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Not Available ; Today energy crisis is worldwide because conventional forms of energy supply and consumption are causing serious economical as well as environmental problems. In our country consumption of petroleum products is increasing day-by-day resulting in huge gap of demand and supply. India rank 6th in the world in terms of energy demand accounting for 3.5 percent of world commercial energy demand in 2001. India currently imports about 70 percent of its petroleum needs by paying Rs.1, 27,000 crores every year. The demand target may be 120.4 m t for 2006-07. Our domestic production of crude oil and natural gas will remain around 33.97 m t during 2006-07.The huge gap between demand and supply of 86.43 m t may be met only by import or by producing biofuels. The current consumption of diesel in India is approximately 40 m t forming about 40% of the total petroleum product consumption. This is expected to reach 52.32 m t by 2006-07 growing at approximately 5.6 % per annum. Government of India has already introduced petrol blended with 5 percent ethanol for use in motor vehicles in 9 states. A committee constituted by Planning Commission for Development of Biofuels recommended replacing about 10 % of diesel with biodiesel by the end of year 2011-2012 (Singh, 2003). Biodiesel production was spread in 21 countries mainly in Europe, Malaysia and USA. The largest biodiesel plant currently in operation was in Rouen, France with a capacity of 120, 000 tonnes. France is currently the world largest producer of biodiesel using it in 50 percent blend with petrol and diesel. During the last few decades, researchers tried all the edible and non-edible vegetable oils in compression ignition and spark ignition engines for different utilities. Since India cannot afford the usage of edible vegetable oils as power source because of short supply, planners suggested the use of non-edible vegetable oils as alternative fuels like Pongamia, Jatropha, and Neem etc. As Indian nation consists of 40 % of wasteland, it is better to develop all these lands by growing non edible oil plants which not only gives the oil but also enriches the environment by adding the green forest cover for ecological balance. In India, rural areas, in general are facing steep power crisis during the last two decades. Farmers are unable to irrigate their lands because of interrupted and short-term power supply. Finally it is effecting the agriculture production very badly. In this context, it is better to use the available plants, which produce the non-edible oil seeds to cater the needs at rural level for self-sustainability. Though there are more than 300 different species of trees, which produce oil-bearing seeds, Pongamia and Jatropha are the drought 177 resistant plants, which grow with limited water. These two plants suit for the Andhra Pradesh ecological zone as it consists of 60 % of dryland, which has enough potential to meet the fossil fuel demand at rural level. Hence these plants can well be utilized to produce the biodiesel at rural and industrial level. All over the world, the trials on biodiesel blending with diesel and other oils are still continued. In Andhra Pradesh, Integrated Tribal Development Agency (ITDA) of Adilabad district has started a pilot project at Utnoor with the effort of SuTRA (Sustainable Transformation of Rural Areas). Here, the villagers collect the Pongamia seed from the nearby forest and extract the oil using expellers. The filtered oil is then used to run the generator (50 W) to supply the electricity to the 100 houses in a village. This project created hopes in villages regarding self-sustainability in producing power. ; Not Available

In Embracing Watershed Politics, political scientists Edella Schlager and William Blomquist provide timely illustrations and thought-provoking explanations of why political considerations are essential, unavoidable, and in some ways even desirable elements of decision making about water and watersheds. With decades of combined study of water management in the United States, they focus on the many contending interests and communities found in America's watersheds, the fundamental dimensions of decision making, and the impacts of science, complexity, and uncertainty on watershed management.

The physical impacts of extreme weather disturbances such as storms and typhoons had been increasing in Santa Rosa-Silang Watershed, where rapid land use conversion and high population pressure are major environmental issues. In this study, the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model was used to analyze the hydrology and sediment yield in the 102-km2 watershed. Spatial information such as digital terrain model and land cover map, both processed and validated using remote sensing and Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data, and soil map together with 36-year rainfall and temperature data, were imported in the model's platform to generate surface inflow, outflow, and sediment yield in the 49 hydrologic response units (HRUs) in the watershed. With these, specific HRUs vulnerable to flooding and erosion were identified and most of these areas were reflective of the high risk barangays previously identified by the local government. Flash flood and erosion occurrences in these areas were primarily due to the low permeability and weak stability of their land cover during extreme rainfall. The results of this study can be an initial scientific basis in developing area-specific mitigation and adaptation strategies to climate-related natural disasters.

This paper aims to showcase the experience of the Magat watershed in the implementation of the watershed management approach. Magat watershed was declared as a forest-reservation area through Proclamation No. 573 on June 26, 1969 because of its great importance to human survival and environmental balance in the region. The Magat case demonstrates the important role that 'champions' like the local government unit (LGU) could play in managing the country's watersheds. With the Nueva Viscaya province constituting 97% of the Magat watershed, the provincial government was committed to provide a strong management support system to the watershed. This involved interplay of critical elements, i.e., favorable policy and political environment, enabling social and institutional mechanisms, adequate financial support, and capable and committed actors and players. The management approach adopted in Nueva Vizcaya treated the watershed as a 'lifeshed' where human concerns are connected with land and water resources. It was premised on 'managing people first' to relate society's interests to the use of watershed resources. The provincial government was able to harness various stakeholders' participation and tap technical and financial support. It provided incentives for people to join in participatory management schemes and to adopt conservation practices. The 'feeling of control and sense of ownership' served as 'lifelines' for individuals and organizations to sustain the watershed.

