Uk Weather Hazards And Climate - Physical Flashcards

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1
Q

What is weather?

A

A description of the day to day conditions of the atmosphere

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2
Q

What is climate?

A

The average weather over a long period of time

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3
Q

What is rain like in the UK?

A

Persistant rainfall over a long period time can lead to floods, which can damage homes and businesses. This is quite common in the UK and in winter/spring melting snow can add to this

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4
Q

What are thunderstorms like in the UK?

A

Electrical storms bring torrential rain, lightening and strong winds ans can lead to flash floods. They’re most common in summer in the south and east of the uk

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5
Q

What is wind like in the UK?

A

They can be remnants of hurricanes coming across the atlantic, they can damage properties and disrupt power lines & transport.
They’re strongest in coastal areas eg west cost and upland areas

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6
Q

What is snow and ice like in the UK?

A

Less common in recent years in the UK, they can cause death & injuries due to slipping and cold. Also disrupts schools, transport and businesses

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7
Q

What is drought and extreme heat like in the UK?

A

Deought is the lack of precipitation, it can cause crop failures

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8
Q

What are heat waves like in the UK?

A

Sometime UK have long spells of dry, hot weather it can cause death due to heat exhaustion

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9
Q

How are weather systems in the UK becoming more extreme?

A

Weather systems cross the UK mainly from west to east are driven by winds from jet streams which moves north to south; they can stick in one position, resulting in a long period of the same weather eg heavy rain

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10
Q

How has temperature in the UK become more extreme?

A

December 2010 was the coldest but April 2011 was the warmest April on record

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11
Q

How has more frequent rain made weather in the UK more extreme?

A

2013 was one of the wettest years on record, and December 2010 was the wettest month

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12
Q

How has major flooding more often made weather in the UK more extreme?

A

Major flooding due to storms in somerset levels in 2013/2014 and in west wales in 2012.

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13
Q

Where is Somerset?

A

Its a country in south west england, the area is drained by several rivers eg the Tone and Parrett

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14
Q

What are the causes of the Somerset Levels flood?

A

1) . It eas the wettest January due to succession of depressions driven across the Atlantic Ocean brought a period of wet weather lasting severla weeks
2) . High tides & storm surges swept water up the rivers which prevented freshwater reaching the sea, so it spilled over river banks
3) . Rivers had not been dredged for at least 20 yrs, so they became clogged with sediment

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15
Q

What were the social impacts of the Somerset levels flood?

A
  • over 609 houses flooded
  • villages cut off eg moorland, this affected people’s dailt lives eg school
  • many people had power supplies cut off
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16
Q

What were the economic impacts of the Somerset levels flood?

A
  • Somerset county council estimated the damage to be more than £10 million
  • over 14,000 ha of land was under water for 3-4 weeks
  • over 1000 livesock evacuated
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17
Q

What were the environmental impacts of the Somerset levels flood?

A
  • floodwaters were contaminated with sewage, oil & chemicals
  • huge amount of debris to be cleared
  • stagnent water had to be deoxygenated before being pumped back into rivers
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18
Q

What were the immediate responses to the Somerset levels flood?

A
  • villages cut off, used boats to do shopping or go to school
  • local volunteers have invaluable support
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19
Q

What were the long term responses to the Somerset levels flood?

A
  • a £20 million flood action plan has been launched:
  • river banks are being raised & more pumping stations built
  • road levels raised to maintain communications
  • rivers Tone & Parrett were dredged to increase capacity of river
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20
Q

How old is the earth?

A

Its believed to be 4.55 billion years old

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21
Q

What is the Quarternary period?

A

Its the period of time that streches from 2.6 millions years ago to now.
- its split into two epochs the pleistocene epoch and holocene epoch

22
Q

What is the entire Quarternary period often called?

A

The ice age due to the presence of a permanent ice sheet on antarctica

23
Q

During the Pliestocene epoch what was there?

A

There were cold glacial episodes lasting approx 100,000 years. - Thick ice would expand, covering vast areas of continents; but then retreat, as each glacial episode was followed by a warmer interglacial episode.
- the warmer intervals were much shorter lasting approx 10,000 years

24
Q

When did the holocene epoch begin?

A

When the last glacial expansion ended and the current interglacial episode started

25
Q

What is solar output?

A

The output of the sun is measure by observing sunspots on the suns surface

26
Q

What are sunspots?

A

They’re caused by magnetic activity inside the sun, which results in dark patches on the suns surface

27
Q

Has solar output affected climate change?

A

The overall output of the sun has barely changed in the last 50years, it has even decreased slightly. Therefore solar output cannot be responsible for the cause of climate change from the 1970’s

28
Q

Why does the suns energy on the earth change?

A

Due to the earths orbit

29
Q

what is the earths orbit?

A

An ellipse, the distance between the earth and the sun changes as the earth orbits; therefore, if it orbits closer to the sun the climate becomes warmer and vice versa

30
Q

What is the Earth’s axis like?

A

Its tilted on an angle, when the angle of the tilt increases, this cane exaggerate the climate, so summers get warmer an winters colder

31
Q

What is the earths shape like?

A

Its not a perfect sphere, so as the earth spins, it wobbles on its axis in a 20,000 year cycle

32
Q

What do these three orbital changes mean for climate change?

