Elbe and Ok Tedi



River Elbe and the Ok Tedi/Fly River system are of similar size of watershed (150,000 km2 and 90,000 km2) and length of the main river (1,300 km and 1,100 km). The rest is very different.
Examine the map packs, if Arcexplorer is installed!

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feature Elbe Fly River
length (km) 1,300 1,100
catchment size (km2) 150,000 90,000
climate, maximum rainfall (m) moderate maritime to continental
1.5 m (Riesengebirge, "Giant Mountains")
tropical
14 m (Star mountains)
discharge to the sea (m3/second) 900 8000
copper load tons/year 300 30,000
prevalent landcover agriculture rainforest
inhabitants (million) 25 0.1
principal industries and trade chemical, food processing, machine building, fine mechanical and electronics, energy, financal and insurance, harbour and transport, press, advertisement, administration (Berlin!)  
mining ongoing: lignite (brown coal) mining, Bohemian Basin and Middle Elbe plains, open pit mines, waste material set aside and used for landscape rehabilitation;

medieval: copper, silver, lead in the Ore Mountains and Harz; underground pit

recent: uranium at Wismut Aue, Ore Mts., underground pit, radioactive waste in slag heaps

Potassium salt: Middle Elbe plains, abandoned in 20th century

medieval and ongoing: Sodium salt, coastal plain, underground leaching

Ok Tedi, copper;
Porgera, gold

 



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