The water cycle Flashcards
The sun
Transfers thermal energy to Earth, allowing for certain processes in the water cycle to take place.
Accumulation
When water that falls from the clouds as rain, snow, hail or sleet, collects in the oceans, rivers, lakes, streams.
Fresh water
Naturally occurring water on Earth’s surface in ice sheets, ice caps, glaciers, icebergs, bogs, ponds, lakes, rivers and streams, and underground as groundwater in aquifers and underground streams.
Surface (snowmelt) runoff
water flowing above ground down hill - produced from melting snow.
Streamflow
The flow of water in a stream or river.
Condensation
The conversion of a vapor or gas to a liquid because of a decrease in temperature. Clouds form..
Evaporation
The process of turning from liquid into water vapor when there is an increase in temperature.
The atmosphere
The envelope of gases surrounding the earth.
Precipitation
Rain, snow, sleet, freezing rain, or hail that falls to the ground.
Transpiration
When heat from the sun causes liquid water in plants to evaporate through the pores in the leaves.
Ice and snow
Freshwater stored in frozen form.
Groundwater flow
Groundwater is water that is found underground in cracks and spaces in the soil, sand and rocks. An area where water fills these spaces is called a phreatic zone or saturated zone. Groundwater is stored in and moves slowly through the layers of soil, sand and rocks.
Infiltration
The process by which precipitation or water soaks into subsurface soils and moves into rocks through cracks and pore spaces.
Transportation
The movement of water through the atmosphere, specifically from over the oceans to over land. Some of the earth’s moisture transport is visible as clouds.
Surface runoff
Water that flows over the land surface. Runoff that occurs on surfaces before reaching a channel is also called overland flow.
