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Questions vary: some are easy and others may require serious thought. Some simply identify locations, which is an important step for understanding places in the world. Other questions ask you to consider the broad meaning of a problem. Many may be useful for class discussions.
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Apo Island p. 2
As the opening case study for this chapter shows, this small island is the site of a pioneering marine preserve that not only has restored ocean fish populations and brought a new prosperity to the community, but also has served as a model for hundreds of other no-take fish sanctuaries in many countries.
Questions:
1. What country is this?
2. What is the name of the larger island to the west of
3. How big is
4. Is this island north or south of the equator?
5. Why is it valuable for a remote island like
Marine Protected Areas
p. 7
The Farallon Islands (circled in pink) are part of a network of areas protected areas for reproduction of marine life, including fish, birds, seals, sea lions, and other species. Marine biologists have found that relatively small preserves can make a big difference in populations. The areas circled in pink make up a network of marine protected areas established in California in 2005.
Questions:
1. Zoom out from these islands. What large city lies just east of the islands?
2. Zoom in close to the southern group of islands. Do these islands look useful for other human uses, such as settlement or farming?
3. On these islands and near other marked preserve area, is all human activity excluded
Paradigm shifts: Valley of
Yosemite National Park p 14
This
beautiful valley was a source of inspiration for naturalist John Muir both in
his nature philosophy and his theories of glaciation, which represented a
paradigm shift for science in his day.
Yosemite
National Park is well known for many reasons, including the fact that John Muir
developed much of his philosophy toward wilderness here. Yosemite is also a place
with dramatic glacial features, including flat-bottomed, U-shaped valleys
(compare these to the steep, V-shaped valleys in most mountains), and steep
cliffs. When Muir lived in Yosemite, the dominant explanation for these
features was erosion by water in Noah's flood. Muir and others turned this
theory on its head by demonstrating that great, ancient glaciers had to be
responsible for such features. This new explanation led to a "paradigm
shift," a revolution in how people understood land forms climate, and
earth history.
1.
Can you see the flat-bottomed valleys in this area? What is the green in the
valley floor, and why are the valley walls not green?
2.
Zoom out and west to the place mark "Northwest of Yosemite." What are
the light-colored patches interspersed among the green? What kind of land use
is marked by the curving, narrow lines just south of here, at the place marker
called "Dorrington"?
Arcata, California, p.
26
Arcata saved millions of dollars by constructing a wetland for wastewater treatment instead of building a conventional water treatment plant. This water treatment wetland has been extremely successful and has provided a refuge for wildlife and space for recreation. Read more about this project in the opening case study for this chapter. Zoom in/out and move north/south to see how Arcata is situated at the head of a shallow, enclosed tidal bay.
Questions:
1. Arcata was forced to be creative about its water treatment plant in part because of the estuary on which it sits. Look carefully at the bay next to Arcata. What characteristics make it especially susceptible to eutrophication from poorly-treated urban wastewater?
2. Arcata is a relatively small, remote community. How is wastewater treatment different in such a situation, compared to in a larger metropolitan area?
3. Zoom out and move north and south along the
Rich black peat soil is visible in the rectangular fields in the former wetlands on the northern edge of the Everglades. Drainage canals (water makes most look dark) are visible around this landscape. The steady drainage of both natural and artificially applied fertilizers from agricultural fields, as well as urban inputs from surrounding ities, have led to imbalances in nutrient concentrations, with resulting eutrophication in the wetlands.
Questions:
1. Refer to your chapter, and explain how nutrients cause eutrophication.
2. We discuss the Everglades Ecosystem as a "system." What are some of the inputs and outputs of this system?
3. Examine land uses to the north and to the east of this place mark. What kinds of land uses do you see?
4. Examine the placemark called "Flow patterns, Everglades." What kinds of contrasting surfaces make up the flow patterns?
Excessive nutrients: Bohai
Bay, Caspian Sea, p 33
All living things require nutrients, such as nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P). Excessive amounts of these nutrients can lead to run-away growth, especially in marine systems. Nutrients washing from farmlands and cities support algae blooms, visible here as greenish cloudiness. When all this algae dies, it begins to decay. Decomposition can deplete oxygen, which kills fish and other marine organisms. Eutrophication (such excessive plant growth) is especially common in enclosed, shallow bays. Here are two examples.
Although colors vary among the satellite images you see, contrasting tones of green, or even yellow, in a blue sea often mark algae blooms.
Questions:
1. What is the large city about 130 km northwest of the bay?
2. Zoom to the
3. Is the enclosed
Zoom to the
Caspian Sea marker that follows the
4. Just west of
the large, northern algae bloom is a ragged, complex shoreline that marks the
delta where the
Niagara Falls p. 34
These falls are famous because of their volume and height,
although they are not the tallest in
Not far east of this site is another expression of the
area's long industrial history. Love Canal, infamous for its chemical
contamination (ch. 13), is near here, in Niagara Falls, New York.
Questions:
1. What body of water is drained by the falls? What is the next lake downstream of the falls?
2. Move your cursor over the falls, from the lake (upstream) to just below the falls downstream. Approximately what is the elevation change at the falls? (Elevations are reported for your pointer if you have the “terrain” layer turned on. Look for the elevation at the bottom of the window, next to the latitude and longitude.)
3. What is the term for the kind of energy embodied in falling water? (refer to chapter 3)
4. What is a term for the energy stored in the lake that has not yet changed elevation at the falls?
Galapagos p. 51
This island group is famous as the site at which Charles Darwin collected evidence for evolution of species. Because the islands are so isolated, they were free of human inhabitants until relatively recently. Most of the animals never developed a fear of humans. It is a popular ecotourist destination today because of its biodiversity and historic scientific importance.
Questions:
1. Approximately how many islands
can you see in this group?
2.
What country claims the Galapagos?
3.
If you zoom in on the northern end of Isla Isabela, the largest island, you'll
see several round features. What are these?
4.
How far is it from the Galapagos to the mainland of
Challenge
question: Why are the features you examined in question 3 important for
Symbiosis: the Great Barrier Reef p. 62
Corals are an outstanding example of symbiosis, in which a
coral polyp (an animal) and an alga (which photosynthesizes) live together and
benefit each other. Together, these partners build some of the largest
structures created by any living organism. The
Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is the longest and largest area of coral reef in the world. It isn’t a single linear wall of corral, however, but rather a chain of individual reefs and islands. If you zoom out from the view shown by our place marker, you’ll see how many patches of reef make up this complex.
