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111 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Natural capital consists of
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resources and ecological services
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List natural resources
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air, water, soil, energy, minerals
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List ecological services
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population control, nutrient recycling, climate control, pollution control, waste treatment, biodiversity, pest & disease control
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Three types of resources
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perpetual - solar energy, winds, tides, flowing water
renewable - fresh air, water, fertile soil, plants and animals Nonrenewable - fossil fuels, metallic minerals (iron, copper, aluminum), non-metallic minerals (clay, sand, phosphates) |
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Who wrote about the tragedy of the commons?
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Garrett Hardin
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Two solutions to the tragedy of the commons
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1. use free-access resources well below their sustainable yields
2. convert free-access resources to private ownership -not practical for global resources |
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Economic Depletion is when:
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the costs of extracting and using what is left of a resource exceed its economic value
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Point sources of pollution
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single, identifiable sources like a smokestack, drainpipe, or exhaust pipe
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Nonpoint sources of pollution
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dispersed, often difficult to identify. examples: pesticides sprayed into the air, runoff of fertilizers and pesticides from farmlands
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"Big Five" causes of environmental problems
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1. rapid population growth
2. unsustainable resource use 3. poverty 4. non including environmental costs of economic goods and services in their market prices 5. trying to manage and simplify nature with too little knowledge |
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Problems associated with air pollution
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- global climate change
- stratospheric ozone depletion - acid deposition |
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Problems associated with water pollution
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- nutrient overload
- oxygen depletion - excess heat - oil spills - infectious agents - toxic chemicals |
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Problems associated with food supply
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- overgrazing
- farmland and wetland loss and degradation - overfishing - coastal pollution - soil erosion, salinization, waterlogging - water shortages - groundwater depletion |
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Affluenza
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a term used to describe the unsustainable addiction to overconsumption and materialism
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Rate of background extinction
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1%
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Axis tilt of earth
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23.5 degrees
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sympatric speciation
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population splits. by mutation or change in ritual
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bottom dwellers
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benthos
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Swimmers
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nektin
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Floaters - can't fight currents
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Plankton
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three type of plankton - animal, bacteriai and plant
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zoo, ultra, and phyto
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Limnetic =
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lake
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Lotic =
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flowing
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Littoral zone
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zone of lake - shallow, lots of light
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Limnetic zone
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open area of lake at top, in photic zone
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profundal zone -
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below the photic zone, below the surface zone, above the benthic zone
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Which types of lake have turnovers
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Temperate lakes
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Agricultural Revolution
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stopped hunting and gathering, starting farming and domesticating
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Industrial Revolution
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started using fossil fuels, everyone flocks to cities
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Manifest Destiny
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started in the 1840s'ish, this is our land to conquer
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Muir
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Sierra Club, instrumental in start of National Park Service
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Early Conservation Era
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Thoreau, Muir, Teddy Roosevelt (parks)
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Thoreau
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Put the environment in perspective
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CCC
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Cleaned up, planted trees, but also made damns that were not good
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When was the Environmental Era and who was involved?
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60s and 70s;
carson, muir, erlich, hardin, roosevelt, roosevelt |
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Carson
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Silent Spring, DDT
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Earth Day
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April 20, 1970
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Hole in the Ozone layer discovered
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1980s
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Cuyahuga River caught fire
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1970s
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Paul Erlich
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Population Bomb - idea that if left unfettered, humans will overextend past earth's carrying capacity
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Garret Hardin
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Tragedy
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Republicans f-ed everything up in the
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1980s
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Aldo Leopald
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environmental ethics
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Shannon Index measures:
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biodiversity
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Factors that affect climate
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Latitude, proximity to large oceans (water is a stabilizing force), proximity to mountains
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Factors of climate
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Temperature and precipiation
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Leeward side of mountain
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dry side - rainshadow. orographic uplifting
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Windward (W W)
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WET side, the side of the mountains that gets the rain as the air moves up
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Wetlands do good stuff -
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filter water, nurseries for creatures, buffer water (stabilizes ph)
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Clean Water Act
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1972 - requires that specific point sources of pollution acquire a permit and develop technology that would enable them to control their output
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Levels of atmosphere
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troposphere, stratosphere, mesosphere, thermosphere or ionsphere
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ozone is in which layer?
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stratosphere
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Weather occurs in which level?
