Insights Static Quiz -63, 2018 –Environment

Answer – a

• Non-biodegradable wastes are generated by thermal power plants which produce fly
  ash; integrated iron and steel plants which produce blast furnace slag and steel melting slag. Industries manufacturing aluminium, zinc and copper produce mud and tailings. Fertilizer industries produce gypsum. Nowadays, fly ash and slag from the steel industry are utilised by the cement industry.
• Fuel obtained from plastic waste has high octane rating. It contains no lead and is known as “green fuel”.

Answer – d

• Tropical Rain Forests – mahogany, ebony and rosewood
• Tropical Deciduous Forests – sal, teak, peepal, neem and shisham
• Thorny Bushes – Cactus, khair, babool, keekar
• Mountain Vegetation – Chir, Pine and Deodar

Answer – a

• Khadins, tanks and nadis in Rajasthan, bandharas and tals in Maharashtra, bundhis in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, ahars and pynes in Bihar, kulhs in Himachal Pradesh, ponds in the Kandi belt of Jammu region, and eris (tanks) in Tamil Nadu, surangams in Kerala, and kattas in Karnataka are some of the ancient water harvesting, including water conveyance, structures still in use today
• Parts of Himachal Pradesh had evolved a local system of canal irrigation called kulhs over four hundred years ago. The water flowing in the streams was diverted into man-made channels which took this water to numerous villages down the hillside. The management of the water flowing in these kulhs was by common agreement among all the villages. Interestingly, during the planting season, water was first used by the village farthest away from the source of the kulh, then by villages progressively higher up. These kulhs were managed by two or three people who were paid by the villagers. In addition to irrigation, water from these kulhs also percolated into the soil and fed springs at various points. After the kulhs were taken over by the Irrigation Department, most of them became defunct and there is no amicable sharing of water as before.

Answer – a

• 10% can be taken as the average value for the amount of organic matter that is present at each step and reaches the next level of consumers.
• Since so little energy is available for the next level of consumers, food chains
  generally consist of only three or four steps. The loss of energy at each step is
  so great that very little usable energy remains after four trophic levels
• The lesser number of carnivores is a corollary of the reason, not a reason in itself

Answer – b

• The water at the surface of the sea or ocean is heated by the Sun while the water in deeper sections is relatively cold. This difference in temperature is exploited to obtain energy in ocean-thermal-energy conversion plants. These plants can operate if the temperature difference between the water at the surface and water at depths up to 2 km is 293 K (20°C) or more. The warm surface-water is used to boil a volatile liquid like ammonia. The vapours of the liquid are then used to run the turbine of generator. The cold water from the depth of the ocean is pumped up and condense vapour again to liquid.
• Due to geological changes, molten rocks formed in the deeper hot regions of earth’s crust are pushed upward and trapped in certain regions called ‘hot spots’. When underground water comes in contact with the hot spot, steam is generated. Sometimes hot water from that region finds outlets at the surface. Such outlets are known as hot springs. The steam trapped in rocks is routed through a pipe to a turbine and used to generate electricity. The cost of production would not be much, but there are very few commercially viable sites where such energy can be exploited. There are number of power plants based on geothermal energy operational in New Zealand and United States of America .