Final Exam Flashcards
What is bycatch?
any non-target organisms that are caught and then disposed of into the ocean
What is humus?
partially decomposed organic matter
When does smog reach its peak?
early afternoon
What percent of the world’s commercial energy does coal supply?
42%
What is the world’s current population?
8 billion
What is the crude birth rate?
the total number of births per 1,000 people
What percent of the Earth’s water supply is available to us as liquid freshwater?
0.3%
What causes cultural eutrophication in lakes and rivers?
plant nutrients
What is an indicator species?
plants/animals that show something about the environment based on their presence, absence, or scarcity
Throughout the world, what is most water used for?
irrigation
What is energy security?
the ability to secure affordable, reliable, and sufficient energy for a particular country
What is the general approach to pollution that the textbook regularly refers to?
Replace, Regulate, Restore
In the early transitional stage of the demographic transition, what happens first that causes the population to grow?
death rate drops
What percent of total waste comes from municipal sources?
5%
If a country is growing rapidly, what will its population pyramid have?
wide base
In 1965, who presented the phrase “necessity is the mother of invention”?
Ester Boserup
What is subsistence farming?
farming to produce food for your own family and local community with little surplus
What is integrated pest management?
a program that uses a combination of biological, cultivation, and chemical approaches to pest management
What is extensive farming?
farming that is characterized by a low density of crops/animals across a large space
What is a keystone species?
a species whose role in an ecosystem is more important than their abundance
What are the four main components of soil?
mineral particles, organic materials, water, and air
What is an ecocentrist?
a person who believes that nature is the center of the universe and man should serve nature
In an energy transformation, where does some of the energy usually end up?
heat energy that flows into the environment
Which pyramid best explains why there are typically only four to five links in a food chain?
pyramid of productivity
What is an anthropocentrist?
a person who feels that a human’s job is to manage Earth’s resources properly so they can be used by future generations
What is the 1st Law of Thermodynamics?
all energy comes from existing energy
What is the leading non-point source of water pollution?
agriculture
What is a fishery?
when fish are harvested from a source in some way
What is Earth a closed system for?
matter
What is a great source of data for the concentration of gases in our ancient atmosphere?
ice cores
How is photochemical smog formed?
primary pollutants interact with sunlight
What is acid deposition best classified as?
a regional problem
What is the pH of rain in the United States?
5.6
What are the major primary pollutants that lead to acid deposition?
SO2 and NO
Because scientists don’t have access to the ancient atmosphere, what must they rely on to draw conclusions?
proxy data
What is the greenhouse effect?
the trapping of heat energy in the troposphere by certain gaseous molecules
What is a population?
a group of individuals of the same species occupying a given area at the same time
What are the organisms that are classified as primary consumers?
herbivores
What is an example of a place that would exhibit primary succession?
a rock exposed by a retreating glacier
What is an example of a place that would exhibit secondary succession?
a heavily polluted stream that has been cleaned up
If every year, only the amount that a fish population grew was harvested, what would this be known as?
maximum sustainable yield
In cultural eutrophication, what do game fish die from?
suffocation from a lack of oxygen
What is an aquifer?
a porous water-saturated layer of underground rock
What type of agriculture is most characteristic of LEDCs?
traditional subsistence agriculture
What type of agriculture is most characteristic of MEDCs?
industrialized agriculture
How is soil developed?
weathering
What is an example of an r-strategist?
insects
What are 6 GHGs?
- carbon dioxide (CO2)
- water vapor
- methane (CH4)
- nitrogen dioxide (N2O)
- ozone
- CFCs
If the temperature one winter is 45 F for 5 days in a row, how many total heating degree days is this?
100 total heating degree days
What best describes the earth’s average surface temperature for the past 900,000 years?
constantly fluctuating
What is the range of estimated species existing on Earth?
4-100 million
What is net primary productivity?
the rate at which producers are adding biomass which is available as food for the next trophic level
The formation of tropospheric ozone is primarily due to which two primary pollutants?
NO and VOCs
What do the matter and energy laws tell us?
both matter and energy laws can be recycled
What is an example of a non-renewable resource?
fertile soil
Why is the energy efficiency of aquatic food productions generally less efficient than terrestrial food productions?
losses between trophic levels
What was the consensus view on climate change from the IPCC?
the climate is changing and it is most likely due to human emissions of GHGs
What might genetically modified foods reduce the need for?
large amounts of pesticides
Which strategist is generally more adaptable to change?
r-strategist
What is a negative feedback loop?
a stabilizing process that reduces change
What possible consequence of global warming represents a negative feedback loop?
methane may be released and rapidly oxidized by bacteria in tundra soils
Where do half of the calories that humans consume come from?
rice, corn, potato, wheat
Was the Montreal Protocol effective?
the Montreal Protocol successfully reduced ozone depleting substances over just a few years
What is the most abundant GHG?
carbon dioxide
What is the most important in determining if the resource is being used sustainably?
the difference between the rate of replenishment and the rate of consumption
What is most soil erosion caused by?
moving water
How did American settlers primarily view the continent?
a hostile wilderness that needed to be conquered
What are 6 primary pollutants?
- carbon monoxide (CO)
- carbon dioxide (CO2)
- unburned hydrocarbons
- nitrogen oxides
- sulphur dioxide
- particulates/particulate matter (PM)
What is an example of a secondary pollutant?
tropospheric ozone
What does shale oil and tar sands have in comparison to conventional oil deposits?
have lower net useful energy yield
Which energy source has the highest net energy ratio for electricity?
solar
