read our review and watch the trailer
Russell Brand lends his voice to E.B., heir to the crown of the Easter Bunny, but all he wants to do is play drums in a rock band, so he runs off to Hollywood. In theaters everywhere, read our review and watch the trailer
Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne are a parenst who move inot a new home, where it quickly becomes clear there's som,ething wrong. Is it the house that's haunted? Or THEIR SON?!? In theaters everywhere, read our review and watch the trailer
The King's Speech (PG-13)
It won Best Picture, Director, Actor and Origianl Screenplay--you need another reason to tsee it? The inspirational story of a future king's struggle with a stutter, and the unlikely friendship he finds with the man who helps him conquer it has now been edited so your children won't hear the F word for the first time. In theaters everywhere, read our review or the R-rated edition and watch the trailer
In a Better World
Winner of Best Foreign Film at this year's Oscars, about a doctor who splits his time between a refugee camp in Africa and his family's beach house, so he can be close to his kids who live with his wife from whom he is separated. Director Susan Bier presents a number of conlficts of varying severity to inspoect just how civilized we really are. In limited release, read our review and watch the trailer
Both a film about a homicidal tire, and a gleeful middle finger at movie audience, critics and studios. In limited release, read our review and watch the trailer
Rainn Wilson (Dwight on "The Office") stars as a man who turns himself into a superhero so he can save his wife from the clutches of the evil drug lord in this comic and violent film from Troma alum James Gunn. In limited release, read our review and watch the trailer
Cat Run
With nothing else goin gon in their lives, two friends decide to start a detective agency, but when their first case requires them to guard a high-pirced escort, they soon find themselves on the run from mob, a Senator and an assassin. In limited release, watch the red-band trailer
This documentary follows the struggle of a Mexican man to keep together his family's century-old trasveling circus. In limited release, watch the trailer
The Last Godfather
A slapstick comedy about a mafia don, played by Harvye Keitel, who anoints his a son he fathered Korea as successor. The trailer looks even dumber than the description you just read. In limited release, watch the trailer
Queen to Play
A French chambermaid (Sandrine Bonnaire) discovers she has a knack for chess and begins to steal away from her husband and daughter in order to learn the game from a reclusive American (Kevin Kline). In French with English subtitles. In limited release, watch the trailer
When a 14-year-old girl is targeted by an online stalker, he parents, palyed by CLive Owen and Catherine Keener, struggle to help her get through the experiece and deal with it on their own terms. Directerd by David Schwimmer. In limited release, watch the trailer
Adrian Brody awakens amid the wreckage of a car in a ditch with no recollection of who he is or how he got there. In limited release, watch the trailer


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Before Richard Cordray resigned yesterday as the director of the Consumer Bureau (our statement; Washington Post story; NY Times story), he appointed a well-qualified deputy director, Leandra English. Under the plain language of the Dodd-Frank Act creating the bureau, the deputy director serves as acting director in the absence of the director. The President's action later that day in nominating his own acting director -- OMB czar Mick Mulvaney -- places the bureau in leadership crisis that will ultimately be decided by the courts.
While we don't doubt that the President has the authority to nominate a new director of the Bureau, who would serve after Senate confirmation (the advice and consent of the Senate, Constitution: Article 2; Section 2), the President's action rejects the clear language of Dodd-Frank and leaves the hard-working staff of the Bureau wondering what will happen when two acting directors arrive. Law professor Adam Levitin has explained that relying on a misunderstanding of the Federal Vacancies Act is "wrong" since the Dodd-Frank Act provides for "a different succession."
"That plain language is an express provision for a different succession, and this makes sense as a policy matter--why design an agency to be insulated from Presidential control, only to hand the keys to the White House whenever the Director leaves before the expiry of his term?"
Mick Mulvaney already has one job, running the powerful White House Office of Management and Budget. Even if we grant him a presumed ability to multi-task; he is a longtime bureau opponent who has publicly called the Bureau a "sad, sick joke." Even were he the only acting director, his actions and words leave him unqualified to run the Consumer Bureau. In his case, handing him the keys is akin to handing them directly to Wall Street.
He should simply decline to show up at the Bureau and let Leandra English serve until the Senate confirms a successor to Director Cordray. The nation suffered a financial collapse less than ten years ago, it does not need turmoil at an agency expressly set up to help us recover from that mess.
Leandra English, who we have worked with and who helped stand up the bureau in 2010 and 2011 and has since served in a variety of senior leadership positions at the Bureau and other government agencies, will be an extremely able Deputy Director and acting Director. She will carry on the mission begun and managed successfully for 6 years by Rich Cordray and his team.
The Bureau's independence from politicization is vital to helping consumers and their families continue to regain necessary trust in consumer financial markets roiled less than ten years ago by the collapse of the economy. While some have forgotten and others choose to ignore it, that collapse was caused by reckless practices of Wall Street banks and other lenders. The Bureau needs a leader committed to its mission and to preventing a recurrence of the conditions that led to the collapse. It does not need a constitutional crisis. The President's action only helps achieve the goal of both Wall Street and predatory lenders to defang, defund and eventually dismantle the successful Bureau.
Under its first Director, Richard Cordray, the Bureau has helped restore confidence to American consumers that they shop in a fair financial marketplace, that they won't be cheated, that they have real choices and that financial wrongdoing will be punished.
U.S. PIRG intends to assist in defending Director Cordray's lawful appointment of Leandra English as acting director of the Consumer Bureau and to fight to protect the Bureau's mission. The idea of the Consumer Bureau needs no defense, only more defenders.