Questions:
1. What term do biologists use to describe this cooperative relationship between coral and algae?
2. What is the term for the relationship where one species benefits another is neither harmed nor hurt?
3. Is the reef a single linear structure or a chain of structures?
4. The cooperative relationship depends on clear, warm water
that allows sunlight to reach the photosynthesizing algae. Zoom out until you
can see
4. Many of the world's coral reefs are affected by sediment
runoff like this. If you lived in
This is a type of surface (or strip) mining in which the top of a mountain or ridge is scraped off by large earth moving equipment to expose horizontal coal seams that can be beneath as much as 100 m of “overburden.” Often that unwanted rock and soil is simply pushed down slope into adjacent valleys burying streams, farms, forests, cemeteries, and other important sites.
If you zoom in on this site, you can see the heavy earth moving equipment as well as the headwall where rock is being cut away to expose the coal. If you zoom out, you can follow the scar made by mining for many kilometers.
There are many larger mines elsewhere in West Virginia and nearby states, but most are too low resolution in Google Earth (at the time of this writing) to be very visible.
Questions:
1. Why is the scar so irregular in shape?
2. Roughly, how long is the scar left by the mining?
3. Where is this mine located?
4. What mountain range is this part of?
Shantytowns of Rio de
Janeiro, Brazil and Mumbai, India p. 81
Shantytowns, slums, and other informal urban areas are common in fast-growing cities of developing countries. While these are often unsafe places to live and raise children, residents stay because they cannot afford to go elsewhere. Thus these neighborhoods continue to grow, as urban populations grow, and as migrants move to the city from impoverished rural areas. These areas have little access to public services such as water, sanitation, garbage removal, transportation, police, or infrastructure maintenance. Many factors contribute to these problems.
The favelas (neighborhoods) of Rio are legendary as unsafe, crowded neighborhoods. In recent years drug-related activity and gangs have become increasingly strong. The favelas continue to grow, however, because many poeple, including rural migrants who have lost their land to large land owners, have nowhere else to go
Shantytowns exist in many areas.
Here are three examples in some of the world’s largest cities. The Dharavi slum
in Mumbai is one of the most densely crowded shanty towns in the world, with
more than 45,000 people per hectare. An estimated 700,000 people live in the
Kibera area of
Questions:
1. Starting from the view in Rio, examine the structure of the neighborhoods that follow the shapes of the hill on which they’re built. How would you compare the density of this neighborhood to that of your neighborhood?
2. Examine Rio, then look at Mumbai's Dharavie neighborhood (the next place marker). What are some of the forces that would lead people to live in these neighborhoods?
3. What are some of the forces that would prevent them from moving elsewhere?
4. Several other cities with shantytowns and slums are listed in your text. Look for one or two of these cities. Is it easy or hard to locate these neighborhoods in these cities?
Kibera neighborhood, Nairobi, Kenya p. 81
Some of the most rapid growth rates in the world are in impoverished countries of sub-Saharan Africa. Growth is rapid in both rural and urban areas, but it is most visible in urban areas, where shantytowns develop as people move to the city in search of work, food, education, and opportunity.
Kibera is Africa's largest shantytown, with about a million
residents in something less than 3 square km.
Zoom in to look closely at the Kibera area. Compare it to
the greener neighborhood just to the north. Also locate the golf course, which
you can identify by the long, green fairways. Note that Kibera’s tightly packed
roofs and the lack of visible straight roadways make this area contrast with other
parts of the city that have been built with more central planning.
Questions:
1. Informal settlements such as this often spring up near to wealthier neighborhoods. What would you think about Kibera if you were golfing in the adjacent golf course?
2. What would you think of the golfers if you were a Kibera resident?
3. Which would be an easier place to be a car owner, in the shantytown or in the rectangular street grid to the north? In which area would it be easier to get around on foot?
4. Pan eastward from the Kibera area. Can you find other areas that appear to be tightly built, informal areas on the edges of Nairobi?
Challenge question: Zoom out until you can see the stair-step pattern of the Rift Valley to the west of Nairobi. About how far is it from Nairobi to the edge of the Rift Valley? How did this rift valley form?
5. Where in Kenya is Nairobi situated (north, south, east,
west)?
Mass extinctions have often been attributed to meteor impacts. This site in Quebec, Canada (not discussed in chapter) is one of the few clearly visible large impact craters. A meteor blasted out a circular hole millions of years ago. Material then fell back into the hole, leaving an island in a circular ring. Mass extinctions listed in your chapter, some eliminating 80-90 percent of life forms, are attributed to similar but larger impacts.
Tellico Dam p. 124
Nearly every policy debate hinges on arguments about some
local problem or decision. For example, a two-block neighborhood called Love
Canal helped initiate the Superfund and new laws about toxic waste disposal
(chapter 13, p. 322). For the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the Tellico Dam, on
the
The dam was completed in 1982. If you have the “populated places” layer turned on, you can see the names of historic places now submerged in the reservoir.
If the “borders” or “roads” layer is on, turn them off so you can see the dam.
Questions:
1. Which side of the dam is upstream? How can you tell?
2. What large town is about 30 km northeast of the dam?
3. Based on inspection of this area, would you say that pivotal policy cases, such as the Tellico Dam case, always occur in highly visible locations, or do they sometimes occur in obscure situations?
4. What was the species whose fate was decided at this dam?
What was the Supreme Court’s decision regarding the ESA in this case?
Amazonian deforestation p. 133
There are many causes of deforestation. You may see several in the area surrounding this placemarker.
The Amazonian rainforest is the largest and most species-rich tropical forest in the world. With more than 7 million km2 (1.2 billion acres), the Amazon basin contains over half the world’s tropical rainforest. You probably also know that the Amazon is rapidly being deforested. Between 1970 and 2000, it’s estimated that more than 700,000 km2 (an area twice the size of Portugal) of the Amazon were cleared, logging companies and by farmers and ranchers looking for new land. There are a number of reasons that settlers are flooding into the Amazon. Part of the story is government policies that favor ranching and grant title to the land to anyone who cuts down the forest and turns it into pasture. Another critical factor is expansion of agriculture in the Cerrado (Savanna) just to the south (see also chapter 9 in textbook). Small subsistence farms are being bought out (either legally or through duress) so that large-scale, industrial farms can increase soy production. These landless farmers move further into the virgin forest in search of homesteads.
