Ch : Resource Issues

Acid Rain Def: Industrial conversion of sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides to acids that return to earth as snow. The concentration of acids harm water features (killing fish and plants). Sig: It’s hard to address because the rain often falls in different regions from those that benefit from the pollution.

Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) Def: Decomposing organic waste dumped into water features use up oxygen that the fish and plants need which results in mass die-offs. Sig: Water using industries (e.g. food processing), sewage and agriculture are the biggest contributors.

Chloroflourocarbons (CFCs) Def: pollutants, like freon, that reduce the ozone layer Sig: The Montreal Protocol in 1987 banned the use of CFCs.

Climate Change Def: It refers to the warming of the earth and its effects on sea levels and weather patterns. Sig: Particular attention is focused on human actions, such as burning fossil fuels, that cause global warming (anthropogenic).

Ecotourism Def: Tourism to the LDCs that is supposed to help sustain fragile ecosystems. Ex: Costa Rica may see keeping the rain forest intact as economically more beneficial than deforestation for cattle production.

Greenhouse Effect Def: Global warming caused by CO2s trapping radiation from escaping out of our atmosphere. Sig: It is causing sea levels to rise and weather patterns to change.

Natural Resource Depletion Def: Using up of the available scarce resources (especially petroleum, natural gas & coal). Sig: The more readily reserves are extracted first making the extraction increasingly more expensive. This should lead to extraction innovation and use of alternative resources).

Ozone depletion Def: It refers to the reduction of the protective ozone gas layer. The ozone protects us from UV light. Sig: The reduction of CFCs has slowed this down but it will take a long time to regenerate itself.

Potential Reserves Def: Reserves of resources that are undiscovered but thought to exist. Sig: Reserves become proven once they are discovered.

Proven Reserves Def: Discovered reserves of resources. Discovery is dependent on technology and will. Sig: Proven reserves can be measured with accuracy.