This paper aims to provide a debate about the Lagoas do Norte project in Teresina-PI, as an intervention strategy and urban planning in Permanent Preservation Areas.

Sustainable procurement is characterized as an environmental management tool used by the public authorities for inclusion of environmental criteria in procurement and contracting. Given the significant environmental impact caused by the construction industry, this instrument can have consequences in the production of sustainable buildings and cities. The aim of this paper is to study the feasibility in adopting sustainable practices for public projects in Brazil. For this, a survey of bids was conducted in 2013 to check the current situation of these signings. From the survey, some challenges to the implementation of sustainable biding were appointed. As a result, there is a real legal feasibility for the implementation of this instrument. In addition, there is a need for a single manager responsible for increasing the integration of agents lifecycle of the building, thus avoiding fragmentation of the process and increasing the quality and sustainability of the final product built.

This paperevaluates the atmospheric conditions over transmission lines in simulations of an extreme meteorological event, considering different land cover scenarios. We used the mesoscale atmospheric model MM5. Although control simulation captured the convective system with a good spatio-temporal precision, itunderestimated wind magnitude. The simulation that replaced cerrado for non-irrigated agriculture and pasture did not capture the system due to albedo and moisture availability feedbacks in the atmospheric circulation. Inthesimulation that replaced the mosaic of agriculture and shrubs for non-irrigated agriculture and pasture, the atmospheric circulation was altered due to soil roughness feedback, which increases the speed of the convective system propagationover the region. The success of extreme events forecast depends on constant improvements in the mesoscale forecast and in the meteorological observation density, as well the use of a realistic vegetation cover.

This article considers the evidence of perceivingthe environment, scientific literacy and poverty through the lens of citizenship. It begins with an introduction and anexplanationof thestudy, then it explores disciplinary approaches in regards ofpoverty and its relationship with the environment. This biased viewallows deriving more specific analyzes by exploring the concept of Scientific literacy and its importance. It was concluded that through scientific literacy, citizensempowered byknowledge, take an active role within the community as well as hissocial status rescue.

Sugar cane vinasse is a residue generated from ethanol production and its disposal is a problem for the producers. Due to its high nutrients content, it is used as fertilizer in the soil of the sugarcane crop, according to limits imposed by legislation. Vinasse can be used for the growth of microalgae, but because of its high turbidity and low pH, the growth of photosynthetic organisms is difficult. So, vinasse was treated before its use as microalgae culture medium. Smectite clay and activated carbon were used as filtering agents and resulted in approximately 65% decrease of vinasse turbidity and increased its pH, from pH 4.5 to 5.4. We tested several dilutions of the filtrate and quantified the growth parameters of Chlorella vulgaris at vinasse concentrations of 20%, 30% and 40% of the filtrate that was diluted withdistilled water. The results showed better growth rates in 30 –40% vinasse (0.563 –0.526 day-1); no algae growth was obtained in vinasse in natura. The present results are an advance in the use of a residue produced in large quantity to support microalgae growth.

Knowledge about rainfall variation is very important for the decision-making process of flood control. However, automatic rain gauges’ densities are very poor in many regions and rainfall series obtained by these types of equipments are much shorter and less reliable thanthose caused by manually operated rain gauges. The literature presents various methods for determination of rainfall intensities, including those denominated Chow-Gumbel and Bell. The study aimed to evaluate the performance of intensity-duration-frequencyequations obtained by use of the Chow-Gumbel and Bell methods. For comparison of the results from the application of the different alternatives considered for the fitting of intensity-duration-frequency equations was used the F test of variance, assuming 5% significance level. For Bahia region stations, test results indicated that, for return periods longer than 5 years and durations above 30 minutes’ equations determined by empirical methods usually produced rainfall intensities roughly equivalent to those determined with the aid of equations established from automatic rain gauge records.

This study has evaluated the quantitative and qualitative features of a cesspool waste before being launched into a wastewater treatment plant, located at Itumbiara city (ETE-Itumbiara), interior of the state of Goiás. It was detected a large variation of the waste characteristics, presenting coarse solids and sand, resulting in 1.6 m³of retained waste over a total of 1,872.5 m³ of a total cesspool waste received, representing 0.064% of the average flow treated by ETE. Regarding the physicochemical parameters, the pH and temperature presented lower variation, and the settling solids and COD showed a higher coefficient of variation, followed by oils and greases and total solids. It was also observed that the lower the pH the higher the concentration of oils and greases.

The environmental assessment of three riparian forest fragments in the upper (CA), medium (TA) and lower (CB) sections of the Sinos River,in the southern part of Brazil was carried outby applying an integrated analysis of botanical and meteorological parametersas well as the atmospheric air genotoxicity. The analysis showed that the riparian forest at CA site had a greater number of trees that were taller, occupying a more basal area, supporting a higher epiphytic richness. Moreover, the air genotoxicity and the amount of rainfall were higher than at TA and CB sites. Considering that the organism responses are influenced by environmental conditions, the indicators analyzed supportedthe idea that the riparian forest at CA site is still a reference area, especially evidenced by the high richness of vascular epiphytes,including species susceptible to human disturbance and by the absence of genotoxic risk.

For UNEP, a country’s equitable and sustainable progress is the result of the effort in developing and implementing systematic planning. The lack of sanitation in the cities brings a great impact on the environment. In 2007, the Brazilian Law n. 11.445 established the participatory planning aiming universalized services to promote health and to reduce the environmental damages. The aim of this study is to develop a proposal, utilizing flowcharts, which could contribute to the accomplishment of municipal participatory planning. The methodology starts with an exploratory study and then moves into a qualitative research. By developing and organizing this proposition using flowcharts, it could facilitate enough understanding in order to prepare a municipal plan of sanitation, which is inserted in the National Guidelines for Basic Sanitation.

The construction of gated communities and activities developed in residential condominiums may have a great pollution potential, particularly if they accommodate a large number of houses. Currently, there is no methodology that can be used to identify and prioritize alternativesin order to minimize environmental impacts, which are specific to gated communities. In the pursuit of studying and thus, identifyingmanagement alternatives, corresponding environmental impacts were grouped accordingly. So, a checklist was developed for in loco verification of the management alternatives for gated communities. A model using a multi-criteria analysis method was developed for the decision-making-more specifically, the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). Criteria for weight attribution were stipulated to allow ranking the management alternatives. Thus, it was standardized a methodology for qualitative assessment of environmental impacts in gated communities, helping prevent their occurrence. Curitiba and its metropolitan area were chosen as the study area due to the large number of existing gated communities. The results showed a preference for managing alternatives that prioritized the concentration in storage, generation and preparation area, as well as the building materials area, in order to avoid the dispersion of contamination and restrict the extension of environmental impacts on soil, air and water.