Roads provide access for land migrants. Even at very high altitude, you can see the fishbone pattern where deforested patches line lateral roads that branch off from main highways. There have been many clashes between native people, farmers, and ranchers over who owns land in this turbulent and chaotic frontier region. The Landless Workers Movement reports that between 19985 and 2000 more than 1,237 rural workers were killed in clashes with loggers and ranchers.
To the east of the placemarker, you can see the light-colored trace of the highway BR163, which connects this area to the port of Santarem, on the Amazon River (see Cargill Port placemarker in this collection).
Questions:
1. What direction is the major highway running in this area?
2. Roughly how far apart are the “fishbone” lateral roads branching off the main highway? About how long are these roads?
3. Based on the sizes of the cleared patches off the roads, would you say that large or small landholders have made these clearings?
4. Based on what you see in these images, and on images on p. 130, explain how deforestation proceeds after a road is cut through the forest.
5. What is the huge river that runs east-west about 180 km north of the place marker?
Clearcuts, Washington State p. 133
Clearcuts are our main method of wood harvesting. This approach is more cost-effective than other practices, but in the Pacific Northwest, home to North America's largest trees and some of our most extensive remaining forest, clearcutting has been a controversial approach.
This area has almost all been harvested at one time or another. the gray areas are recent clear-cuts. Light green patches have been replanted and have young forests. Darker green areas are older forests. If you zoom in on them, you can see roads and staging areas left from the last harvest. A few small patches of tall trees remain.
Yellowstone National Park p. 145
Established in 1872,
Questions:
1. What is the famous geyser at near the place marker?
2. What evidence can you see in this view of facilities to accommodate the millions of tourists who visit this area every year?
3. How does the design of Yellowstone differ from the biosphere reserves designated under the Man and Biosphere program described in your textbook (p. 145)?
4. About 20 km east of
Challenge question: how was this lake formed?
Great Barrier Reef p. 148
The
This huge reef system is built by living coral. Corals live in a cooperative arrangement, in which a coral polyp (an animal) and an alga (which photosynthesizes) live together and benefit each other. Countless fish, shrimp, and other organisms find shelter and reproduce in the reef's crevices.
Questions:
1. Note that the reef is composed of many smaller shallow areas and islands. Approximately how wide is the reef complex near the place marker?
2. If you turn on the “populated places” layer, you can see the names of the Australian states and cities near the reef. Which state has the reef along its coastline?
3. Note that you can see the approximate shape of the ocean
floor when you are zoomed out. South of about
4. What do you suppose are some of the economic benefits of
protecting this reef complex?
Cerrado, Brazil p. 154
These fields near
Questions:
1. How much evidence can you see in this view of natural vegetation?
2. What other countries lie directly to the west of the Cerrado?
3. In which direction is
4.
You can zoom in to Cargill’s soy terminal by clicking on the placemarker for
“Santarem,” which is a deep-water port (which can handle ocean-going ships) on
the Amazon River. The multinational commodity trading corporation Cargill has
built a port at Santarem on the Amazon to load soybeans onto ocean-going cargo
ships. This terminal makes shipping cheaper, makes soy farming much more
profitable, and thus encourages clearing of the Amazon basin and the Cerrado.
What is the white fishbone-shapped pattern about 160 km (100 mi) south of
Santarem?
5.
Note the long conveyor arm that delivers soybeans from the warehouse to the
ship dock. If you zoom out from this point to see the Atlantic Ocean, how far
is Santarem from the ocean? That is, how far can ocean-going ships penetrate
the continent to reach this facility?
Feedlot, Kansas p. 160
Rapid increases in the production of corn and soy (see fig. 7.10) have produced a corn- and soy-based food system in the United States. Most of the meat we eat is raised or fattened on corn in industrial-scale production systems, which keep consumer costs down but have environmental effects that can be invisible to consumers.
This is one of many feedlots in
this part of Kansas, where steers (young male calves, neutered for faster body
growth and cooperative behavior) are brought for fattening on corn. Steers may
be trucked to this feedlot from farms and ranches as far away as
Questions:
1. Zoom in until you can make out the individual lots in the feedlot. What are the black dots in the lots?
2. Why are they lined up along the outer edges of many of the pens?
3. Feeding cattle on corn requires that the animals be fed a regular diet of antibiotics, because corn is richer than a cow's natural grass diet and tends to ferment in the animal's stomach. One of the health concerns involved in this kind of operation is that the dried manure contains antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which may then become windborne in hot, dusty, summer conditions. Is this an important risk factor in this location?
4. Zoom out and search around the area. Can you find other, similar feedlots in this neighborhood?
5. Each animal in a feedlot consumes about 88 liters (40 gal) of water each day. As you look around the landscape of this area of Kansas, what sources of water do you see? Where do you suppose the water comes from for animals and for irrigation in this area?
Aquaculture: Fish farm, China p. 162
As ocean harvests of seafood decline because of overfishing
and destructive harvest techniques, growing fish in ponds and net pens and
cages has become an increasing source of food for human consumption. Currently,
about half of all seafood consumed directly by humans comes from aquaculture
operations. This large aquaculture facility in
Growing fish in high concentrations requires use of pesticides and antibiotics to keep diseases and parasites under control. The feces and uneaten food that drain from the pens can pollute local waters and cause severe eutrophication in confined bays or small lakes. Fish (often exotic species or genetically engineered varieties) can also escape and invade local populations.
Questions:
1. In what major city is this farm located?
2. Why do you think such a large aquaculture facility would be located here?
3. Is this salt or fresh water?
4. Why is the fish farm located here rather than out in the open ocean?
5. What are some of the environmental consequences of fish farming, according to your readings?
6. Extra credit: A large tourist facility (which was still
under construction at the time of writing) is shown on
Irrigation, Kansas p. 168
These circles are the dominant pattern of Midwestern agriculture, especially in regions growing corn. They are created by center-pivot irrigation systems in which a long line of sprinklers circles around a well or other water source.
Questions:
1. Why is this type of irrigation advantageous?
2. Zoom out to an eye altitude of 50 or 60 miles. Would you say that most crops in this area are irrigated or farmed without irrigation?
3. Irrigation on this scale became possible with the invention of efficient pumps. Pumps made possible the use of nearly-free of groundwater or river water, and abundant, cheap energy to run the pumps. Which of these resources is likely to be most limiting for farmers in years to come? Why?
