The Anthropocene: Acknowledging the extent of global ......The Anthropocene: Acknowledging the extent of global resource overshoot , and what we must do about it. Research, education,

The Anthropocene: Acknowledging the extent of global

resource overshoot , and what we must do about it.

Research, education, and policy guidance for a better global future.


Understanding the balance between human needs and environmental resources


The Anthropocene Story 3 minute video

Reflections on the Anthropocene Story

“ … we must find a safe operating space for humanity”

“... we must understand resource limits and size ourselves to

operate within planetary boundaries”

“…our creativity, energy, and industry offer hope”

Reflections on the Anthropocene Story

Empty words

Cognitive and behavioral paradigm shifts would offer ‘guarded’ optimism for the future.

A preview of this afternoon’s discussion: 1. Realistic meta-level picture of humanity’s relationship with the planet 2. Talk about that relationship and the conceptual meaning of sustainability 3. Discuss the need for ‘transformative’ change and one approach to achieving future sustainability

The Problem

Climate change is not the problem.

Water shortages, overgrazing, erosion, desertification and the rapid extinction of species are not the problem.

Deforestation,

Deforestation, reduced cropland productivity,

Deforestation, reduced cropland productivity,

and the collapse of fisheries are not the problem.

Each of these crises, though alarming, is a symptom of a single, over-riding issue.

Humanity is simply demanding more than the earth can provide.

Climate change

Desertification Deforestation Collapse of

fisheries Rapid extinction of species

Witnessing dysfunctional

human behavior

Today’s reality: Global Resource Overshoot

Supply = 1 Earth

http://www.unfpa.org/




How do we know we are

- living beyond our resource means? - exceeding global capacity?

- experiencing resource overshoot?

• Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Released in 2005, the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment was a four-year global effort involving more than 1,300 experts that assessed the condition of and trends in the world’s ecosystems. The Assessment found that in the last half of the 20th century, humans changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than in any comparable period of history, primarily to meet growing needs for food, freshwater, timber, fiber, and fuel.

D:/report.html

Capture fisheries Wild foods Biomass fuel Genetic resources Biochemicals Fresh water Air quality regulation Climate regulation Erosion regulation Water purification Pest regulation Pollination Natural hazard regulation Spiritual values Aesthetic values

What do we know about the status of the world’s ecosystem services?

Degraded Enhanced Mixed

Provisioning

Cultural

Regulating

Crops Livestock Aquaculture Carbon sequestration

Timber Fiber Water regulation Disease regulation Recreation & ecotourism

Financial Indicators

• GDP = Gross Domestic Product

• ISEW = Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare

• ISEW = GDP w/adjustments Degree of consumption inequality

+ Value of housework

- Wasted expenditures (e.g. wars)

- Pollution and environmental damage costs

- Depletion of non-renewable resources

$

1950 1975 2000 2025

GDP

ISEW

$

1950 1975 2000 2025

GDP

ISEW

Quantifying Human Demand: Our ‘Ecological Footprint’

A population’s eco-footprint (demand) is

the area of land and water ecosystems

(bio-capacity) required to produce the

resources that the population consumes,

and to assimilate the wastes that the

population produces, wherever on Earth

the relevant land/water may be located.

Overshoot – Demand now outstrips supply. It takes more than 1.5 years for the earth to

regenerate the renewable resources humans

consume in a year.

Human Demand:

Our Global ecological

Footprint

Nature’s Supply:

Global Biocapacity

ffads

global biocapacity: 12.0 billion hectares

current human eco-footprint:

19.0 billion hectares

The

Big

Pic

ture

gha

Time

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

Ecological Footprint

1.0 One Earth

(Capacity = 100%)

# Earths

gha

Time

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010


1.0 One Earth

(Capacity = 100%)

# Earths

Unsustainable

Possibly Sustainable

gha

Time

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010


1.0 One Earth

(Capacity = 100%) Capacity allocation for bio-diversity

# Earths

gha

Time

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010


1.0 One Earth

(Capacity = 100%)

Historical

“Empty World”

The World has Fundamentally Changed

“Overshoot” World

# Earths

Time

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

1.0 (Capacity = 100%)

Historical

“Empty World”



# Earths

Time

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

Historical

“Empty World”



Limitations Man-made Capital

Labor Natural Capital

Policy Implications

Invest in capital goods “Economic stimulus” plans

Maximize production

Invest in natural capital

To end poverty (In a production constrained world):

Stabilize and reduce population!

human population (2013): 7.1 billion

average eco- footprint/person: 2.7 gha

biocapacity per person: 1.7 gha

overshoot (EF – biocapacity) 1.0 gha

58% overshoot

Our Global Ecological Deficit

ffads

global biocapacity:


current human eco-footprint:


Th

e B

ig P

ictu

re

Missing: Four Phantom Planets

If everyone on Earth lived the consumer lifestyles of North Americans, we’d need three or four additional Earth-like planets.

