Our Changing Planet Ch 1

• human induced
• ex: since agricultural practices existed around 10,000 years ago local pollution (air & water) existed

clearing of all trees

are gases that warm a planet's surface by absorbing outgoing infrared radiation--radiant heat--and reradiating some of it back toward the surface

• the definition of greenhouse gases warming the planet is called the green house effect.
• the greenhouse effect is a natural physical process that operates in all planetary atmospheres

• the most abundance anthropogenic greenhouse gas on Earth is carbon dioxide, which is produced by fossil fuels. and by deforestion
• fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and natural gas that are composed of the fossilized remains of organisms.

is a chemically distinct region within the stratosphere, part of the atmosphere

is a form of oxygen that is much less abundant than, and chemically unlike, the oxygen that we breathe (O2)

over antartica, a patch of extremely low ozone concentration in the ozone layer, is believed to be anthropogenic in origin

or the number of species present in a given area

a warming of Earth's atmosphere due to an anthropogenic enhancement of the greenhouse effect

are layers of unconsolidated material that is transported by water or air

is a group of components that interact

is composed of four parts: the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biota, and solid earth

is a think envelope of gases that surrounds earth

is composed of the various reservoirs of water, including ice

include all living organisms (some ecologists define the biosphere as the entire region in which life exists, but we will avoid that term here, because it overlaps our other sysstem components) in earlier edition we do use biosphere to overlap

includes all rocks, or consolidated mixtures of crystalline materials called minerals, and all unconsolidated mixtures of crystalline materials called minerals, and all unconsolidated rock fragments. it is devided into 3 parts ..core mantal and crust

• of any planet or of the sun is the central part.
• Earths core is a dense mixture of metallic iron and nickel and is part solid part liquid

is a thick, rocky layer between the core and crust that comprises the largest fraction of the earths mass

is a thin, outer layer which conssists of light, rocky matter in contact with the atmosphere and hydrosphere

compounds(CFC) have been increasing as a result of human activities. also called freons, CFCs are synthetic compoounds containing chlorine, fluorine, an carbon

are thought to have contributed almost as much additional greenhouse effect over the past few decades as