Increasingly complex ecological and political issues and decreasing conservation program funding have led to a more challenging environment for conservation work. Watershed level partnerships and coalitions offer opportunities for diverse organizations and agencies to unite for conservation initiatives. The Flathead Watershed Sourcebook is an excellent example of the power of collaboration. A product of the Flathead Community of Resource Educators (CORE), this book and companion website address the need to increase awareness and appreciation of natural, historical and cultural resources of the Flathead and to communicate watershed level interconnectedness to students. This watershed crosses international boundaries, encompasses a Biosphere Reserve, a World Heritage Site, nearly six million acres of forests, farms, cities, national park land, wilderness areas, and one of the most biologically intact ecosystems in North America. This unique collaborative effort offers a central source for watershed information, and includes over 50 "Watershed Perspectives," short individually contributed vignettes that help tell the story of the watershed from a variety of viewpoints. Authored and coordinated by a master's graduate student, this project engaged resource professionals, scientists, educators, and citizens to promote place-based learning and conservation. The Sourcebook has been successfully incorporated into classroom learning throughout the Flathead and reprint requests are mounting. The author will also unveil the ongoing collaboration underway by the Flathead CORE to develop middle school curriculum to accompany the Sourcebook. The curriculum is being designed to aid teachers in increasing their students' proficiency and introducing them to conservation concepts through diverse activities and exercises.

What is the best way to divide a rugged landscape? Since ancient times, watersheds separating adjacent water systems that flow, for example, toward different seas, have been used to delimit boundaries. Interestingly, serious and even tense border disputes between countries have relied on the subtle geometrical properties of these tortuous lines. For instance, slight and even anthropogenic modifications of landscapes can produce large changes in a watershed, and the effects can be highly nonlocal. Although the watershed concept arises naturally in geomorphology, where it plays a fundamental role in water management, landslide, and flood prevention, it also has important applications in seemingly unrelated fields such as image processing and medicine. Despite the far-reaching consequences of the scaling properties on watershed-related hydrological and political issues, it was only recently that a more profound and revealing connection has been disclosed between the concept of watershed and statistical physics of disordered systems. This review initially surveys the origin and definition of a watershed line in a geomorphological framework to subsequently introduce its basic geometrical and physical properties. Results on statistical properties of watersheds obtained from artificial model landscapes generated with long-range correlations are presented and shown to be in good qualitative and quantitative agreement with real landscapes. ; ISSN:2296-424X

This paper aims to showcase the experience of the Magat watershed in the implementation of the watershed management approach. Magat watershed was declared as a forest-reservation area through Proclamation No. 573 on June 26, 1969 because of its great importance to human survival and environmental balance in the region. The Magat case demonstrates the important role that champions like the local government unit (LGU) could play in managing the countrys watersheds. With the Nueva

This is the final published version. It first appeared at http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fphy.2015.00005/full#h11. ; What is the best way to divide a rugged landscape? Since ancient times, watersheds separating adjacent water systems that flow, for example, toward different seas, have been used to delimit boundaries. Interestingly, serious and even tense border disputes between countries have relied on the subtle geometrical properties of these tortuous lines. For instance, slight and even anthropogenic modifications of landscapes can produce large changes in a watershed, and the effects can be highly nonlocal. Although the watershed concept arises naturally in geomorphology, where it plays a fundamental role in water management, landslide, and flood prevention, it also has important applications in seemingly unrelated fields such as image processing and medicine. Despite the far-reaching consequences of the scaling properties on watershed-related hydrological and political issues, it was only recently that a more profound and revealing connection has been disclosed between the concept of watershed and statistical physics of disordered systems. This review initially surveys the origin and definition of a watershed line in a geomorphological framework to subsequently introduce its basic geometrical and physical properties. Results on statistical properties of watersheds obtained from artificial model landscapes generated with long-range correlations are presented and shown to be in good qualitative and quantitative agreement with real landscapes. ; We acknowledge financial support from the European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Grant 319968-FlowCCS, the Brazilian Agencies CNPq, CAPES, FUNCAP and FINEP, the FUNCAP/CNPq Pronex grant, the National Institute of Science and Technology for Complex Systems in Brazil, the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) under contracts no. IF/00255/2013, PEst-OE/FIS/UI0618/2014, and EXCL/FIS-NAN/0083/2012, and the Swiss National Science Foundation under Grant No. P2EZP2-152188.

Prepared for: Laura Jane Musser Fund, Environmental Initiative. ; December 2014. ; The largest and most destructive fire in the history of Larimer County, the High Park Fire, burned 87,200 acres within the Cache la Poudre watershed with aftereffects including increased flooding, significant erosion, and increased threats to many natural and cultural resources. The natural resources which have been impacted, and will continue to be threatened, include: water used for municipal, domestic, hydropower, and agricultural supply; soil productivity across the forested region; critical habitat for federally listed threated or endangered species; and native plant communities on lands where invasive and noxious species are absent. Currently, restoration work has been completed ad hoc in areas that may not maximize the benefit for the larger public. A comprehensive planning effort was needed to combine stakeholder interests and scientific knowledge to prioritize and maximize future restoration efforts on these publicly owned lands. Our goal was to bring together expert stakeholders to identify the risks and values at risk within the watershed. While this was originally viewed as an activity that would focus solely on the burn area, initial feedback we received suggested we adapt the research to include not only the recently burned area, but the entire watershed, and beyond that, the entire county. As Larimer County had significant interest in our process and provided input to the final model, and to make the results as widely applicable as possible, we decided to use the Larimer County boundary as our research extent. This would allow for the prioritization of restoration activities within the burned area, but also prioritize areas in the Cache la Poudre Watershed and the adjacent Big Thompson Watershed (which was significantly degraded by intense flooding in September 2013). We also adapted the research to include other risks and factors that were not initially included in the post-fire analysis. To accomplish our goal of prioritizing areas across the landscape for restoration activities to reduce risk and increase ecological health, we invited expert stakeholders from local municipalities, the state and federal government, and academic researchers to a workshop for them to provide feedback on risks and values at risk within the watershed.