...There has been debate over the present day characteristics of biomes of tropical regions. For some, they are seen as a natural response to the climate of the area, whereas for others they are regarded as a product of human interference. Discuss the statement in the context of the tropical biome you have studied. [40] A tropical rainforest is an ecosystem type that occurs roughly within the latitudes 28 degrees north or south of the equator (in the equatorial zone between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn). This ecosystem experiences high average temperatures and a significant amount of rainfall. In particular, I will be focusing on Borneo Rainforest, which is the oldest rainforest in the world. The island is divided among three countries (figure 1): Malaysia and Brunei in the north, and Indonesia to the south. Approximately 73% of the island is Indonesian territory. In the north, the East Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak make up about 26% of the island. Climate is the average weather the region receives over a 30 year period. Climate can be on a global scale or a local scale, for instance where it is mountainous more rainfall is generated therefore that region sees a different climate to perhaps a neighbouring region. Aspect and altitude also affects climate, which will be explored in greater detail. The purpose of this essay is to explore whether the natural, climatic factors have influenced the characteristics of the rainforest, or whether humans have had...
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...Deforestation Jason Hennessee Axia College of University of Phoenix Deforestation “Dad! Dad! It’s opening day! Can we please go to the forest to watch the boats race?” Junior, age 10, was very excited about the idea of watching the boats race from the relative quiet and shade of one of the forests to border the river. “Sissy already has the car packed for the trip, and I think she even remembered to grab the charcoal this time!” Dean opened one eye. Seven in the morning was a bit early to leave for the boat races thirty minutes away when they started at nine. But, such was Junior’s excitement that Dean forced himself out of his bed earlier than he planned on. “Ok, son. Let’s check Renee’s packing and we’ll see about weather and conditions. Does Mom have her work finished yet?” Anne appeared framed in the bedroom door. “Yeah. I have some more reading to do, but I can do it at the site. The races are not my favorite thing, but you’ll need my help if the kids want to get wet. However, there is something I need to talk to you about. Junior, honey, please go make sure you have a cooler full of water and juice for us today.” Off like a shot, Junior dashed out of the room and Anne went in, closing the door behind her and lifting Dean’s laptop to the bed. “Dean, I think the forest is gone. Check this out.” Dean read the headlines and cutlines of the pictures and articles that Anne showed him. He shook his head as one by one they all told a devastating...
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...GEO 215 Week 3 DQ 3 How will the deforestation of the Earth’s tropical forests affect the Earth’s temperature or climate? Explain. Response #1 Rainforest grows to large heights and it is important because a growth in the sunlight through the forest canopy can lead to species of the forest not surviving. with the forests getting direct sunlight and over 2 inches of rain an hour, the area is hot and humid. Deforestation is where less heat is absorbed and less moisture is released. The plant life that needs this warm, wet atmosphere will die with more sunlight and less moisture. Deforestation can be related to the growth of drought, flooding and releasing oxygen. Acres of the rainforest is being deforested globally and stored carbon is being released into the atmosphere. The rainforests play a hugh role in the local climate regulation because of the rainforests interaction with the water cycles. The rainforests have an enormous effect on global weather. Rainforests vegetation affect the surface albedo or the surface of the ground absorbing more heat than bare soil. The loss of the rainforest vegetative cover will mean there will be less heat absorption moving on to less moisture being taken up into the atmosphere. The deforested regions may decline the rainfall. Deforestation can affect weather in other parts of the world. There can be a change in the rainfall. The rainforest help generate rainfall over land masses. Response #2 Deforestation affects the climate by escalating...