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We use the following raid makeup in our kills
- 2 tanks
- 3 healers
- 2 melee dps
- 2 ranged dps
- 1 ranged "star killer" (we typically use a warlock)
The Fight
Once you engage Algalon, you have 1 hour to kill him before he beams up and you have to wait until the next week to try again. As such, make sure you cover all strategy and directions before you first engage him, as you won't have much downtime between attempts to explain things!
Have your first tank engage Algalon and hold him in the center of the room; the ranged should spread out around the room. You will need to switch tanking Algalon every time the MT reaches a stack of 4 Phase Punches, as the 5th punch will send the tank into another dimension (you don't want this to happen).
|Star-Killer: there is an excellent guide on StratFu on the messy business of killing stars. Killing stars is a very important role, since they are all dieing together and, when they die, will do massive damage to the raid: for the sake of survival, they must each be dpsed down a bit to time when they go off, to keep them from exploding together.
There are two key things the healers and dps need to watch for:
- Cosmic Smash: this is a red circle on the ground. As with most red circles, standing in it is a Bad Thing; unlike most red circles, it will hurt people who aren't standing directly in it, too. It will one-shot any non-tank who is in it when it ruptures; move as far away from it as possible, because it will do damage to everyone (even those not standing in it), doing more damage to those closer to it. So move away! If you spot one near somebody else and they aren't moving, call it out. The tank and melee will need to reposition themselves around the room with Algalon to dodge these.
- Black Holes: this is a dark circle on the ground. It is a teleporter, taking you to another dimension, one with dark ghostie ghoulies (Dark Matter) flying around. In general, you don't want to step in these; watch out for them. They spawn when a collapsing star dies, so you don't want to be near/on a collapsing star when it dies, or you will instantly be ported as its black hole drops! There will be a time when you WANT to go in the black hole, though: to escape Big Bang.
Big Bang:
This is the one time you WANT to go in the black hole. Anyone caught outside of the dark ghostie-ghoulie dimension within the black holes when Big Bang goes off will be killed instantly, unless they have some sort of damage-reduction shield up (but NOT an immunity effect, as Big Bang will eat through it).
When Big Bang occurs, one person must stay outside of the portals to "eat" the Big Bang, as having the whole raid (those living) inside the portals will cause Algalon to go Berserk and immediate Ascend, killing everyone regardless of dimension. You must use a damage-reduction type cooldown to survive the Big Bang; dieing to the attack will still cause Algalon to Ascend. Your raid must use abilities such as Guardian Spirit or Dispersion to allow the person staying outside to survive the Big Bang; "immunity" effects such as Hand of Protection, Ice Block, and Divine Shield will not work.
- We had our tank eat each of the big bangs through use of raid cooldowns applied to them, though I hear that shadow priests with dispersion can also eat a big bang. My guild has never attempted the dispersion thing, though.
If you are not the one staying out to eat the Big Bang, go immediately into the nearest black hole when he begins casting the Big Bang, and then move a few yards away from where you entered. Once the Big Bang is cast, everyone inside the black hole dimension will immediately drop back into the real dimension, and if you're standing in a place where a black hole is, you'll be ported right back into the black hole dimension to wait helplessly for 6 seconds (with the Dark Matters munching on you) while the rest of the raid is wondering where you went. Position yourself carefully!
|NOTE: the black holes' teleportation acts on a periodic pulse, meaning that sometimes you might get ported the moment you clip the edge of the hole, or you might not get ported after running clear over the hole from one side to the other. Be sure to give yourself plenty of time to get ported when running to escape a Big Bang!
|Resto Druids: you will be responsible for keeping full hots on the current tank and healing the rest of the raid as much as possible. I recommend keeping a rejuv on as much of the raid as possible around keeping your tank with HoTs. The tanks will switch periodically as they get stacked up with Phase Punches (5 stacks will shift them to another dimension). Allow your LB stacks to bloom periodically for the heal-boost and mana return, and reapply the stacks quickly after blooming. Ahead of a tank-switch, get a rejuv and regrowth on the next tank so that they have a head-start on the HoT buffer when they taunt Algalon.
The whole raid will be taking a fair amount of damage. Every time a collapsing star dies, the whole raid will take about 16k damage; this is why you have a specific player assigned to be a star-killer, as the stars are all slowly dieing and you want to control WHEN they die so that they don't all explode at the same time. You will want your star-killer to be very vocal about incoming collapses, warning you ahead of the collapse so that you can make sure the raid is topped off.
If your raid has more ranged players than not, I highly recommend having most of the dps group up and move together to make the most of AoE heals. Trust me, having a full set of ranged dps rather than melee (or a mix of melee and ranged makes) healing this fight a PitA due to trying to heal each person without being able to catch them all, or most of them, with an AoE. Your tanks will be taking an immense amount of damage, so you want to limit how much time you spend healing the dps up to full as much as possible.
When entering the Black Holes to avoid the Big Bangs, make sure you have refreshed your HoTs and heals on the tank, apply any damage-reduction shields to the tank as necessary to ensure that they will survive the Big Bang, and then jump in and move a few yards away from where the black hole was, so that you don't fall back in it when you're ported back to the boss. Heal others who are in your dimension with you, as each second spent in the realm does damage, on top of the Dark Matter ghoulies who will attack you.
You will likely get heal-aggro on the Living Constellations. This can be annoying, as they're huge and will hide things like Cosmic Smash from your view. If you've got aggro on several, try to kite them overtop of the Black Holes; when a constellation hits a black hole, both of them will despawn. Be careful not to close too many black holes, however, as you will need the holes to escape the Big Bang. We opted to have our non-active tank pick these constellations up and do the job of kiting them over the holes, so that the healers could focus on keeping everyone alive.
Phase 2
At 20%, all of the constellations (collapsing and living) will despawn, and 4 black holes will immediately spawn in a square around Algalon (possibly sending some unluckily positioned people temporarily into the other realm). Your raid should hold off on pushing him to 20% until after a big bang, since Big Bangs will still happen on time (and the tanks will still be stacking phase punches, and switching boss aggro when they're off-tanking a dozen adds is tricky business). The Dark Matter ghosts will spawn out of the black holes, making your job healing that much more difficult: the OT should pick them up, but be ready to tank some yourself as more spawn and start overwhelming the raid.
There will still be Cosmic Smashes during this phase, though they will be much harder to spot through the ever-growing mass of ghosties. Keep a sharp eye out for them, and move the ghosts around as a group whenever Cosmic Smash goes out in case any are hidden by the mass.
All DPS should focus on burning down Algalon in this phase, before the adds overwhelm the raid.
Good luck, and have fun!


