How can urban living be sustainable

How can urban living be sustainable? Urban living means living in a city or town or a densely populated area. A sustainable city is an urban area where residents have a way of life that will last a long time. The environment suffers minimal damage, economic, historic and social factors should also be able to stand the test of time. However one area or building can be sustainable and eco-friendly but the scale is only very small so isn't a lot of use in the long run. In cities and towns presently and in the future, we will have a number of issues facing us to make a sustainable city. Some of these issues are; waste disposal, efficient public transport, housing, energy supplies, supporting local businesses and protecting our natural environment. Waste Disposal Waste disposal is one of the biggest issues facing us. The only reason it is an issue is because there is too much waste. We are running out of ways to dispose it; that is suitable, cheap and sustainable. At the moment, each person throws away about 450kg of rubbish yearly. This means that over 111 million tonnes of rubbish end up in landfill sites around the UK. Landfill is the most common method of disposing waste; over 64% of our bin rubbish ends up in a landfill site (excluding industrial, business, and hospital waste). A landfill is carefully structured to isolate it from the surrounding environment

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 2478
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Geography
Access this essay

Why does Green Peace want Antarctica as a World Park?

Christian German 8A Why does Green Peace want Antarctica as a World Park? Antarctica has become a unique place in the modern world, the only continent that remains relatively untouched by human interference and therefore arguably the only pristine wilderness left on Earth. For Greenpeace it seemed imperative to keep it that way. Some ecologists have even argued that Antarctica could provide important information for future generations seeking to reverse the environmental degradation wrought by humanity in the Twentieth Century. Paradoxically, despite winds of up to 450 kilometres per hour and temperatures reaching -50C Antarctica has the most delicate ecosystem of any place on earth. Ever since humankind began to explore the continent, from Amundsen and Scott's famous battle to the South Pole onwards, it had been noted that Antarctic ecosystems take years to recover from damage if they recover at all: a footprint in the moss can linger for decades before it disappears. This proposed World Park can also protect the delicate ecosystem like the Antarctic Treaty but even better let scientists make experiments while not harming the environment to see ways on how to deal with climate change. This shows it would be better for Antarctica to become a World Park because the animals will get a better protection from all those people in there while without it will just encourage

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 503
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Geography
Access this essay

Development Case Study - Dharavi, Mumbai, India.People want to redevelop in Dharavi as it is situated in the heart of Mumbai, very close to the CBD on extremely valuable ground. Which in their eyes is being "wasted" by using it as a slum.

Name Sean Tuffy Case Study - Dharavi, Mumbai, India. Two news articles and links to various websites related to Dharavi can be found on: http://www.geographyalltheway.com/igcse_geography/population_settlement/settlement/squatter_settlements.htm Where in the world is Dharavi? It is in Mumbai, India, located extremely close to the CBD on a very valuable 175 hectares of land. Describe the location of Dharavi? Dharavi is one of the largest slums in the world, with a populaton of about 800,000 spread over 0.67 square miles. It is sandwiched between two of Mumbai's suburban railway lines, the Western and Central Railways, it is also extremely close to Mumbai's CBD making it very valuable. Briefly describe the history of Dharavi? Dharavi was once an island in the 18th century, which was made up of mangrove swamp where fishermen lived, but in the 19th century the swamps began to vanish and consequently so did the fishing industry. Soon after several other separate islands in the region began joining together to form one big island, this was helped by a big dam at Sion which significantly slowed water flow down. These now dry marshes were perfectly suited for residential use and migrants soon established a colony, first the Gujarat, followed by many others. In the 1920s the area had a large influx in migrants. Dharavi's first ever school was built in 1924 and was the only

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 1149
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Geography
Access this essay

Earthquake in Kobe – A Natural Disaster Waiting to Happen

h/w Saturday, 05 October 2002 Earthquake in Kobe - A Natural Disaster Waiting to Happen Introduction It all happened on the morning of January the 17th 1995, the second most populated and industrialized city in one of the biggest economies of the world, was struck by a powerful earthquake causing thousands of injuries and hundreds of deaths. It was a disaster waiting to happen. Situated in the south-central region of Japan, Kobe was the second largest city in Japan people and industrial-wise, after Tokyo. It was the biggest earthquake to hit Japan, after the great Kanto earthquake of 1923, where around 140,000 people were killed, most after the impact. The strong shock occurred across the fault that runs through the city of Kobe, and the Awaji island. The earthquake lasted for around 20 seconds, with around 5,500 deaths resulting from it. The number of injuries reached about 35,000 in total, and nearly 180,000 buildings were said to have collapsed. The damage was recorded over a radius of 100 km from the epicentre. The earthquake also hit the cities of Osaka and Kyoto. The economic loss was worse than anything. It was the largest ever to be lost directly from a natural disaster. Directly from the shaking itself, around 13 trillion yen worth of damage was caused. This is around £100 billion and before, the loss of life, production, and business

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 1173
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Geography
Access this essay

River Chess Coursework

River Chess Coursework My coursework involve a study of the river chess near Amersham. It is obviously based on the work that we did as part of the Rivers module. My work will show how this river changes as it moves downstream. Firstly, the River Chess springs from the Chess Valley in Chesham and Hertfordshire which is in South-East of England. The reason why we studied R. Chess is because the nearest river to us and it will be wise to take measurements of the size of a small river instead of a large e.g. Thames, where it will be difficult to take measurements. Chess River has a drainage basin of 105 square km that covers parts of Chesham, Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire. Site 1: 1.5 km from source Site 2: 16km from source Site 3: 17 km From source It is important to study the rivers and systems, so we know what to expect and will be able to control them in different ways Leaves example - where the rivers it will not lead to a disaster to the surrounding villages as we all know that if a major river flood can cause devastation as when the Mississippi flooded in New Orleans in 2005. Therefore studying the history and the rivers we have Aid to bring about the prevention of floods. However, the study of rivers in the summer is different than in the winter because the river depth varies depending more rain in

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 803
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Geography
Access this essay

Why did so many people die in the 2010 Haiti earthquake?

On the 12th January 2010, a tragic 7.0 magnitude quake on the Richter scale struck near Port au Prince in Haiti. This devastating earthquake was caused by a conservative plate boundary which had not caused an earthquake for 200years. 3,500,000 people were affected by the quake, 220,000 were estimated to have died, and over 300,000 people were injured. Over 188,383 houses were badly damaged 105,000 were destroyed by the earthquake (293,383 in total) and 1.5m people became homeless. After the quake there were 19 million cubic metres of rubble and debris in Port au Prince which was enough to fill a line of shipping containers stretching end to end from London to Beirut (The capital of Lebanon). Furthermore, 4,000 schools were damaged or destroyed and 60% of Government and administrative buildings, 80% of schools in Port-au-Prince and 60% of schools in the South and West Departments were destroyed or damaged. The impact of this was one of the most devastating anyone had ever witnessed. However, why did San Francisco earthquake (Loma Prieta) in 1980 which was magnitude of 6.9 in the Richter scale only cause 69 deaths compared to the death toll of 220,000 in Haiti? The area with the most damage, Port-au-Prince, was built on loose sedimentary rock, which amplifies the seismic waves and intensifies them. We can see how much extra damage the loose sediment does as houses that were

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 1206
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Geography
Access this essay