| Jul 2012| © 2012 UPES

THE MULTIDISCIPLINARY NATURE OF ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES and GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

Arti JainHealth Safety Fire and Environment

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ENVIRONMENT

An envelop which surrounds all living and non living beings and effects, directly or indirectly the sustenance of life on green and living planet earth.

The combination of external physical conditions that affect and influence the growth, development, and survival of organisms

Is the sum total of water, air and land and the interrelationships that exist among them and with the human beings ,other living organisms and materials.

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Components of Environment

Biotic Components

Abiotic Components

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Environmental Science - A Multidisciplinary Science

Environment is a multidisciplinary Science which includes study of :

Chemistry Physics Geology Climatology Earth Sciences Engineering Modelling of weather/ecosystem Remote Sensing Maths Zoology Botany etc. etc...

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OBJECTIVES

The environment can be protected by adopting the following strategies:

• Maintenance of environmental quality

• Balancing the ecosystem

• To restrict and regulate the exploitation of natural resources

• To adopt engineered technology without creating adverse effects on the environment

• To control over population and over consumption of resources

• To promote environmental education and training among people

• To formulate laws and regulations to control pollution

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OBJECTIVES OF ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION

To help children and general public towards:

Awareness: acquire sensitivity to the total environment and its allied problems.

To create an overall understanding of the impacts and effects of behaviors and lifestyles - on both the local and global environments, and on the short-term and long-term

Skill: acquire skills for identifying environmental problems.

To help individuals, groups and societies acquire the action competence or skills of environmental citizenship - in order to be able to identify and anticipate environmental problems and work with others to resolve, minimize and prevent them.

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Knowledge: To know conservation of natural resources.

To help individuals, groups and societies gain a variety of experiences in, and a basic understanding of, the knowledge and action competencies required for sustainable development

Evaluation ability:

To evaluate environs measures and education and education programmes in terms of social, economic, ecological and aesthetic factors.

Values - to help individuals, groups and societies acquire feelings of concern for issues of sustainability as well as a set of values upon which they can make judgments about appropriate ways of acting individually and with others to promote sustainable development

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Participation :

To provide individuals, groups and societies with opportunities to be actively involved in exercising their skills of environmental citizenship and be actively involved at all levels in working towards sustainable development.

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IMPORTANCE OF ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPEMENT

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Environment is not a single subject.

It is an integration of several subjects that include both Science and Social Studies.

To understand all the different aspects of our environment we need to understand

biology, chemistry

physics, geography,

resource management, economics

and population issues.

Thus the scope of environmental studies is extremely wide and covers some aspects of nearly every major discipline.

We live in a world in which natural resources are limited.

Water, air, soil, minerals, oil, the products we get from forests, grasslands, oceans and from agriculture and livestock, are all a part of our life support systems.

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Without them, life itself would be impossible.

As we keep increasing in numbers and the quantity of resources each of us uses also increases, the earth’s re- source base must inevitably shrink.

The earth cannot be expected to sustain this expanding level of utilization of resources.

We waste or pollute large amounts of nature’s clean water; we create more and more material like plastic that we dis-card after a single use.

Increasing amounts of waste cannot be managed by natural processes.

These accumulate in our environment, leading to a variety of diseases and other adverse environmental impacts now seriously affecting all our lives.

Air pollution leads to respiratory diseases, water pollution to gastro-intestinal diseases, and many pollutants are known to cause cancer.

Improving this situation will only happen if each of us begins to take actions in our daily lives that will help preserve our environmental resources.

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We cannot expect Governments alone to manage the safeguarding of the environment, nor can we expect other people to prevent environmental damage.

We need to do it ourselves.

Aesthetic/Recreational value of nature:

The aesthetic and recreational values that nature possesses enlivens our existence on earth.

This is created by developing National Parks and Wildlife Sanctuaries in relatively undisturbed areas.

The beauty of nature encompasses every aspect of the living and non-living part of our earth.

One can appreciate the magnificence of a mountain, the power of the sea, the beauty of a forest, and the vast expanse of the desert.

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NEED FOR ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION

All major natural resources in the country are in grave danger of irreparable damage.

A society cannot survive if its natural resources are rendered unfit for use by its people.

The only hope of salvaging this grave situation is by making the young aware that they need to proactively begin to protect the environment they will inherit.

Science and Technology can help in a limited way but cannot deliver it.

