Transcript Guided Notes about Natural Resources

Guided Notes about
Natural Resources
Chapter 25, Section 1
1.
All living things must have
certain resources to grow,
develop, maintain life
processes, and reproduce. In
addition to food and water,
most animals also need shelter.
2.
Natural resources include
Earth’s air, water, and land;
all living things and
nutrients, rocks and
minerals.
3. Renewable resources are natural
resources that it is possible to use
indefinitely without causing a
reduction in the supply. They
include fresh air, surface water,
groundwater, fertile soil, elements
that cycle through Earth’s systems,
and living things.
4.
Resources that exist in an
inexhaustible supply, such
as solar energy, also are
renewable resources.
5. Renewable resources are
replaced through natural
processes at a rate that is equal
to, or greater than, the rate at
which they are being used.
6.
Sustainable yield is the
replacement of renewable
resources at the same rate
at which they are consumed.
7.
Sunlight is considered to be
a renewable resource
because it will be available
for the next 5 billion years.
8.
Nonrenewable resources are resources
that exist in a fixed amount in Earth’s
crust and can only be replaced by
processes that take hundreds of millions
of years. Fossil fuels, gemstones, and
metallic elements are nonrenewable.
They are exhaustible because they are
being used at a much higher rate than
they rate at which they were formed.
9.
Natural resources are not
distributed evenly on Earth.
The wealth of a country is
determined by the
availability of natural
resources.
1. Land provides places for
organisms to live and interact.
It also provides spaces for the
growth of crops, forests,
grasslands, and for wilderness
areas.
2. 42 percent of the land in the
United States is public land and
are federally administered to
protect timber, grazing areas,
minerals, and energy resources.
3. National wildlife refuges provide
protection of habitats and
breeding areas for wildlife,
including endangered species.
4. It can take 1000 years to form a
few centimeters of soil, yet it can
be lost in minutes as a result of
erosion by wind or water. Plowing
and leaving bare ground without
plant cover can increase topsoil
loss.
5. The loss of topsoil can lead to
desertification, which is the process
by which productive land becomes
desert. This can be prevented by
reducing overgrazing and by
planting trees and shrubs to anchor
soils and retain water.
6. Aggregate is a mixture of
gravel, sand, and crushed stone
that naturally accumulates on
the Earth’s surface. Aggregates
are found in floodplains or
alluvial fans, or are deposited by
glacial activity.
7.
An ore is a natural resource
that can be mined at a
profit. The value of an ore
on the market is greater
than the cost of its
extraction.
8. The most important sources of
metallic ore deposits are
hydrothermal fluids. Hydrothermal
veins commonly form along faults
and joints.
Which minerals are often found in
placer deposits?
Gold, diamonds, platinum, and
gemstones