[Mission 2023] QUED ( Questions from Editorials ) 18 November 2022

Solution: c)

The gas in the magma of Hawaii’s volcanoes tends to escape, and so lava flows down the side of their mountains when they erupt. Hawaii’s volcanoes are called shield volcanoes because successive lava flows over hundreds of thousands of years build broad mountains that resemble the shape of a warrior’s shield.

Shield volcanos are also found in California and Idaho as well as Iceland and the Galapagos Islands. Alaska’s Wrangell-St. Elias National Park has eight shield volcanoes including Mount Wrangell. Volcanoes like Mount St. Helens are called composite or stratovolcanoes. Their steep, conical slopes are built by the eruption of viscous lava flows and rock, ash and gas. Japan’s Mount Fuji is another example of a composite volcano.

How do scientists monitor Mauna Loa?

Scientists use tiltmeters to track long-term changes in the tilting of the ground, helping them identify when the ground is swelling or deflating.

A rapid change in tilt can indicate when an eruption will occur. There’s also a thermal webcam at Mauna Loa’s summit that will identify the presence of heat. And satellite radar can keep track of ground swelling and deflation.

Source

Solution: d)

Climate engineering (also called geoengineering) is a term used for both carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and solar radiation management (SRM), also called solar geoengineering, when applied at a planetary scale.

The following list is an example technologies that have been called climate engineering approaches:

Carbon dioxide removal (CDR)

• Biochar
• Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS)
• Direct air capture and carbon storage (DACCS)
• Enhanced weathering (EW)

Solar Radiation Management (SRM)

• Marine cloud brightening (MCB)
• Mirrors in space (MIS)
• Stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI)

Passive daytime radiative cooling (PDRC) 

Solution: b)

Solution: c)

The Supreme Court has declared the National Green Tribunal’s (NGT) position as a “unique” forum endowed with suo motu powers to take up environmental issues across the country.

“The exercise of power by the NGT is not circumscribed by the receipt of applications. When substantial questions relating to the environment arise and the issue is civil in nature and those relate to the Act, the NGT, in our opinion, even in the absence of an application, can self-ignite action either towards amelioration or towards prevention of harm,” a three-judge Bench held in a judgment.

The Tribunal has to perform equally vital roles that were preventative, ameliorative or remedial in nature. “The functional capacity of the NGT was intended to leverage wide powers to do full justice in its environmental mandate,”

The judgment described the NGT “as a complimentary, competent, specialised forum to deal with all environmental multidisciplinary issues both as original and also as an appellate authority, which complex issues were hitherto dealt with by the High Courts and the Supreme Court”.

“Unlike the civil courts, which cannot travel beyond the relief sought by the parties, the NGT is conferred with power of moulding any relief,” the court stated.

Source

Solution: c)

Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs):

• Typically, an ETF mirrors a particular index, which means the group of stocks in the ETF would be similar to those in the index that it is benchmarked to.
• They are traded on stock exchanges like shares.
• Usually, ETFs are passive funds where the fund manager doesn’t select stocks on your behalf. Instead, the ETF simply copies an index and endeavours to accurately reflect its performance.
• In an ETF, one can buy and sell units at prevailing market price on a real time basis during market hours.