Vocab 1
What is a Population?
All the individuals of one species living in a particular area.
What is a carrying capacity?
The greatest number of a particular species that the environment can support, given the natural resources available.
What are Pollutants?
Any substance that contaminates the environment.
How do we extract the energy from fossil fuels?
We ignite/burn them.
What element are all fossil fuels primarily made out of?
Carbon.
What is Hydroelectricity?
Electric currents produced from the energy of moving water.
What is a nonrenewable resource?
Resources that cannot be replaced by natural processes as quickly as they are used.
What are Hazardous Wastes?
Wastes that are poisonous, cause cancer, or catch fire
Our big three fossil fuels account for what percentage of the USA's total energy use?
80-81%
We boil them.
What is a fossil fuel?
What is a Renewable Resource?
Resources that can be replaced by natural processes faster than humans can consume them.
What is Biomass?
Renewable organic matter, such as wood, soy, corn, fibers, rice hulls, and animal manure.
Why do we burn fossil fuels at power plants and not wood?
Fossil fuels generate 2-3 more times more energy than burning wood.
15% of petroleum is not used as fuel. What is that 15% used for?
Making plastics.
What is Fusion?
The combination of atomic nuclei at very high temperatures
What is Fission?
When energy is released when the nucleus of an atom splits apart.
What is Geothermal Energy?
Thermal energy that is contained in and around magma.
What are the three fossil fuels and what are their states of matter?
Coal - Solid
Natural Gas - Gas
Petroleum - Liquid
Why do we have more coal than any other fossil fuel?
Because coal formed from the remains of plants while natural gas and oil formed from the remains of animals. There were far more plants than animals 300-400 million years ago.
What is a Nuclear Reactor?
Devices that uses energy from controlled nuclear reactions to generate electricity
What is Nuclear Waste?
Any radioactive material that results when radioactive materials are used.
What is a Photovoltaic Cell?
A device that converts radiant energy directly into electrical energy.
What are the four categories of energy use?
Commercial, Residential, Transportation, and Industrial
Put the following in order from 1-5:
As living things die their biomass settles to the bottom of ancient seas, swamps, and bogs forming thick layers of organic materials.
The layers of organic matter become trapped under layers of sediments trapping it in the ground.
About 300 million years ago the Earth was covered with rich amounts of living matter. The Earth was much warmer and wetter overall.
Those carbon compounds collect under layers of impermeable rock layers and eventually form into our fossil fuels.
Over millions of years the trapped organic matter slowly breaks down concentrating the amount of carbon.
1. About 300 million years ago the Earth was covered with rich amounts of living matter. The Earth was much warmer and wetter overall.
2. As living things die their biomass settles to the bottom of ancient seas, swamps, and bogs forming thick layers of organic materials.
3.The layers of organic matter become trapped under layers of sediments trapping it in the ground.
4. Over millions of years the trapped organic matter slowly breaks down concentrating the amount of carbon.
5. Those carbon compounds collect under layers of impermeable rock layers and eventually form into our fossil fuels.