AP Environmental Science

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    HistoryEdited Aug 28, 2020 1:38 PM by admin…

    Week of 8.24.20

    Top questions answered:

    What books are we using this year?

    Three of them:

    • The “frog” book by Withgott, which is only currently available on the class iPads:
    • The “bee” book, which can be found on the Apple iBooks store for you to purchase, as well as on the class iPads:
    • Friedland and Relyea “Environmental Science for the AP exam”, which is available online at Amazon as paper textbook, or for rental as a Kindle book (there are readers for mac and pc online). Since the rental for this is only currently available until 2.2021, we are posting some chapters as pdf on the server: http://physics.hpa.edu/physics/apenvsci/texts/fr_3e/
    We may also include readings that will be posted on the physics server.

    What is our homework for the weekend?
    The practice questions at the end of modules 1-3 are due Sunday
    The Practice exam (better known as the chapter questions) multiple choice (MC) 1-11 and free response (FR) 1,2 are due Monday.
    We are easing into the homework load, which might include videos, questions and chapter readings.
    Until we get the iPad supply sorted out, we'll use them in class only.

    How are our quizzes and homework weighted?
    Most assignments count for 8 points each, unless they take a great deal of your time, which I really respect. Tests will count for more, again depending on the degree of coverage. We will have larger exams at the end of each quarter, and a simulation exam in March, just before spring break, to see what you will want to cover before the AP exam in May.

    What about labs?
    I'll try to include at least one lab or hands-on activity each week. These might include little goldfish crackers, fake rabbits, and this week, a mystery about 8 countries and their global footprint.

    What is the best way to take notes?
    Serious studies by folks in white lab coats have determined that writing notes out on paper, then reviewing them sometime before you sleep that day is the most effective way to learn. Typing on a computer is less effective, unless you are using it to summarize your notes from the day. Reading the notes on the weblog before class is a great idea, as it is the thread of our class discussions.

    Please keep the questions coming, I can only answer what you ask.
    -------------------------
    Global footprint mystery sleuthing:
    1. how would you group the countries? Language? Economy? Sustainability? History? Religion? Political?
    2. what cause and effect incidents can you see on the graphs?
    3. surplus is green, deficit is red, over what time frame? when did/will the lines cross? when did they start?

    Events:
    Australia-what about the red bumps?
    Pakistan-what happened in 1978?
    US-what happened in 1973?
    NZ-how can fishing areas increase?
    Bengaladesh-what causes the bumps?
    Brazil-1984, what happened?
    S. Korea has two cliffs-why?
    When did the UK become in deficit? Why?

    Sustainability: Thinking of forever

    Click for full-size image
    Notice that these are not your usual "energy, food and water" items people think about.
    Sustainability is living within your means.
    Starbucks example...

    Ecological footprint: created by Jurgen Randers and Mathis Wackernagel (both here for the opening of this famed structure)
    1. energy
    2. settlements
    3. timber
    4. food
    5. seafood
    6. carbon
    7. built up land
    8. forests
    9. cropland
    10. fisheries
    What impacts your global footprint?

    APES notes

    important——

    energy->water->food->culture

    1. With energy you can move/purify water
    2. With water you can grow food
    3. With food you can maintain a culture

    What is the "environment"?

    Front of ship fell off-

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM

    "we towed it out into the environment"

    "you mean into another environment"

    Environment: Everything around us, including us

    Climate change map-try this out:

    http://www.impactlab.org/map/#usmeas=absolute&usyear=2080-2099&gmeas=absolute&gyear=1986-2005

    Nebraska->Alberta by 2050

    Footprints:-----------

    Your footprint: https://www.footprintcalculator.org

    Reducing your carbon footprint:

    Notes on the texts: "frog book" on the iPads, "bee" book on your computer, Friedland and Relyea (pdf for now)

    Friedland and Relyea, 3rd edition, until the text rental situation is resolved (2.21)

    http://physics.hpa.edu/physics/apenvsci/texts/fr_3e/

    Note that the FR text is more detailed. The first two chapters of both this and the frog book (iBook) deal with defining environmental science, the scientific process and how APES covers many different topics. (see notes in previous class)

    The FR text is divided into modules, with practice questions (PQ) at the end of each section and chapter questions (CP) at the end of each chapter. Your homework will often be the PQ during the week, and the larger CP over the weekend.

    Module 1 -------------

    Fracking-know what it is? Why is it controversial? How has it changed how we generate electricity in our country? At what cost? Why is this politically important? Why are the solvents they use secret? What is the impact of these solvents on water? Who developed it around 1960? What did he later put all of his money into?

