The peer effects of corporate poverty alleviation behavior: Empirical evidence from China.

This study explores the peer and economic effects of corporate poverty alleviation behavior. Using the data of A-share non-financial listed corporates in Shanghai and Shenzhen of China from 2016 to 2020, the empirical analysis of this study finds that: corporate poverty alleviation behavior has significant peer effects; the guidance of local poverty alleviation policies weakens the peer effects of corporate poverty alleviation behavior; compared to private enterprises, the poverty alleviation behavior of the peer firms has a more significant impact on state-owned enterprises; and corporate poverty alleviation behavior can result in the backflow of economic benefits and achieve the organic unity of economic and social benefits. The purpose of this paper is to explore the peer effects of corporate poverty alleviation behaviors through empirical analysis using available public data. The results of the study not only increase the motivation of corporate to participate in poverty alleviation from a peer effects perspective, but also reveal key factors for sustaining corporate poverty alleviation behaviors.

Hybrid Triboelectric Nanogenerators: From Energy Complementation to Integration.

Energy collection ways using solar energy, wave, wind, or mechanical energy have attracted widespread attention for small self-powered electronic devices with low power consumption, such as sensors, wearable devices, electronic skin, and implantable devices. Among them, triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) operated by coupling effect of triboelectrification and electrostatic induction has gradually gained prominence due to its advantages such as low cost, lightweight, high degree of freedom in material selection, large power, and high applicability. The device with a single energy exchange mechanism is limited by its conversion efficiency and work environment and cannot achieve the maximum conversion of energy. Thus, this article reviews the research status of different types of hybrid generators based on TENG in recent years. Hybrid energy generators will improve the output performance though the integration of different energy exchange methods, which have an excellent application prospect. From the perspective of energy complementation, it can be divided into harvesting mechanical energy by various principles, combining with harvesters of other clean energy, and converting mechanical energy or various energy sources into hydrogen energy. For integrating multitype energy harvesters, mechanism of single device and structural design of integrated units for different application scenarios are summarized. The expanding energy harvesting efficiency of the hybrid TENG makes the scheme of self-charging unit to power intelligent mobile electronic feasible and has practical significance for the development of self-powered sensor network.

Effect of biofertilizer and wheat straw biochar application on nitrous oxide emission and ammonia volatilization from paddy soil.

Biofertilizer can improve soil quality, especially the microbiome composition, which potentially affect soil nitrogen (N) cycling. However, little is known about the responses of nitrous oxide (N2O) emission and ammonia (NH3) volatilization from biochar-amended paddy soil to the biofertilizer application. Therefore, we conducted a soil column experiment using four 240 kg N ha-1 (equivalent to 1.7 g N pot-1) treatments consisting of biofertilizer (3 t ha-1, equivalent to 21.2 g pot-1), biochar (7.5 t ha-1, equivalent to 63.6 g pot-1), and a mixture of biofertilizer and biochar at the same rate and a control (CK). The results showed that the N2O emissions and NH3 volatilizations were equivalent to 0.15-0.28% and 18.0-31.5% of rice seasonal N applied to the four treatments, respectively. Two treatments with biofertilizer and biochar individual amendment significantly increased (P < 0.05) the N2O emissions to same degree by 30.2%, while co-application of biochar and biofertilizer further increased the N2O emission by 74.4% compared to the control. The higher N2O emission was likely attributed to the increased gene copies of AOA, nirK, and nirS. Applying biofertilizer significantly increased (P < 0.05) NH3 volatilization by 24.7% relative to the control, while applying biochar had no influence on NH3 volatilization. Co-application of biofertilizer and biochar significantly decreased (P < 0.05) NH3 volatilization by 12.3% compared to the control. Overall, the net global warming potential based on NH3 and N2O in current study increased by 13.0-26.0% in both the individual- and co-application of biofertilizer and biochar. Interestingly, both individual- and co-applications of biofertilizer and biochar increased the rice grain yield by 16.5-38.3%. Therefore, applications of biofertilizer and biochar did not increase the GHGI. Particularly, the co-applying of them significantly lowered (P < 0.05) the GHGI by 15.2%. In conclusion, biofertilizer and biochar should be co-applied to achieve the goals of environment protection and food security.

Hybridized Mechanical and Solar Energy-Driven Self-Powered Hydrogen Production.

Photoelectrochemical hydrogen generation is a promising approach to address the environmental pollution and energy crisis. In this work, we present a hybridized mechanical and solar energy-driven self-powered hydrogen production system. A rotatory disc-shaped triboelectric nanogenerator was employed to harvest mechanical energy from water and functions as a sufficient external power source. WO3/BiVO4 heterojunction photoanode was synthesized in a PEC water-splitting cell to produce H2. After transformation and rectification, the peak current reaches 0.1 mA at the rotation speed of 60 rpm. In this case, the H2 evolution process only occurs with sunlight irradiation. When the rotation speed is over 130 rpm, the peak photocurrent and peak dark current have nearly equal value. Direct electrolysis of water is almost simultaneous with photoelectrocatalysis of water. It is worth noting that the hydrogen production rate increases to 5.45 and 7.27 µL min-1 without or with light illumination at 160 rpm. The corresponding energy conversion efficiency is calculated to be 2.43% and 2.59%, respectively. All the results demonstrate such a self-powered system can successfully achieve the PEC hydrogen generation, exhibiting promising possibility of energy conversion.

Production of Bio-Energy from Pig Manure: A Focus on the Dynamics Change of Four Parameters under Sunlight-Dark Conditions.

