Earth's Resources: overview of SQA Higher Environmental Science Area 2
An overview of the Earth's Resources area of SQA Higher Environmental Science, covering the geosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere and atmosphere, the resources and services each provides, and how they are used, with study tips and links to each key area.
Reviewed by: AI editorial process; not yet individually human-reviewed
Jump to a section
Earth's Resources is the second of the three areas of SQA Higher Environmental Science. It studies the four great Earth systems, the geosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere and atmosphere, examining how each forms, what resources and services it provides, and how human use affects it. This page maps the four key areas and shows how they connect.
The four key areas
- The geosphere
- The solid Earth (crust, mantle, core) and the rock cycle linking igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks. Weathering breaks rock down (physically, chemically or biologically) and erosion transports it; soil forms slowly from weathered rock and organic matter; and minerals are finite resources whose use is made sustainable by recycling and efficient extraction.
- The hydrosphere
- All Earth's water, cycling by evaporation, condensation, precipitation and run-off. About 97 percent is salt water and most fresh water is locked away, so the accessible fraction is tiny. Water pollution (sewage, fertiliser run-off, industry) causes problems such as eutrophication, and water is cleaned by drinking-water and waste-water treatment.
- The biosphere
- The living world, divided into biomes whose distribution is set by climate (temperature and precipitation, varying with latitude and altitude). It supplies biological resources and biomass and provides ecosystem services (provisioning, regulating, supporting, cultural), which are renewable only if harvested no faster than they regrow.
- The atmosphere
- The layer of gases (about 78 percent nitrogen, 21 percent oxygen) structured into the troposphere, stratosphere and beyond. It drives weather and climate and warms the planet through the greenhouse effect. Atmospheric pollution includes acid rain (sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides), ozone depletion (CFCs) and particulates.
How to study Earth's Resources
- Hold the four spheres apart, then link them. Know what defines each sphere, then see how they interact (weathering links geosphere and hydrosphere; climate links atmosphere and biosphere).
- Keep the pollution problems distinct. Eutrophication, acid rain, ozone depletion and the greenhouse effect have different causes and effects; mixing them up is a common error.
- Learn the processes as sequences. The rock cycle, the water cycle, eutrophication and the greenhouse effect are all step-by-step processes that examiners ask you to describe in order.
- Practise the calculations. Percentages of water and gases, recycling energy savings and sustainable-yield comparisons recur.
- Connect to Sustainability. This area sets up the energy, water, food and climate topics that follow, so revise them together.
For the official course specification
Qualifications Scotland (formerly SQA) publishes the full Higher Environmental Science course specification, specimen and past papers, and marking instructions at sqa.org.uk. Always revise from the current specification and past papers, because question style and terminology are board-specific.