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...Deforestation has become a serious global issue which is resulting in many negative effects such as a loss of biodiversity, land erosion and climate change. Deforestation can be broadly defined as “forest conversion and different types of degradation that reduce forest quality” (Sven, 2000). The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) provides a narrow definition: “depletion of tree crown cover to less than 10% as the deforestation” (FAO, 1993: 10). Forests play a significant role in humanity’s life. According to the World Rainforest Movement (1998), 25% of medicines come from the forests. Moreover, over the past 8000 years, about 5000 square miles of forest has been cut down annually (Rochen, 2008; Seitz, 2008). There are three main causes which lead to the deforestation: logging, overpopulation and road construction. This essay will examine each cause and evaluate the effects. It will begin with discussing the causes of deforestation. Next, it will examine the serious effects. Industrial logging is one of the most significant causes of deforestation. According to Phelps (2005), industrial logging is the clearance of trees for commercial purposes. In West Africa, over the past 40 years, about 2800-3500km² forests have been logged every year (Middleton, 2008). The peasants in Africa play an important role but it is modern industry that cut down so many trees. For example, as Heller (2001) found, every year more than 800 square miles of trees disappear due to the demand of paper...
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...Tanzania also known as the African Great Lakes nation. This region was known as Tanganyika and it wasn’t until after German East Africa was transferred to the United Kingdom as a mandate by the League of Nations in 1920 for its name Tanzania to come in place. Tanzania’s absolute location is at 6.3070° S, 34.8540° E. It’s located in the south eastern part of Africa. Its south of Kenya and north of Mozambique. With the Indian ocean to the east and the Democratic Republic of Congo to its west. Located in Tanzania is the tallest peak in Africa, Mount Kilimanjaro. Standing at 19,340 feet. Also part of the largest lake in Africa, Lake Victoria. Tanzania is located directly under the equator in the tropic of Capricorn. Tanzania is mostly has a hot...
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...but every year areas the sizes of Panama are being decimated (Deforestation). The clearing of large tracks of forests, which is thereafter converted to a non-forest use, is known as deforestation. Deforestation has a multitude of devastating effects in the world we live in. However with the cooperation of people worldwide this process can be drastically slowed down and even stopped. Forests are cut down for various reasons, but are almost always related to money in some way or another. The most common reasons are Urbanization, logging, large-scale agriculture, mining and urbanization. Deforestation can occur naturally and is caused by lighting, which then triggers forest fires. On average in U.S. 4 million to 5 million acres are lost due to forest fires, but in recent years more than 9 million acres have burn. Scientist believe the reason for the drastic increase is because global warming making summer season longer and dryer which is inductive to forest fires (Wildfires). Healthy forests help absorb greenhouse gasses and carbon emissions that are caused by human civilization and contribute to global warming. Without trees, more carbon and greenhouse gasses enter the atmosphere. To make matters worse, trees actually become carbon sources when they are cut, burned, or otherwise removed. According to the World Wild Life organization 15 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions are the result of deforestation. This number might be hard to wrap your head around, but compared...
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...To what extent can preparedness and planning mitigate the effects of tropical revolving storms? [40] Tropical revolving storms are also known as hurricanes, typhoons and cyclones. They occur in the tropics and sub-tropics and form over the oceans where sea surface temperatures are above 27 degrees C. The impact of tropical revolving storms can be devastating. Examples of major natural disasters caused by these storms are Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and Tropical Cyclone Nargis in 2008. The main hazards associated with tropical revolving storms are hurricane force winds, torrential rainfall (leading to river flooding), and storm surges flooding low-lying coasts. The impacts however can vary in severity due to a range of human and physical factors. The human factors include how urbanised the area affected is, as built up cities tend to have impermeable surfaces which increases run-off and worsens the floods that occur. These impermeable surfaces replace trees and vegetation via deforestation which would intercept the rain and store it in the soil, allowing it to be released over a period of time and avoid severe flooding. Other human factors include warning systems put in place to predict incoming storms and inform the public about them. This can be linked in with the effectiveness of the government, as governments in developed and stable countries often deal with disasters more effectively than governments in less developed countries. However, regardless of the human factors...
