UCU SCIEAR31: Resources and their sustainable management

Part 1: System Earth and the Challenge of Sustainable Development

original notes by Dr. S. de Meer

In part 1 of the "Earth & Society" course, the subjects dealt with in your previous Earth & Environment courses, will be recapitulated upon. Furthermore, the critical environmental geosciences and sustainability issues facing humankind will be identified. We shall go on to give an overview of the resources, risks and hazards associated with the principle Earth subsystems, that way forming a basis for a more detailed study of these topics during the remainder of this course.

Content:

Earlier, the Earth System Science approach was introduced. This approach views the Earth as a single dynamic entity in which the constituent subsystems, that is the solid Earth, the hydrosphere, the atmosphere and the biosphere with its human inhabitant, continuously interact. First of all, a number of topics from "System Earth" will be reviewed. In the notes, it is reviewed how the Earth and life on Earth has evolved through (geological) time, moving on to consider the appearance and impact of humans. Throughout the history of the Earth, mineral and energy resources have accumulated, controlled by specific geological settings and the associated temperature-pressure conditions. Our modern-day society is dependent on these non-renewable mineral and energy resources, and for the world to meet the demand of its expanding population for goods and energy, we must understand of how and where such resources occur and how best to use them. Population growth may be the single most important factor threatening long term environmental integraty of the planet. If global population increases as rapidly as many estimates suggest, the pressure to find and produce mineral and energy resources will be enormous, as will the potential pollution related to their extraction and use. In Part 1, besides introducing ideas on the evolution of life on Earth, the accumulation of resources and the ascent of humans, we will explore via a modelling exercise the broad impact of our growing population on the Earth and its resources. We will also develop an overview of the impact of natural disasters (e.g. earthquakes, volcanism, tsunamis, landslides, floods) on our ever-growing population concentrations and the question of global change.

Topics:

Reading and self-study:

Assignment(s):