Investigating Global Issues

• How much plastic ends up in the ocean every year?

  12 million tons
• What is the deadliest form of plastic pollution?

  discarded fishing lines + nets
• How many marine animals are estimated to be killed by the deadliest form of plastic pollution?

  half a million
• How are animals adapting and taking advantage of plastic rafts?


  Using them as shelter
• What natural floating objects were Columbus turtles only found on?

  Seaweed and driftwood
• What percentage of observed drifting objects is now plastic pollution?

  90%
• How many tons of discarded fishing gear is left in the oceans each year?

  Over a million
• What sea creature is especially vulnerable to discarded fishing gear?

  Turtles
• How many sea turtles did the BBC Planet film while saving colombus crabs?

  Eight
• Plastics in the ocean break down into microplastics through photodegradation. This is where heat energy from the Sun breaks apart the polymer chains that bind the plastic together
• Plastics in the ocean break down through what process?

  Photodegradation
• What is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch?

  Plastic pollution in the Pacific being accumulated by ocean gyres. These are a large system of circular currents formed by global wind patterns and forces created by Earth's rotation.
• Ocean gyres have trapped together and formed the Great Pacific Garbage Patch
• 1.2M pieces of plastic found in the GPGP in 2015
• An aerial survey of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch was conducted. They found there were 250 pieces of plastic for every human in the world.
• The size of the GPGP was 3x the size of France - which is 80,000 tons of waste
• IN CLIMATE GRAPHS:

  Temperature is the line

  Rainfall is the bar
• Fill in the gaps

  A) Emergents

  B) Canopy

  C) Under canopy

  D) Ground level

  E) Shrub level

  
• Global temperature has increased drastically from 1980
• Since the 1970's global warming has been occurring
• Climate change has been happening since the creation of the Earth, global warming is just making it more extreme.
• Examples of greenhouse gases: CO2, nitrous oxide, methane
• Greenhouse gases are like a blanket that cover the Earth, but now there are too much and the blanket is too thick. It traps heat energy but currently it is trapping too much heat- global warming.
• Humans have contributed to global warming by industrial activity, transport emissions and agriculture (cows) which has added gg's and created the enhanced greenhouse effect- faster than average rising temperatures.
• Since 1900 global sea level has increased by 20m
• Some birds are migrating earlier and some plants are flowering earlier
• Globally weather has become even more intense (rainfall, droughts)
• Tropical rainforests have over 2000mm of rainfall annually. Temperatures range from 20c to 30c. The high temperatures leads to rapid evaporation which increases humidity. The combination of these creates good conditions for plant growth.
• Deforestation is the conversion of forest to another land in the long term reduction of tree canopy cover below 10%
• Deforestation is the conversion of forest to another land in the long term reduction of tree canopy cover below 10%
• 3 causes of rainforest destruction: Logging for timber and pulp, Commercial farming, Mining and mineral extraction
• 70% of the Peruvian Rainforest is for gas and oil extraction
• Coal, copper and gold are mined in rainforests