4. If ethanol increases demand for corn, and raises the price paid to farmers for corn, what changes would you expect in this landscape or in the price of water and energy?
5. How big is each circle?
Contour plowing p. 175
This non-glaciated region of
Questions:
1. Why are some fields planted in regular square shape while others have complex patterns of different colored strips?
2. Approximately how wide are the strips?
3. What are the rough-textured, dark green areas?
4. What large river is directly north of these fields?
5. According to your readings, why is contour plowing important?
Questions:
1. what is the
large pond to the east (right) of the feedlot fields?
2. Zoom out until you can see some of the surrounding land uses. What land uses do you see adjacent to this feedlot?
Love Canal, NY p. 189
This site was a neighborhood built on toxic waste dump in the 1950s. Residents suffering from exposure organized and fought for restitution in one of the pivotal cases that led to the development of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). This act created the Superfund, which provides funding to clean up such toxic sites.
The location of this site is not random.
Questions:
1. Why are there no houses in the blocks around the green space?
2. What important environmental legislation
followed from the citizen protests around
3. Houses that were once condemned as uninhabitable have been recently resold by the federal government for prices significantly less than nearby housing. Would you buy one of these houses?
Cancer Alley p. 192
There are at least 26 chemical factories and tank farms
along the Mississippi River between
Questions:
1. Zoom in to the factory complex next to the place marker. What features can you identify in the complex?
2. In the left side of your GoogleEarth window, find the Layers list. (If it is not visible, you may need to turn it on: find the View menu > Layers.) In the list of layers, find the "Geographic Features" group, and make sure the "USA Features" is checked ON. Now pan north of the original place marker location. Move around to see how many names of oil and gas fields you can find in the area around this factory. Hint: if you zoom out beyond an "eye altitude" of about 22,000 feet, the names will disappear. How many gas and oil fields can you find in this area?
3. Zoom to an eye
altitude of about 18,000 feet. Now pan slowly down the river (starting a
south-east direction). How many concentrations of oil tanks and petro-chemical
plants can you find between this site and the city of
4. What major natural hazard periodically threatens industrial facilities in this region?
Texas City, TX p. 193
Texas City is one of many places where residential neighborhoods adjoin industrial zones. For people living in the neighborhoods, the health risks associated with air and water contamination can be severe, but many cannot afford to move to a new area.
Questions:
1. What are the many white circles in the image?
2. Zoom in and move just north of the industrial zone. You can find neighborhood blocks with driveways but no houses: often corporations buy up these neighborhoods to avoid charges of endangering the health of residents. What would you do if you lived one block farther north of these vacated blocks?
3. Zoom out until you can see the position of Texas City in relation to the Gulf of Mexico. What kind of natural weather event frequently threatens Gulf Coast communities?
4. How exposed is Texas City to these events? How easy would it be for residents to evacuate in an emergency?
Herbicide exposure in the Corn Belt: Melvin Iowa p. 195
Exposure to farm chemicals such as Atrazine is an important
health risk in many areas.
Questions:
1. The landscape here was surveyed in 1-square mile sections. Many farms consisted of one or more quarter sections (1/2 mile x 1/2 mile), although many farms have been consolidated and combined in recent years. Using your measuring tool, figure out how many houses there are per square mile in this area.
2. Zoom out and get a sense of how much area is covered by this settlement pattern, with widely scattered houses every half mile or so in all directions. Why would farm chemicals such as Atrazine be a significant public health hazard in this area?
3. Move
around this region of
4. If exposure to farm chemicals is an important and wide-spread health risk for rural families, how would you recommend reducing the problem?
Vostok
Station, Antarctica p. 211
The Russian Vostok Antarctic station, located at 78 degrees S, 106 degrees E, is the site that produced the longest ice core to date. Ice cores contain ice from thousands of years ago, as well as carbon dioxide and methane trapped in gas bubbles. By examining the subtle differences in the weight of oxygen and hydrogen atoms in ancient ice, climatologists can find clues to ancient climate conditions--such as how warm and cold the earth's atmosphere was. The Vostok core is the longest record to date, reaching 3,623 km long (over 3 km!) and 420,000 years.
Imagery in this part of the world may be poor when viewed close up. Zoom out to
see Vostok's location in
Questions:
1. Look up the Vostok Antarctic Station online, and find out its elevation.
2. How does the station's elevation compare to that where you live?
3. Why was it useful to drill at this elevation?
4. What is the latitude at Vostok?
5. What is the lowest latitude (closest to the equator, smallest number) on the continent?
Mt. Kilimanjaro p. 218
At 5,895 m (19,340 ft),
Note that this site may be easiest to view with the “terrain” layer turned on, to show topography.
Questions:
1. What is the latitude of the mountain top?
2. What is the small depression on the mountain top within which the marker is placed?
3. As you fly around the mountain, look at the surrounding countryside. Do you see any other mountain ranges?
4. In what country is the mountain located?
5. If you scan down the mountain sides, you will see river
channels running down toward the plains below. What might be the effect on
surrounding farm lands when the snows of Kilimanjaro are permanently gone?
Grinnell glacier, Montana p. 2218 (see also chapter 1)
This location is easiest to view if
you have the “terrain” layer turned on, to show elevations. This site is a
visible case of rapidly receding mountain glaciers. When Glacier National Park
was created in 1910, it contained 140 recognized glaciers. Now only 30 greatly
shrunken glaciers remain in the park, and those are melting rapidly. If current
trends continue, there will be no glaciers in the park by 2030.
One of the most frequently visited glaciers is Grinnell Glacier, named after George Bird Grinnell, who founded the Audubon Society and also was instrumental in exploring and preserving Glacier Park. Compare the historic and current photos of this glacier in fig. 9.11 (p. 209) with this satellite image. Try flying around the mountain to get a view of nearby peaks and valleys.
Questions:
1. What is the smooth gray area dotted with white to the North (lower) end of the glacier?
2. The 1914 photo in fig. 9.11 shows the glacier reaching as far as the pond that is in the foreground in the default view for this place marker. Find the measuring tool, and measure the length of the ice field (from the back wall to the edge of the meltwater lake). Then measure to the cliff where the falls are in the 1914 figure shown in fig. 9.11. How long is the ice sheet now, compared to its length in 1914?
