The impact of humans on the glacial environment the economic value of both relict and active environments and the impacts they face

1. Humans and Glacial
Environments
Lower Sixth

2. What opportunities do landscapes like this
offer?

3. What about this one?

4. Consider
• How do we in the UK use our relict landscapes
• Write down how we use these environments
• Explain how we try to protect these areas

5. 2005 – Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
(MEA)
Value of Polar Ecosystems
Fisheries Wild foods
Genetic resources Fresh water
Carbon sequestration Climate regulation
Aesthetic Value Spiritual value

6. Putting a value on the landscape
• There are active, high latitude and high altitude polar
regions
• There are also relict glaciated landscapes
• What is the difference?
• The first being truly considered a wilderness area as they
are remote
• Harsh environments with little or no population
• The latter are less remote highly populated and provide
many opportunities for economic development

7. What do they offer?
Relict
• Farming
• Mining and quarrying
• Hydroelectricity
• Tourism
Active
• These can give people spiritual value
• They can help maintain the gene pool of wild
organisms
• They provide sanctuary to many birds and
animals that might otherwise be impacted upon
by man
• Scientific research

8. Economic Value
• Farming:
• In developing countries where transport links are poor
where the indigenous population live off subsistence
farming
• 70% of people in Bolivia live in the High Andes. They
grow staple foods like potato and quinoa as well as
rearing llamas and alpacas
• In developed countries farming is generally pastoral.
Animals are grazed in the summer on highland
pasture and brought down in the winter to be on the
farms

9. Economic Value
• Forestry:
• Commercial forestry is often
found in upland areas such as the
Lake District due to the difficulty
of farming profitably in these
conditions
• In the UK its done by the Forestry
Commission
• Mainly grow conifers such as
Sitka Spruce as it tolerates the
poor soil conditions

10. Economic Value
• Mining and Quarrying:
• Erosion can expose economically valuable rocks, as
well as mineral deposits and ore.
• The metamorphic, igneous rocks in the lake district
allowed for lead and slate mining.
• The lowland outwash plains have been useful for
gravel and sand quarrying

11. Economic Value
• HEP:
• Norway and New Zealand get
90% of their power from HEP
mainly due to natural ribbon
lakes or a dammed reservoir in a
glaciated valley.
• Switzerland has over 500 HEP
stations providing 70% of its
power
• Although it is considered green it
does have issues

12. Economic Value
• Tourism:
• Skiing – Alps, Pyrenees, Rockies, Canada
• Mountaineering - Alps, Pyrenees, Rockies, Canada
• Climbing – Lake District, North Wales, Cairngorms,
Yosemite National Park
• Walking – Lake District
• There has been huge increases in tourism over the
last 30 years and glaciated areas both active and
relict are considered environmentally fragile and care
needs to be taken to preserve them

13. Tourism v management
• Tourism in these areas needs management so the
benefits do not outweigh the costs
• It’s a fine balance between protecting our environment
and allowing people to enjoy it

14. Ecology and environmental value
• Glacial and periglacial landscapes make huge contributions to
the life support systems of our planet
• 75% of all freshwater is locked up in ice (Glaciers contain 2% of
all global water)
• Many of the eroded valleys provide natural hollows for
reservoirs
• Valuable as a source of irrigation when other sources dry up
due to glacial melt during warmer periods (Glaciers produce
260m gallons for Boulder Colorado)
• The extensive permafrost and tundra peat acts as carbon sinks
• However, this will reduce as positive feedback within the
warming climate

15. Tundra Ecosystems
• High Latitudes remain polar deserts
• However, at lower latitudes (70 – 75 degrees N) there
is a continuous covering of vegetation composed of
dwarf shrubs, sedges and grasses, mosses, and
lichens.
• Tundra plants have adapted to harsh conditions
• It has low primary productivity and low biodiversity
• As nutrient values in the soil are low (Permafrost and
cold conditions)
• Any human impact in these conditions can have a
serious impact

16. Human Impacts
• Acid rain
• Oil spills such as Exxon Valdez March 24, 1989
which grounded on Bligh Reef in Alaska's Prince
William Sound, rupturing its hull and spilling nearly 11
million gallons of Prudhoe Bay crude oil into a
remote, scenic, and biologically productive body of
water
• Toxic waste from coalmining in Svalbard and metal
smelting in the Kola peninsula in Russia have all
contaminated areas
• ANWR is another area that has come under threat in
the USA (Alaska) and has created huge controversy