esap chap 1

NEPA Requirements (national enviromental policy act)

- The National Environmental Policy Act - Jan. 1, 1970 - Considered the "Environmental Magna Carta" - Requires Environmental Assessments and Environmental Impact Statements for any project which receives federal funding

George Perkins Marsh

-Wrote Man and Nature, which provided the first description of the extent to which natural systems had been impacted by human actions. -Warned that people's willful destruction of the environment could have disastrous consequences.

Environmental Worldviews: P.M., S, E.W.

1. Planetary management with humans managing nature mostly for their own benefit. 2. The Stewardship Worldview assumes we have an ethical responsibility as humans to be caring and responsible managers, or stewards, of the Earth. 3. Environmental wisdom based on learning how nature has sustained life for 3.8 billion years and integrating these lessons from nature into our actions.

Risk-Benefit Analysis

A risk-benefit analysis is a comparison between the risks of a situation and its benefits. It's used to figure out whether a course of action is worth taking or if the risks are too high. People do this in their everyday lives without realizing it, because everything we do has some kind of risk.

Chernobyl: April 26, 1986

A sudden surge of power during a reactor systems test destroyed Unit 4 of the nuclear power station at Chernobyl, Ukraine, in the former Soviet Union. The accident and the fire that followed released massive amounts of radioactive material into the environment.

Describe two specific societal and/or environmental changes which occurred due largely or solely to the industrial revolution.

Changes in farming, soaring population growth, and an ever-increasing demand for workers led masses of people to migrate from farms to cities.

A Few intro. Case Studies of Note

Cuyahoga River on Fire, Santa Barbara Oil Spill: 196, etc.

Identify three different "natural sciences" which are generally considered to be a part of environmental science.

Ecology, Geology, Biology, etc.

Define "economic growth" and identify the two basic ways this accomplished

Economic growth is an increase in the capacity of a nation, state, city, or company to provide goods and services to people ex. growth in the size of the workforce and growth in the productivity (output per hour worked) of that workforce

Paul Ehrlich

Ehrlich claims that increasing populations and affluence are increasingly stressing the global environment, due to such factors as loss of biodiversity, overfishing, global warming, urbanization, chemical pollution and competition for raw materials.

The Organic Act of 1897

Established the National Park Service; note that National Parks (10) existed prior to August 25th, 1916, when this network service was established.

Pigouvian Tax or Full-Cost Pricing:

Internalizing external costs

Marginal Costs

Is often used when referencing the cost of dealing with one more unit of a pollutant

Who was Julian Simon and what did he see as "the most valuable resource" on Earth

Julian Simon was a enviromental economist who saw "human ingenuity" as the most valuable resource on earth.

Private lands

Lands owned by individuals and businesses.

Public lands

Lands typically owned jointly by the citizens of a country, but managed by the government.

Graphically display linear and exponential growth (show both on the same graph)

Linear = green (line) exponential = red (upward curve)

Subsidies

Payment intended to help a business grow and thrive; typically provided by a government in the form of a grant or tax break.

Policy Instruments

Policy instruments are the tools which can be used to overcome problems and achieve objectives.

How to manage Negative Externalities?

Polluter Pays Principle: external costs are internalized by the producer / manufacturer Entire Society shares cost(s) associated with negative externalities (general taxes)

Ecosystem Services

Processes by which life-supporting resources are produced. May focus on the maintenance/health of: A. Natural Systems B. Human Systems C. Both

Identify one governmental approach that might encourage pollution prevention

Promoting the use of nontoxic or less toxic substances, implementing conservation techniques, and reusing materials rather than putting them into the waste stream.

Garrett Hardin

Published "The Tragedy of the Commons" in the journal Science in 1968; argued that rational people will exploit shared resources (commons).

Describe a relatively quick way to calculate doubling time. (For example, given a growth rate of 2.0%, D.T. =?).

Rule of 70 70 divided by growth rate (g.r.) ex. If given a g.r. of 1.5%, you would simply divide 70 by 1.5, therefore DT = ...

NEPA catalysts

Santa Barbara Oil Spill Rachel Carson's SS+ Passage of: the Wilderness Act (1964), Clean Water Act, Clean Air (1963), Clean Water Act (1948)

What is meant by commons?

The cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including natural materials such as air, water, and a habitable Eart

Hallie Daggett

The first woman employed by the Forest Service as a fire lookout was Hallie M. Daggett, Daggett served as a fire lookout for 14 seasons.

