C12- Earth's Resources Flashcards
List some human uses of earth’s resources
Make homes to live in Provide food Make energy needed to cook Stay warm Fuel transport
Give an example of some finite resources
Metal ores used to extract metal
Crude oil used to make polymers and petrochemicals
Limestone to make cement and concrete
Crude oil to make petrol, diesal and kerosene that we use for transport
Fossil fuels
Give some examples of renewable resources
The crops used to make biofuels
Give examples of natural products that are replaced by a synthetic product
Wool- Replaced by acrylic fibre
Cotton- replaced by polyester
Silk- replaced by nylon
State the stages of an LCA in the correct order
Raw material extraction
Manufacture
Use/ reuse/ maintainance
Recycle/waste management
What is the importance of LCA?
They highlight environmental impact and health issues when comparing products or prcesses.
How can Lca be misused?
If they do not take into account differences in cost or performance
What are the limits of Lca’s
Lca’s use a mix of numerical values and value judgements, Lca’s are not a purely objective process.
Unlike in this task, in the real world it is easy to quantify: use of water, use of resources etc. But it is not easy to quantify the effects of pollutants because we can’t be sure what the overall total effect will be. This means we have to use value judgements
List some products that can be reused and recycled
Glass bottles
Car parts
Describe how glass can be reused and recycled
Glass bottles can be reused and also can be recycled for a different use and they can be crushed and melted to make different glass products.
How can metal be reused and recycled?
Car parts can be reused. Cars can also be crushed and melted at the end of their life cycle to make different products.
What is the importance of reusing and recycling products?
The ingots can then be used to manufacture new metal items
Why can recycling sometimes be difficult?
It can be difficult to sort different materials from one another. the sorted materials may need to be transported to where they can be processed.
