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Books > Earth & environment > Geography > Physical geography > General
The first field guide to all of the world's major land habitats-richly illustrated and packed with essential information to help you get the most out of your outdoor adventures Accurately identifying and understanding habitats in detail is essential to any birder, naturalist, outdoor enthusiast, or ecologist who wants to get the most out of their experiences in the field. Habitats of the World is the first field guide to the world's major land habitats-189 in all. Using the format of a natural history field guide, this compact, accessible, and comprehensive book features concise identification descriptions and is richly illustrated-including more than 650 color photographs of habitats and their wildlife, 150 distribution maps, 200 diagrams, and 150 silhouettes depicting each habitat alongside a human figure, providing an immediate grasp of its look and scale. Each major habitat has an illustrated "climate box" that allows easy comparisons between habitats. Thirty other illustrated boxes present clear explanations of complex phenomena affecting habitats-from plate tectonics and mountain formation to fire regimes and climate change. Requiring no scientific background, Habitats of the World offers quick and reliable information for anyone who wants a deeper understanding and appreciation of the habitats around them, whether in their own backyard or while travelling anywhere in the world. Covers 189 of the world's major land habitats Provides all the information you need to quickly and accurately identify and understand habitats anywhere in the world Features concise text, more than 650 color photographs of habitats and their wildlife, an up-to-date distribution map for each habitat, and hundreds of helpful diagrams and illustrations
This book assesses the impact of energy transitions on the future of natural gas in the EU energy mix. As we approach 2050, the requirement to sharply decrease CO2 and other GHG emissions means that the role of gas infrastructure in the EU and beyond will change drastically. But what does such change mean? To address this question the author critically analyses the EU's evolving natural gas market policy and law. Clearly structured throughout, the book explores the following questions: How can we maximise the potential of gas infrastructure to reduce carbon emissions? What are the lessons learned from decision making experience in the natural gas sector? Is the EU moving towards or away from a climate neutral gas sector? How will green and low carbon gas technologies be supported? And, are proposals to drive a growing share of hydrogen, biomethane, and synthetic methane to the system just an excuse to prolong fossil fuel operations? The book explores whether the EU will continue to subsidy natural gas projects or decarbonise the gas grid before 2050, and at what cost. Recommendations are proposed for a new regulatory and policy framework for development and operation of hydrogen pipelines, injection of biomethane into the existing gas grid and for pipelines carrying CO2. Filling an important gap in the literature, this book aims to develop an understanding of and clarify the complex range of legislation involved within a single analytical framework. Although the focus is mainly on the future of gas in the EU, the findings and recommendations are relevant for a much wider geography. This book will be an invaluable reference to policy makers and practitioners as well as researchers and students across the social sciences interested in the future of energy.
This encyclopaedia contains 350 entries arranged alphabetically. The topics include biospeleology (by organism and by habitat); cave and karst geoscience; cave archaeology and human use of caves; art in caves; cave and karst history; hydrology and groundwater; conservation and management; and exploration, equipment and rescue. The largest number of entries are on cave and karst sites across the world from individual caves such as Mammoth Cave (the world's longest cave) and Krubera (the deepest in the world) through key regions such as the Dinaric karst and the Gunung Mulu World Heritage Site, to coverage of individual countries such as Iran and New Zealand or larger areas (Asia, Central; Asia, South-east, etc.). The essays in this volume, written by an international team of specialists, progress from general concepts to deeper understanding with jargon explained for the non-specialist. Each essay is fully referenced, with suggestions for further reading and cross-references to related encyclopaedia articles.
This book argues that legal geography provides new insights into contemporary conservation challenges. Despite unprecedented efforts, we are facing an extinction crisis, and in situ protected area programs are falling short. This book discusses the protected area phenomenon and calls for changes to current approaches, informed by legal geography -an inter-disciplinary area focused on the intertwined people-place-law dynamics that enable, or disable, effective management practices. The book examines two protected area types: World Heritage Sites, where places of 'outstanding universal value' are protected for all humanity, and Ramsar protected wetland sites, one of the first global environmental protection initiatives. Using case studies from the Australasian region (Australia, the Pacific and Southeast Asia), it reveals how current approaches can be improved by taking into account the people-place-law nexus embedded in legal geography research.