Optimum Level of Pollution

The point at which the marginal pollution control costs and the marginal enviromental damage costs cross.

Cap-and-Trade

a method for managing pollution in which a limit is placed on emissions and businesses or countries can buy and sell emissions allowances

perpetual resources

a natural resource that is widely available and in no danger of being used up; examples include sunlight and wind (lasts forever)

Command and Control

an approach to protecting the environment that sets strict legal limits and threatens punishment for violations of those limits

OPEC Embargo

an event where the 12 countries that made up OPEC at the time stopped selling oil to the United States. Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries

Indirect Costs

are externalities, and are not accounted for in the cost-revenue analysis of producers; not recognized by the producer as a cost or benefit. (perhaps recognized as a "cost" in a discussion, but no $ transacting present)

Janine Benyus "Biomimicry"

biomimicry: the scientific effort to understand, mimic, and catalog the ingenious ways in which nature has sustained life on the earth for 3.8 billion years. She realized that 99% of the species that have lived on the earth became extinct because they could not adapt to changing environmental conditions. She views the surviving species as examples of natural genius that we can learn from.

Describe the fundamental difference(s) between Conservationists and Preservationists

conservation seeks the proper use of nature, while preservation seeks protection of nature from use

Direct Costs

costs borne by the producer and passed directly on to the user or purchaser

The three Scientific Principles of Sustainability.

dependence on solar energy, biodiversity, chemical cycling

Compare / contrast "ecology","environmental science", & "environmental ethics"

ecology: study of how organisms interact with their environment and each other. envi. sci: how the earth (nature) works and has survived and thrived, how humans interact with the environment, and how we can live more sustainably. envi. ethics: human beliefs about what is right or wrong with how we treat the environment.

Love Canal

he Love Canal area was originally the site of an abandoned canal that became a dumping ground for nearly 22,000 tons of chemical waste. "national symbol of a failure to exercise a sense of concern for future generations" Lois Gibbs brought wide public attention to the environmental crisis in Love Canal

Total Economic Value

the value of a resource considering both use and nonuse values

Lacey Act (1900)

wildlife conservation & protection; prohibits trade in wildlife, fish, and plants that have been illegally harvested/taken, possessed, transported and/or sold; requires a permit to transport live or dead animal/animal parts across state lines

RC's SS: Pesticide Use & Unintended Consequences

Namely, Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane = DDT

First National Park established?

Yellowstone National Park established; first NP in the world (1872)

First parkland set aside by government?

Yosemite Land Grant (1864): the first "parkland" set aside by the federal government

Current Global Human Population Growth Rate = approximately ____ %

1.1%

Country A has a population of 10 million in the year 1980 and a growth rate that is 3.5%, which remains constant for the duration of this non-quiz question; determine the pop. of Country A in the year 2020.

40

Population of humans who ever roamed the earth

45-50 billion

Human population by November

8 billion

Biosphere: Biosphere I (outside of _________ ) ; Biosphere II (outside of Tucson)

Biospere I is Earth Biosphere II is outside of Tucson

How this approach could reduce some types of pollution?

According to environmental economists, we could live more sustainably and increase our beneficial environmental impact by including the harmful environmental and health costs of the goods and services into market prices and placing a monetary value on the natural capital that supports all economies.

The Forest Reserve Act of 1891

Allowed the President of the United States to set aside land in the public domain as forest reserves, which soon become known as The National Forests

Ecological Footprint

Amount of biologically productive land and water needed to supply a population with the renewable resources it uses and to absorb or dispose of the pollution and wastes from such resource used

Discuss the relationship between potentially renewable resources and sustainable yield.

As long as the rate of harvesting of the potentially renewable resource does not exceed that of regeneration, the can be used in a sustainable way.

Describe the overall trend in human population growth over the last 500 years or so.

For tens of thousands of years, the human population grew very slowly. Then, about 500 years ago, due to technological innovation, the population started to grow exponentially and increased dramatically.

Define GDP; per capita GDP:

GDP: the annual market value of all goods and services produced by all firms and organizations, foreign and domestic, operating within a country. per capita GDP: the GDP divided by the country's total population at midyear.

Teddy, John, & Gifford

Gifford Pinchot was an important figure in the American conservation movement. First political forester. John Muir, the most famous naturalist in American history. Early advocate for the preservation of wilderness in the United States of America. After becoming president in 1901, Roosevelt used his authority to protect wildlife and public lands by creating the United States Forest Service

The E.F. of the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere?