This study investigated the effect of sunlight-dark conditions on volatile fatty acids (VFAs), total ammonium nitrogen (TAN), total alkalinity (TA) and pH during pig manure (PM) digestion and then the subsequent influence on biogas yield of PM. PM1 and PM2 were performed in a transparent reactor and a non-transparent reactor, respectively. Two sets of experiments were conducted with a temperature of 35.0±2.0 °C and a total solid concentration of 8.0% to the digestion material. The dynamic change of the four parameters in response to sunlight-dark conditions resulted in variations of the physiological properties in the digester and affected the cumulative biogas production (CBP). PM1 obtained higher CBP (15020.0 mL) with a more stable pH and a lower TAN concentration (1414.5 mg/L) compared to PM2 (2675.0 mL and 1670.0 mg/L, respectively). The direct path coefficients and indirect path coefficients between the four parameters and CBP were also analyzed.

Current status and future potential of energy derived from Chinese agricultural land: a review.

Energy crisis is receiving attention with regard to the global economy and environmental sustainable development. Developing new energy resources to optimize the energy supply structure has become an important measure to prevent energy shortage as well as achieving energy conservation and emission reduction in China. This study proposed the concept of energy agriculture and constructed an energy agricultural technical support system based on the analysis of energy supply and demand and China's foreign dependence on energy resources, combined with the function of agriculture in the energy field. Manufacturing technology equipment and agricultural and forestry energy, including crop or forestry plants and animal feces, were used in the system. The current status and future potential of China's marginal land resources, energy crop germplasm resources, and agricultural and forestry waste energy-oriented resources were analyzed. Developing the function of traditional agriculture in food production may promote China's social, economic, and environmental sustainable development and achieve energy saving and emission reduction.

Effect of initial pH on anaerobic co-digestion of kitchen waste and cow manure.

This study investigated the effects of different initial pH (6.0, 6.5, 7.0, 7.5 and 8.0) and uncontrolled initial pH (CK) on the lab-scale anaerobic co-digestion of kitchen waste (KW) with cow manure (CM). The variations of pH, alkalinity, volatile fatty acids (VFAs) and total ammonia nitrogen (NH4(+)-N) were analyzed. The modified Gompertz equation was used for selecting the optimal initial pH through comprehensive evaluation of methane production potential, degradation of volatile solids (VS), and lag-phase time. The results showed that CK and the fermentation with initial pH of 6.0 failed. The pH values of the rest treatments reached 7.7-7.9 with significantly increased methane production. The predicted lag-phase times of treatments with initial pH of 6.5 and 7.5 were 21 and 22 days, which were 10 days shorter than the treatments with initial pH of 7.0 and 8.0, respectively. The maximum methane production potential (8579 mL) and VS degradation rate (179.8 mL/g VS) were obtained when the initial pH was 7.5, which is recommended for co-digestion of KW and CM.

Influence of initial pH on thermophilic anaerobic co-digestion of swine manure and maize stalk.

The contradictions between the increasing energy demand and decreasing fossil fuels are making the use of renewable energy the key to the sustainable development of energy in the future. Biogas, a renewable clean energy, can be obtained by the anaerobic fermentation of manure waste and agricultural straw. This study examined the initial pH value had obvious effect on methane production and the process in the thermophilic anaerobic co-digestion. Five different initial pH levels with three different manure ratios were tested. All digesters in different initial pH showed a diverse methane production after 35 days. The VFA/alkalinity ratio of the optimum reaction condition for methanogens activity was in the range of 0.1-0.3 and the optimal condition that at the 70% dung ratio and initial pH 6.81, was expected to achieve maximum total biogas production (146.32 mL/g VS).

Anaerobic digestion of pig and dairy manure under photo-dark fermentation condition.

Anaerobic digestion (AD) with livestock manure is a promising way for biogas production. This work presents the influence of photo-dark fermentation on biogas production of pig manure (PM) and dairy manure (DM). All sets were conducted with temperature 35 ± 2 °C and total solid concentrations 8%: PM1 and DM1 in transparent reactor under sunlight for photo-dark fermentation, and PM2 and DM2 in non-transparent reactor for dark fermentation. DM2 had the best cumulative biogas production (CBP) of 15,447.5 mL, followed by PM1 (15,020 mL) with stable pH and low total ammonium nitrogen (TAN) concentration (1384.99 mg/L), and DM1 and PM2. The CBP of DM2 was 5.77 times as much as PM2. The relationship between CBP and four factors including volatile fatty acid (VFA), TAN, total alkalinity and pH was analyzed. pH gained the maximum determination coefficient with the CBP among all sets and total alkalinity showed negative correlation with CBP of PM1 and DM1.

Environmental Kuznets curve analysis of the economic development and nonpoint source pollution in the Ningxia Yellow River irrigation districts in China.

This study applies the environmental Kuznets curve to test the relationship between the regional economic growth and the different types of agricultural nonpoint source pollution loads in the Ningxia Yellow River irrigation area by using the Johnes export coefficient method. Results show that the pollution load generated by crop cultivation and livestock-breeding industries in the Ningxia Yellow River irrigation area shows an inverted U-shaped feature; however, this feature is absent in living-sewage pollution load. Crop pollution has shown a decreasing trend since 1997 because of the increased per capita income of farmers. Livestock-breeding pollution load reached its turning point when the per capita income of farmers reached 8386.74 RMB. Therefore, an increase in the per capita income of farmers corresponds to an increase in the livestock-breeding pollution load in the Ningxia Yellow River irrigation area.