    Bio=life, so biotic means living, abiotic means not living (druids had a neat view on this)

    How systems are defined enables us to create models of cause and effect (favorite topic of physicists and historians as well)

    Module 2 ---------------

    Environmental indicators: what we know and can observe that indicate the condition of a system

    Ecosystem services: can be economic, direct or cascading (off shore oil for example, impacting fishing in the gulf of Mexico)

    Click for full-size image


    Long list. Let's go for something more digestible:


    Click for full-size image

    Note that biodiversity is a key indicator (why?)

    These are the 5 challenges that you will deal with in this century. Knowing about them will enable you to impact change.

    It's all about you.

    More terms:

    Genetic diversity: variation in a population (could be age distribution in our class)

    Species: different in obvious ways (definitions vary on this)

    Species diversity: variation of species in a habitat (age distribution in the school or elab)

    Speciation: an adaptation based on stress

    Evolution needs three things:

    1. some form of genetic variation
    2. some stress that favors this variation
    3. survivors have to reproduce and carry on the variation
    Think of giraffes as an example:
    1. longer necks in some animals
    2. drought that kills all short neck creatures (just like in land before time)
    3. long neck animals survive to reproduce and carry on the variation
    There is a theory that the background rate of mutation/speciation was much higher long ago because our atmosphere was thinner, and enabled more cosmic rays to penetrate, causing much higher rates of mutation/speciation.
    Cool stuff:
    In England, butterflies have adapted since 1850 to look more like soot from coal fires.
    In NYC, a species of "subway mosquitoes" have been found that feed on humans in a dark, cool place
    Huh.

    Extinction is the opposite of speciation, where species die off.
    There is such a thing as a "background rate of extinction", which we have surpassed by many times
    Diversity is good: think of monoculture food crops: one pest kills everything.

    Food production: see Malthus and Norman Borlaug, e.g. Mexico famine

    Anthopogenic (anthro=man, genic=cause) Climate change:
    Greenhouse gases (see car windshield as an example)
    Not too many people know we need some CO2 to keep water above freezing-think of this as we search for exoplanets...
    Resource depletion is hard to grasp, but resource constraints are easier:
    If we had a major tsunami here that closed airports (all near the shore) and ports, how long would we have:
    electricity?
    water? (pumped by electricity)
    food?

    Recall our first concept:
    energy->water->food->culture

    1. With energy you can move/purify water
    2. With water you can grow food
    3. With food you can maintain a culture

    Sustainability: Thinking of forever

    Click for full-size image
    Notice that these are not your usual "energy, food and water" items people think about.
    Sustainability is living within your means.
    Starbucks example...

    Ecological footprint: created by Jurgen Randers and Mathis Wackernagel (both here for the opening of this famed structure)
    1. energy
    2. settlements
    3. timber
    4. food
    5. seafood
    6. carbon
    7. built up land
    8. forests
    9. cropland
    10. fisheries
    What impacts your global footprint?

    Module 3 -------
    Next: The notorious scientific method
    Look up "cold fusion"
    Look up "Monty Python witch scene"

    Why are lab notebooks done in pen?
    What were the last words of Alfred Nobel's brother?
    Why is there no Nobel prize for Mathematics?

    Replication is key: if you have magic beans, and nobody can replicate your results, you are in trouble.
    See also Korean claims of cloning humans (not sheep, we already did that-her name was Dolly)
    Key idea: even wrong experiments are valuable: Edison: "I learned 800 ways not to make a light bulb"

    Read about Chlorpyrifos, then look up Round up (glyphosate) in the recent news. Which of these do we use at HPA? Explain.

    Control group is the population you don't mess with, to determine change.
    Natural experiment is something you observe cause and effect from, but not by what you setup (look up Mount Pinatubo and cooling of the planet)

    Frog book (iBook) chapter one: REVIEW FROM LAST CLASS----------------------------------

    Ozone hole example: compare and contrast with anthropogenic climate change-why different?

    Renewable vs. non-renewable resources (one politician recently tried to get nuclear energy classified as a renewable resource-it takes billions of years)

    Renewable can be a forest, if used at a sustainable rate, otherwise not

    Malthus again, Norman Borlaug again, and a new name: Paul Erlich (1968) "The Population Bomb"
    In short: famine and conflict will arise from population growth.
    In reality, it is much more complex, involving politics (e.g. Syria), economics (e.g. refugees from sub-Saharan Africa) and water rights (e.g. Palestine).
    Jurgen Randers told me during the Elab opening that he thought in the next 50 years, China would invade Mongolia to the north, stating as a cause "religious instability" but the real cause would be access to water there.
    If the Himalayan snowpack ceases to be a seasonal flow for the rivers of Asia, most of Western China would be in a drought, unable to produce food.
    Look up flooding in the yangtze river...

