Please don’t cut and paste information, but summarize and paraphrase in your own words. Please cite references. 1. One way that coal combustion affects aquatic ecosystems, as described in Course Content and elsewhere, is through acid precipitation. What’s another way, aside from coal ash and fly ash, that air emissions from coal combustion can affect freshwater, estuarine or marine ecosystems? Describe, briefly, each step, from combustion to the ultimate effects on one or more freshwater or marine species. Given that/those species, which environmental spheres are involved, and how? 2. The Dust Bowl was probably the greatest threat to U.S. farmlands in the 1930s. That was then. What about now? What is the greatest threat or threats? What are some possible solutions? 3. (FOR THIS QUESTION, ANSWER EITHER A OR B.) a. An industrial entity hired you to be their chief environmental officer. What they produce can be whatever you choose. Describe the operation: what are its components or stages? What materials are used? What types of wastes are generated? What is your waste management plan and approach for protecting the environment and human health? or b. Earlier this week, this were these headlines: [Add headlines]. Despite the chronic failure of past efforts, many still hope for resolution, because it beats the alternative. There’s probably more in the media on the Israeli-Palestinian issue than on global climate change. Israelis, and Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, live in an area not much larger than New Jersey. They are linked, however uncomfortably, by their shared environment. There’s even been some progress on joint solutions to environmental problemssee, for example, Israel, Palestine and the environment. i. Describe three environmental problems they face, other than those described in the preceding article. Include some problems they face separately, and some they face jointly. Your descriptions should be about one solid paragraph each, so that someone unfamiliar with the issues, such as your new boss from the quiz, could understand them. ii. Discuss, in detail, one of the three problems you described above in terms of environmental systemswhere and in which sphere does the problem originate, in that region? Which other spheres are involved, from origin of the problem to the ecological and/or human health effects? Please cite your information sources for a or b. 4. Some recent media attention about oyster culture and restoration in the Chesapeake Bay and other coastal areas intrigued some environmentally minded citizens in Chincoteague Island, VA. They’re now contemplating starting commercial oyster aquaculture in their own water body, Chincoteague Bay. Hearing about a certain Chincoteague Island commercial oyster operation may have been a motivating factor. They have asked you, as an objective environmental expert from outside the area, to help them decide whether it makes sense environmentally to do so. (Whether it makes sense economically is another question for another time.) They want to know, briefly: a. The links between oysters, environmental quality and human health b. Chincoteague Bay’s current environmental quality. How might that change in the near-term future? c. Your recommendations, based on a & b Some notes to guide you: Chincoteague is in Accomack County, VA The Virginia State Department of Health regulates shellfish harvest areas (although another agency, the Virginia Marine Resources Commission, leases sites and licenses harvesters) Oysters can be legally grown and harvested in any area approved for shellfish harvesting The current farm has several growing locations in approved shellfish harvest areas of Chincoteague Bay Oysters can be grown the old-fashioned way, by putting old shell on the bottom and allowing wild oyster larvae in the plankton to settle on and affix to them, where they remain until harvested. More modern, intensive methods employ cages that suspend hatchery-bred oysters off the bottom. These methods promote faster growth. Please cite your information sources.
Hide