The moral and ethical education for changing people’s attitude

To protect children living in polluted regions, environmental education represents a relevant means of prevention

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It is need for the hour to propose the environmental education with the essential elements of moral philosophy.

For conceptual change

Essential components Of The environmental education

Alerting the public to the need to achieve global sustainable development and the likely consequences of failing to do so.

Focusing the educational curricula for global sustainable development by incorporating the know –how and skills and also the moral imperatives.

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Responsibility of Government:

We often feel that managing all this is something that the government should do.

But if we go on endangering our environment, there is no way in which the Government can perform all these clean-up functions.

It is the prevention of environment degradation in which we must all take part that must become a part of all our lives.

Just as for any disease, prevention is better than cure.

To prevent ill-effects on our environment by our actions, is economically more viable than cleaning up the environment once it is damaged.

Individually we can play a major role in environment management.

This can only be made possible through mass public awareness.

Mass media such as newspa- pers, radio, television, strongly influence public opinion.

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However, someone has to bring this about. If each of us feels strongly about the environment the

Practice and promote issues such as

saving paper, saving water

reducing use of plastics

practicing the 3Rs principle of reduce, reuse, recycle,

and proper waste disposal.

Join local movements that support activities such as

saving trees in your area

go on nature treks,

recycle waste

buy environmentally friendly products.

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• Practice and promote good civic sense

- such as no spitting or tobacco chewing

- no throwing garbage on the road

- no smoking in public places

- No defecating in public places.

• Take part in events organized on World Environment Day, Wildlife Week, etc.

• Visit a National Park or Sanctuary, or spend time in whatever nature you have near your home.

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Curriculum development

Reasons for including moral education in engineering Curricula:

• As future planners

• designers,

• builders and decision makers

• students shoulder special responsibility in protecting the integrity of nature and the natural environment.

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Key Concepts and Definitions MATTER: Substance, which occupies space and has mass.

CHEMISTRY: The science of matter- the study of the composition, structure and properties of matter and the changes that matter undergoes.

ENERGY: The capacity to do work, such as causing a body of matter to move. The rate at which energy is transferred or moved. That is energy per unit time is called power.

RESOURCES: Matter of specific kinds and energy needed by humans for their well being or existence.

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CLIMATE: The overall, long term characteristics of weather, including temperature, precipitation and, storms and wind patterns in an area.

POLLUTANT: A substance present in greater than natural concentration as a result of human activity and having a net detrimental effect upon its environment or upon something of value in that environment.

BIOLOGICAL COMMUNITY: The total of all living organisms inhabiting in the specified area. A biological community and the environmental conditions that characterize it are termed a biome. A group of organisms of the same species in a biological community is called population.

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PRODUCTIVITY: Rate of production of biomass per unit time per unit area by organisms called productivity.

AUTECOLOGY—the study of individual species in relation to the environment

BIOTIC : living components of the system, in nature.

ABIOTIC: non-living components of any system in nature

INDUSTRIAL ECOLOGY: is the study of the relationship of living

organisms with their environment (industry).

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AUTOTROPH : is an organism that produces organic compounds from carbon dioxide as a carbon source, using either light or reactions of inorganic chemical compounds as a source of energy.

AUTECOLOGY : the study of individual species in relation to the

environment

ALLEE EFFECT : is a phenomenon which describes a positive relation

between population density and the per capita growth rate.

In other words, for smaller populations, the reproduction and survival of

individuals decreases. This effect usually saturates or disappears as

populations get larger.

* It is named after W. C. Allee.

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ECOLOGY

Original definition given by : Haeckel

Ecology = oikos logos (Greek words)

Oikos (house or dwelling place) & logos (the study of)

Ecology is the study of the relationship of organisms with their environment.

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Ecology is the scientific study of the processes influencing the distribution

and abundance of organisms, the interactions among organisms, and the

interactions between organisms and the transformation and flux of energy

and matter.

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INDUSTRIAL ECOLOGY : is the scientific study of the driving forces that influence the flow of selected materials among economic processes, energy and matter.

Domains of Industrial Ecology

1. Material extractor

2. Material processor / Manufacturer

3. Consumer

4. Waste processor

Material Processor

Consumer

Material Extractor

Waste processor

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Global Environmental Issues

Population explosion

Land degradation

Loss of Biodiversity

Global warming

Habitat Destruction

Ozone Depletion

Ground water depletion

Deforestation

Environmental Pollution

Acid Rain