ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES

(GLS684)

TOPOGRAPHICAL
ENVIRONMENTAL
Physical environmental
Earth profile
Distribution of the movement of
the earth's surface
 Diastrophism

• Diastrophism, also
called tectonism, large-scale
deformation of Earth’s crust by
natural processes, which leads
to the formation of continents
and ocean basins, mountain
systems, plateaus, rift valleys,
and other features by
mechanisms such
as lithospheric plate movement
(that is, plate
tectonics), volcanic loading,
or folding.
 Sudden Movement

• These movements cause considerable

deformation over a short span of time, and
may be of two types.
• Volcanic
– Volcanism includes the movement of
molten rock (magma) onto or toward the
earth’s surface and also formation of many
intrusive and extrusive volcanic forms.

• Earthquake
– It occurs when the surplus accumulated
stress in rocks in the earth’s interior is
relieved through the weak zones over the
earth’s surface in form of Earthquake kinetic
energy of wave motion causing vibrations
 LITHOSFERA MOVEMENT

Plate Tectonic Theory

• all of the major movements of the earth crust movements that produce
whether the movement vertically, horizontally or both simultaneously and
also includes the processes of formation of the Earth's crust
• The Earth's surface is divided into several lithosfera plate. These plates are
constantly moving relative to each other.
• plates collide or meet each other at the plate boundary
• a meeting between the plates produces three types of plate boundaries
– Transform boundary
– Divergent boundary
– Convergent boundary
Transform Boundary

Fault Line
A transform fault or transform
boundary is a plate boundary where
the motion is predominantly horizontal
It ends abruptly and is connected to
another transform, a spreading ridge, or
a subduction zone
 Divergent boundary

When a divergent boundary occurs

beneath oceanic lithosphere, the rising
convection current below lifts the
lithosphere, producing a mid-ocean
ridge.
Extensional forces stretch the
lithosphere and produce a deep fissure.
When the fissure opens, pressure is
reduced on the super-heated mantle
material below. It responds by melting,
and the new magma flows into the
fissure. The magma then solidifies and
the process repeats itself.
 Mid Ocean Ridges

sea level

Magma rises up
 Convergent boundary

Divide by two situation:

1. Subduction zone
2. Mobile belts
 Subduction Zone

• Subduction is a geological process that takes

place at convergent boundaries of tectonic
plates where one plate moves under another
and is forced or sinks due to gravity into the
mantle.
• Plates include both oceanic crust and continental
crust. Stable subduction zones involve the
oceanic lithosphere of one plate sliding beneath the
continental or oceanic lithosphere of another plate
due to the higher density of the oceanic
lithosphere.
• Usually have a high rate
of volcanism and earthquakes
• develop belts of deformation and metamorphism in
the subducting crust, whose exhumation is part
of orogeny and also leads to mountain building
Mobile belts
 Major Lithospheric Plates

• Pacific Plate – 103,300,000 km2

• North American Plate – 75,900,000 km2
• Eurasian Plate – 67,800,000 km2
• African Plate – 61,300,000 km2
• Antarctic Plate – 60,900,000 km2
• Indo-Australian Plate – 58,900,000 km2 often considered two
plates: Australian Plate – 47,000,000 km. ...
• South American Plate – 43,600,000 km2
 TSUNAMI

A tsunami is a large ocean wave that is caused

What causes by sudden motion on the ocean floor.
a tsunami?...
• This sudden motion could be :
– an earthquake,
– a powerful volcanic eruption,
– or an underwater landslide.
 The impact of a large meteorite could also
cause a tsunami.

 Tsunamis travel across the open ocean at

great speeds and build into large deadly
waves in the shallow water of a shoreline.
 TSUNAMI
Subduction Zones are Potential Tsunami
Locations stuck plate : continues to
descend into the mantle,
prevents a slow the motion causes a slow
and steady rate of distortion of the overriding
plate.
subduction and The result is an
instead the two accumulation of energy
plates become very similar to the energy
"stuck." stored in a compressed
spring. Energy can
accumulate in the
overriding plate over a
long period of time.

The moving wave begins travelling
out from where the earthquake has
occurred. Some of the water travels
out and across the ocean basin, and
at landward to flood
the overriding plate snaps back into an
unrestrained position. This sudden motion is
the cause of the tsunami - it gives an
enormous shove to the overlying water.
 ROCK CYCLE

• Understanding eksogen process

• The solid material that form the earth's crust
is rocks
• rocks including soil, sand, minerals
Rocks Cycle
Igneous rock
 Sedimentary rocks

• Sedimentary rocks are formed by the accumulation of sediments. There

are three basic types :

– Clastic sedimentary rocks such

as breccia, conglomerate, sandstone, siltstone, and shale are formed
from mechanical weathering debris.
– Chemical sedimentary rocks, such as rock salt, iron ore, chert, flint,
some dolomites, and some limestones, form when dissolved materials
precipitate from solution.
– Organic sedimentary rocks such as coal, some dolomites, and
some limestones, form from the accumulation of plant or animal
debris.
Sendimentary Rocks
 Metamorphic Rocks

• Metamorphic rocks have been modified by heat, pressure, and chemical

processes, usually while buried deep below Earth's surface.

• There are two basic types:

– Foliated metamorphic rocks such as gneiss, phyllite, schist,
and slate have a layered or banded appearance that is produced by
exposure to heat and directed pressure.
– Non-foliated metamorphic rocks such as hornfels, marble, quartzite,
and novaculite do not have a layered or banded appearance.
SOIL
Soil profile
 Soil texture

• Soil classification is typically made based on the relative

proportions of silt, sand and clay
Soil
 Soil erosion

• soil transfer rate exceeds the rate of soil

produced by the bedrock through weathering .
• Erosion, whether it is by water, wind or tillage,
involves three distinct actions – soil
detachment, movement and deposition.
• erosion is closely related to the climate, the
topography of the area (the slope of the land),
land surface conditions