Problem: “Good planets are hard to find.”

• Humanity is already consuming resources at an unsustainable rate.

• We are already exceeding planetary boundaries.

• We are putting earth systems and human civilization at risk.

http://www.planetunderpressure2012.net/location.asp

“…the continued functioning of the Earth system as it has supported the well-being of human

civilization in recent centuries is at risk. Without urgent action, we could face threats to water, food, biodiversity, and other critical resources:

these threats risk intensifying economic, ecological, and social crisis, creating the potential for a humanitarian emergency on a global scale.”

“[We are] burning through [global] resources in the name of prosperity, as if there is no tomorrow” Ban Ki-Moon (4/20/12)

What is sustainability?

Sustainability conceptually describes an economy

and full set of societal endeavors, the demands of

which are in equilibrium with basic ecological and

resource support systems

Resource Sufficiency Evaluation (RSE)

What is sustainability?

Despite the confusion, ‘sustainability’ is not a difficult concept

Sustainability simply means that the human family must live more equitably within the productive means of nature.

Humans cannot consume essential renewable resources faster than Nature replenishes them nor generate material wastes faster than nature can assimilate and recycle them.

No society is sustainable if it maintains itself or grows by depleting its income-producing wealth or ‘capital’. It follows that:

The world community must learn to live on the annual income generated by both its manufactured capital and natural capital.

Economic Implications

A sustainable economy thrives on the annual income of its capital assets: finance capital, manufactured capital natural capital.

At ‘carrying capacity’ a sustainable economy is a non-growing or steady-state economy.

A steady-state economy is characterized by a constant or modestly fluctuating through-put of energy and material resources (‘natural income’) that leaves its capital intact.

A steady-state economy is not a stagnant economy. It does not grow but can develop dynamically. Society steadily improves as technologies evolve, new industries replace old, and human well-being increases.

What’s to fear? What’s not to like??

Resource overshoot

Possible Solutions

“Our collective challenge: Scaling down the human endeavor”

R = P A T D

e

< = R e Cap

Resource demands must be less than or equal to capacity

C I

P T

< = R e Cap

Can we stabilize and reduce human population numbers?

C

Possible Solutions

0.00

5.00

10.00

15.00

20.00

25.00

30.00

1940 1960 1980 2000 2020 2040 2060 2080 2100 2120

Global Population (Billions)

Constant Fertility

Global Population – What will it really look like later this century ? N

um

be

r o

f P

eo

ple

(m

illio

ns)

Median

9.3 B by 2050

0.00

5.00

10.00

15.00

20.00

25.00

30.00

2000 2010 2020 2030 2040 2050 2060 2070 2080 2090 2100 2110

Constant fertility

Median Variant Assumptions

Global Population (Billions)

Global Population – What will it really look like later this century ? N

um

be

r o

f P

eo

ple

(m

illio

ns)

Median

+0.5 TFR

-0.5 TFR

Constant Fertility

Population growth is not destiny

Empowering women and expanding access to family planning information and services

must be part of the global sustainable development discourse and solution.

P T

< = R e Cap

Can we lower our consumption of material goods and services?

C

Possible Solutions

Reducing consumption

Who will be giving up their “goodies?”

In fact the world is going in the other direction (e.g. cars in China)!

P T

< = R e Cap

Can we ‘decouple’ our economy from the demands we place on natural capital?

C R e D =

Will ‘greening’ our global economy lead to a sustainable world?

Possible Solutions

Mr. T

Technology

Technology advancement is not the answer to the sustainability challenge.

It is necessary, but not sufficient!

Greening the economy is not the answer to the sustainability challenge.


Resource efficiency improvement is not the answer to the sustainability challenge.



Greening the economy is necessary, but not sufficient.