Despite our growing awareness of the vital role they play in the global environment, wetlands remain among the most endangered ecosystems on Earth and are still being destroyed and degraded at an alarming rate. This much-needed publication, which includes contributions from leading researchers and practitioners, presents a holistic perspective on the restoration of wetland ecosystems such as shallow lakes, streams, floodplains and bogs. Through the use of carefully chosen case studies, the authors examine European wetland restoration projects from Scandinavia to Bulgaria and from Ireland to Belarus, focusing on the lessons they can teach to a new generation of conservationists. As well as reviewing the sum of current knowledge on the subject, the text is a store of practical know-how, covering a wide range of conservation approaches and techniques. It analyzes the major problems in the field and identifies key principles for achieving sustainability in wetland restoration. The topics covered include: * the role of wetlands in landscape functioning * human interference with natural processes such as water and matter cycles and energy dissipation * the impact of land use on global problems such as climate change, floods and droughts * the role played by diversity in wetland functioning The work shows that without sustainable land use over the totality of their catchment areas, and without cohesive inter-agency cooperation, individual restoration projects will have a short life span. The balance between scientific background and practical restoration makes this book a valuable resource for scientists as well as wetland managers, decision makers and land use planners, as well as students of ecology, nature conservation and environmental protection.
This book explores China's eco-development strategies and practices from a multi-scalar perspective, discussing the importance of interplay between multi spatial levels of the built environment, as well as the stakeholders who are key players for China's eco-development. Based on a selection of eco-development Chinese case studies - eco-city, eco-community and eco-building - it highlights how specific eco initiatives and green features are applied and practiced, offering a guide to China's strategy directions and design and planning trends. The book identifies gaps and strategies and solutions for future eco-development expected to take place in China in the coming decades, as well as useful references for eco-development in other countries, and provides a useful resource for studies in the fields of urbanism, sustainable development and eco-design.
An ethnographic tapestry of personal and institutional narratives about Jerusalem's social history. Overlooking the Border: Narratives of a Divided Jerusalem by Dana Hercbergs continues the dialogue surrounding the social history of Jerusalem. The book's starting point is the border that separated the city between Jordan and Israel in 1948-1967, a lesser-known but significant period for cultural representations of Jerusalem. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, the book juxtaposes Israeli and Palestinian personal narratives about the past with contemporary museum exhibits, street plaques, tourism, and real estate projects that are reshaping the city since the decline of the peace process and the second intifada. What emerges is a portrayal of Jerusalem both as a local place with unique rhythms and topography and as a setting for national imaginaries and agendas with their attendant political and social tensions. As sites of memory, Jerusalem's homes, streets, and natural areas form the setting for emotionally charged narratives about belonging and rights to place. Recollections of local customs and lifeways in the mid-twentieth century coalesce around residents' desire for stability amid periods of war, dispossession, and relocation?? intertwining the mythical with the mundane. Hercbergs begins by taking the reader to the historically Arab neighborhoods of West Jerusalem, whose streets are a battleground for competing historical narratives about the Israeli-Arab War of 1948. She goes on to explore the connections and tensions between Mizrahi Jews and Palestinians living across the border from one another in Musrara, a neighborhood straddling West and East Jerusalem. The author rounds out the monograph with a semiotic analysis of contemporary tourism and architectural ventures that are entrenching ethno-national separation in the post-Oslo period. These rhetorical expressions illuminate what it means to be a ??erusalemite in the context of the city's fraught history. Overlooking the Border examines the social and geographic significance of borders for residents' sense of self, place, and community, and for representations of the city both locally and abroad. It is certain to be of value to scholars and advanced undergraduate and graduate students of Middle Eastern studies, history, urban ethnography, and Israeli and Jewish studies.
Airplane Performance on Grass Airfields presents an experiment-based approach to analysis and flight testing of airfield performance on grass runways. It discusses improvements for operations efficiency and safety of these airfields. The book analyzes the interaction between the landing gear wheels and the surface of a grass runways during both takeoff and landing. Considering the ground performance of an aircraft on a grass runway, the book covers test methods and devices for measuring performance and introduces an information system for the surface condition of grass airfields: GARFIELD. The system is based on a tire-grass interaction model and uses digital soil maps, as well as current meteorological data obtained from a weather server. The book is intended for researchers and practicing engineers in the fields of aviation and aircraft safety and performance.