Haiti, .78 ha (1.9 ac)

Describe two limitations or drawbacks to pollution cleanup strategies: (vs. prevention)

High costs, Trying to fix one thing can end up increasing risk of another problem. (ex. the control of an air pollution problem using a wet scrubber may cause problems related to solid waste disposal and water pollution.)

"Throughputs": Low-vs. -High-Throughput Societies

High-Throughput Society: attempts to boost economic growth by increasing the flow of matter and energy resources through the economic system to produce more goods and services. Such an economy produces valuable goods and services. However, it also converts large quantities of high-quality matter and energy resources into waste, pollution, and low-quality heat, which tend to flow into planetary sinks (air, water, soil, and organisms). Low-throughput (low-waste) economy: A low-throughput economy works with nature by reusing and recycling most nonrenewable matter resources; using renewable resources no faster than natural processes can replenish them; reducing resource waste by using matter and energy resources more efficiently; reducing environmentally harmful forms of consumption; and promoting pollution prevention and waste reduction.

Sustainable yield

Highest rate at which a potentially renewable resource can be used indefinitely without reducing available supply.

Aldo Leopold: A Sand County Almanac

His book A Sand County Almanac is a reason why he is considered an influential individual. He helped raise issues and start debates on environmental ideas. He promoted a "Land Ethic" in which humans are ethically responsible for serving as the protectors of nature.

Explain the I = PAT equation.

I = PAT is an equation that expresses the idea that environmental impact (I) is the product of three factors: population (P), affluence (A) and technology (T)

"Julian Simon vs. Paul Ehrlich": The Debate regarding Human Population Growth

In 1980, Paul Ehrlich and Julian Simon placed a famous bet on whether the prices of a bundle of natural resources would rise or fall over the ensuing decade. Simon won the bet as the real price of the bundle fell significantly, and the result of this bet has been taken as proof that technological progress is likely overcome any Neo-Malthusian concerns about natural resource scarcity. Contrary to the popular perception, however, an examination of the price history of the identical bundle of goods from 1900-2007 shows that Ehrlich and not Simon would have won a majority of the bets over the past century and would have done so by a wide margin. More info: In 1968, Ehrlich published The Population Bomb, which argued that mankind was facing a demographic catastrophe with the rate of population growth quickly outstripping growth in the supply of food and resources. Simon was highly skeptical of such claims, so proposed a wager, telling Ehrlich to select any raw material he wanted and select "any date more than a year away," and Simon would bet that the commodity's price on that date would be lower than what it was at the time of the wager.

Transfer Act (1905)

In February of 1905, the Forest Reserves (National Forests) were transferred from the US Department of the Interior (General Land Office branch) to the US Department of Agriculture (Division or

Throughputs and Linear vs. Circular Metabolism

In a circular cycle, there is nearly no waste and almost everything is re-used a 'linear' metabolism which is characterized as an urban world process has a clear resource in-put and waste out-put.

Describe two major differences between hunter-gatherer societies and industrialized-agriculture societies:

In a hunter-gatherer society, everyone must take part in hunting and gathering tasks to sustain the group. In an agrarian society, some people must work as farmers, but not everyone.

Identify two important changes that many environmental scientists think should take place in the decades ahead in order to truly experience global sustainability.

In many parts of the world, renewable forests are shrinking, deserts are expanding, and topsoil is eroding. The lower atmosphere is warming, floating ice and many glaciers are melting at unexpected rates, sea levels are rising, and ocean acidity is increasing. There are more intense floods, droughts, severe weather, and forest fires in many areas ^ Stop these many things from continuing.

LDCs and MDCs: A Comparison

MDC: Country that is highly industrialized and has a high per capita GDP. Use more of earth's natural resources but have less of a population. Ex. U.S., Japan, Canada, Australia, Germany, etc. LDC: Country that has low-to-moderate industrialization and low-to-moderate per capita GDP. The less-developed countries, with 83% of the world's population, use about 30% of the world's natural resources. Ex. Africa, Asia, Latin America, China, India, Brazil, Thailand, and Mexico.

What has happened to the length of doubling time of the human population over the course of human history? (be comfortable explaining these transformations)

Number of years for population to double has severely decreased/population rising.