A

They vary the distribution of the Sun’s energy on the Earth, this can have a significant impact on climate change

33
Q

What are volcanic eruptions like?

A

They can temporarily cause climate change, when SO2 mixes with water vapour it becomes an volcanic aerosol. These aerosols reflect the sunlight away and reduce the Suns heat energy entering the Earth’s atmosphere

34
Q

How do fossil fuels affect climate change?

A
  • they account for over 50% of the global greenhouse gas emissions
  • they’re used in transport, building and heating homes, when they’re burnt they release CO2 into the atmosphere.
  • as population grows, peoplenare demanding more energy, which increases use of fossil fuels & CO2 levels therefore prohibiting heat from escaping the Earth
35
Q

How does agriculture affect climate change?

A
  • it contributes to 20% of global emissions
  • cattle produce methane during digestion as well as microbes as they decay organic matter under water of flooded rice fields
  • as population grows so will demand for food, and agricultures contribution to climate change will increase too
36
Q

How does deforestation affect climate change?

A

Clearing trees, reduces the amount of CO2 absorbed by tress during photosynthesis as well as this when trees are burnt to clear and area, the CO2 that has been stored is released; increasing climate change

37
Q

How do alternative energy sources manage climate change?

A

By using other sources eg hyrdoelectric and solar, wind and tides, it reduces carbon emissions
- they’re renewable and dont emit large amounts of CO2, they’ll also last into the future

38
Q

How does carbon capture help to manage climate change?

A
  • coal is the mosy polluting fossil fuel
  • carbon capture and storage (CCS) uses technology to capture CO2 produced and compresses it and transports it by pipelines to be injected into the ground and stored in geological reservoirs -> reducing levels of CO2
39
Q

How does planting trees help manage climate change?

A
  • trees act as carbon sinks, removing CO2 from the atmosphere by photosynthesis. They also release moisture which has a cooling effect by producing more cloud, reducing incoming solar radiation
40
Q

How do international agreements help manage climate change?

A
  • they provide countries globally with aims for everyone to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and control other factors eg temperature
  • latest Paris Agreement 2015 has 195 countries involved, this will help reduce levels of gases as climate change is a global issue and requires global solutions and aims to reduce it
41
Q

What is the problem with a change in agricultural systems?

A

Patterns of rainfall & temperature will change, extreme weather eg drought and floods will happen more often and the distribution of pests and diseases will change
-> will affect agriculture and people’s livelihoods

42
Q

How can farmers adapt to changes in agricultural systems?

A
  • introduce drought resistant strains of crops
  • new irrigation systems
  • educating farmers in water harvesting techniques
  • shade trees can be planted to protect seedlings from sun
  • new cropping patterns can be introduced
43
Q

How do people in the Himalyas manage their water supplies?

A
  • most glaciers in the himalayas are receding and are threatening long term security of water supply
  • > an artificial glacier project will supply water to villages, water will be collected in winter through diversion canals and when the glacier ‘melts’ it will provide water for locals
44
Q

What’s the risk of rising sea levels?

A
  • rates of coastal erosion will increase
  • fresh water supplies will become contaminated by seawater
  • coastal areas will be prone to damage from storm surges
45
Q

How do the maldives manage rising sea levels?

A

climate models suggest the islands be unihabitable by 2030

  • a 3m wall has been built around the capital Male with sandbags
  • building houses that are raised off the ground on stilts
  • restoration of coastal mangrove forests - their roots trap sediment & offer protection from storm surges
46
Q

what are the global effects of climate change?

A
  • many of the world’s glaciers and ice caps are shrinking
  • artic sea is less extensive than in the past affecting wildlife such as polar bears
  • low-lying pacific islands and the Maldives are under threat from sea levels
  • economic impacts eg lower crop yields
  • more heat related disease eg malaria
  • environmental impacts eg desertifiaction
47
Q

what is the evidence for climate change?

A

when layers of sediment or fresh falls of snow become buried they trap and preserve evidence of the global temperature at that time, scientists can study the O2 in ocean sediments or water molecules in ice to calculate the temperature

48
Q

what is the RECENT evidence for climate change?

A
  • shrinking glaciers and melting ice
  • rising sea level, when temps rise and freshwater ice melts, more water flows to the seas and when it warms it expands - thermal expansion
  • the timing of natural seasonal activities eg tree flowering and bird migration is advancing
49
Q

what happens when solar activity is at its maximum and minimum?

A

at maximum - the sun gives off more heat, large explosions occur on the surface resulting in solar flares
at minimum - the solar output is reduced, it can lead to lower temps on earth

50
Q

what is the greenhouse effect?

A

the atmosphere allows most of the heat from the sun to pass straight through it to warm up the surface, when earth gives off heat in the form of longer wave radiation, some gases eg CO2 and methane are able to absorb it and traps them

51
Q

how do nitrous oxides affect climate change?

A
  • they’re upto 300 times more effective in capturing heat than CO2
  • agricultural fertilisers, sewage treatment, car exhausts and power stations producing electricity add to it
52
Q

what happens to air that is sinking and rising from the ground?

A
  • air that’s sinking forms areas of high pressure, winds on the ground move outwards from these areas eg the north pole
  • air that’s rising forms areas of low pressure, winds on the ground move towards these areas of low pressure eg the equator