The Science of Sustainability NEW SCIENCE, OLD CONCERNS

Alon Shepon

outlineThe Mystery of

Easter Island

Sum up

Indicators& calculations

Branches:EconomyIndustryEthics

Food system

Definitions, jargon& Concepts

Easter Island

An island. hundreds of statues (Moai) and platforms (ahu) erected from

quarries (1200-1650 AD). Pollen records show an existence of a forest declining in the last

millennia. Inhabited by ~900 AD. By 1722 - barren with ~2000 inhabitants. What were the reasons for the civilization's collapse?

Sustainability

• Brundtland commision (UNED, 1983): [sustainable development… as meeting] “the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.“

• Officially introduced at the World Congress "Challenges of a Changing Earth 2001" in Amsterdam by the International Council for Science.

• Its an interdisciplinary science of natural sciences, economy, engineering, humanities, ethics and more.

• It aims at providing ways to reduce human impact and align it with the Earth’s carrying capacity.

Brief history of footprints

Malthus (1798) "The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man. Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio. Subsistence increases only in an arithmetical ratio...“ ,Malthus T.R. 1798. An essay on the principle of population.

Tragedy of the Commons – Hardin (1962) Limits to Growth (1972) – World3 dynamic system model Vitousek et al. (1986) humanity’s appropriation of the biosphere Rees and Wackernagel (1994) Ecosystem Millennium report (2005) International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and

Technology for Development (2008)

Sustainable jargon

Natural capital, carrying capacity (biocapacity), overshoot, ecosystem services, soft, and hard sustainability

Kuznets curves

Food System

Population has doubled in the last 50 years. ~ 9 billion by 2050.

Increase in population and food consumption per capita doubling (or even tripling) of food demand by 2050.

~1 billion people are hungry, >1 billion over fed, overweight. Arable land increase 1.2->1.5 billion ha from 1950-1999;

Grain production has doubled. Doubling of food production either doubling of land or

double in yield ~1/3 of the world's cropland abandoned during the past 40

due to erosion. USA food system: 50% of total land, 80% of fresh water, and

17% of fossil fuel.

Can humanity achieve sustainable food production systems at the beginning of the 21st Century?

Ecological economy

• Dynamics and co-evolution between the human economy and natural systems. • Develop sustainable systems• Open vs. Closed systems, subsets and wholes.

• Well-being and growth.• Learning from ecosystems.

Ethics

Ecocentrism vs. Anthropocentrism Ecosystem valuation, resource distribution Substitutability of natural

resources

Industry

Linear design and thought – cradle to grave Life Cycle Analysis

cradle2cradle Material flow Analysis and Net Energy

AnalysisEnergy return on investment

Emergy

Sustainable indicators

Qualitative tools to assess sustainability There exist many indicators, ecological,

economical, social or a combination of them. Let’s explore one of them: the ecological

footprint

- It transforms human impact into 6 land types

- aggregates it into global hectares.

Sum Up

A cycle, cyclic, stable over time A biomimcry concept implement in

human systems Transects all human disciplines Aligning the ecological footprint with

Earth’s carrying capacity.

More info

Please visit our website for more info and summaries: http://openwetware.org/wiki/Sustainability

http://www.weizmann.ac.il/plants/Milo/index.php?page_name=energyANDsustainability