COMPONENTS OF EARTH

COMPONENTS OF EARTH:

The outer crust of the Earth is called lithosphere. The water covering 75% of the Earth’s surface and also found underground comprise the hydrosphere. The air that forms a blanket around the Earth is called atmosphere. The life-supporting zone of the Earth where the atmosphere, the hydrosphere and the lithosphere interact and make life possible is known as the biosphere.The conditions surrounding an organism and regularly interacting with it forms the environment. It includes both the physical factors and organisms. The physical or non-living factors like air, water, soil, light and temperature are called the abiotic components. The living things like human beings, plants, animals and microbes form the biotic components.

Natural resources 

It indicates the potential wealth of a country. The variety of substance that man gets from earth and nature to meet his basic needs are called natural resources. The word resource means a source of supplying a material generally held in reserve. Natural resources are both living and non-living. Some of these resources are found in abundance, while others are found in limited quantities and that too in some restricted parts of our land. For this reason, the natural resource have to be wisely used. However, in reality it is not so. They are being used indiscriminately.

Types of Natural Resources:

Natural resources are broadly of two types:

• Inexhaustible natural resources

• Exhaustible natural resources

Inexhaustible natural resources:Are the ones that are present in unlimited quantity in nature and are not likely to be exhausted by their use or by human activities.

e.g., air, water, solar energy, tidal energy.

Exhaustible natural resources: Are present in limited quantity in nature and these are likely to be exhausted by human activities.

e.g., coal, petroleum, minerals, soil, plants (flora) and animals (fauna).