Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
ferent than Asian culture, different than Eastern European culture, and so on and so on. What
this means is that people from different cultures use and evaluate the environment differently.
Culture change, resource change
All cultures change over time. As they do, certain items of everyday use (horse-drawn buggies) may
gradually disappear, while previously unknown items rise in importance (automobiles). Because re-
sources are culturally defined, it stands to reason that culture change may result in resource change.
Consider, for example, changes in energy resource consumption that have occurred in the United
States (see Figure 16-1).
Figure 16-1:
Sources of en-
ergy in the United
States: 1850,
1910, and 1990.
In 1850, 90 percent of the United States' energy supply consisted of firewood. Virtually all of the re-
maining 10percent came fromcoal. By1910,however,those numbers were virtually reversed. About
78 percent of the country's energy consumption was based on coal and about 7 percent on firewood.
The remaining 15 percent came from formerly untapped or unused sources: oil (6 percent), natural
gas (6 percent), and hydropower (3 percent).
By 1990, the picture had completely changed once again. Oil was now the most important commod-
ity, accounting for about 39 percent of all energy consumption. The percent contribution of coal had
shrunk to about 24 percent, while that of natural gas had risen to about 25 percent. The contribution
ofhydroelectric remained afairly steady 4percent. Finally,nuclear energyhadcome onthescene and
was contributing about 8 percent to the national total while an old stalwart, firewood, had virtually
dropped off the charts (though it remains important in home heating in a few states.)
These changes had nothing to do with depletion and discovery of resources, but a great deal to do
with culture change. Thus, decreased use of wood over time is not explained by depletion of forests.
In fact, more forest cover exists today in the contiguous 48 states than there has been for some time.
Likewise, lack of reliance on oil and natural gas 150 years ago was not due to lack of these items or
knowledge of their existence. Instead, there were limited means of putting them to productive use,
and, therefore, they were in very limited demand.
Search WWH ::




Custom Search