Chapter 6: Biotic Resources (A Tired Planet)

Ecosystem Structure & Function

• Ecosystem structure refers to the individuals and communities of plants and animals of which an ecosystem is composed , plus their age and distribution, and the associated abiotic resources • Ecosystem functions can be thought of as emergent phenomena; these functions create a whole that is greater than the sum of its individual parts • Example: coral reefs

Interlude: Risk, Uncertainty, Ignorance

Risk: You know the possible outcomes and the probabilities. A calculable, insurable cost.

(50% chance of dying by age 60 for a smoker) Pure uncertainty: You know the possible outcomes, but not the probabilities (March Madness brackets) Absolute uncertainty: You don’t even know the possible outcomes (What will a collapsed ocean ecosystem look like?)

Renewable Resources

Renewable resources are the elements of ecosystem structure that provide the raw materials for economic processes Fish, Timber, Soil, Air, Water…

Growth/Sustainable Yield Curve

• Critical Concepts: • Sustainable yield is the net annual reproduction from a given stock • Critical dispensation point (minimum viable population) • Carrying capacity (equilibrium around which a population has stabilized) • Usefulness • Pedagogical device • Idea of maximum sustainable yield • Concept of harvest in proportion to resource stocks • Drawbacks • High degree of uncertainty: population, reproductive rates, external factors • Dynamic process • Not useful for setting quotas

Ecosystem Services

1. Ecosystems are funds that provide services.

2. Ecosystems renew by capturing solar energy.

3. Ecosystem services, unlike man-made fund-services, do not ‘wear out.’ They also cannot be stockpiled.

4. However, we cannot predict how our presence, use, and abuse impacts a complex ecosystem.

5. Keep in mind that situation matters: a degraded, stressed forest in an urban setting might be more useful than one hundreds of miles away in a park…

Ecosystem Services

• “It is impossible to create something from nothing; all economic production requires a flow of natural resources generated by a stock of natural capital…Even abiotic stocks (i.e., elements and fossil fuels) can only be extracted and consumed at some cost to the ecosystem. In other words, production requires inputs of ecosystem structure. Ecosystem structure generates ecosystem function, which in turn provides services. All economic production thus has an impact on ecosystem services, and because this impact is unavoidable, it is completely internal to the economic process.” (Daly & Farley 107)

Ecosystem Services

Ecosystem services are ecosystem functions that have value to human beings.

• Carbon sequestration by forests • Climate regulation • Storm protection • Water supply protection • Pollination • Erosion control When we fail to appreciate ecosystem services… • Dust Bowl • 2006 tsunami • India’s dead cows ( http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/28/international/asia/28vultures.html

)

Waste Absorption Capacity

Raw materials are converted into high-entropy waste.

Waste absorption capacity is fixed; waste flows are determined by us.

Greater capacity to absorb biological waste (evolution!!) than man made chemical waste.

Great Pacific Garbage Patch 80% of ocean trash originates on land 90% of ocean trash is plastic 20 billion pounds per year of trash ends up in the ocean

Ocean Ecosystem Services

More diverse ocean ecosystems are more stable and more productive. Oceans and coastal ecosystems provide: • Food source • Waste absorption, waste detoxification, filtering • Flood control • Nutrient cycling • Cultural/aesthetic values (Worm et al. 2006, Science)

Oceans & Maximum Sustainable Yield

When we harvest biological stock from an ecosystem, we are changing the capacity of the ecosystem to produce more stock & the capacity for the ecosystem to provide services critical to our survival.

30% of currently fished species considered collapsed in 2003 Predicted collapse of all currently fished species by 2048 (Worm et al 2006) http://endoftheline.com/ Have we reached the critical depensation point?

Biosphere II

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosphere_2 • • •

Biosphere 2 is a 3.14-

acre (12,700 m 2 ) [1] structure originally built to be an artificial, materially-closed ecological system in Oracle , Arizona $200 Million to provide ecosystem services for 8 people.

And yet… It failed.

What does the word “Hubris” mean?