This book presents extensive and new information on the geomorphology of cratonic areas of southern South America. It includes valuable data relating to recurrent controversies in general geomorphology beyond the boundaries of South America and reveals the great need to integrate many different aspects of geomorphology in regional studies. With the focus on ancient landscapes and especially on planation surfaces it addresses the question of what processes could form such huge features, and how they can be preserved for so long. Many of the papers include maps of planation surfaces or other geomorphic units. The volume brings together an up-to-date, state-of-the-art collection of information on South American geomorphology, and shows beyond doubt that geomorphology is on the same time scale as global tectonics, biological evolution and major climate change. Some of the papers describe ancient geomorphological features of areas that have never been studied or published before, while others describe regions which are totally unknown to the public. The scope of the book extends from tropical latitudes north of the Tropic of Capricorn, south to freezing Patagonia in the "roaring fifties", more than 3,500 km from north to south. Including over one thousand citations from geological and geomorphological literature, this volume will serve as a starting point for a whole new phase of studies of the fascinating landscape history of southern South America.
This book brings together original and novel perspectives on major developments in human rights law and the environment in Africa. Focusing on African Union law, the book explores the core concepts and principles, theory and practice, accountability mechanisms and key issues challenging human rights law in the era of global environmental change. It, thus, extend the frontier of understanding in this fundamental area by building on existing scholarship on African human rights law and the protection of the environment, divulging concerns on redressing environmental and human rights protection issues in the context of economic growth and sustainable development. It further offers unique insight into the development, domestication and implementation challenges relating to human rights law and environmental governance in Africa. This long overdue interdisciplinary exploration of human rights law and the environment from an African perspective will be an indispensable reference point for academics, policymakers, practitioners and advocates of international human rights and environmental law in particular and international law, environmental politics and philosophy, and African studies in general. It is clear that there is much to do, study and share on this timely subject in the African context.
“Unlike the standard nature guides that explain how to recognize common animals, Nature stresses the web of interrelationships that link the regional flora and fauna. This affectionate examination of some of North America’s most spectacular surviving old-growth forests will delight backpackers and armchair naturalists.†—Los Angeles Times Book Review Everything you ever wanted to know about the flora and fauna of Southeast Alaska is contained in the third edition of this lively field guide to the natural world, from bears to banana slugs, mountains to murrelets. The authors, who are both Alaskan residents and biologists, combine scientific research with personal experiences to make a definitive field guide for residents of or visitors to Southeast Alaska. The unique features of the book include: In-depth information about how wildlife coexists with the environment Detailed discussions of mammals, birds, fish, invertebrates, fungi, and plants Detailed map of wilderness areas in Southeast Alaska More than 200 black-and-white illustrations A bibliography, list of common and scientific names, and an index New to this edition: More than 100 new illustrations, many never before published, as well as new maps and photos Major expansion of sections on geology, old-growth forests, marine mammals, and amphibians Fifty-two new sidebars—written in the first person to give the text a more personal touch—that describe recent findings or experiences. Sweeping updates and elaborations to chapter narratives—often thanks to technology unknown in 1992. In-depth guide to Southeast Alaska’s flora and fauna; more than an identification manual, Nature explores how the species and habitats encountered in the woods and waters of Southeast Alaska fit into the bigger picture.
The study of ice composition represents an effective tool in our understanding of the dynamics of glaciers, ice sheets and ice shelves. The authors of this work relate the distribution of isotopes and impurities in ice masses to ice flow, to the key zone close to the ice-substratum interface and to the mechanisms effective in the contact zone between glacier and ocean. Other material in this book is concerned with how global changes may be induced by a climatic warming due to anthropogenic activities. This monograph on glaciology, geophysics and geomorphology is intended for researchers, graduate students and teachers.
This open access book is the first comprehensive overview of maritime or marine spatial planning. Countries across the globe are beginning to implement maritime spatial plans; however the authors of this collection have identified several key questions that are emerging from this growing body of MSP experience. How can maritime spatial planning deal with a complex and dynamic environment such as the sea? How can MSP be embedded in multiple levels of governance across regional and national borders - and how far does the environment benefit from this new approach? This book actively engages with the problems encapsulated in these questions, and explores possible solutions. Situated at the intersection between theory and practice, the volume draws together several strands of interdisciplinary research, reflecting on the history of MSP as well as examining current practice and looking towards the future. The authors and contributors examine MSP from disciplines as diverse as geography, urban planning, political science, natural science, sociology and education; reflecting the growing critical engagement with MSP in many academic fields. This innovative and pioneering volume will be of interest and value to students and scholars of maritime spatial planning, as well as planners and practitioners.