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...will discuss deforestation across the globe and how it affects the world’s ecosystems. Everyday, a piece of Earth’s ecosystem is demolished by human hands for the conquest for timber, minerals, and other resources. Forests cover 2% of the Earth’s surface, 6% of the landmass, and yet they house half the animal and plant species while rainforests cover twice that area. Deforestation is occurring across the globe on a scale that if it were continue at its present rate the forests could disappear within the next one to two hundred years. This raises concerns and questions. First, why should we be concerned? Second, what kind of damage could deforestation lead to animal and plant species, human existence, and to mother Earth and its atmosphere? Third, how and why the rainforests benefit the human race. To answer these questions, this paper will discuss where the most deforestation is occurring and the consequences of deforestation. Tropical rainforests are defined by two primary factors: location and amount of rainfall they receive. Rainforests receive from 4 to 8 meters of rain a year. Most of the rainfall is blocked by heavy vegetation, and water reaches the forest floor by rolling down branches and trunks. A distinctive characteristic is that the rainforests have no seasonality or no dry or cold season of slower growth. In addition, they are the Earth’s oldest living ecosystems. The rainforests are a priceless part of mother earth and their removal through deforestation would mean...
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...Biodiversity Lasnosha Snowden ENV 300 Environmental Science Nicole Minor June 15, 2015 All living organisms are present in ecosystems to coexist together to create biodiversity and without different species, these environment could fail horribly. Every living organism has a purpose in order to keep the balance of biodiversity. In order for there to be “biological diversity, these items are organized at many levels, ranging from complete ecosystems to the chemical structures that are the molecular basis of heredity” (1987). Not always in a friendly environmental manner, Human actions has played a big key role in the changing of the environment. A nonproductive planet would be result, if we did not have an abundance of species and ecosystems. All living organisms rely on one another to survive and thrive. Biodiversity is the total of species living together in an area, a community, or the entire planet. Genetic diversity, habitat diversity, and species diversity are three different concepts can be defined as Biodiversity. The same species in different populations found with patterns of variations and a bundle of different genes located in one species is known as genetic diversity. Within a specified area, the number of different habitats is habitat diversity. When checking for species diversity there are three qualities that you should look for species dominance, species evenness, and species richness. The most abundant species measured is species dominance. The entire...
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...double garage. Most electricity is generated by burning coal. A constant and growing demand for red meat. Cattle belch out methane, a toxic greenhouse gas, much more dangerous than carbon dioxide. More and more forests and bushland, which absorb carbon dioxide from the air, are being cut down so more cattle can graze. A reduction in the planet's ability to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. The earth has natural sources of carbon dioxide (a greenhouse gas), and has had long before mankind began altering the environment, but the earth has natural means to actually remove some greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, especially carbon dioxide which is removed by plants (especially dense, tall forests) through photosynthesis. Global deforestation...
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...Wabash Watershed Wabash Watershed (1961-1990) Introduction Global warming is a resultant of Heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere. The release of these gases has increased in the last 500 years since the industrial revolution. There is an expectation that global warming will result to rising sea levels, droughts, fires, heat waves, extreme storms, heavy rainfall, floods, and melting of snow and ice. These changes as envisaged would affect agriculture and general food availability with devastating consequences for existence of life on earth. In additional, life would change completely because many systems are tied to the climate. For example, temperature changes would affect breeding cycle of insect, and this has implications on pollination and food availability for humans. Although short-term weather variations are normal and expected, long-term changes are deleterious to the environment and life on earth (Houghton, 2004). There is evidence that global warming is becoming worse primarily due to rise in carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere. In 1950s, the concentration of carbon dioxide was at 315 parts per million. Currently, the concentration is about 385 parts per million. To discover an increase in concentration of carbon dioxide throughout history, scientists have used bubbles of air trapped in ice and results show that the current concentration of carbon dioxide is the highest and has been, for more than 10,000 years (Maslin, 2007). Atmospheric carbon dioxide...
