AQA Chemistry 5.10.1.1
Using the Earth’s resources and sustainable development
Warmth, shelter, food, transport: all from the Earth’s resources. Sort them finite or renewable from the data, pair natural products with what replaces them, and work out how long a resource will last.
Triple Science · Higher tier
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Wood or coal?
Both can be burned to keep a house warm. Both came from plants: wood from trees growing now, coal from plants that lived millions of years ago.
If you had to guess, which one could we keep using forever?
Data cards · finite or renewable
Is it replaced as fast as we use it?
Humans use the Earth’s resources for warmth, shelter, food and transport. Natural resources, supplemented by agriculture, provide food, timber, clothing and fuels. Finite resources from the Earth, oceans and atmosphere are processed to provide energy and materials.
Renewable: replaced by natural processes as fast as it is used. Finite: not replaced on a human timescale, however much is left. Read each card, then decide.
Card 1 of 6
Timber from a managed forest
Sustainable development
Chemistry plays an important role in improving agricultural and industrial processes to provide new products and in sustainable development, which is development that meets the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
Recycling is not renewing
Recycling aluminium uses about 95% less energy than extracting new aluminium, and makes the ore last longer. The aluminium is still a finite resource. More in the recycling lesson.
Orders of magnitude · how long will it last?
Divide what is left by how much is used each year. Reserves and use must be in the same unit first. Then read the size of the answer: tens of years is urgent; millions of years is not.
years left = reserves ÷ use per year
Written out · a data step, not an AQA equation
Think again · recycled means renewable?
“Aluminium is renewable, because we can recycle it.”
Your call
ChooseIs aluminium a finite or a renewable resource?
Sort
What supplements or replaces it?
Place each product with the natural product it supplements or replaces.
Tap a card, then tap the box it belongs in. Tap a placed card to take it back.
Command words in this lesson
- State
- An example: wool is supplemented by polyester.
- Calculate
- Same units first, then reserves ÷ use per year.
- Evaluate
- Use the order of magnitude to say how significant the number is.
Key fact
Sustainable development meets the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
Key note · AQA 5.10.1.1
Using the Earth’s resources
- Humans use the Earth’s resources for warmth, shelter, food and transport.
- Natural resources, supplemented by agriculture, provide food, timber, clothing and fuels.
- Finite resources are not replaced on a human timescale; renewable resources are replaced as fast as they are used.
- Natural products are supplemented or replaced by agricultural and synthetic ones: wool by polyester, rubber by synthetic rubber, wood by plastics, wild fish by farmed fish.
- Sustainable development meets present needs without compromising future generations’ ability to meet theirs.
- Years left = reserves ÷ use per year, in the same units. The order of magnitude shows how significant it is.
Photograph this card. Tomorrow, cover it and say each line first.
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Not sure whether a resource is finite?
Reserve and use figures in the calculations are round numbers for practice, not data.