9-12: Water, Soil Conservation, and Wastes

Activities that affect the quality and quantity of the soil

1. Farming

2. Construction

3. Waste Disposal

4. Mining

It can affect soil health and quality in 2 Primary ways.

Farming

The 2 Primary ways that can affect soil in farming

1. physical loss of top soil (erosion)

2. loss of soil organic mater, soil structure, and soil life (degradation)

Removal of vegetation affects the soil and water quality.

Construction

A number of significant impact of solid wastes in soils have been conducted.

Waste Disposal

Negative effects of mining in soil quality

1. contamination of soil

2. erosion

3. carbon emissions

Set of management strategies for prevention of soil being eroded from earth’s surface and being chemically altered

Soil Conservation

Why is soil conservation important?

• provide nutrients

• recycle/filter water

• stores water

• soil is the basis of life on earth

Methods for Soil Conservation

1. Cover crops

2. Plant trees

3. Terrace Farming

4. No-till farming

5. Contour Plowing

6. Crop Rotation

7. Intercropping

8. Salinity Management

9. Windbreak

10. Soil Organisms

11. Soil PH

Are close-growing crops that provide soil protection, seed protection, and soil improvement between periods of normal crop production.

Cover Crops

3 Advantages of Cover Crops

1. improving soil properties

2. enhancing soil fertility

3. recycling nutrients

Prevention from soil erosion and acts as a wind barrier to vegetations.

Plant Trees

Makes a sloping land into number of level flat areas resembling a series of steps.

Terrace Farming

It leaves old materials (stalks, cobs, leaves) behind when planting new crops.

No-till farming

Benefits of No-till farming

1. control soil erosion

2. reduces wind erosion

3. maintain crop productivity

Method of tilling sloped land

Contour Plowing

Practice of growing a series of dissimilar types of crops in the same area in sequential reasons.

Crop Rotation

Increases plant biodiversity to help disguise plants from insect species.

Intercropping

The salinity of soil that is caused by the excessive accumulation of salts that has negative effect on the metabolism of the crops in soil.

Salinity Management

Shelterbelt

Windbreak

It is a plantation usually made up of one or more rows of trees or shrubs to provide shelter from the wind and protect soil from erosion.

Windbreak (shelterbelt)

The helpful organisms promote its fertility and form an element in the conservation of soil.

Soil Organisms

One of the determinants of the availability of nutrients in soil.

Soil pH

3 Conservation Policies

1. Soil Conservation Services

2. Natural Resource Conservation Services

3. Conservation Reserve Program

Unwanted or unusable materials

Waste

3 Kinds of Wastes

1. Solid Waste

2. Liquid Waste

3. Gaseous Waste

7 Wastes according to Generation (Origin)

1. Municipal Solid

2. Industrial

3. Agricultural

4. Fishery

5. Radioactive

6. E-wastes

7. Biomedical

More commonly known as trash or garbage

Municipal Solid Wastes

4 Waste Disposal Practices

1. Landfill

2. Dump

3. Compost Pit

4. Material Recovery Facility

Site for the disposal of waste materials by burial and is the oldest form of waste treatment

Landfill

Also called as dumpsite which is a collection of ammunition, military stores deposited near battlefront for distribution.

Dump

Dumping the decaying biodegradable substances

Compost Pit

Any garbage, refuse, sludge from waste treatment

Solid Waste

Characteristics of Wastes

1. Corrosive

2. Ignitability

3. Reactive

4. Toxicity

Wastes that contains acids or bases

Corrosive

They cause explosions and toxic fumes when heated

Reactive

Wastes harmful when ingested or absorbed

Toxicity