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...resources, “For most of the past decade, the world has been consuming more food than it has been producing” (Turk, and Bensel, 2011). Within developing countries they produce much of the grains that we import into the U.S. With the consumer good demands such grains are being used for livestock, which raises the prices of imported goods from local stores. The more the price rises within stores, the wealthier our importers get. Due to these demands of grain production the countries who supply them end up not being able to produce enough grain for livestock. In some areas grains are grown for a specific use for production of bio fuels for cars. “Increasing demand for food, feed, and bio fuels has been a major driver for deforestation in the tropics” (Turk, and Bensel, 2011). The demands for such items increase within six months to the year. The more it increases the more suffering the livestock deals with. Although it’s extremely important to feed every living creature especially...
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...What is global warming? Global warming is the change of the climate. The temperature is rising, the trend is clear and unmistakable. The past 37 years has been warmer than the 20th century average. The 12 warmest years on record have all occurred since 1998. 2012 contiguous united states. Globally, the average surface temperature has increased more than one degree Fahrenheit since the late 1800’s. Most of that increase has occurred over just the past three decades. We are overloading our atmosphere with carbon dioxide, which traps heat and steadily drives up the planets temperature. Where does all this carbon dioxide come from? The fossil fuels we burn for energy-coal, natural gas, and oil-plus the loss of forest due to deforestation especially into the tropics. http://ucsusa.org/global_warming Tim C. 2012 Trees are important tools in the fight to stave off global warming, because they absorb and store the key greenhouse gas emitted by our cars and power plants, carbon dioxide (CO2), before it has a chance to reach the upper atmosphere where it can help trap heat around the Earth’s surface. All Plants Absorb Carbon Dioxide, but Trees are Best While all living plant matter absorbs CO2 as part of photosynthesis, trees process significantly more than smaller plants due to their large size and extensive root structures. In essence, trees, as kings of the plant world, have much more “woody biomass” to store CO2 than smaller plants, and as a result are considered nature’s...
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... * Indonesia * http://www.mapsofworld.com/world-top-ten/countries-with-highest-deforestation-map.html 3. Some forest regions are found outside their expected climate range. For example, there are places where tropical rainforests are found that are outside the tropics. Where does this occur and why do you think this might be the case? * These might occur because of ocean currents and fires 4. Find two areas that appear to have never had forest. Describe their location. With the aid of an atlas, determine if these regions are associated with another type of landform. * Sahara desert, central Australia 5. Describe the current distribution of Australia’s forests. * Forest distribution is confined mainly to regions with an average rainfall exceeding 500 millimetres per year. Most forests occur in the northern, eastern and south-western coastal zones, although woodland forests extend inland 6. Describe the distribution of Victoria’s forests. 7. Find a map which shows the distribution of Victoria’s forests before European arrival and describe the changes. Explain why some areas have had large changes, such as Gippsland while other areas, such as the high country, have not changed as much. * It all changed after the European settlers, the whole area was covered by forests, but after they came they started the process of deforestation for things they needed for their day to day...
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...Surname Centre No. Candidate No. Paper Reference(s) Initial(s) Paper Reference Signature 4 3 7 0 4370/2H 2 H Examiner’s use only London Examinations IGCSE Geography Team Leader’s use only Question Leave Number Blank Higher Tier Paper 2H Monday 9 November 2009 – Afternoon Time: 2 hours 30 minutes Section A 1 2 3 4 5 6 Materials required for examination Ruler, pencil and pen Items included with question papers Nil Section B 7 Instructions to Candidates In the boxes above, write your centre number, candidate number, your surname, initials and signature. Check that you have the correct question paper. This paper is arranged in two sections, A and B. In Section A, answer ALL questions in the spaces provided. In Section B, answer ONE question in the spaces provided. Indicate which question you are answering by marking the box ( ). If you change your mind, put a line through the box ( ) and then indicate your new question with a cross ( ). 8 9 Information for Candidates The marks for individual questions and the parts of questions are shown in round brackets: e.g. (2). There are 9 questions in this question paper. The total mark for this paper is 150. There are 40 pages in this question paper. Any blank pages are indicated. The following abbreviations are used throughout this paper: MEDC: More Economically Developed Country LEDC: Less Economically Developed Country Advice to Candidates Write your answers neatly and in good...
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