In The End of the Anthropocene, Michael J. Gormley examines literary imaginations of the anthropocene's end and the future of the astropocene. Gormley analyzes literary images of human tracks on Earth, the Moon, and Mars to characterize the late-stage anthropocene and to explore humanity's role in the universal ecosystem. The End of the Anthropocene uses a predictive and paradigmatic model of ecocriticism, examining science fiction works as interplanetary nature narratives.
"Lakes is my favorite kind of natural history: meticulously researched, timely, comprehensive, and written with imagination and verve."--Jerry Dennis, author of The Living Great Lakes Lakes might be the most misunderstood bodies of water on earth. And while they may seem commonplace, without lakes our world would never be the same. In this revealing look at these lifegiving treasures, John Richard Saylor shows us just how deep our connection to still waters run. Lakes is an illuminating tour through the most fascinating lakes around the world. Whether it's Lake Vostok, located more than two miles beneath the surface of Antarctica, whose water was last exposed to the atmosphere perhaps a million years ago; Lake Baikal in southern Siberia, the world's deepest and oldest lake formed by a rift in the earth's crust; or Lake Nyos, the so-called Killer Lake that exploded in 1986, resulting in hundreds of deaths, Saylor reveals to us the wonder that exists in lakes found throughout the world. Along the way we learn all the many forms that lakes take--how they come to be and how they feed and support ecosystems--and what happens when lakes vanish.
Laws of the Sea assembles scholars from law, geography, anthropology, and environmental humanities to consider the possibilities of a critical ocean approach in legal studies. Unlike the United Nations' monumental Convention on the Law of the Sea, which imagines one comprehensive constitutional framework for governing the ocean, Laws of the Sea approaches oceanic law in plural and dynamic ways. Critically engaging contemporary concerns about the fate of the ocean, the collection's twelve chapters range from hydrothermal vents through the continental shelf and marine genetic resources to coastal communities in France, Sweden, Florida, and Indonesia. Documenting the longstanding binary of land and sea, the chapters pose a fundamental challenge to European law's "terracentrism" and its pervasive influence on juridical modes of knowing and making the world. Together, the chapters ask: is contemporary Eurocentric law-and international law in particular-capable of moving away from its capitalist and colonial legacies, established through myriad oceanic abstractions and classifications, toward more amphibious legalities? Laws of the Sea will appeal to legal scholars, geographers, anthropologists, cultural and political theorists, as well as scholars in the environmental humanities, political ecology, ocean studies, and animal studies.
This book offers a critical analysis of core concepts that have influenced contemporary conversations about environment-society relations in academic, political, and civil circles. Considering these conceptualizations are currently shaping responses to environmental crises in fundamental ways, critical reflections on concepts such as the Anthropocene, metabolism, risk, resilience, environmental governance, environmental justice and others, are well-warranted. Contributors to this volume, working across a multitude of areas within environmental social science, scrutinize underlying worldviews and assumptions, asking a common set of key questions: What are the different concepts able to explain? How do they take into account society-environment relations? What social, cultural, or geo-political biases and blinders are inherent? What actions or practices do the concepts inspire? The transdisciplinary engagement and reflexivity regarding concepts of environment-society relations represented in these chapters is needed in all spheres of society-in academia, policy and practice-not the least to confront current tendencies of anti-reflexivity and denialism.
As a continent of extreme, rare and complex environments, Australia has produced a startling group of ecological pioneers. Australian thinkers and innovators have made some truly original contributions to ecological thought. This study traces the emergence of ecological awareness in Australia. By constructing a social history with chapters focusing on different fields in the arts, sciences, politics and public life, Martin Mulligan and Stuart Hill are able to bring to life the work of significant individuals.