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CHICAGO (CBSNewYork/AP) — Despite being in a 3-2 hole against the Chicago Bulls, the Brooklyn Nets insist they are the team to beat in this best-of-seven series.
"There's no doubt in our mind. We are the better team," Andray Blatche said on Wednesday.
The Bulls will try again to wrap it up when the series shifts back to the United Center on Thursday.
"We are in the hole and we are swinging to get out," said Blatche. "We are going to continue to fight."
The Nets seemed all but out of it before a 110-91 victory at the Barclays Center on Monday night. Now, the Bulls appear to be reeling as they try to avoid a decisive seventh game at Brooklyn on Saturday.
Point guard Kirk Hinrich might miss his second straight game because of a bruised left calf, and Luol Deng and Taj Gibson were sick Wednesday and stayed home. Joakim Noah has battled plantar fasciitis in his right foot — the same issue dogging Brooklyn guard Joe Johnson, except it's in his left foot.
"I think we are (better). I think all-around, we are a better team than they are one through five," said the Nets' Gerald Wallace. "We've got to establish our bigs and kind of dominate from the inside, start inside-out and that's kind of the way our team is built. We go inside-out, and we are able to get in transition and we are able to pick teams apart that way."
The most pressing matter for Brooklyn is trying to find a way to win in Chicago, something it hasn't done this season. The Nets dropped both regular season matchups there and lost Games 3 and 4.
"Number one, the Bulls. Number two, we just did a poor job of closing," Nets interim coach P.J. Carlesimo said. "The first game there we didn't get a shot. We had the ball with whatever it was, a three-, four-point lead and we didn't get a shot our last three possessions. And obviously Game Four, up 14 with less than three minutes to go would be a pretty good place to be you would think. So twice we did a very poor job of finishing. I don't think there's any magic to the building. I think it's the guys the white uniforms and the fact that we've done a poor job closing out for sure."
Now, they're trying to hang on.
Only eight NBA teams have overcome a 3-1 deficit, and the odds that the Nets would add to that number seemed slim at best after Game 4.
"I think we've been confident throughout the whole series regardless of whether they were up 3-1," Johnson said. "The series is not over man until the first team gets four wins so at this point we've still got a shot. We understand that we've got a big task ahead of us and that's going to Chicago and getting a win."
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(TM and © Copyright 2013 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2013 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)


