Glaciers: Environmental Fragility

Question 1

How does fragility related to cold environments?

Answer 1

cold environments are fragile - the effects of small shifts in rainfall patterns of ambient temps can often do great harm to fragile environments and can act as indicators of imminent threats elsewhere. Also difficulty to restore, (e.g. irreversible damage to natural environments or lengthy time to recover) may result in a chain reaction of knock on effects.

Question 2

What are some of the reasons cold environments are so fragile?

Answer 2

• Slow ecosystem development and highly specialised species and habitats —> plants and animals are highly adapted to the lack of daylight during winter and harsh climate conditions (strong, drying winds, lack of rainfall, presence of permafrost and short growing seasons). very diverse ecosystem, but take a very long time to be established.
• Sensitive to change —> plants/animals have adapted to a particular environment. scientists concerned about possible consequences of climate change in Artic and Sub-Artic regions
• Once damaged, a very long time to recover, or never recover. said that just treading on Tundra vegetation can result in the footprint remaining for a decade.
• Food webs can be affected easily
• Slow nutrient cycle —> nutrient deprived environment, much longer to breakdown things. if litter or other foreign objects are placed in the environment, they will take an extremely long time to decompose, which can affect plant and animal behaviour.

Question 3

How do humans impact cold environments?

Answer 3

Humans affect cold environments through direct intervention or through passive contribution. They can also affect environments on a local scale (e.g. dropping litter) or contribute on a regional or global scale through pollution, oil usage, etc.

Question 4

How is tourism a human impact on cold environments?

Answer 4

a recent but present problem in cold environments. The development of ski resorts increases urbanisation and construction - displacing wildlife and ecosystems. Humans in alpine areas disrupt the ecosystem (destroying plants in snow sports and scaring wildlife away) - these won’t recover. Any litter dropped will stay in the ecosystem for a long time. Tourism in cold environments is a growing industry, with sea ice destruction and cruise ship crashes also contributing to environmental destruction (for example the MS Explorer crash, 2007)

Question 5

How is resource exploitation an impact on cold environments?

Answer 5

polar and Periglacial environments have an abundance of natural resources (especially oil and minerals). Oil exploitation disrupts the habitat due to the infrastructure that comes with it (e.g. drilling and pipelines). Oil spills cause catastrophic damage, as the fragile ecosystem cannot remove the oil quickly. Metal and mineral exploitation damages the environment through mining and quarrying, scaring away wildlife and causing damage beyond repair. Antarctica is currently protected from this. Scientific research is also a threat, as scientific tests can disrupt the environment.

Question 6

How is fishing and whaling a human impact on cold environments?

Answer 6

polar regions are under threat from unsustainable fishing, which disrupts food chains. Sealing and Whaling which began as far back as the 18th centuary, although there are some bans, there is still a greatly reduced number of whale species. Reports of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, which causes wide scale marine habitat damage. Overfishing also removes vital animals in the food chain.

Question 7

How is pollution a human impact on cold environments?

Answer 7

largest scale problem impacting cold environments. Local issues (leaving litter, etc) and a global issue (the combustion of fossil fuels, etc). the combustion of fossil fuels causes a variety of issues, often setting up positive feedback loops (which an impact can quickly spiral into a worse impact). Warmer temps cause melting which means permafrost melts, glaciers retreat and alpine environments thaw for longer summers. It also causes local floods near glaciers and albedo effect is lessened due to less ice sheets.
— higher regional temps affect cold environments in other ways. Invasive species that are adapted to higher temps have grown and caused the colonisation of some cold environments. Migration patterns of certain animals have been disrupted by the higher temps. Therefore food chains are disrupted due to both of these.

Question 8

What happens as global temps increase due to climate change?

Answer 8

• sea ice extent will decrease, revealing darker sea. revealed sea has a lower albedo (it is less reflective to sunlight) so more incoming radiation will be absorbed by the oceans, raising the ocean temp further.
• Melting permafrost in Periglacial regions (e.g. Russia, Canada and Alaska). release of methane through decay of previously frozen soils so more CO2 and methane into atmosphere, enhancing the greenhouse effect further.
• Reduction in snow cover on land means increased bare rock exposed, so more heat absorbed and raises the ground temp, leading to melting of more snow.
  + As ice on the land recedes and melts, vegetation can recolonise and increase photosynthesis so they will sequester more carbon from the atmosphere.
  + growing season for plants in Tundra regions will be longer and warmer. encourage plants to flourish and survive longer. taking CO2 out of the atmosphere restoring the balance.
• Longer and drier summers
• Changes to current ranges of plant and animal species
• Rapid rates of sea level rise (30cm - 1m by 2100)