3. Pan away from the glacier past the small turquoise-blue lake below the cliff. Can you guess what gives the lake its milky color?
4. As you back away from the Grinnell Glacier, you will pass through a long valley with several lakes. The glacier once occupied this entire valley. How would downstream streams change with the receding of this glacier?
5. What would be the effect of this change on ecosystems or on towns that rely on glacier-fed streams?
Tuvalu p. 218 (see also chapter 1)
The islands of
Questions:
1. Describe the shape of an atoll.
2. Zoom in to the island where
3. Zoom in close to the town of
4. What would happen to the town if the dark lagoon next to the airstrip were to rise a meter or so and flood the airstrip?
5. Find your measuring tool (look under the View menu at the
top of the window, if it's not already visible). How far is it to
6. If people and goods had to come and go by sea, instead of by air, what are two or three nearby population centers that people could go to or trade with?
Free Air Carbon Enrichment
studies (FACE) p. 221
This field
laboratory north of the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, MN is the site
of several famous ecological experiments concerning biodiversity and resilience
to environmental changes, such as global warming. This site is one of a network
of Long-Term Ecological Research sites, established to support studies that may
run for years or decades, and that give insights that cannot be gained from
shorter studies.
Since 1997, Peter Reich and his colleagues have been carrying out free
air carbon enrichment (FACE) experiments (see Exploring Science box in this chapter).
To the east of the biodiversity plot grid, you can see five faint circles
surrounded by a service road. These circles are the carbon enrichment studies.
The thin poles from which CO2 is emitted (see photo in boxed reading in text)
are difficult to see at this resolution level. Sets of different species are
also tested to determine their growth under elevated CO2 levels. Reich finds
that mixtures of species produce more biomass than do single species. While
most plants grow better under elevated CO2 levels, the nutritional quality of
their biomass often declines. Furthermore, for all species except legumes,
nitrogen quickly becomes limiting under this faster growth.
Questions:
1. What is the
diameter of one of the FACE circles?
2. What are some of
the lessons about biodiversity that have been learned in this study? (see
discussion in text)
3. What is the
benefit of doing these experiments in the open air in an abandoned farm field?
This view shows the main factory
complex. Note the smokestack shadows, as well as the uniform color of the
landscape. Smelting (heating ore to extract minerals) produces large amounts of
acidic air emissions that can damage or destroy vegetation downwind of a
smelter. If you zoom out and move northeast and from this place marker, you can
see that there is more than one smelter complex in the area.
Questions:
1. Zoom out to see the location of the factory and the workers' housing. Also move south to find the place marker marked “What is this feature?”. What is done at this place mark?
2. Return to the original place mark. Find the workers' housing, and zoom in close enough to see the buildings. Describe the housing you see. In what ways does it look like a healthy or unhealthy place for workers to live?
3. Note that the surrounding landscape is made up of tundra pockmarked with wetlands, probably a saturated landscape. Why would this be a hard place to contain contaminated runoff from processing?
4. Zoom out to get a sense of whether
5. Do those of us who use the metals produced in
As your textbook describes,
The town of
1. How far from the smelter do you need to go to find dark, native forest?
2. Which way was the wind blowing when the image was taken?
3. What time of day was the GE image made?
4. The Adirondack Mountains of Upstate
Lake Mead (Opening case study)
This reservoir and the Hoover Dam at its lower end, supply
electric power to Las Vegas. Inreasing evaporation during longer, drier summers
and reduced snowmelt runoff from the Rockies are lowering water levels and
threatening power production. If you look carefully, and if you view photos in
the area, you can see the "bathtub ring" where higher water levels
bleached the rock surface in years past.
Try to locate the Hoover dam at the downstream end of this reservoir.
Three Gorges Dam p. 248
This mammoth dam is one of the central structures of
(Depending on the date of the imagery available, the dam may not extend all the way across the river. On the north side of the river are locks, which will raise and lower ships past the dam’s 150 m elevation change.)
Questions:
1. What river passes this dam and the Three Gorges? What province is this dam in?
2. If you move 50 km west of the dam, is the landscape mountainous or level? How about 50 km east of the dam?
3. Find the measuring tool (Tools > Measure). Roughly how
far is the dam from
4. Follow the river upstream (west) to where it reaches the
level landscape of the
5. What’s the latitude of the dam?
6. What’s the latitude of
7.
Aral Sea, Lake Chad p. 249
Water diversion has badly depleted many water bodies, especially
in dry regions. The Aral Sea and
Note that Google Earth provides historical imagery: look under the View menu for Historical Imagery. This tool produces a slider that lets you see the Aral Sea change from 1973 to recent years, and Lake Chad from 1963.
Questions:
1. What countries border the
2. Yellow boundary lines show that the large island in the
3. Zoom in near the place marker next to the
Go to the
4. You can see the former shape and size of
5. What countries border
6. Find a global climate map, in your text book or in an
atlas. Does
Excessive nutrients: Bohai Bay, Caspian Sea, p 254
All living things require nutrients, such as nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P). Excessive amounts of these nutrients can lead to run-away growth, especially in marine systems. Nutrients washing from farmlands and cities support algae blooms, visible here as greenish cloudiness. When all this algae dies, it begins to decay. Decomposition can deplete oxygen, which kills fish and other marine organisms. Eutrophication (such excessive plant growth) is especially common in enclosed, shallow bays. Here are two examples.
Although colors vary among the satellite images you see, contrasting tones of green, or even yellow, in a blue sea often mark algae blooms.
Questions:
1. What is the large city about 130 km northwest of the bay?
2. Zoom to the
3. Is the enclosed
Zoom to the
Caspian Sea marker that follows the
4. Just west of
the large, northern algae bloom is a ragged, complex shoreline that marks the
delta where the
Acid mine drainage, Butte
MT p. 256
Acidic
water that drains from mines or that collects in mines is a persistent environmental
hazard in mining areas. The Berkeley Pit in Butte, Montana is famous for its
acid waters, made toxic by sulfuric acid, copper, and other minerals leached
from surounding bedrock. Sulfuric acid forms as water reacts with copper-sulfer
minerals in the rocks. This mine was once a rich sources if copper, but it has
been abandoned because it was no longer economical to work. Both groundwater
and rainwater collect in the pit. In 1995 the site made headlines when 340 snow
geese died after resting on the lake during migration.
Questions:
1.
What are some of the metal contaminants that are of greatest concern in water
quality?
2.