William Stanley Jevons

1865 – English Economist

In economics the Jevons paradox is the proposition that technological progress that increases the efficiency with which a resource is used tends to increase (rather than decrease) the rate of consumption of that resource. Jevons observed that technological improvements that increased the efficiency of coal use led to increased consumption of coal in a wide range of industries. He argued that, contrary to intuition, technological improvements could not be relied upon to reduce fuel consumption.


Greening the economy is necessary, but not sufficient.

While green technologies may help to de-link resource extraction from economic growth, they will not ensure progress towards sustainability.

Complete mitigation of the global warming and climate disruption crisis

Sustainability

Sustainability

Achieving food security

Solutions

1. Change the political mandate from economic growth to

shared economic development within planetary limits.

Our challenge, should we choose to accept it:

Write a new, more adaptive cultural narrative

Sustainable material growth is an oxymoron.

The economic policy emphasis must shift from

efficiency and growth (merely getting bigger)

toward sufficiency, equity and development

(qualitative improvement, getting better).

The underpinning values of society must shift

from competitive individualism, greed, and short-

term self-interest, toward cooperative mutualism,

community, and humanity’s long-term collective

interest in survival.

Motivation and Rationale? It’s in everyone’s long-term best interest

Individual and national interests have converged with humanity’s common interests. That is;

Sustainability is a collective problem that demands collective solutions (no country can become sustainable on its own);

Failure to act for the common good will ultimately lead to civil insurrection, geopolitical chaos, resource wars and ecological destruction.

Cognitive Steps Forward

Recognize that on a biophysically-constrained planet, everything is connected to everything else: economic policy is ecological policy is social policy.

Re-legitimize public planning at all levels of governance. We need comprehensive mitigation and adaptation strategies for global change (markets alone can’t achieve sustainability).

Abandon the cult of consumerism. The material ethic is spiritually empty and ecologically disastrous. Cultivate saving and conserver values over shopping and consumer values.

Solutions



2. Increase media attention to population and sustainability

issues.

Solutions



2. Increase media attention to population and sustainability

issues and serial dramas for behavioral change.

3. Incorporate resource sufficiency evaluation (RSE) and

reporting into national and global governance.

The Global Challenge

“How do we promote dynamic and inclusive economic and human

development

while achieving more equitable and

sustainable management of resources”

…UN System Task Team on the Post-2015 Development agenda

The Global Challenge

“How do we promote dynamic and inclusive economic and human

development

while achieving more equitable and

sustainable management of resources”

…UN System Task Team on the Post-2015 Development agenda

Balance the resources we demand with what’s available!

Economic Activity Social Structure

The finite system of planetary natural resources

The open system of human development and well-being

Earth (A closed system)


What does RSE look like?


Bio-physical (not economic) ‘balance sheets’




Bio-physical ‘balance sheet’ accounting - Germany

Resource Category

Fresh Water

Energy

Bio-capacity

Societal Demand

30

330

420

National Capacity

110

130

160

Surplus (Deficit)

80

(200)

(260)

Sustainability Rating

Sustainable

Unsustainable

Unsustainable

Measurement Units

Billion cubic meters

1000KT Oil Equivalent

Million global hectares

Human Activities

Sustainability Assessment Measuring what we want to achieve

Earth Resources

Resource

Accounting Methodology

Resource

Accounting Methodology

Biophysical Resource Demands

Biophysical Resource Capacity

Policy Direction

Policy Options: Macro-economics

Nat’l Population Policy Consumption policies

Material Recycle Technology Transitions

EF Accounting I/O Analysis

Energy Balances

Biophysical

Balance


Benefits • Directly measures a critical sustainability criteria • Measures what we need to manage in today’s world and

provides a clear understanding of sustainable resource use



provides a clear understanding of sustainable resource use • Provides a prescriptive solution to the north-south political

divide by asking all countries – both developed and developing – to evaluate, report, and make progress toward bio-physical balance

• Protects inter-generational equity



provides a clear understanding of sustainable resource use • Provides a prescriptive solution to the north-south political

divide by asking all countries – both developed and developing – to evaluate, report, and make progress toward bio-physical balance

• Protects inter-generational equity • Builds public awareness of our universal challenge of resource

system overuse • Puts sustainability into the political discourse


Our road map to a sustainable future.

Thank you

(additional information available)

Thank you

We’d appreciate your questions and comments.

Documents

The Anthropocene: Acknowledging the extent of global ......The Anthropocene: Acknowledging the extent of global resource overshoot , and what we must do about it. Research, education,