Benchmark 4B
The Physical Setting: The Earth
Grades 6-8, page 69

The benefits of the earth's resources--such as fresh water, air, soil, and trees--can be reduced by using them wastefully or by deliberately or inadvertently destroying them. The atmosphere and the oceans have a limited capacity to absorb wastes and recycle materials naturally. Cleaning up polluted air, water, or soil or restoring depleted soil, forests, or fishing grounds can be very difficult and costly.
 

NSES Content Standard F 
Science in Personal and Social Perspectives: Natural hazards 
Grades 5-8, page 168 
Human activities also can induce hazards through resource acquisition, urban growth, land-use decisions, and waste disposal. Such activities can accelerate many natural changes. 

NSES Content Standard F 
Science in Personal and Social Perspectives: Natural resources 
Grades 9-12, page 198 
Humans use many natural systems as resources. Natural systems have the capacity to reuse waste, but that capacity is limited. Natural systems can change to an extent that exceeds the limits of organisms to adapt naturally or humans to adapt technologically. 

NSES Content Standard F 
Science in Personal and Social Perspectives: Environmental quality  
Grades 9-12, page 198 
Natural ecosystems provide an array of basic processes that affect humans. Those processes include maintenance of the quality of the atmosphere, generation of soils, control of the hydrologic cycle, disposal of wastes, and recycling of nutrients. Humans are changing many of these basic processes, and the changes may be detrimental to humans. 

NSES Content Standard F 
Science in Personal and Social Perspectives: Environmental quality 
Grades 9-12, page 198 
Many factors influence environmental quality. Factors that students might investigate include population growth, resource use, population distribution, overconsumption, the capacity of technology to solve problems, poverty, the role of economic, political, and religious views, and different ways humans view the earth. 

NSES Content Standard F 
Science in Personal and Social Perspectives: Natural and human-induced hazards 
Grades 9-12, page 199 
Human activities can enhance potential for hazards. Acquisition of resources, urban growth, and waste disposal can accelerate rates of natural change.