First review Flashcards
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)
The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) was signed into law on January 1, 1970. NEPA requires federal agencies to assess the environmental effects of their proposed actions prior to making decisions.
Oligotrophic
An oligotroph is an organism that can live in an environment that offers very low levels of nutrients. They may be contrasted with copiotrophs, which prefer nutritionally rich environments.
Montreal Protocol
Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer (a protocol to the Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer) is an international treaty designed to protect the ozone layer by phasing out the production of numerous substances that are responsible for ozone depletion.
Kyoto Protocol
An international treaty which extends the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that commits State Parties to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, based on the premise that (a) global warming exists and (b) human-made CO2 emissions have caused it.
Xeriscaping
The conservation of water through. creative landscaping. Originally developed for drought-afflicted areas; landscape (an area) in a style which requires little or no irrigation.
Anthropocentrism
The point of view that humans are the only, or primary, holders of moral standing.
Effluent
liquid waste or sewage discharged into a river or the sea.
Pscnocline
A layer in an ocean or other body of water in which water density increases rapidly with depth.
Genuine Progress Indicator
A metric used to measure the economic growth of a country. It is often considered as a replacement to the more well known gross domestic product (GDP) economic indicator.
Thermohaline Circulation
A part of the large-scale ocean circulation that is driven by global density gradients created by surface heat and freshwater fluxes.
Confined Aquifer
Those in which an impermeable dirt/rock layer exists that prevents water from seeping into the aquifer from the ground surface located directly above.
Intertidal
Of or denoting the area of a seashore that is covered at high tide and uncovered at low tide.
Unconfined Aquifer
When its upper surface (water table) is open to the atmosphere through permeable material.
Zooxanthellae
Single-celled dinoflagellates that are able to live in symbiosis with marine invertebrates such as corals, jellyfish, and sea anemones.
Riparian Forest
A forested or wooded area of land adjacent to a body of water such as a river, stream, pond, lake, marshland, estuary, canal, sink or reservoir.
U.S. Oil Pollution Act of 1990
Passed by the 101st United States Congress and signed by President George H. W. Bush. Streamlined and strengthened EPA’s ability to prevent and respond to catastrophic oil spills. A trust fund financed by a tax on oil is available to clean up spills when the responsible party is incapable or unwilling to do so.
Toxic Substance Control Act
A United States law, passed by the United States Congress in 1976 and administered by the United States Environmental Protection Agency, that regulates the introduction of new or already existing chemicals.
North American Free Trade Agreement
An agreement signed by Canada, Mexico, and the United States, creating a trilateral trade bloc in North America. U.S. trade with NAFTA partners has unlocked opportunity for millions of Americans by supporting Made-in-America jobs.
Bogs
A wetland that accumulates peat, a deposit of dead plant material—often mosses, and in a majority of cases, sphagnum moss. It is one of the four main types of wetlands.
Cap and Trade
Emissions trading or cap and trade is a government-mandated, market-based approach to controlling pollution by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emissions of pollutants.
Pelagic
Any water in a sea or lake that is neither close to the bottom nor near the shore can be said to be in the pelagic zone. In open oceans or seas rather than waters adjacent to land or inland waters.
Benthic
The ecological region at the lowest level of a body of water such as an ocean or a lake, including the sediment surface and some sub-surface layers.
Harmful Algal Blooms
HABs, occur when colonies of algae — simple plants that live in the sea and freshwater — grow out of control and produce toxic or harmful effects on people, fish, shellfish, etc…
Factory Fishing
A factory ship, also known as a fish processing vessel, is a large ocean-going vessel with extensive on-board facilities for processing and freezing caught fish or whales. Fish stocks and marine biomass have been over-fished and devastated in many parts of the world.
Estuaries
The tidal mouth of a large river, where the tide meets the stream.