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Drunk Bridgeton man calls 911 from patrol car, claims kidnapping
By The Associated Press
BRIDGETON — State police said an intoxicated man being driven to his southern New Jersey home by troopers called 911 and claimed they were kidnapping him.
The incident began after the Bridgeton man — whose name was not disclosed — was taken to the state police barracks in that Cumberland County community earlier this month.
Law enforcement officers had found him while investigating a disorderly persons call in Bridgeton and decided to transport him home, putting him in the cruiser's back seat.
After making the fake 911 call, he continued to be disorderly despite repeated warnings. When the troopers pulled over and tried to arrest him, he resisted but was eventually restrained and taken back to the barracks.
He was charged with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest and obstruction.


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Quickie sausage goulash
Nutrition and extra info
Nutrition: per serving
- kcal417
- fat19g
- saturates5g
- carbs42g
- sugars1g
- fibre5g
- protein21g
- salt4.34g
- 2 tbsp olive oil
Olive oilol-iv oyl
Probably the most widely-used oil in cooking, olive oil is pressed from fresh olives. It's…
- 454g packet low-fat sausages, cut into big chunks
- 2 onions, roughly chopped
Onions are endlessly versatile and an essential ingredient in countless recipes. Native to Asia…
- 400g can chopped tomato
- 1 tbsp tomato purée
- 1 tbsp bouillon powder (powdered stock)
- 1 tbsp paprika
A spice that's central to Hungarian cuisine, paprika is made by drying a particular type of…
- good pinch of sugar
Honey and syrups made from concentrated fruit juice were the earliest known sweeteners. Today,…
- 4 medium floury potatoes, cut into large chunks
The world's favourite root vegetable, the potato comes in innumerable varieties. A member of…
- 2 big handfuls shredded spring greens
Spring greenssp-ring gr-eens
Spring greens are the first cabbages of the year. They have fresh, loose heads without the hard…
Heat 1 tablespoon of the oil in a large saucepan and fry the sausage chunks until evenly browned. Remove from the pan and set aside.
Mix the remaining oil with the onions in the pan and cook over a high heat, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes or until the onions are golden brown. Pour in the tomatoes, stirring in the bits from the bottom of the pan, then add the tomato purée. Fill the can up with water twice and pour the water into the pan. Sprinkle in the bouillon powder, paprika and sugar and plenty of salt and pepper. Stir well and bring to the boil.
Tip the potatoes into the pan, cover and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Drop in the shredded greens and sausages and gently heat for 5 minutes or until the greens are tender. Taste for seasoning before serving.


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New rumours regarding Microsoft's future Xbox plans have emerged today, with sources claiming Microsoft is telling developers that its future new console won't be shipping with any form of optical drive.
We generally pass on random phone rumors, but PocketNow seems to have scooped something that sounds awfully tasty. The LG X3 (codename) will supposedly have a Tegra 3 quad-core processor, a 4.7-inch 720p screen, an 8MP camera, and NFC. Um, yum?
Sure, Kodak is quickly becoming a penny stock. But that doesn't mean it can't still produce a solid and rugged outdoor camcorder like the Playfull Waterproof.


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errors and omissions insurance(redirected from Professional Liability Insurance)
Also found in: Dictionary, Thesaurus, Medical, Acronyms, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia.
Errors and Omissions Insurance
An insurance policy providing coverage for a professional in the event he/she does not perform his/her duties well and it results in harm to a client. That is, errors and omissions insurance covers negligence. It is offered to attorneys, physicians, architects, etc. It is known by its abbreviation, E&O.
errors and omissions (E&O) insurance
Insurance that protects against malpractice. Especially when working with a buyer's broker, who has a high degree of responsibility to anticipate problems and warn the client, one should ask for proof of E&O insurance before hiring a real estate professional.