Environmental Sedimentology

The preface book of “Environmental Sedimentology”explains that environmental issues like climate change and human impacts have become increasingly important in earth sciences. Sedimentology plays a key role by elucidating environmental change archives and informing management strategies. While traditional sedimentology texts focus on facies analysis and interpreting the geological record, and applied texts examine the oil industry, this book takes a more environmental approach.

Specifically, it outlines the emerging field of Sedimentological environments, which draws on traditional sedimentology, applied sedimentology, and other disciplines like hydrology and ecology. The “Environmental Sedimentology” book examines processes in modern sedimentary systems and their responses to natural and human disturbances. It aims to introduce environmental aspects of sedimentology, allow specialists to expand into this subfield, and inform policymakers. The target audiences are earth scientists, environmental scientists, geographers, hydrologists, and engineers.

Transitioning to structure, the book covers terrestrial, coastal, and marine settings. Each chapter introduces sources, processes, natural and anthropogenic impacts, management strategies, and future concerns like climate change. While formatted differently, chapters emphasize physical, chemical, or numerical aspects relevant to the environment. Numerous case studies illustrate key concepts with location-specific examples. Extensive references allow readers to explore topics further.

In summary, as environmental issues gain prominence, this timely volume fills a need for a sedimentology textbook examining modern systems and environmental change. With broad relevance across earth science disciplines, it introduces concepts, techniques, and applications at the intersection of sedimentology and environmental science.

The Book provides a comprehensive introduction to this rapidly expanding field which addresses the functioning and dynamics of contemporary sediment systems and how these systems respond to a range of both natural and anthropogenically-induced disturbance events.

• considers a range of sedimentary environments; mountain and upland, fluvial, lacustrine, arid, urban, deltaic and estuarine, temperate coastal, tropical coastal, and continental shelf
• aspects of sediment management and remediation are also considered as are the potential impacts of on-going and future climatic and environmental change
• Readership: advanced level undergraduates in earth science, environmental science and physical geography, and graduate students in the earth and environmental sciences with an interest in contemporary sediment systems