APES Units 1, 4, 5, and 8

1.2, 1.4, 1.5, 1.6, 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 5.2, 5.9, 5.10, 5.17, 8.9, 8.10

Biomes

World’s major communities: based on temperature + rainfall

Vertical zonation

How biomes change as altitude increases

Nine terrestrial biomes

Tundra, taiga, temperate rainforest, deciduous forest, grasslands, chaparral, desert, savanna, tropical rainforest

Climatograms

Graphs that show precipitation and temp changes over a year based on biome

Earthquakes

Occur when energy stored in plates is released

Volanoes

Occurs at plate boundaries or fixed hot spots

Hot spots

Areas where magma breaks through Earth’s crust

Convergent boundaries

Plates move towards one another (mountains, island arcs, volcanoes, earthquakes)

Continental - continental plate boundaries

Create mountains (crumple)

Continental - oceanic plate boundaries

Subduction zones (oceanic plate slides under continental plate due to density difference), creates trenches, volcanoes, and earthquakes

Oceanic - oceanic plate boundaries

Subduction zones (older, more dense oceanic plate subducts), creates deep ocean trenches

Divergent boundaries

Plates move away from one another - seafloor spreading, rift valleys, volcanoes, earthquakes

Transform boundaries

Plates slide past each other - earthquakes

Composition of soil

45% minerals, 5% organic matter, 25% air, 25% water

Main components of soil

Clay (small), silt (medium), sand (large)

Loam

40% sand, 40% silt, 20% clay

Humus

Dark colored, dead organic material found on top of the soil - if low: add compost or manure

Pore space

The space in between the soil particles - sand = largest

Porosity

The total amount of pore space. - clay has the greatest

Water holding capacity

The amount of water that a type of soil can hold - clay has the highest

Permeability

Ability of water or other minerals to move through the soil particles

Density

How heavy one soil is compared to another

Percolation/infiltration/permeability

Rate that water flows through sample

Soil texture by fractionation/soil texture by feel

Determines percentages of soil components

pH

Measures the acidity of the soil - higher is more basic - add lime to raise, sulfur to lower

Too high nutrients

Add plants, flush soil

Too low nutrients

Add fertilizer, humus, compost, manure

Older land =

Thick soil

O horizon

Organic material - on top of the ground

A horizon

Topsoil - mixture of 3 rock particles + humus - lots of bugs and bacteria, nutrient poor

E horizon

Zone of leaching - not all soil diagrams

B horizon

Subsoil - clay and minerals accumulate here

Illuviation

Accumulation of nutrients that are leached out of layer above

C horizon

Weathered parent material - aquifers

R horizon

Parent rock

Sheet erosion

Entire layers of soil removed

Rill erosion

Rivulets of soil are removed - hilly areas

Gully erosion

Large grooves washed away

Splash erosion

Water splashes + creates small holes

Chemical erosion/weathering

When acids come in contact with rocks causing them to break

Wind erosion

When soil is loose and dry

Conventional tillage

Poor farming practice, breaks up soil

Construction sites

Cause most erosion

Desertification

Overgrazing livestock results in a desert environment

Problems with soil erosion

Destruction of infrastructure, landslides/mudslides, siltation behind dams, nutrient runoff into waterways, deposits in waterways

Tree plantations

Large tracts of land where trees are grown for the purpose of harvesting later for profit

Virgin forests/primary forests

Not seriously disturbed in hundreds of years - large trees

National forests

Managed by the federal government - US Forestry Service

Clearcutting

Removal of all trees from an area in a forest

Reforestation

Re-planting trees that have been cut down

Selective cutting

Cutting only certain trees

Prescribed (planned) burns

Fires help some trees to reseed, lets more sunlight in, and helps ecosystems, adds nutrients to the soil

Unplanned burns

Naturally occur

Heat island effect

Cities are warmer than surrounding areas

Minerals

Naturally occurring elements + compounds - economic value

Ore

Rocks with enough minearls in them to mine for a profit

Alloy

Metals mixed, melted, or fused together with other metals to make a product that is more useful

Surface mining

When deposits are mined near surface

Overburden

Soil and rock located above the mineral

Open-pit mine

Big holes in ground - hard to remediate

Strip mining

Bulldoze thin parallel strips, burying each as you progress, unused debris called spoil piles

Acid drainage formula

S + H₂O → H₂SO₄

Mountaintop Removal

Destroys entire mountains - coal

Placer mining

Running water to isolate minerals

Subsurface mining

Deposits deep under earth’s surface

Tailings

Toxic runoff from mines

Smelting

Melting ores at high temperatures to separate impurities

Slag

Byproduct of processing, waste liquid is hazardous

Restoration/reclamation

Restoring mining sites back to original condition

Phytoremediation

Using bacteria/plants to digest mining byproducts

Sustainable manufacturing

Minimizing waste during industrial processes

Industrial ecology

Extention of sm in which “wastes” for one industry are raw materials for another

Dematerialization

Decrease in size and weight of product over time as technology improves

MSW

Non-liquid garbage

Industrial Solid Waste

Mining, agriculture, petroleum, industry

Hazardous waste

Solid/liquid waste that is toxic, corrosive, flammable, or chemically reactive

Wastewater

Sewage & polluted runoff

E-waste

Electronics - waste of plastics + metals