Concentrations of four heavy metals (Cr, Cu, Ni, and Zn) were measured at 1,082 sampling sites in Changhua county of central Taiwan. A hazard zone is defined in the study as a place where the content of each heavy metal exceeds the corresponding control standard. This study examines the use of spatial analysis for identifying multiple soil pollution hotspots in the study area. In a preliminary investigation, kernel density estimation (KDE) was a technique used for hotspot analysis of soil pollution from a set of observed occurrences of hazards. In addition, the study estimates the hazardous probability of each heavy metal using geostatistical techniques such as the sequential indicator simulation (SIS) and indicator kriging (IK). Results show that there are multiple hotspots for these four heavy metals and they are strongly correlated to the locations of industrial plants and irrigation systems in the study area. Moreover, the pollution hotspots detected using the KDE are the almost same to those estimated using IK or SIS. Soil pollution hotspots and polluted sampling densities are clearly defined using the KDE approach based on contaminated point data. Furthermore, the risk of hazards is explored by these techniques such as KDE and geostatistical approaches and the hotspot areas are captured without requiring exhaustive sampling anywhere.

Over the last five decades, there has been a decline of rural communities in Taiwan due to urbanization expansion. In the past 10 years, the central government has implemented the Rural Regeneration Project (RRP) aimed at revitalization and sustainable development in rural Taiwan. During the project’s implementation, communities have faced several disasters as a result of climate change-induced extreme rainfall events. Perceptions and adaptation practices of climate change-induced extreme events are critical to community sustainability and resilience. The gap between perceived and actual risks that communities experience creates challenges for policy-makers in achieving sustainability goals. This study aims to evaluate the perceived climate change-induced flooding hazard perceptions compared to the scientific projection and actual hazard events in 287 rural communities implementing the RRP. This study revealed consistency in risk perception, in that communities facing high potential exposure to extreme rainfall showed higher awareness of various impacts of climate change. However, when comparing climate actions, communities exposed to low-potential hazard areas had a relatively higher degree of recognition of the benefits of adaptation to climate change. Moreover, 59 rural communities with low awareness and exposed to high potentials of extreme events were widely distributed among hills of western, southern, and northern Taiwan, where compound disasters such as mudslides can occur. This research suggests that there is a need to integrate climate change planning and work with communities to bridge the gap between perceived and actual climate risks. In particular, capacity training, counseling services, and implementation of adaptation practices should be integrated into institutional planning and management for providing assistance in disaster prevention, relief, and post-event restoration; also, encouraging climate actions can directly improve community resilience toward climate change. While investing in the sustainable development of rural communities is largely based on revitalizing economic development, this study revealed the link to ensure resilience and social-ecological sustainability in rural communities under climate change impacts.

Developing countries in the global south that contribute less to climate change have suffered greater from its impacts, such as extreme climatic events and disasters compared to developed countries, causing climate justice concerns globally. Ho Chi Minh City has experienced increased intensity and frequency of climate change-induced urban floods, causing socio-economic damage that disturbs their livelihoods while urban populations continue to grow. This study aims to establish a citywide flood risk map to inform risk management in the city and address climate justice locally. This study applied a flood risk assessment framework integrating a coupled nature–human approach and examined the spatial distribution of urban flood hazard and urban flood vulnerability. A flood hazard map was generated using selected morphological and hydro-meteorological indicators. A flood vulnerability map was generated based on a literature review and a social survey weighed by experts’ priorities using the Fuzzy Delphi Method and Analytic Network Process. Vulnerability indicators including demographic characteristics, infrastructure, and land use patterns were used to generate a flood vulnerability map. The results illustrate that almost the entire central and northeastern parts of the city are at high flood risk, whereas the western part is at low flood risk. The findings have implications in urban planning via identifying risk hot spots in order to prioritize resources for mitigating hazards and enhancing community resilience to urban floods.

Negative air ions (NAI) produce biochemical reactions that increase the levels of the mood chemical serotonin in the environment. Moreover, they benefit both the psychological well being and the human body’s physiological condition. The aim of this research was to estimate and measure the spatial distributions of negative and positive air ions in a residential garden in central Taiwan. Negative and positive air ions were measured at thirty monitoring locations in the study garden from July 2009 to June 2010. Moreover, Kriging was applied to estimate the spatial distribution of negative and positive air ions, as well as the air ion index in the study area. The measurement results showed that the numbers of NAI and PAI differed greatly during the four seasons, the highest and the lowest negative and positive air ion concentrations were found in the summer and winter, respectively. Moreover, temperature was positively affected negative air ions concentration. No matter what temperature is, the ranges of variogram in NAI/PAI were similar during four seasons. It indicated that spatial patterns of NAI/PAI were independent of the seasons and depended on garden elements and configuration, thus the NAP/PAI was a good estimate of the air quality regarding air ions. Kriging maps depicted that the highest negative and positive air ion concentration was next to the waterfall, whereas the lowest air ions areas were next to the exits of the garden. The results reveal that waterscapes are a source of negative and positive air ions, and that plants and green space are a minor source of negative air ions in the study garden. Moreover, temperature and humidity are positively and negatively affected negative air ions concentration, respectively. The proposed monitoring and mapping approach provides a way to effectively assess the patterns of negative and positive air ions in future landscape design projects.

Reforestation after a landslide facilitates competition between herbaceous plants and arborous plants. Tangible variations in grassland areas in regions susceptible to landslides can only be found within collections of trees. A landslide area in the Sule Watershed was investigated. Relative illuminance results reveal that the Rhodes grass (Chloris gayana Kunth) biomass in this landslide area increases with relative illuminance. A comparison of regions with tree islands indicates that the size of the grassland areas decreased and the number of tree islands increased during 2005–2010. Furthermore, a germination experiment in a soil-seed bank indicates that more woody plant species exist around the tree island than in other areas in the landslide region. Trees in a tree island change the micro-climate of the landslide region, and they gather as many nutrients and as much moisture as possible, enabling vegetation to expand around the tree island. Additionally, the area with Rhodes grass and its biomass declined annually in the tree island region. Investigation results show that tree islands and soil-seed banks are suited to reforestation in landslide regions. The pioneering research will assist regional landslide management in Taiwan.

Thermal adaptation studies provide researchers great insight to help understand how people respond to thermal discomfort. This research aims to assess outdoor urban plaza conditions in hot and humid regions of Asia by conducting an evaluation of thermal adaptation. We also propose that questionnaire items are appropriate for determining thermal adaptation strategies adopted by urban plaza users. A literature review was conducted and first hand data collected by field observations and interviews used to collect information on thermal adaptation strategies. Item analysis—Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)—were applied to refine the questionnaire items and determine the reliability of the questionnaire evaluation procedure. The reliability and validity of items and constructing process were also analyzed. Then, researchers facilitated an evaluation procedure for assessing the thermal adaptation strategies of urban plaza users in hot and humid regions of Asia and formulated a questionnaire survey that was distributed in Taichung’s Municipal Plaza in Taiwan. Results showed that most users responded with behavioral adaptation when experiencing thermal discomfort. However, if the thermal discomfort could not be alleviated, they then adopted psychological strategies. In conclusion, the evaluation procedure for assessing thermal adaptation strategies and the questionnaire developed in this study can be applied to future research on thermal adaptation strategies adopted by urban plaza users in hot and humid regions of Asia.