Time to underpin Wikipedia wisdom
Time to underpin Wikipedia wisdom
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是时候巩固维基百科的智慧了
作者：
A. Bateman;D. Logan
环境科学家需要解决加拿大油砂开采的影响（Nature 468, 476; 2010），并应扩展到下游作业的影响。美国北部高平原地区的社区担心从加拿大焦油砂中输送原油穿过生态敏感草原并通过奥加拉拉含水层的重要补给区（拟议的 Keystone XL 管道穿过内布拉斯加州沙山的路线）的风险。公众辩论主要是在缺乏关于水资源和水生生态系统风险的科学证据的情况下进行的。这导致错误信息传播：例如，当地利益相关者普遍认为，从破裂的管道中释放出的任何石油都可能污染整个高地平原的地下水供应——基于对含水层作为地下湖的广泛误解。相比之下，其他人则认为泄漏的石油将被无害地封存在含水层中。这些误解的大部分归咎于科学家与公众沟通不畅。然而，科学家本身由于获取数据的机会有限而常常无法提供技术投入——正如 Keystone XL 提案所发生的情况。与此相关的重要数据尚未向公众透露，例如流体化学成分和最大管道泄漏量。
The need for environmental scientists to address the effects of tar-sands mining in Canada (Nature 468, 476; 2010) should be extended to the impacts of downstream operations. Communities across the northern High Plains region of the United States are concerned about the risks of piping crude oil from Canadian tar sands across ecologically sensitive prairie and through an important recharge zone of the Ogallala Aquifer—the route of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline through the Nebraska Sand Hills.The public debate is being conducted largely in the absence of scientific evidence about risks to water resources and aquatic ecosystems. This causes misinformation to circulate: for example, local stakeholders commonly believe that any oil released from a ruptured pipeline could contaminate the entire High Plains groundwater supply—based on the widespread misconception of an aquifer as an underground lake. Others, by contrast, believe that spilled oil would be harmlessly sequestered in the aquifer. Much of the blame for these misconceptions must be down to poor communication with the public by scientists. However, scientists themselves are often hampered from providing technical input because of their limited access to data—as has happened with the Keystone XL proposal. Important data pertaining to this have not been divulged to the public, such as the fluid chemical composition and the maximum pipeline leakage volumes.