Module 12

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Module 12

• Sustainability

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Sustainable Living

• Sustainably means that
• We use the essential products and processes of
  nature no more quickly than they can be
  renewed/produced
• We discharge wastes no more quickly than they can
  be absorbed.
• Global carrying capacity is based on the
  sustainability of global ecosystems.

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Humans are Part of Nature

• As we eat, drink and breath, we constantly
  exchange energy and matter with our environment.
• Food chains that support animal life including
  our own are based on plant ecosystems.
• Nature absorbs our wastes and provides
  life-support services such as clean water,
  climate stability and protection from UV
  radiation.

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Ecosystem Services

• The Earth's human economies would soon collapse
  without fertile soil, fresh water, breathable
  air, and an amenable climate
• These are Nature's life-support services
• The human economy depends on ecosystems
• Its not the other way around

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Nature and Economy
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Global Commons

• These provide us with
• air
• water
• soil
• nutrients
• climate stability
• natural resources

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Waste not, Want not

• We treat waste as a problem of disposal. We bury
  it instead of reusing or recycling it.
• Where and how to bury it becomes an environmental
  issue.
• The consequences of waste disposal become
  environmental problems (air pollution, etc).
• We treat natural systems of waste absorption and
  disposal as free goods and services.

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Do More with Less

• Energy and material efficiency
• Use alternate (renewable) sources of energy
• Recycle and re-use wastes
• Reduce consumption - find quality of life in
  other ways

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Sustainability Two Sides

• Ecological sustainability underpins socioeconomic
  sustainability
• The necessary conditions for developing
  sustainability
• Securing a satisfactory quality of life for all
  (socioeconomic imperative). While
• Reducing the Ecological Footprints of the
  industrialized countries (ecological imperative).

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Standard of Living

• The necessities and luxuries essential to a level
  of existence that is customary within a society
  or culture.

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Sustainability Gap

• Developing countries aspire to the higher
  standard of living of developed countries
• More material growth, at least in the poor
  countries, seems essential for socioeconomic
  sustainability.

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Ecology Gap

• According to Ecological Footprint analysis, the
  current level of global human consumption exceeds
  the available ecological capacity of the Earth by
  30.
• From this perspective, any global increase in
  material and waste throughput seems ecologically
  unsustainable.

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Sustainability Challenge

• If we rely on conventional economic strategies
  and technologies to fix development problems, the
  additional energy and material growth would
  further compromise global ecosystems.
• Sustainable development is more than simple
  economic reform.
• How can we decrease humanitys total ecological
  impact while providing adequately for the needs
  of all humankind?

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SUMMARY

• Conventional wisdom
• Global population cannot grow indefinitely
• Unconventional wisdom
• Material consumption cannot grow indefinitely
• Carrying capacity is limited by ecological
  resources
• Sustainability means finding an ecological
  footprint that preserves the integrity of global
  ecosystems - on which we all depend