Zehra's Webpage
Team 4:
Environmental Impact
Evalutation
My group (Team 4) is assigned to evaluate the exploration and production strategy with reference to environmental impact. The collective strategy of our team for research is to contact alumni mentors and get in touch with students from Teams 2 and 3 to get an idea of the information they are looking into.
Personal Aims and Objectives:
-update website on a weekly bases
-meet weekly targets for research
-analyze different alternatives and matching scenarios to ANWR
10/21/03
n evaluation of the environmental impact of the Exploration and Production strategy would involve knowledge of not only the methods for exploration and production of oil but also of the ANWR ecosystem . As a part of Team 4, I have decided to work with and collect information regarding the ANWR ecosystem and to come up with a classification that would aid our analysis in the coming week.
In the last time meeting, a few parameters had been set up for classifying the ecosystem. They are as follows:
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* ABIOTIC
->Structure
(1) Atmosphere
(2) Soil
(3) Water
Each of these categories can be further divided into:
-Energy
-Chemistry
-Dynamics
* BIOTIC
-> Flora
-> Fauna
(1) Species
(2) Behavior
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Generally the geography of the ANWR region can be subdivided into:
*coastal lagoons
*barrier islands
*artctic tundra
*foothills
*mountains
*boreal forests
Alternatively ANWR could be classified with respect to:
(1)Climatology
One should take into account some of the factors/ variables the arctic region is sensitive to. For example:
(1) There is large temperature change over marginal ice zone and shelf areas , which causes reduced ice thickness.
(2)Ozone loss takes place in the mid latitudes and the role of the Arctic polar vortex
(3)Solar irradiance - there are decreasing amounts of global irradiatnce reaching the surface of the Arctic.
There is no simple division as such, since there are many important, complex and climate feedback mechanisms that involve polar regaions such as ANWR. For example global changes in the concentration of radiatively active gases causes changes in the radioactive exchange at the surface and in the atmosphere which may eventually be modified by polluted air eaching the Arctic from industrial areas in the Northern Hemisphere.
(2)Glaciology
(3)Geology
The physical models that can be specifically researched are those of the:
-atmosphere (part of climatology research)
-land surface
-oceans
-sea ice
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It is difficult to predict the exact and dirrect environmental impacts caused by exploration and the production of oil in the ANWR region, which is a part of the Arctic-terrestrial ecosystem, because of the interactions within the Ecosystem and between the changing environmental variables. The environmental conditions that cause changes in levels of precipitation, the length of the growing season, cloudiness and UV-B radiation levels are different for specified regions in the Arctic It is the combination of natural environmental changes and anthroprogenic stresses which now present threats to the terrestrial arctic ecosystems.
Environmental characteristics of the ANWR ecosystem
Stress
-Despite the long, dark and cold winters due to which water required for life forms is in solid state, organisms have a tendency to adjust.
-Variation in precipitation and soil moisture that could lead to extremes of flood and anaerobic conditions or drought in the summer, are also a part of the temperature differentials that determine the survival of flora and fauna. On the other hand permafrost dynamics determines soil moisture for plants, soil microbes and invertebrates.
Disturbance and mechanical impacts
-Permafrost dynamics.
-Freeze thaw cycles in soil and rock, which produces patterning in different landscapes and hence disrupts plant communities and soil fauna when ice grows.
-Water erosion that occurs during permanent degradation, which results in the removal of soil and organic matter.
-Wind erosion , erodes substrate and plants through ice crystal abraision.
Snowcover
-Limits length of active period for plants.
-Offers benign environment for plants, invertebrate and winter active herbivoures beneath the snow cover.
(The following categories will be sustantiated and the information shall be posted on the webpage over the weekend)
Biotic characteristics
-Growth and life cycle strategies for plants
-Characteristics of Arctic Animals
-Biodiversity
-Population dynamics
Responses of the biota to environmental change
-Responses of organisms
-Impllications of climatic change for interactions between soil microbes and plants
-Implicaitons for interactions between plants and animals
-Changes in distribution of organisms and communities
Feedback from Arctic terrestiral ecosystems (applicable to ANWR) to global environmental change
-Carbon stocks, trace gas fluxes
-Carbon-siock source relationships
-Albedo