Humans altering Earth
Storyboard Text
- Humans affect the quality, availability, and distribution of water
- Building dams affects ocean water levels. It also affects sediment transport which in turn affects water quality upstream.
- Chemicals used in agriculture can enter streams and other bodies of water through surface runoff. This impacts the quality of water (contaminates it.)
- Burning fossil fuels creates sulfur dioxide. When it enters the atmosphere, it dissolves in raindrops to make sulfuric acid. This then falls back to Earth in the form of acid rain which damages existing vegetation and ecosystems in the bodies of water where it lands. This affects the quality of water on Earth.
- Greenland ice has been observed to be melting at an increasing rate, therefore contributing to sea level rise and the quantity and distribution of water.
- Extracting water from wells faster than it can be replenished by rain etc. is water mining. This is a human-created impact that affects water volume. Wells can also creates cones of depression that move the groundwater table downwards.
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