Features
‘The Most Important Geological Resource We Have'
No, it's not oil but soil that's the topic of new volume edited by U of G land resource scientist
BY ANDREW VOWLES
“It's the most important geological resource that we have — the whole of civilization is based on it.”
So says professor emeritus Ward Chesworth, Land Resource Science, about a topic that fills a new 900-page reference book edited by the U of G geochemist.
The second edition of the Encyclopedia of Soil Science contains hundreds of articles about numerous topics, including physics, chemistry, biology, soil conservation and geology. But it's not just dirt, insists Chesworth. If you care about your food, the environment and human civilization itself, he says, you're interested in soil science.
“Human history is little more than a footnote to the exploitation of soil that started with the agricultural or neolithic revolution 10,000 years ago,” he writes in the introduction to the volume. “All the magnificent cultural artifacts of civilization, from cathedrals to efficient plumbing systems, are the direct heritage of this exploitation, and the big question today concerns what humanity must do to sustain this heritage.”
He hopes scientists and students will use the book as an entry point for learning about life on Earth — and for recognizing and addressing humans' impact on soils and geological processes.
“I see it as an introduction to the complexity of soils,” says Chesworth, who will discuss soils and society with undergraduates by co-teaching a fourth-year course next fall called “Ill Fares the Land.”
The book is part of the Springer Encyclopedia of Earth Science series. The first edition was published in 1979.
Several articles in the new edition were written by other faculty in the Department of Land Resource Science: Profs. Emmanuelle Arnaud, Michael Brookfield, Les Evans, Pieter Groenevelt, Richard Heck, Gary Parkin, Peter Van Straaten and Jon Warland. Parkin also served on the editorial advisory board, which helped co-ordinate articles from about 200 international experts.
Chesworth has studied soils around the world and published more than 100 journal and review articles in earth sciences.
Besides collaborating with colleague Prof. Peter Martini on three books on geology and soils, he has co-edited four volumes of the annual Kenneth Hammond Lectures on Environment, Energy and Resources, co-ordinated on campus by the Faculty of Environmental Sciences.
He has spoken to various international groups, including the Geological Society of America, which named him a fellow in 2004.