OPEC nations

OPEC Nations: 2020: Algeria Angola Congo Ecuador Equatorial Guinea Gabon Indonesia* Iran Iraq Kuwait Libya Nigeria Qatar Saudi Arabia United Arab Emirates Venezuela

Bhopal: Dec. 2-3, 1984

On the night of December 2, 1984, chemical, methyl isocyanate (MIC) spilt out from Union Carbide India Ltd's (UCIL's) pesticide factory turned the city of Bhopal into a colossal gas chamber. It was India's first major industrial disaster. Company: Union Carbide

Distinguish between renewable resources, potentially renewable resources, and non-renewable resources; include an example of each.

Renewable resources are solar energy, wind energy, geothermal energy, biofuels, cultivated plants, biomass, air, water and soil. In contrast, non-renewable resources are those that are available to us in limited quantities, or those that are renewed so slowly that the rate at which they are consumed is too fast. Examples include oil, natural gas, coal, and nuclear energy.. A potentially renewable resource can be replenished fairly rapidly (hours to several decades) through natural processes. Examples of such resources include forest trees, grassland grasses, wild animals, fresh lake and stream water, groundwater, fresh air, and fertile soil.

Silent Spring

Silent Spring is an environmental science book by Rachel Carson. Published on September 27, 1962, the book documented the environmental harm caused by the indiscriminate use of pesticides. Rachel was one of the most influential peoples on envi. harm/pesticides.

Identify three approaches that might decrease/prevent "a tragedy of the commons":

Solutions to the tragedy of the commons include the imposition of private property rights, government regulation, or the development of a collective action arrangement.

Wangari Maathai

Started the Green Belt Movement in Kenya, first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Wikipedia

Exxon Valdez Oil Spill (1989)

Supertanker crashed into a reef in Prince William Sound, Alaska. - 42 million liters (11 million gallons) - Half a million birds and thousands of marine mammals killed

Sustainable Fisheries

Sustainable fishing respects marine ecosystems and adapts to the reproductive rate of fish to maintain a balance and ensure the survival of all species

Three Mile Island: March 29, 1979

The Three Mile Island Unit 2 reactor, near Middletown, Pa., partially melted down on March 28, 1979.

Biocapacity

The ability of a productive ecosystem to regenerate renewable resources.

Describe the Tragedy of the Commons

The tragedy of the commons refers to a situation in which individuals with access to a public resource (also called a common) act in their own interest and, in doing so, ultimately deplete the resource

Henry David Thoreau

Thoreau laid the foundation for modern-day environmentalism. He articulated a philosophy based on environmental and social responsibility, resource efficiency, and living simply that is as inspiring now as it was then. He believed that to live a good life we must keep the wild intact. "Live the life you have imagined"

Describe the four justifications for methods of placing value on the environment listed below: a. Utilitarian justification: b. Ecological justification: c. Aesthetic justification: d. Moral justification:

Utilitarian Justification: Seeing that the aspect of the environment as valuable because it benefits people either economically or is necessary for human survival. Ecological Justification: An ecosystem that is necessary needed for the survival of some species that interest us, or that the system provides itself some benefit. Aesthetic Justification: Appreciation of the beauty of nature. Moral Justification: Having to do with the belief that varies aspects of the environment have a right to exist and our moral obligation is to allow them to continue or help them persist.

Environmental Degradation or Natural Capital Degradation

We waste, deplete, and degrade much of the earth's life-sustaining natural capital.

The Fires of 1910

nationwide, but especially destructive fires in the West; US Forest Management Policy clearly changed, resulting in decades of Suppression-focused fire policy. Following the 1910 fire season, the U.S. Forest Service adopted a policy of total fire suppression. In 1935, the Forest Service established the so-called 10 a.m. policy, which decreed that every fire should be suppressed by 10 a.m. the day following its initial report.

The Clean Water Act (1972)

officially known as the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, the CWA seeks to restore and maintain the "chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation's waters by preventing point and nonpoint pollution sources, providing assistance to publicly owned treatment works for the improvement of wastewater treatment, and maintaining the integrity of wetlands". (Also CWA of 1977 & Amend.)

Describe what is meant by the phrase "an environmentally sustainable society"

one that meets the current and future basic resource needs of its people in a just and equitable manner without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their basic needs.

The US Wilderness Act (1964)

preservation of large*, undeveloped land areas, and established a legal definition of wilderness: "A wilderness, in contrast with those areas where man and his own works dominate the landscape, is hereby recognized as an area where the earth and its community of

Montreal Protocal Act

•The Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer (the Montreal Protocol) is an international agreement made in 1987. It was designed to stop the production and import of ozone depleting substances and reduce their concentration in the atmosphere to help protect the earth's ozone layer