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Environment and Sustainability

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Environment and Sustainability 7. Environment and Sustainability 7 7. Environment and Sustainability The Environment and Sustainability chapter describes the existing Chapter Contents conditions related to environmental resources and sustainability in the Los Gatos, including aesthetics, cultural and historic resources, greenhouse 7.1 Aesthetics ............................................................................................... 7-6 gas emissions, and hydrology. Additional information regulating to 7.2 Agricultural and Forestry Resources ............................................... 7-12 greenhouse gas emissions is located in Chapter 4: Mobility, and additional information on Town designated Historic Districts is located in Chapter 3: 7.3 Biological Resources .......................................................................... 7-18 Land Use. 7.4 Air Quality ............................................................................................. 7-27 7.5 Climate Change/Greenhouse Gas Emissions ............................... 7-30 7.6 Cultural and Historical Resources ................................................... 7-37 7.7 Tribal Cultural Resources .................................................................. 7-42 7.8 Geology and Soils ............................................................................... 7-43 7.9 Hydrology and Water Quality ............................................................ 7-50 7.10 References ........................................................................................... 7-54 Public Draft Background Report | March 2019 Page 7-1 Attainment Status. Attainment status for a pollutant indicates whether or Key Terms not an Air District meets the standard set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (federal) or California Environmental Protection Active Fault. A fault is a fracture in the crust of the earth along which Agency (state). Continuous air monitoring ensures that these standards rocks on one side have moved relative to those on the other side. Most are met and maintained. faults are the result of repeated displacements over a long period of time. A fault trace is the line of the earth’s surface defining the fault. An active California Historical Landmarks. Buildings, sites, features, or events of fault is one that has ruptured in the past 11,000 years (California statewide historical significance. Department of Conservation). California Points of Historical Interest. Sites, buildings, features, or Adaptation. Adaptation is preparing for climate change impacts that are events that are of local (town, city, or county) significance and have expected to occur by making adjustments in natural or human systems in anthropological, cultural, military, political, architectural, economic, response to actual or expected climatic stimuli or their effects that are scientific or technical, religious, experimental, or other value. aimed at minimizing harm or taking advantage of beneficial opportunities. California Register of Historical Resources. A list of cultural resources Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. A federal agency that advises determined by the State Historical Resources Commission to be of the President and Congress on matters of historic preservation and architectural, historical, archaeological, or cultural significance at the state oversees the review of projects under Section 106 of the National Historic level. Preservation Act (NHPA). Carbon Dioxide (CO2). A naturally occurring gas that exists in the earth’s Aesthetics. Regarding viewpoints and landscapes, refers to the visual atmosphere. CO2 is also a by-product of burning fossil fuels and biomass, resource and appeal due to characteristics such as lighting, setting as well as land-use changes and other industrial processes. It is the conformance, architectural style, color, openness, or perspectival intent. principal man-made greenhouse gas (GHG) that affects the earth's radiative balance. It is the reference gas against which other GHGs are Air Basin. A geographic area that exhibits similar meteorological and measured and, therefore, has a global warming potential of one. geographic conditions. California is divided into 15 air basins. Carbon Dioxide Equivalent (CO2e). CO2e is the measure of how much Air Pollution. Air pollution refers to any chemical, physical (particulate heat trapping potential a given type of greenhouse gas has on average matter), or biological agent(s) that modifies the natural characteristics of over a 100-year time period, based on its molecular structure compared to the atmosphere. This can occur indoors or outdoors and often has carbon dioxide (CO2). CO2 has a baseline of one, while other gases can be harmful health effects. Car emissions, chemicals from factories, dust, tens to thousands of times higher. The carbon dioxide equivalent for a pollen and mold spores may be suspended as particles. Ozone is a major gas is derived by multiplying the tons of the gas by the associated global component of air pollution in towns and cities, causing smog. warming potential. Carbon dioxide equivalents are commonly expressed as "metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents” (MT CO2e). Different Aquifer. A geologic formation that is water bearing. A geological molecules decay at different rates, causing their heat trapping potential to formation or structure that stores and/or transmits water, such as to wells decline over periods of decades to centuries. and springs. Use of the term is usually restricted to those water-bearing formations capable of yielding water in sufficient quantity to constitute a Climate. Climate, in a narrow sense, is usually defined as the "average usable supply for people’s uses. weather," or more rigorously, as the statistical description in terms of the mean and variability of relevant quantities over a period of time ranging Attainment Area. An attainment area is a geographic area that meets the from months to thousands of years. The classical period is three National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for a criteria pollutant. decades, as defined by the World Meteorological Organization. These Page 7-2 Public Draft Background Report | March 2019 7. Environment and Sustainability quantities are most often surface variables such as temperature, Encroachment. The advancement of structures, roads, railroads, precipitation, and wind. Climate in a wider sense is the state, including a improved paths, utilities, and other development into natural areas statistical description, of the climate system. including floodplains, river corridors, wetlands, lakes and ponds, and the buffers around these areas. The term also encompasses the placement Climate Change. Climate change refers to any significant change in of fill, the removal of vegetation, or an alteration of topography in such measures of climate (such as temperature, precipitation, or wind) lasting natural areas. These cause impacts to the functions and values of natural for an extended period (decades or longer). Climate change may result areas, such as a decline in water quality, loss of habitat (both aquatic and from: natural factors, such as changes in the sun's intensity or slow terrestrial), disruption of equilibrium (or naturally stable) conditions, loss of changes in the earth's orbit around the sun; natural processes within the flood attenuation, or reduction of ecological processes. climate system (e.g., changes in ocean circulation); human activities that change the atmosphere's composition (e.g., through burning fossil fuels); Endangered Species. A species whose survival and reproduction in the and the land surface (e.g., deforestation, reforestation, urbanization, wild is in immediate jeopardy from one or more causes, including: loss of desertification, etc.). habitat; change in habitat; over exploration; predation; competition; disease; or other factors. Criteria Pollutants. The criteria pollutants are the six principle pollutants harmful to public health and the environment for which the Environmental Endemic Species. Endemic species are plants and animals that exist only Protection Agency has set NAAQS. The pollutants are: carbon monoxide in one geographic region. Species can be endemic to large or small areas (CO), lead, nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone (O3), particulate matter (PM), and of the earth, some are endemic to a particular continent, some to part of a sulfur dioxide (SO2). continent, and others to a single island. Critical Habitat. Specific areas designated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Erosion. Erosion is the process of removal and transport of soil and rock Service (USFWS) as essential to the conservation of a federally-listed by weathering, mass wasting, and the action of streams, glaciers, waves, species and which may require special management considerations or winds, and underground water. protection. On Town, county, state, or private land where there is no federal involvement, a critical habitat designation has no regulatory Exceedance. An exceedance occurs when a measured air pollution level impact. In other words, designation of critical habitat generally does not exceeds criteria prescribed by the Environmental Protection agency or the affect non-federal land unless and until the property owner needs a federal California Air Resources Board. permit or requests Federal funding for a project. Expansive Soils. Expansive soils greatly increase in volume when they Cultural Resources. Observable evidence of past human activities that is absorb water and shrink when they dry out.
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