What formed the geenish-yellow grid about 300 m southeast of the place marker?
Cattle
feedlot in Broken Bow, Nebraska, p 259
Most American beef is produced in feedlots such as this one. Because cattle can consume hundreds of liters of water and produce hundreds of liters of waste every day, water management is an important consideration in and around feedlots. Feedlots are a particular concern in some areas because feedlots have become a dominant form of food production, but laws regarding waste treatment have not evolved to keep up with proliferation of feedlot waste.
Questions:
1. What are the large, dark circles near the feedlot? (You may need to consult with your colleagues or instructor to answer this one.) What is their diameter?
2. As you look at the landscape around the feedlot, would you say that rainfall is abundant or scarce in this area? What clues help you answer this question?
3. Zoom in to the feedlot until you can see its features. Note the clusters of dark dots that are cattle lined up at feed troughs. The black lagoons are the wastewater holding ponds. How does this treatment method compare to the treatment method in conventional municipal water treatment facilities?
Yamuna River, Delhi, India p. 259
Developing regions face steep challenges in providing water
and wastewater treatment to burgeoning populations. Delhi, India’s capital
city, is a sprawling, fast-growing metropolitan area of about 13 million
people.
Zoom to the Connaught Circle place
marker. This circle is a major traffic circle and landmark in the newer part of
the city. You can see the orderly structure the British colonial government
tried to impose on this city, before it began to grow as rapidly as it has done
in recent decades. The main railway station can be found just north of this
circle. Government buildings lie south of
With 1.1 billion people, India’s
population is set to exceed China’s in a few years.
Questions:
1. What is the concentration of fecal coliform bacteria when
the Yamuna leaves
2. Zoom to the water treatment facility marked. The round tanks are aeration tanks where sewage is treated. Do you see any similar structures in other parts of the city?
3. Explain why cities such as
Port au Prince,
Haiti (Opening case study)
Haiti's
capital city, Port au Prince, still shows some signs of devastation from the
earthquake in 2010, but this densely crowded city still teems with life and
energy. The death toll was unusually high because of poor-quality concrete construction.
How an impoverished, often corrupt city can raise itself from the dust is a
question that remains unanswered.
Zoom
out and around the city to get a sense of its size, density, and location.
What other country ocupies the eastern end of this island?
Powder River Basin (Coal bed methane)p. 280
The
Powder River area of Wyoming is one of the regions where rich deposits of natural
gas (CH4) have been found in association with underground coal deposits. At
this placemarker you can see the spidery network of roads, each ending in a
well pad, where the well is drilled and maintained. The natural gas industry
and well owners insist that each pad takes up only a small amount of space;
ranchers and hunters contend that the cumulative effect covers the landscape.
Are both right? Meanwhile, anglers oppose the contamination of streams by toxic
brine runoff that is produced by the pumping process.
Questions:
1.
Note the dry, brown landscape. How does this area's dry climate influence the
debate over gas extraction? How might this influence the position of anglers in
the area?
2.
Zoom out slightly, so you can still see the network of drill pads and roads.
Move southeast past the town of Wright until you see the black lines of the exposed coal beds in a
strip mine. Have you passed any areas without drilling pads and roads along
this way?
3.
What is the origin of the methane associated with coal beds? (see your
readings.)
Bingham Canyon
Mine p. 280
This
marker is near the entrance to the Bingham Canyon Mine, on the southwest margin
of Salt Lake City, Utah. Copper ore has been mined here since 1906.
Mount St. Helens p. 286
When this volcano
erupted on May 18, 1980, it was the deadliest and most economically destructive
volcanic event in the recorded history of the
The eruption blew out the west side of the mountain lowering the summit by about 400 m and depositing nearly 1 km3 of dust, ash and volcanic rock on the surrounding land. You can see the horseshoe-shaped crater and a new central cone forming as lava and ash continues to emerge from the volcano. The catastrophic blast that ruptured the wall of the mountain created hurricane-force winds that flattened thousands of ha of forest. Ash spread over millions of ha of seven western states. Fortunately, the eruption was preceded by numerous earthquakes and a measurable bulge that developed on the mountain’s flank. This gave most local residents ample warning to evacuate the area.
Try flying around the mountain using the compass rose in the upper right corner of your screen to get a bird’s eye view of the post-eruption shape of the volcano.
Questions:
1. What is the white material inside the volcano’s crater?
2. How can snow persist on top of molten lava?
3. Why was the
direction of the eruption and ash fall fortunate for
4. What evidence
can you see of ash and mud flows from the mountain?
Barrier
islands: Chandeleur Islands p. 288
Barrier
islands are long, narrow strips of sediment that tend to shift and move, but
they provide important protection for inland marshes and settlements. In this
view you can see a number of barrier islands, outlined in yellow if state
boundaries are turned on.
Note
the "bird's-foot" shape of the delta where the Mississippi enters the
Gulf of Mexico just southwest of the island arc near the place marker.
These barrier islands are distinctive becasue their primary
source of new sediment, the Mississippi River, has been constrained into a
narrow channel that carries sediment away from the shore and deep into the Gulf
of Mexico. Removing sediment this way aids navigation--in the past, constantly
shifting sediment blocked shipping channels. The loss of sediment has greatly
diminished coastal shorelines and barrier islands, though.
Questions:
1.
Zoom in to the islands near the place markers. Do they fully occup the yellow
boundary lines? (note: the boundary lines disappear as you zoom in.)
2.
Pan west to the area around the main Mississippi channel. The perforated,
sponge-like landscape was formerly continuous swampland. How might this affect
settlements in this area?
Jonah gas field, coal bed
methane p. 299
This is an example of coal-bed methane extraction described
in your textbook. It is located south of
Because methane doesn’t migrate easily through the geologic formations, wells have to be drilled close together to extract the gas. The 3,100 wells proposed for this 30,000 acre project are projected to disturb two-thirds of the land surface. Each well pad occupies only about 1 hectare of land, but the spider web of connecting roads and pipelines disturbs a large area. This project also creates a brown cloud of dust and air pollution from disturbed soil, truck traffic, and pumping and drilling operations.
Questions:
1. What are the white spots in this aerial view?
2. Why are they arranged in a rectilinear array?
3. Why are they connected like beads on a string?
4. Why do some of the white dots have black spots in them?
5. Does it look to you as if two-thirds of the land in this
area is disturbed? If not, how might opponents have arrived at this claim?
