- Roughly what volume percent of the global water inventory is comprised by groundwater?
Your answer:
About 97%.
Less than 1%.
About 25%.
About 10%.
- Which of the following is not a factor which limits the use of groundwater deeper than 750 m as a source of drinking water?
Your answer:
The cost of drilling each meter of well is progressively greater the deeper the well.
The permeability of the host rock generally decreases with depth so the rate of groundwater flow into a well would be progressively less.
Most water at these depths is mixed with petroleum.
The porosity of the host rock generally decreases with depth so there is less water to be extracted.
- In which of the following areas would you expect groundwater to lie consistently closest to the Earth's surface?
Your answer:
Adjacent to a perennial marsh.
At the top of a hill.
On a loose rock slope.
At the base of an alpine glacier.
- An ideal aquifer should possess:
Your answer:
low porosity, high permeability rocks or sediments.
high porosity, low permeability rocks or sediments.
low porosity, low permeability rocks or sediments.
high porosity, high permeability rocks or sediments.
- Which of the following rock types would typically make the best aquifer?
Your answer:
sandstone
granite
siltstone
claystone
- The erosion performed by overland flow of water is called:
Your answer:
sheet erosion.
discharge.
gully erosion.
stream flow.
- Soil erosion rates depend significantly upon the type of ground cover. Which of the following ground cover types would be most effective for minimizing soil erosion?
Your answer:
grass
wheat
bare soil
corn
- The western and eastern divides of the Mississippi drainage basin correlate to which of the following landforms?
Your answer:
The Rocky and Appalachian Mountains.
The Rocky Mountains and the Alps.
The Cascade Range and the Porcupine Mountains.
The Ural and Himalayan Mountains.
- What are the two basic conditions that are required for the development of a braided stream network?
Your answer:
Low stream discharge and very physically resistant streambed material.
High stream discharge and very physically resistant streambed material.
Low stream discharge and easily eroded streambed material.
High stream discharge and easily eroded streambed material.
- Which of the following is most essential for a desert to form?
Your answer:
The land elevation must be less than 100 m above sea level.
The evaporation rate must greatly exceed the precipitation rate.
There must be no trees of any kind.
The rainfall must be less than 10 inches a year.
- Drought and civil wars have plagued the southern and southeastern edge of the Sahara Desert for several years. Significant numbers of livestock, and thousands of people, have died. Which of the following proposed solutions to this problem would geologists support as a long-term solution?
Your answer:
De-populate the affected areas by relocation of the people.
Let all the livestock and people die.
Drill deeper groundwater wells.
Seed the clouds to produce more precipitation.
- A desert environment would be dominated by:
Your answer:
equal amounts of chemical and mechanical weathering.
mechanical weathering.
chemical weathering.
no weathering.
- In an arid or desert environment, which of the following mass wasting events would be least likely?
Your answer:
solifluction
rock fall
mudflow
creep
- In an arid environment, what are the three important factors that determine dune formation and morphology?
Your answer:
Wind strength, rainfall amount, degree of surface vegetation.
Wind strength, sand supply, degree of surface vegetation.
Sand supply, rainfall amount, wind strength.
Wind strength, surface rock type, rainfall amount.
- What is the most recent time that glacial ice sheets covered the landscape of present-day Michigan?
Your answer:
About 5,000 years ago.
About 45,000 years ago.
About 60,000 years ago.
About 15,000 years ago.
- What is the approximate thickness of the thickest ice in Antarctica?
Your answer:
7500 m
3500 m
10 m
1000 m
- Which of the following would be most similar to the average flow rate of glacial ice?
Your answer:
The speed of wind which is just able to transport silt-sized particles.
The flow rate of the Mississippi River near New Orleans.
The speed of the Gulf Stream oceanic current.
The average flow rate of groundwater.
- In glaciology terminology, the opposite of ablation is:
Your answer:
sublimation.
termination.
loess.
accumulation.
- Which of the following glacial features is most likely to be found in the present-day landscape of Oakland County?
Your answer:
cirque
horn
fjord
kettle
- Presently about 30% of the incoming solar radiation is simply reflected back to space without heating the Earth. This percentage was almost certainly greater 20,000 years ago. Why?
Your answer:
About half of the continents were covered by ice which more efficiently reflected light.
The Earth was spinning faster at this time and it was more difficult for solar radiation to penetrate the spinning atmosphere.
The Earth was covered with dense forests which more efficiently reflected light.
Much of the Earth was covered by highly reflective sand dunes.
- A rock or sediment body that effectively stores and transmits groundwater is called what?
Your answer:
- A rock or sediment body that is very inefficient at storing and transmitting groundwater is called what?
Your answer:
- Coarse-grained, poorly sorted, poorly stratified sediments that overlap at the base of desert mountains and make good aquifers are called what?
Your answer:
- Currently about what percentage (type a number) of the Earth's land surface is covered with glacial ice?
Your answer:
- What is the name of the boundary between the subsurface water unsaturated and saturated zones?
Your answer:
- What is the name of the bowl-shaped depression in which many alpine glaciers originate?
Your answer:
- Sinkholes, caves and disappearing streams are collectively described by what term?
Your answer:
- What term describes the measure of a substance's ability to transmit fluids?
Your answer:
- What greenhouse gas currently makes the largest contribution to the Earth's greenhouse effect?
Your answer:
- What greenhouse gas is emitted into the atmosphere in the greatest amounts by humans?
Your answer: