GEOS 1004 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Stream Energy, List Of Lakes By Volume, Tectonic Uplift
Document Summary
The presence of water in earth"s atmosphere plays a fundamental role in the constant evolution of. Both liquid water and ice contribute to erosion and transport of uplifted rock downhill towards basins. Water also breaks rock down at the chemical level, driving weathering reactions to generate soil and add chemical elements to ground and surface water. Gravity is the force which gives water the energy to shape landscapes. Elevated land surface has potential energy with respect to sea level (or continental basins below sea level); water accesses this energy to wear away uplifted rock and transport it. The potential energy contained in elevated landscapes is the result of kinetic energy of moving tectonic plates, whose energy source is the thermal energy of earth"s interior. *key point the earth system"s evolution is fundamentally energy-driven and can be explained/described in physics terms.