Chernobyl nuclear plant p. 301
The
nuclear power plant at Chernobyl, Ukraine was the sie of the most notorious
nuclear power accident. Because this is a sensitive site, modern images are
unavailable as of this writing. Access to the area is prohibited, but many
photos have been posted by visitors, and these can help give an idea of the
recent landscape of the area. The region remains radioactive and mostly
deserted. You can zoom in to see the buildings that make up the facility.
Questions:
1.
When did this reactor accident occur?
2.
What went wrong?
3.
Zoom out until you can see the large city about 110 km (in a straight line) to
the southeast. What is the name of this city?
Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository p. 301
The
While a majority of Congress voted
in favor of the
Questions:
1. Describe the landscape around
2. Move approximately 43 km northeast, to 37 degrees 6
min N, 116 degrees, 2 min W. What are the circular features on the ground in
this area?
Solar facility, Barstow, CA p. 312
This experimental solar facility near
A.) The shiny oval structure on the left (west) is a solar pond. This is a relatively low-tech, low cost approach to harvesting solar energy. The principle is to fill a pond with 3 layers of water:
1 A top layer with a low salt content
2 An intermediate insulating layer with a salt gradient, which sets up a density gradient that prevents heat exchange by natural convection in the water.
3 A bottom layer has with a high salt content which reaches a temperature approaching 90 degrees Celsius.
The different densities in the layers due to their salt content prevent convection currents developing which would normally transfer the heat to the surface and then to the air above. The heat trapped in the salty bottom layer can be used for different purposes, such as heating of buildings, industrial processes, or generating electricity.
B.) The rectangular arrays
(bottom right) are parabolic trough systems (see fig 20.11 in text). The
reflective surface of a parabolic trough concentrates sunlight onto a receiver
tube located along the trough's focal line, heating the fluid flowing in the
tube to as much as 400 degrees C. This heated fluid is then transported through
pipes to a steam turbine/ generator. The troughs are normally designed to track
the sun along one axis, predominantly north-south. Parabolic troughs assembled in
collector fields are responsible for almost all commercially produced solar
thermal power, with a total installed capacity of more than 350MWe in
C.) The concentric circles (top center) are rows of mirrors surrounding a central power tower (also know as a 'heliostat' power plant). This design uses many flat, moveable mirrors (called heliostats) to focus the sun's rays upon a collector tower (the target). The high energy at this point of concentrated sunlight is transferred to a substance that can store the heat for later use. That energy can, in turn, be used to boil water for use in steam turbines that generate electricity.
Solar One, which operated at this site from 1982 to 1988, was the world’s largest power tower plant. In this plant, water was converted to steam in the receiver and used directly to power a conventional steam turbine generator. The heliostat field consisted of 1818 heliostats of 39.3 m reflective area each. The project met most of its technical objectives by demonstrating (1) the feasibility of 2 generating power with a power tower, (2) the ability to generate 10 MW for eight hours a day at summer solstice and four hours a day near winter solstice. During its final year of operation, Solar One’s availability during hours of sunshine was 96% and its annual efficiency was about 7%.
Solar Two To absorb and store energy, effectively, the facility was modified in 1996 to a more advanced molten-salt heat-transfer system. The Solar One heliostat field, the tower, and the turbine/generator required only minimal modifications. The salt storage medium is a mixture of 60 percent sodium nitrate and 40 percent potassium nitrate. It melts at 220oC (428oF) and is maintained in a molten state (290oC/554oF) in the ‘cold’ storage tank. Molten salt can be difficult to handle because it has a low viscosity (similar to water) and it wets metal surfaces extremely well. Consequently, it can be difficult to contain and transport. All tubing, valves, and storage tanks must be made of leak-proof, corrosion-resistant metals. Solar Two has produced 10 MW of electricity with enough thermal storage to continue to operate the turbine at full capacity for three hours after the sun has set.
A more recent heat transfer material that has been successfully demonstrated at other facilities is liquid sodium. Sodium is a metal with a high heat capacity, allowing that energy to be stored and drawn off throughout the evening. It is highly toxic, flammable, explosive, corrosive and dangerous, however.
Questions:
1. Why do you suppose this facility was located where it is?
2. Which of the three solar arrays most closely resembles
that on
3. Describe the placement of the mirrors in Solar Two
4. Why is the solar pond separated by horizontal dikes into 5 compartments?
5. Why might these three different types of solar collectors
be placed so close together?
This remote beach
in
A shallow, gently sloping bottom and unusually high tides allow the ships to be driven up onto the beach and then winched into position, where an army of laborers swarms over them like ants dismembering a dead beetle. Metal is dragged away and sold for recycling. Organic waste is often simply burned on the beach, where ashes and oily residue wash back into the water. Typically, it takes only about two months to completely dismantle and recycle a large tanker. Accidents among the workers are common. Almost no one has protective clothing—often not even shoes. Gangs of men cutting apart huge pieces of steel and hauling them ashore by hand frequently are injured. And even when they go home at night, workers and their families are only a few meters away from the toxic mess on the beach. Notice the shantytowns adjacent to the breaking yards.
Questions:
1. Why is the sand black around the beached ships?
2. How far is it from the closest of the ships to the workers shacks?
3. About 260 km southeast of Alang Beach is India’s largest city. What is the name of this city?
4. Why is it helpful to be close to a large, industrial city and yet across the bay?
Challenge question: about 50 km northeast from Alang Beach is a complex of white features along the bay. What are these features?
U.S. Superfund Sites p. 335
As you can read in your textbook, the Comprehensive
Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) passed in 1980
and modified in 1984 authorized rapid containment, cleanup, or remediation of
abandoned toxic waste sites. The EPA estimates there are at least 36,000
seriously contaminated sites in the
This folder contains place markers for all Superfund sites. Each site has basic documentation as well as a link to the US EPA Superfund web site, which reports the site's contaminants, as well as its clean-up status. This file was produced by US EPA, which updates to the data regularly. Those updates as well as documentation describing the contents of the file can be found at URL:http://www.epa.gov/enviro
This file was downloaded from the EPA website on 1/20/2007 and was converted to the KML format by Michigan Tech Research Institute (www.mtri.org).
Questions:
1. If you live in the United States, find a superfund site near your home (if you live elsewhere, find a site that sounds interesting). What is its name?
