Consuming Resources

Question 1

What are the four main types of resources?

Answer 1

1) Physical - natural materials found at or below the earth’s surface, such as soil and rock, many rocks are used as energy sources or contain minerals. They are essential for human activity and making products.
2) Energy - resources used specifically for heating. Fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas can be burned for heat or to produce steam to generate electricity.
3) Mineral - materials that are normally mined or quarried from the ground in raw form and then heated and purified to make materials that are used.
4) Biological - resources of biological origin that have developed through growth and development e.g. trees, or resources grown for human use e.g. crops.

Question 2

What are the three main types of resource defined by their availability?

Answer 2

1) Non-renewable resources - cannot be remade because they take millions of years to form again, e.g. coal and oil.
2) Sustainable resources - Can deliberately renewed so that it can last into the future e.g. planting trees.
3) Renewable resources - renew themselves so do not need to be managed, e.g. solar and wind power.

Question 3

Give two benefits and three costs of non-renewable resources e.g. tar

Answer 3

Benefits:
1) Extraction would bring further money to oil companies.
2) Could avoid the costs of switching to other fuels such as hydrogen.
Costs:
1) Extraction uses large amounts of water and energy.
2) Only 50 year supply
3) Acquiring oil sometimes requires deforestation.

Question 4

Give two benefits and two costs of sustainable e.g. biofuels.

Answer 4

Benefits:
1) Carbon neutral
2) Engines don’t need to be changed to use biofuels.
Costs:
1) Land used to grow crops could be used to grow food to solve food shortages.
2) Reduces biodiversity as it may lead to habitat destruction.

Question 5

Give two benefits and three costs of renewable energy e.g. solar energy.

Answer 5

Benefits:
1) Unlimited
2) Limited carbon emissions, so environmentally friendly
Costs:
1) Intermittent as new ways of storing electricity are needed.
2) Current production is small-scale.
3) Relatively expensive

Question 6

Where is current production of oil focused?

Why has there now been a fall in oil production?

Answer 6

Current oil production is focused in the Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia.
Many of these countries have reached ‘peak oil’, which means production of relatively cheaply obtained oil has reached its maximum so there is now a fall in production.

Question 7

What is the oil consumption of a country largely related to?

What is 70% of the world’s oil used for?

Answer 7

The oil consumption of a country is largely related to the wealth of the country and its reliance on cars which is dependent on its development.
70% of the world’s oil is used for the transportation of goods and people within and between countries.

Question 8

What percentage is the USA of the global population, how much of the world’s oil does the USA consume and why(3)?

Answer 8

The USA has less than 5% of the global population but uses 25% of the oil mainly due to:

1) Lack of public transport systems
2) Low-density urban settlements so need long journey’s to get to work, etc
3) History of low petrol prices.

Question 9

What is Malthusian Theory? (3)

What were other natural checks?

Answer 9

1) Malthusian theory states that population grows exponentially but food production grows arithmetically, this means that population will eventually outstrip food production.
2) At this point the population would decrease through starvation, Malthus called this a natural check on population growth.
3) According to malthusian theory whenever population outstripped food supply ‘natural checks’ would reduce the population to a more manageable level and would then continue to grow again till the next natural check.
Other natural checks were war, disease and morality.

Question 10

What was the name of Boserup’s theory of resource consumption? What was the theory?

Answer 10

Necessity is the mother of invention.

1) Boserup did not believe population growth was limited by food production.
2) She said population growth controls farming methods, she believed people would try not to give in to famine or disease.
3) Instead they would invent solutions to the problem she used the term ‘agricultural intensification’ to explain how farmers can produce more food from the same piece of land using better farming techniques and chemical fertilisers.

Question 11

What is a finite resource?

Answer 11

A finite resource is one that is limited or restricted.

Question 12

Give four main uses of oil.

Answer 12

1) To fuel cars
2) To heat buildings
3) To make plastics that we use in everything from milk containers to computers.
4) To provide electricity

Question 13

What is peak oil?

What are the possible impacts of this?

Answer 13

Peak oil is the point at which oil production reaches its maximum level and then declines.
This could lead to recession or war as countries that import oil try to get access to the oil reserves.

Question 14

Which two countries are expected to see the biggest rise in energy consumption?

Answer 14

China and India

Question 15

What is energy security?

Answer 15

Energy security means access to reliable and affordable sources of energy. Countries with enough or surplus energy are said to be energy secure while those without enough are said to be energy insecure.

Question 16

By 2035, how is the global demand for energy expected to increase?

Answer 16

The global demand for energy is expected to grow by a third by 2035 with daily oil demand increasing to 100 million barrels a day.

Question 17

What is the main problem for the USA with regard to energy consumption?

Answer 17

The USA is the world’s largest consumer of energy, yet it has to half its oil so it is energy insecure. Even the loss of one source can create shortages and drive up global oil prices, so a continuous supply is essential.

Question 18

What has the USA done in order to ensure the supply of energy is stable?
Example.

Answer 18

The USA has attempted to stabilise areas of human conflict where oil supplies could be cut off.
E.g. The invasion and occupation of Iraq was critical to the future of US oil supplies because Iraq has the world’s third largest oil reserves.

Question 19

How and why has China’s demand for energy changing?

What percentage of the world’s total energy consumption is China expected to account for?

Answer 19

By 2013 China was the world’s second largest consumer of energy, the Chinese demand for energy has increased by 86% since 2000, and it now accounts for a sixth of all the energy produced globally.
It needs this energy for industry and also to meet the demands of growing Chinese car ownership.
40%

Question 20

How has the USA tried to reduce its dependence on imported oil?

Answer 20

The USA has tried to reduce its dependency on imported oil by seeking new domestic energy from previously inaccessible sources e.g. shale gas which can easily replace oil in electricity power stations.

Question 21

Why could renewable resources become so important in the future?

Answer 21

Renewable resources could help to fill a potential energy gap created as demand for energy increases and ‘peak oil’ is reached.

Question 22

Give two advantages and four disadvantages of hybrid cars.

Answer 22

Advantages:
1) Low CO2 emissions 
2) Use a lots less fuel
Disadvanatges:
1) Expensive to build and run
2) Not very fast
3) Can only be used for short journeys

Question 23

Renewable energy case study.

Give three facts.

Answer 23

Wind power in the USA

1) Wind turbines convert the power of the wind into electricity.
2) There are now more than 13,000 wind turbines in California, and hundreds of homes and farms across the state are also using smaller wind turbines.
3) In 2012 wind energy provided 5% of California’s total energy requirements.

Question 24

Non-renewable energy case study.

Give five facts.

Answer 24

Natural gas in Europe

1) Natural gas is used for electricity production, heating and cooking.
2) In Britain much of the gas is collected from under the North Sea, however much of the gas has been used up.
3) In 2006, the UK imported 50% of its gas supplies and this is expected to increase to 80% by 2020.
4) Britain is now dependent on gas supplied from Eastern Europe and Russia.
5) It is expected that after 2030, global gas supplies will fall and other energy sources will need to be found after this date.

Question 25

In what three main ways can governments locally and nationally attempt to manage resource consumption?

Answer 25

1) Education
2) Recycling
3) Conservation

Question 26

Why is education important for managing resource consumption?
How can people be educated?
Give an example of things we need to educate people about.

Answer 26

Education is important to change people’s behaviour, this can be done through advertising, schools and public awareness.
Examples:
1) Reducing use on non-renewables and using them more efficiently, e.g. walking instead of driving.

Question 27

Why is conservation important for managing resource consumption?
Case study conservation.

Answer 27

Conservation involves maintaining the health of the natural world, this can be controlled and encourage by governments in a number of ways.
Case study: The UK government offers two ‘Green deals’ to households who reduce their energy consumption by installing insulation.
1) 100% grants to households who do this.
2) Loans -