- Industry: Broadcasting & receiving
- Number of terms: 5074
- Number of blossaries: 1
- Company Profile:
The largest broadcasting organisation in the world.
Microscopic particles suspended in the lower atmosphere that reflect sunlight back to space. These generally have a cooling affect on the planet and can mask global warming. They play a key role in the formation of clouds, fog, precipitation and ozone depletion in the atmosphere.
Industry:Natural environment
Organic matter that can break down or decompose rapidly under natural conditions and processes is referred to as biodegradable. Garden and food waste, animal waste, and most paper products, as well as plastics derived from vegetable content, will biodegrade, but not plastic carrier bags and polystyrene cups, for example.
Industry:Natural environment
Biodiesel is fuel generated from vegetable oil that can be used pure or blended with regular diesel (diesel produced by refining crude oil) in conventional, unmodified diesel engines. It is not the same as waste vegetable oil, otherwise known as 'unwashed biodiesel', which requires engine modification.
Industry:Natural environment
Biodiversity (a contraction of the phrase biological diversity) means the variety of life on earth, or within one particular ecosystem, in terms of the number of distinct biological species present. Tropical rainforests, for example, support a huge variety of species, so are highly biodiverse, while polar regions are far less so. Scientists worry that deforestation, such as that associated with planting crops for biofuels, animal feed and human consumption is reducing biodiversity. See also monoculture.
Industry:Natural environment
Biofuel is a general term for fuel, including biodiesel, that is derived from biomass - living or recently dead organic matter. In general it is made from sugar, starch, vegetable oils or animal fats. Examples include bio-ethanol from energy crops such sugar cane, corn, palm oil, and rape seed.
Industry:Natural environment
Biomass is renewable organic matter that can be used as fuel. It is living or recently dead material - wood and other plant matter, or even animal waste. Fuel derived from biomass is known as biofuel. It does not include fossil fuels, which have formed - and stored their carbon - over millions of years. Because the CO2 released when biomass is burned is balanced by the CO2 absorbed during its production - and because new plant matter is re-growing and absorbing more CO2 all the time - it's regarded as carbon neutral.
Industry:Natural environment
A biomass boiler is a central heating system or a stove powered by biomass (usually wood) rather than fossil fuels form of pellets or wood.
Industry:Natural environment
The soot that results from the incomplete combustion of fossil fuels, biofuels, and biomass (wood, animal dung, etc.). It is the most potent climate-warming aerosol. Unlike greenhouse gases, which trap infrared radiation that is already in the Earth's atmosphere, these particles absorb all wavelengths of sunlight and then re-emit this energy as infrared radiation.
Industry:Natural environment
Carbon is the fourth most common chemical element in the universe, and carbon compounds - in other words, carbon chemically combined with other elements - are the basis of all known life forms on earth. Pure carbon appears in many apparently diverse forms, from diamond to graphite to charcoal, but it is much more commonly found in substances such as coal, oil, natural gas, wood and peat that we use for fuel. When we burn these substances to provide energy - either directly in our homes as heat, or in power stations to produce electricity - the combustion process produces 'oxides' of carbon, including the gas CO2.
Industry:Natural environment
Carbon capture, carbon sequestration, or CCS (carbon capture and storage) are all terms to describe relatively new technologies designed to let major producers of CO2 emissions, such as fossil fuel-burning power stations, prevent the CO2 they create being released into the atmosphere. Instead it is stored by being injected into underground or undersea geological formations. Some CCS technology is already in operation on a limited scale in other countries but its use is not yet widespread.
Industry:Natural environment