2. What sort of activity created this site?
3. What wastes are stored there?
4. What is its current status?
Love Canal, NY p. 335
This site was a neighborhood built on toxic waste dump in the 1950s. Residents suffering from exposure organized and fought for restitution in one of the pivotal cases that led to the development of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). This act created the Superfund, which provides funding to clean up such toxic sites.
The location of this site is not random.
Questions:
1. Why are there no houses in the blocks around the green space?
2. What important environmental legislation
followed from the citizen protests around
3. Houses that were once condemned as uninhabitable have been recently resold by the federal government for prices significantly less than nearby housing. Would you buy one of these houses?
Shanghai p. 343
This megalopolis at the mouth of the Yangtze River is the
center of the largest population concentration in
A new, sustainable city is being built on Chongming Dao (Island) in the Yangtze River just north of Shanghai. According to city officials, Chongming Dongtan will be completely self-supporting in energy, water, and waste disposal and largely self-supporting in food supplies. If plans for renewable energy come to fruition, it will also be carbon-neutral. Planners also hope to protect and even expand forest area and unique wetlands that now exist on the island. However, the island, which only appeared in 1947, has a maximum elevation of 4 m and much of its area could be lost to rising sea levels and erosion as future sediment deposits are halted by the Three Gorges Dam. Dongtan is expected to house 50,000 residents by 2010. Interestingly, Chongming is a major relocation center for people displaced by the Three Gorges Dam.
Questions:
1. Where is
2. Zoom in to the place marker at the center of the old city. What makes the shadows you can see on the right side of the river?
3. What is the name of this region of
4.
5. What evidence can you see from the air that the Pudong
region is newer and more modern than the Bund district, the older city on the
west side of the river?
Calumet Industrial District, Chicago
p. 345 This derelict industrial district is in the process of being re-used and re-developed. While much remains to be done, and while there are always concerns regarding equity in a redeveloping neighborhood, this is one example of the potential communities have in re-using urban brownfields.
Urban planning and urban
sprawl, Sun City and Salton City p. 347
Most American cities expand as “
Sun City: This suburb of Phoenix claims to be the
first and largest planned retirement community in America. It has seven
recreation centers, eight golf courses, three country clubs, two bowling
centers and an artificial lake. All this greenery takes a lot of water in the
hot, dry,
Questions:
1. After you admire the pattern of the streets around the place marker, zoom in to see the houses more closely. What are the green spaces between the neighborhoods?
2. In what state is this city located?
3. How likely is it that you would walk to a shopping center or grocery store if you lived here?
4. From what altitude can you see the golf courses and other features of this development? Could you see these features from space?
5. If you zoom in close, do you see evidence of water-saving landscaping in the images?
Questions:
6. would you build a house here? why or why not? Was it a good idea to build all these streets here? why or why not?
7. Turn off road names (in the Layers) to see the ornate patterns of the streets. Turn on road names. Which set of road names do you like best?
8. Zoom out to see the location of
Shenzhen, China
Shenzhen is one of the rapidly growing industrial cities of southern China. This urban manufacturing center is one of the primary sources of export products, such as toys, to overseas markets. A quarter century this city was only a few villages and farm fields. Today it provides jobs for migrants from across the country and is a major part of the China’s economic engine.
With this rapid growth, can China maintain a healthy environment for its citizens? China recognizes environmental quality and environmental health as a critically important issue, and in some ways development there has led the way in environmental quality and efficiency. However market forces, such as the cheap cost of low-grade coal, the fight to produce cheap goods for export, together with a lack of enforcement of pollution controls, make environmental quality here difficult to achieve.
Questions:
1. Zoom in close to this new city. Are there parks and recreational space provided for its residents?
2. Describe the housing in this city.
3. What is the large city to the south of Shenzhen? Is that city a major harbor, or not?
Tellico Dam p. 370
Large projects in the United States now require an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), a study that reports on the ways a project might affect environmental, historical, cultural, and other amenities. The EIS project was involved in identifying the Snail Darter, a small fish whose sole spawning grounds were just upstream of this dam.
Finding this fish sparked a
national debate over what would have been a fairly routine dam building
project, in the 1970s, when dam building was a routine business. Destroying the
spawning grounds contradicted the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the Tellico
Dam, on the
The dam was completed in 1982. If you have the “populated places” layer turned on, you can see the names of historic places now submerged in the reservoir.
If the “borders” or “roads” layer is on, turn them off so you can see the dam.
Questions:
1. Which side of the dam is upstream? How can you tell?
2. What large town is about 30 km northeast of the dam?
3. Based on inspection of this area, would you say that pivotal policy cases, such as the Tellico Dam case, always occur in highly visible locations, or do they sometimes occur in obscure situations?
Rio, site of Earth Summit p. 376
Rio
de Janeiro, Brazil was selected as teh site of the 1992 Earth Summit, an
international meeting at which global policies were discussed, and the notion
of "sustainability" became widely recognizeds as a goal.
The
placemarker is near one of Rio's most famous beaches. The neighborhood here is
relatively affluent. Zoom out to peruse the city. Note that it is large, that
it has a mix of urbane, wealthy areas and neighborhoods with low levels of infrastructure
and high rates of poverty.
Rio
was a reasonable place to hold a meeting like the Earth Sumit because it is
both a developing area and a developed city and because Brazil is one of the
world's great sources of biodiversity and also a site of rapid change.
Questions:
Is
Rio near to the Amazon river basin, or far from it?
2.
What is the countryside near Rio like?
3.
What was one of the issues discussed at the Rio 1992 meeting besides
sustainability?
Shenzhen, China p. 387
Shenzhen
is one of the rapidly growing industrial cities of southern China. This urban
manufacturing center is one of the primary sources of export products, such as
toys, to overseas markets. A quarter century this city was only a few villages
and farm fields. Today it provides jobs for migrants from across the country
and is a major part of the China’s economic engine. With this rapid growth, can
China maintain a healthy environment for its citizens? China recognizes
environmental quality and environmental health as a critically important issue,
and in some ways development there has led the way in environmental quality and
efficiency. However market forces, such as the cheap cost of low-grade coal,
the fight to produce cheap goods for export, together with a lack of
enforcement of pollution controls, make environmental quality here difficult to
achieve.
Questions:
1.
Zoom in close to this new city. Are there parks and recreational space provided
for its residents?
2.
Describe the housing in this city.
3.
What is the large city to the south of Shenzhen? Is that city a major harbor,
or not?