Environmental Science (5th period) 10/10/08
Posted: October 10, 2008
http://toxics.usgs.gov/definitions/eutrophication.html
1. What is eutrophication?
2. Your opinion/thinking question: How is eutrophication related to photosynthesis?
3. What does an algal bloom reduce?
4. How does agriculture contribute to eutrophication?
Go to http://todayinscience.wordpress.com/2008/02/24/corn-boom-causing-fisheries-doom/
5. What crop are American farmers growing more than at any time since World War II? Why?
6. How is the nation’s corn crop fertilized?
7. What happens to this nitrogen-based fertilizer?
8. Why does this run-off of fertilizer cause a “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico? (thinking question – relate this to your definition of eutrophication)
9. What were two solutions proposed by environmentalists to solve the runoff problem?
10. Why are American farmers growing more corn?
11. How is corn different from soybean and alfalfa?
12. What do you propose as a solution to this problem?