    Ecological Footprint again:

    Tragedy of the Commons:
    Garrett Hardin, UCSB (look this up)
    We will duplicate this with a fishing example:
    Download file "TOTCGoldfishActiv.pdf"



    Comments

    /groups/apenvironmentalscience/search/index.rss?tag=hotlist/groups/apenvironmentalscience/search/?tag=hotWhat’s HotHotListHot!?tag=hot6/groups/apenvironmentalscience/sidebar/HotListadminadmin2020-08-19 15:43:59+00:002020-08-19 15:43:59updated30adminadmin2011-09-08 21:36:21+00:002011-09-08 21:36:21updated29adminadmin2011-08-24 23:20:40+00:002011-08-24 23:20:40updated28adminadmin2011-08-24 22:42:36+00:002011-08-24 22:42:36updated27adminadmin2011-08-22 02:41:09+00:002011-08-22 02:41:09updated26adminadmin2011-08-22 02:40:02+00:002011-08-22 02:40:02updated25adminadmin2011-08-21 20:39:11+00:002011-08-21 20:39:11updated24adminadmin2011-08-21 20:30:42+00:002011-08-21 20:30:42updated23adminadmin2011-08-21 20:30:13+00:002011-08-21 20:30:13updated22adminadmin2011-08-21 20:25:48+00:002011-08-21 20:25:48updated21adminadmin2011-08-21 20:25:18+00:002011-08-21 20:25:18updated20adminadmin2011-08-21 00:22:12+00:002011-08-21 00:22:12updated19adminadmin2011-08-21 00:18:56+00:002011-08-21 00:18:56updated18adminadmin2011-08-21 00:15:43+00:002011-08-21 00:15:43updated17adminadmin2011-08-21 00:12:37+00:002011-08-21 00:12:37updated16adminadmin2011-08-21 00:12:02+00:002011-08-21 00:12:02updated15adminadmin2011-08-20 23:59:41+00:002011-08-20 23:59:41updated14Added tag - hotadminadmin2011-08-20 23:59:38+00:002011-08-20 23:59:38addTag13Added tag - conservationadminadmin2011-08-20 23:59:32+00:002011-08-20 23:59:32addTag12Added tag - critical thinkingadminadmin2011-08-20 23:59:19+00:002011-08-20 23:59:19addTag11Added tag - ch1adminadmin2011-08-20 23:59:08+00:002011-08-20 23:59:08addTag10Added tag - sustainabilityadminadmin2011-08-20 23:59:05+00:002011-08-20 23:59:05addTag9adminadmin2011-08-20 20:47:39+00:002011-08-20 20:47:39updated8adminadmin2011-08-20 20:46:15+00:002011-08-20 20:46:15updated7adminadmin2011-08-20 20:43:07+00:002011-08-20 20:43:07updated6adminadmin2011-08-20 19:14:13+00:002011-08-20 19:14:13updated5adminadmin2011-08-20 19:11:26+00:002011-08-20 19:11:26updated4adminadmin2011-08-20 18:59:57+00:002011-08-20 18:59:57updated3adminadmin2011-08-20 18:56:59+00:002011-08-20 18:56:59updated2First createdadminadmin2010-11-07 01:41:28+00:002010-11-07 01:41:28created1wiki2020-08-19T15:43:59+00:00groups/apenvironmentalscience/wiki/welcomeFalseCh01 Overview/groups/apenvironmentalscience/wiki/welcome/Ch01_Overview.htmladmin30 updatesCh01 Overview Welcome to our APES wiki. You should be able to do the following after logging in with your account: To create a new page, click the ...Falseadmin2020-08-19T15:43:59+00:00adminadmin2013-02-05 02:24:03+00:002013-02-05 02:24:03updated4Added tag - hotadminadmin2013-02-05 02:24:02+00:002013-02-05 02:24:02addTag3adminadmin2013-02-05 02:05:35+00:002013-02-05 02:05:35updated2First createdadminadmin2013-02-05 02:03:35+00:002013-02-05 02:03:35created1wiki2013-02-05T02:24:03+00:00groups/apenvironmentalscience/wiki/394a8FalseEnergy notes/groups/apenvironmentalscience/wiki/394a8/Energy_notes.htmladmin4 updatesEnergy notes Week of 2.4.13: energy wrap-up e2 video: coal vs. nuclear in class AP exams: FRQ 2002.1 2004.2 2006.1 2007.2 2008.1 ...Falseadmin2013-02-05T02:24:03+00:00adminadmin2013-02-05 02:23:20+00:002013-02-05 02:23:20updated6Added tag - hotadminadmin2013-02-05 02:23:18+00:002013-02-05 02:23:18addTag5adminadmin2013-02-05 02:23:12+00:002013-02-05 02:23:12updated4adminadmin2013-02-05 02:21:48+00:002013-02-05 02:21:48updated3adminadmin2013-02-05 02:20:26+00:002013-02-05 02:20:26updated2First createdadminadmin2013-02-05 02:06:00+00:002013-02-05 02:06:00created1wiki2013-02-05T02:23:20+00:00groups/apenvironmentalscience/wiki/c360bFalseFeb-May plan/groups/apenvironmentalscience/wiki/c360b/FebMay_plan.htmladmin6 updatesFeb-May plan 1. conclusion of energy chapters (see previous wiki) 2. GCC AP questions FRQ: 2006.2 2005.3 2005.4 2007.3 ...Falseadmin2013-02-05T02:23:20+00:00adminadmin2012-03-07 05:53:55+00:002012-03-07 05:53:55updated14adminadmin2012-03-07 05:43:38+00:002012-03-07 05:43:38updated13adminadmin2012-03-07 05:41:35+00:002012-03-07 05:41:35updated12adminadmin2012-03-07 05:38:57+00:002012-03-07 05:38:57updated11Added tag - hotadminadmin2012-03-07 05:38:55+00:002012-03-07 05:38:55addTag10adminadmin2012-03-07 05:36:47+00:002012-03-07 05:36:47updated9adminadmin2012-03-07 05:22:26+00:002012-03-07 05:22:26updated8adminadmin2012-03-07 05:20:01+00:002012-03-07 05:20:01updated7adminadmin2012-03-07 05:18:58+00:002012-03-07 05:18:58updated6adminadmin2012-03-07 04:58:55+00:002012-03-07 04:58:55updated5adminadmin2012-03-07 04:57:33+00:002012-03-07 04:57:33updated4adminadmin2012-03-07 04:56:53+00:002012-03-07 04:56:53updated3adminadmin2012-03-07 04:54:20+00:002012-03-07 04:54:20updated2First createdadminadmin2012-03-07 04:53:33+00:002012-03-07 04:53:33created1weblog2012-03-07T05:53:55+00:00groups/apenvironmentalscience/weblog/de030FalseGreen Apple/groups/apenvironmentalscience/weblog/de030/Green_Apple.htmladmin14 updatesGreen Apple Team, Please watch this video about NYC: Trailer: http://www.pbs.org/e2/episodes/101_the_green_apple_trailer.html On the server: http://physics.hpa...Falseadmin2012-03-07T05:53:55+00:00adminadmin2011-09-13 19:08:24+00:002011-09-13 19:08:24updated4Added tag - hotadminadmin2011-09-13 19:08:22+00:002011-09-13 19:08:22addTag3adminadmin2011-09-13 19:08:10+00:002011-09-13 19:08:10updated2First createdadminadmin2011-09-13 19:04:30+00:002011-09-13 19:04:30created1weblog2011-09-13T19:08:24+00:00groups/apenvironmentalscience/weblog/4ecddFalseQuestions for Wednesday, wiki adds/groups/apenvironmentalscience/weblog/4ecdd/Questions_for_Wednesday_wiki_adds.htmladmin4 updatesQuestions for Wednesday, wiki adds Team, I'd like to try something for class tomorrow: each of you to create a question from chapter 3, and email it to me by this evening (Tuesday). Pl...Falseadmin2011-09-13T19:08:24+00:00hot/groups/apenvironmentalscience/search/index.rss?sort=modifiedDate&kind=all&sortDirection=reverse&excludePages=wiki/welcomelist/groups/apenvironmentalscience/search/?sort=modifiedDate&kind=all&sortDirection=reverse&excludePages=wiki/welcomeRecent ChangesRecentChangesListUpdates?sort=modifiedDate&kind=all&sortDirection=reverse&excludePages=wiki/welcome0/groups/apenvironmentalscience/sidebar/RecentChangesListmodifiedDateallRecent ChangesRecentChangesListUpdateswiki/welcomeNo recent changes.reverse5searchlist/groups/apenvironmentalscience/calendar/Upcoming EventsUpcomingEventsListEvents1Getting events…