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Troposphere
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The Rule of 70
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70/population growth rate = number of years it will take for population to double
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National Forest
- who, what |
U.S. Forest Service, Department of Agriculture, Can be used for resource farming
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National Parks
- who, what |
National Park Service
Dept of Interior Recreation Activities |
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National Wildlife Refuges
- who, what |
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Land Management,
Used to protect wildlife, but you can still mine for resources |
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National Resource Lands
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BLM, same as wildlife refuges but with less emphasis on wildlife protection
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National Wilderness Protection Systems
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MOST restrictive, within other preservation areas
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Topsoil made up of which horizons
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O and A
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O horizon
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loose containing partly decayed organidc matter such as leaf litter
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A horizon
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mineral material mixed with humus (rich, organic material produced by the decomposition of plants and animals)
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E horizon
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litte organic matter, light-colored layer, water percolates through it, washing out finer materials in a process called illuvation. leaches
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leaching
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water moving through E horizon removes soluble materials from the other layers and eposits them in lower layers
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"Bottom up" reasoning
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Inductive reasoning
- use observations to come to conclusion |
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"Top down" reasoning
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Deductive reasoning
- arrive at specific conclusion based on a generalization |
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Positive feedback loop
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- system changes in one direction further and further
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Negative feedback loop
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- system changes in opposite direction
-equalizing |
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Synergistic interaction
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- two or more processes interact so that the combined effect is greater than the sum of their separate effects
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Hydrocarbons and example
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compounds of carbon and hydrogen atoms
ex: methane |
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Chlorinated hydrocarbons and example
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compounds of carbon, hydrogen, and chlorine atoms
ex: DDT |
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First Law of Thermodynamics
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energy is neither created nor destroyed
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Second Law of Thermodynamics
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when energy is converted, some is always degraded to lower quality
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Organization of ecology
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organisms --> populations --> communities --> ecosystems --> biosphere
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B horizon
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below the area where leached material is deposited; sometimes called the zone of accumulation
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C horizon
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sits atop the bedrock that is being weathered and contains partially altered parent material in chunks
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Warm front
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days of cloudy skies and drizzle
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Cold front
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high surface winds and thunderstorms; severe weather
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jet streams
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hurricane-force winds circling the earth
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High pressure air is ______ and produces ________weather
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cool, dense air that descends - fair weather
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Low pressure air is ______ and produces ________weather
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low density - cloudy, stormy
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El Nino
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change in direction of tropical winds - warms coastal surface water, supppresses upwellings, can trigger extreme weather chagnes
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La Nina
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cools some coastal surface waters and brings back upwellings; more Atlantic hurricanes, colder winters in Canada and NE US and torrential rains in SE Asia
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Biome: little precipitation, little vegetation; can be tropical, temperate, or polar
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Desert
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Biome: enough precipitation to support grasses but not enough to support large stands of trees; found in tropical, temperate, and polar
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Grasslands
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Biome: hots places that have rain except during dry seasons; lots of hoofed animals
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Savanna
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Biome: cold winters, hot and dry summers; deep fertile soils
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Temperate grassland
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Biome: temperate shrubland with good climate but subject to fires, flooding, and mudslides
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Chaparral
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Biome: little leaf litter on ground because of fast decomposition, dominated by broadleaf evergreens, lots of life in canopy layer
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tropical rain forests
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Biome: ample rainfall, dense stands of large conifers, lots of mosses and ferns
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Temperate rain forests or coastal coniferous forests
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euphotic zone
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zone of aquatic ecosystem through which sunlight can penetrate
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Dissolved O2 levels higher near the:
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surface, because photosynthesis takes place here
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Dissolved CO2 levels higher near the:
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bottom, because CO2 is produced through aerobic respiration
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warm, nutrient-rich shallow water that contains most marine species
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coastal zone
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Estuary
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partially enclosed area of coastal water where seawater mixes with freshwater and nutrients from rivers, streams, and runoff from land
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coastal wetlands
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land areas covered with water all or part of the year
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Bathyal zone of ocean
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dimly lit middle zone that does not contain photosynthesizing produces because of a lack of sunlight. zooplankton and smaller fish
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abyssal zone of ocean
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dark and very cold, very little dissolved oxygen. tons of nutrients on the ocean floor
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oligotrophic
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newly formed lake, very clear, little plant nutrient
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eutrophic lake
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shallow lake with murky brown or green water and poor visibility. lots of nutrients
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inland wetlands
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lands covered with fresh water all or part of the time and located away from coastal areas
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services of inland wetlands
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filtering toxic wastes and pollutants, absorbing excess water from storms, providing habitats for a variety of species
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Species richness
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number of different species
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species evenness
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abundance of individuals within each species
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species diversity =
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species richness + species evenness
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Three patterns of population distribution are:
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clumped, uniform, random
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r-selected species
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reproduce early and put most of their energy into reproduction - Type III
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K-selected species
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reproduce late in life and have a small number of offspring with fairly long life spans - Type I
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Statutory laws
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developed and passed by legislative bodies such as federal and state governments
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Administrative laws
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administrative rules and regulations, executive orders, and enforcement decisions related to implementation of laws
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common law
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unwritten rules and principles derived from thousands of past legal decisions along with commonly accepted practices or norms; case law
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