AGRICULTURE |
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Agriculture (a term which encompasses farming) is the art, science or practice of producing food, feed, fiber and many other desired goods by the systematic raising of plants and animals. Agri is from Latin ager ("a field"), and culture is from Latin cultura, meaning "cultivation" in the strict sense of tillage of the soil. Thus a literal reading of the English word yields tillage of the soil of a field. In actual usage, Agriculture denotes a broad array of activities essential to food and material production, including all techniques for raising and processing livestock (see Animal husbandry) no less than those essential to crop planting and harvesting.
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COASTAL WETLANDS |
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In physical geography, a wetland is an environment "at the interface between truly terrestrial ecosystems...and truly aquatic systems...making them different from each yet highly dependent on both" (Mitsch & Gosselink, 1986). In essence, wetlands are ecotones.
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HYDROLOGY |
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Hydrology (from Greek: Yδρoλoγια, Yδωρ+Λoγos, Hydrologia, the "study of water") is the study of the movement, distribution, and quality of water throughout the Earth, and thus addresses both the hydrologic cycle and water resources. A practitioner of hydrology is a hydrologist, working within the fields of either earth or environmental science, or civil and environmental engineering.
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LIQUIFIED NATURAL GAS - LNG |
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Liquefied natural gas or LNG is natural gas that has been processed to remove impurities and heavy hydrocarbons and then condensed into a liquid at atmospheric pressure by cooling it to approximately -163 degrees Celsius. LNG is transported by specially designed vessels and stored in specially designed tanks. LNG is about 1/600th the volume of natural gas at standard temperature and pressure (STP), making it much more cost-efficient to transport over long distances where pipelines do not exist. Where moving natural gas by pipelines is not possible or economical, it can be transported by LNG vessels, where the most common tank types are membrane(prismatic) or Moss Rosenberg(spheres).
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MINERALS, OIL, GAS |
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Fuel oil is a fraction obtained from petroleum distillation, either as a distillate or a residue. Broadly speaking, fuel oil is any liquid petroleum product that is burned in a furnace for the generation of heat or used in an engine for the generation of power, except oils having a flash point of approximately 40 °C (about 100 °F) and oils burned in cotton or wool-wick burners. In this sense, diesel is a type of fuel oil. Fuel oil is made of long hydrocarbon chains, particularly alkanes, cycloalkanes and aromatics. Factually and in a stricter sense, the term fuel oil is used to indicate the heaviest commercial fuel that can be obtained from crude oil, heavier than gasoline and naphtha.
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POLLUTION |
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Pollution is the release of environmental contaminants. Carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), and nitrogen oxides produced by industry and motor vehicles are common air pollutants. Sunlight converts nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons to ozone or smog. Water pollutants may consist of a wide range of organic and inorganic chemicals such as heavy metals, petrochemicals, chloroform, and bacteria. Water pollution may also occur in the form of thermal pollution and dissolved oxygen depletion. Soil contamination is an important aspect of environmental pollution; this phenomenon occurs when chemicals are released by spill or underground storage tank leakage. Among the most significant soil contaminants are hydrocarbons, heavy metals, MTBE, herbicides, pesticides and chlorinated hydrocarbons. The U.S., Russia, China and Japan are the world leaders in air pollution emissions; however, Canada is the number two country on a per capita basis.
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POWER PLANTS |
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A fossil fuel power plant is an energy conversion center that combusts fossil fuels to produce electricity, designed on a large scale for continuous operation.
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TECHNOLOGY |
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Technology is a word with origins in the Greek "technologia" ("τεχνολογία") "techne", "τέχνη" ("craft") and "logia", "λογία" ("saying")." "Technology" is a broad term dealing with the use and knowledge of humanity's tools and crafts.
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