A systematic, unifying approach to the dynamics of the ocean and atmosphere is given in this book, with emphasis on the larger-scale motions (from a few kilometers to global scale). The foundations of the subject (the equations of state and dynamical equations) are covered in some detail, so that students with training in mathematics should find it a self-contained text. Knowledge of fluid mechanics is helpful but not essential. Simple mathematical models are used to demonstrate the fundamental dynamical principles with plentiful illustrations from field and laboratory.
Revised and fully updated, this textbook provides a detailed yet accessible introduction to the key aspects of ecosystem services. Ecosystem services is one of the most powerful guiding principles for ecology, biodiversity conservation and the management of natural resources. It provides the basis of assessing the multiple values and services that ecosystems can provide to humankind, including diverse issues such as carbon sequestration, flood control, crop pollination and aesthetic and cultural services. The second edition of Ecosystem Services: Key Issues has been fully revised and updated to address policy and scientific developments, as well as new and emerging issues, such as nature-based solutions, zoonotic diseases and environmental justice. It includes new and updated case studies from across the world and each chapter contains further reading, learning objectives and discussion questions to aid student learning. The book details the historical roots of ecosystem services in the second half of the twentieth century, through initiatives such as the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, The Common International Classification of Ecosystem Services (CICES) and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. It shows how ecosystem goods and services can be categorised and valued in economic as well as non-monetary terms, while also highlighting some of the difficulties and limitations of valuation techniques. The author describes how themes such as systems thinking, social-ecological resilience and natural capital relate to ecosystem services, and how these can contribute to more sustainable and equitable development. This book will be essential reading for students and scholars of ecosystem services, ecology, environmental science, biodiversity conservation, environmental economics, natural resource management and sustainable development. It will also be of use to professionals and policymakers who are looking to integrate ecosystems and their services into their decision making processes.
The sixth edition of a bestseller, Air Quality provides students with a comprehensive overview of air quality, the science that continues to provide a better understanding of atmospheric chemistry and its effects on public health and the environment, and the regulatory and technological management practices employed in achieving air quality goals. Maintaining the practical approach that has made previous editions popular, the chapters have been reorganized, new material has been added, less relevant material has been deleted, and new images have been added, particularly those from Earth satellites.
An interdisciplinary work that comparatively studies rule of law practices and the relationship between the rule of law and regional integration, a topic largely explored in European integration. By looking at the function of the rule of law in ASEAN rather than what it 'means' measured on normative conception, the book situates the rule of law in broader institutional and political processes in the member states and in regional relations to show the motivations of member states in adopting a peculiar type of regional architecture. It asks whether forging the rule of law in the region can help build it internally for member states. The book revisits discourses on the 'spill-over' of economic integration, the impact of globalization in reshaping the state and generating new tools of the rule of law. It makes a comprehensive comparison - the European Union, Africa Union and MERCOSUR - showing the uneven pathways to rule of law in various contexts.
The Nile Basin contains a record of human activities spanning the last million years. However, the interactions between prehistoric humans and environmental changes in this area are complex and often poorly understood. This comprehensive book explains in clear, non-technical terms how prehistoric environments can be reconstructed, with examples drawn from every part of the Nile Basin. Adopting a source-to-sink approach, the book integrates events in the Nile headwaters with the record from marine sediment cores in the Nile Delta and offshore. It provides a detailed record of past environmental changes throughout the Nile Basin and concludes with a review of the causes and consequences of plant and animal domestication in this region and of the various prehistoric migrations out of Africa into Eurasia and beyond. A comprehensive overview, this book is ideal for researchers in geomorphology, climatology and archaeology.
This is an invitation to readers to ponder universal questions about human relations with rivers and water for the precarious times of the Anthropocene. The book asks how humans can learn through sensory embodied encounters with local waterways that shape the architecture of cities and make global connections with environments everywhere. The book considers human becomings with urban waterways to address some of the major conceptual challenges of the Anthropocene, through stories of trauma and healing, environmental activism, and encounters with the living beings that inhabit waterways. Its unique contribution is to bring together Australian Aboriginal knowledges with contemporary western, new materialist, posthuman and Deleuzean philosophies, foregrounding how visual, creative and artistic forms can assist us in thinking beyond the constraints of western thought to enable other modes of being and knowing the world for an unpredictable future. Riverlands of the Anthropocene will be of particular interest to those studying the Anthropocene through the lenses of environmental humanities, environmental education, philosophy, ecofeminism and cultural studies. |
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