APES Chapter one review

ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES: 1) Population growth, 2) poverty, 3) unsustainable resource use, 4)

management/simplification of nature without sufficient knowledge (pollution, climate change, and
biodiversity depletion), and 5) not including environmental costs in market prices

COMPONENTS/INTERACTIONS: Earth’s Life Support System 1) lithosphere, 2) hydrosphere, 3)

atmosphere, 4) biosphere : Human Culturesphere 1) population, 2) economics, 3) politics, 4) technology

PLAYERS: Preservationists: Protect undisturbed nature Restorationists: Restore human-degraded nature

Conservationists: Use nature sustainably Ecologists: Biologists study plants/animals/environment
Conservation Biologists: Study biodiversity (human impacts) and preserve
Environmental Scientists: Study Earth, human interactions, resulting problems/solutions
Environmentalists: Env. quality degraded by human impacts based on beliefs, politics, ethics, science

RESOURCES
1) Perpetual (sun,wind,tide,river)
2) Renewable (air,water,soil,biodiversity)
3) Nonrenewable (fossil fuels, metallic and non-metallic minerals)
Ecological Footprint: land needed to produce resources for average person
Economic Depletion: Extraction cost exceeds value—then six choices exist: 1) Find more, 2)
recycle/reuse, 3) waste less, 4) use less, 5) substitute, 6) wait millions of years for renewal
Tragedy of the Commons: Overuse of free-access resources (land, ocean, air, space, wildlife). “If I don’t
use this resource, someone else will.” Three solutions: 1) regulate or limit to sustainable yields (difficult
to calculate), 2) make private (global impossibility), or 3) community rules (easiest) .

POLLUTION
1) Anthropogenic/man-made (point source—smokestack, non-point source—runoff), 2) Natural (volcano)
Prevention: input—five ways to reduce—refuse, replace, reduce, reuse, recycle
Cleanup: output—three disadvantages—temporary, only converted, too expensive
Government Help?: 1) Incentives (subsidies, tax write-offs), 2) Regulations, or 3) Taxes

GLOBALIZATION INDICATORS: 1950-present, 1) Economic—World economy, trade, industries,

2) Info./communication—Internet, 3) Environmental—Global warming, ozone loss, pollution, infections
Developed: US, CAN, NZ, AUS, JAP, EUR—85% wealth, 88% natural resources, 75% waste, 20% pop.

Advantages. ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT Disadvantages (* = poverty)

Life expectancy increasing Developing countries reversed*
Infant mortality decreasing Developing countries reversed*
Pollution decrease in developed nations Pollution too high in all nations*
Food production outpacing population growth Industrial food production may be harmful
Safe drinking water increasing Ecosystems for biodiversity decreasing*
More goods/less money Unsustainable resource use/Global Warming
Wealth distribution wider/World poverty

Planetary Management WORLDVIEWS Environmental Wisdom

1) We control nature 1) Nature isn’t ours—we’re not in charge
2) There’s always more 2) There is not always more
3) All economic growth is good 3) Some technology/economic growth is bad
4) Success depends on managing benefits 4) Success depends on sustaining by changing

EQUATIONS
Rule of 70: (Doubling Time) = (70) / (% Growth Rate)
(Environmental Impact) = (Population) X (Affluence or consumption) X (Technological Impact)
GWP: Total goods world GNP: Total goods in & out of country GDP: Total goods in country
PPP: Market value Per capita: Per person = (Total)/(Population)