Dictionary- words and their meanings

(Alphabetic order)

Biodiversity: Variety of different species and variety of ecosysems.

Climate: Physical properties of an area based on analysis of weather records over a longer period (minimum 30 years). Two main factors; temperature and precipitation.

Ecological footprint: measures how fast we consume resources and generate waste.

Ecosystem: An environment together with the group of organisms that live within it.

Economic growth: Increase in the capacity to provide people with goods and services.

Energy: Capacity to do work by performing mechanical, physical, chemical, or to cause a heat transfer between to objects at different temperatures.

Environment: All external conditions, factors, matter, and energy, living and nonliving, that affect any living organism.

Environmentally sustainable society: Sosciety that meets the current and future needs of its people for basic resources without compromising the ability of future generations of humans and other species from meeting their basic needs.

Food security: Condition under which person in a given area has daily access to enough food to have an active and healthy life.

GDP: Gross Domestic Product, annual market value of all goods and services produced by all firms and organizations, foreign and domestic, operating within a country.

Geology: Study of the earth’s dynamic history.

Global climate change: longterm changes in any aspects of the earth’s climate, especially temperature and precipitation.

Global warming: Warming of the earth’s lower atmosphere because of increases in the concentrations of one or more greenhouse gases.

Greenhouse effect: Natural effect that releases heat in the atmosphere near the earth’s surface. If the atmospheric concentration concentrations of greenhouse gases increase and other natural processes do not remove them, the average temperature in the atmosphere will increase.

Greenhouse gases: Gases in the earth’s lower atmosphere that cause the greenhouse effect. Example: carbon dioxide, methane

Hazardous chemical: Chemical that can cause harm because it is flammable or explosive, can damage the skin or lungs, or can cause allergic reactions of the immune system.

Hazardous (toxic) waste: Any solid, liquid, or containerized gas that can catch fire easily, is corrosive to skin tissue or metals, is unstable and can explode or relase toxic fumes. Often from manufacturing processes.

More-developed country: Country that is highly industrialized and has a high per capita GDP.

Natural capital: Natural resources and natural services that keep us and other species alive and support our economies.

Natural resources: Materials such as air, water, and soil and energy in nature that are essential or useful to humans.

Nonrenewable energy: Energy from resources that can be depleted and are not replenished by natural processes within a human time scale. Examples: burning of oil and coal.

Nonrenewable resource: Resource that exists in a fixed amount in the earth’s crust and has the potential for renewal ny geological, physical, and chemical processes taking place over hundreds of millions to billions of years. Example: copper, aliminium, coal, and oil.

Overfishing: Harvesting so many fish of a species that not enough breeding stock is left to replenish the species and it becomes unprofitable to harvest them.

Overgazing: Destruction of vegetation when too many grazing animals feed too long on a specific area and exceed the carrying capacity of a rangeland or pasture area.

Recycle: Collecting, separating, and changing items into something new.

Reduce: To consume less of a good or service in order to reduce one’s environmental impact and to save money.

Reforestation: Renewal of trees and other types of vegetation on land where trees have been removed.

Renewable energy: Energy that comes from resources that are replenished bt natural processes continually or in a relatively short time.

Renewable resource: Resource that can be replenished rapidly through natural processes as long as it is not used up as faster than it is replaced.

Resource: Anything obtained from the environment to meet human needs and wants.

Reuse: To use a product over and over again in the same form.

SCP: Sustainable Development and Production

SDG: Sustainable Development Goals.

Sustainability: Ability of earth’s various systems, including human cultural systems and economies, to survive and adapt to changing environmental conditions indefinitely.

Sustainable agriculture: Method of growing crops and raising livestock based on organic fertilizers, soil conservation, water conservation, biological pest control, and minimal use of nonrenewable fossil-fuel energy.

Sustainable consumption and production: fulfilling the needs of all while using fewer resources, including energy and water, and producing less waste and pollution.

Sustainable development: Development that meets the basic needs of the current generations of humans and other species without preventing future generations of humans and other species from meeting their basic needs.

UNESCO: United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Waste management: Managing wastes to reduce their environmntal harm without seriously trying to reduce the amount of waste produced.

Water pollution: Any physical or chemical change in surface water or groundwater that can harm living orgamism or make water unfit for certain uses.

eSource: Miller, G. T. and Spoolman, S. E. (2007). Living in the environment . 18th ed. USA: Cengage Learning