Cold 3- Periglacial Landforms & People

Question 1

Periglacial areas

Answer 1

Areas that experience a cold climate, intense frost action and the development of permafrost
Either physically close to glacial or temporally close to glacial

Question 2

Permafrost

Answer 2

Subsoil temperatures below 0°c for two years or more

Continuous, discontinuous and sporadic

Question 3

Frost heave

Answer 3

Freezing of the soil just below the surface due to the direct formation of ice crystals of lenses in the active layer
Causes an upward expansion of the soil surface

Question 4

Solifluction

Answer 4

The slumping or downslope movement of rock and soil material due to gravity
Saturated active layer is very mobile

Question 5

Stone polygons

Answer 5

Patterned ground with rings of stone around raised domes

Question 6

Formation of stone polygons

Answer 6

Frost heave causes upward expansion of soil

Ice lenses beneath large stones push the stones upwards as they freeze & expand

Question 7

Solifluction lobes

Answer 7

Rounded, tongue-like features formed from solifluction

Question 8

East Greenland Pingo

Answer 8

Water is forced upwards through a crack in the permafrost and freezes, creating a rounded hill

Question 9

Makenzie pingo

Answer 9

A frozen lake with sediment on the floor insulates the ground beneath it, creating talik
The trapped water then freezes into a ball and raises the ground above it

Question 10

Ice wedge polygon

Answer 10

Ground contraction creates cracks which then fill with water and freeze, exerting pressure and widening the crack
The ridges of the ice wedges create a polygon shape

Question 11

Loess

Answer 11

Deposits of fine sediment are carried long distances by unobstructed winds at high velocities

Question 12

Challenges of a cold environment for people

Answer 12

Very low temperatures, short summers, low precipitation, stony poor soils, permafrost, water logging, blizzards

Question 13

Oil exploration in the Arctic

Answer 13

Prudhoe Bay oilfield discovered in 1967
Trans-Alaskan pipeline constructed (insulated stilts zig zag)
Exxon Valdez (1989) ran aground & spilt 11 million gallons of crude oil

Question 14

NPRA

Answer 14

National Petroleum Reserve, Alaska

An area that could be developed for oil fields ‘in an emergency’

Question 15

ANWR

Answer 15

Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
Set up to preserve wildlife, continue subsistence uses and ensure necessary water quantity & quality
Under pressure to drill 1002 lands

Question 16

Arguments for drilling

Answer 16

Enhance revenues to treasury, create 250,000 jobs, past developments didn’t seem to harm wildlife

Question 17

Arguments against drilling

Answer 17

ANWR contains some of the last true wilderness, habitat to many species (Porcupine Caribou), claims that 2,000 km^2 of fragile tundra already destroyed in Prudhoe Bay (60 contaminated waste sites)

Question 18

Alaska’s White Mountains

Answer 18

Sustainable tourism: network of routes, artificial soil protection sheets, drainage ditches, all hunters need permits, Rangers prevent illegal hunting

Question 19

The Antarctic Treaty System

Answer 19

Prohibits any measures of a military nature, and provides the freedom of scientific investigation
It protects the environment, ensures waste is removed and tourist numbers limited

Question 20

Sealing and whaling

Answer 20

Sealing around the Island of South Georgia, over 300,000 killed in three years
Blue and white whales targeted and stocks seriously depleted by 1965

Question 21

International Whaling Convention

Answer 21

Ended whaling by 1985
Now there are thought to be over 5,000 blue whales
(Numbers dropped to 1,000 in 1967)

Question 22

Fishing

Answer 22

Antarctic rock cod and krill fished
Krill underpins the whole ecosystem (sensitive to pollutants)
Quotas set to reduce fishing and restore stocks

Question 23

Tourism in Antarctica

Answer 23

Increased from 9,000 in 1992 to 46,000 in 2008
20 tourists per expert guide & cruise ships of 100 people
Only 10m close to penguins & no litter
Only 5% of 200 landing sites showed damage

Question 24

Concerns with Antarctic tourism

Answer 24

Extremely fragile ecosystem, disturb breeding animals, over-flying causes distress, invasive species brought into region

Question 25

Madrid Protocol of 1998

Answer 25

Due to depletion of reserves in the rest of the world and the demand for resources, the mineral resources might one day have to be exploited (review in 2048)