Transcript Chapter 1

Chapter 1
Environmental
Problems, Their
Causes, and
Sustainability
Core Case Study:
Living in an Exponential Age
 Human
population growth: J-shaped curve
Figure 1-1
Exponential Growth
A
quantity increases by a constant rate
of increase per unit of time
 Also


called Geometric Growth
Follows a geometric pattern of increase
2,4,8,16,32, etc.
Arithmetic Growth
 Increases
at a constant amount per unit of
time
 1,3,5,7, etc.
 Also called Linear Growth
 Graph will be a sloping straight line
 Food production is increasing in this manner
1-1 What Is an Environmentally
Sustainable Society?
 Concept
1-1A Our lives and economies
depend on energy from the sun (solar
capital) and on natural resources and
natural services (natural capital) provided
by the earth.
 Concept
1-1B Living sustainability means
living off the earth’s natural income without
depleting or degrading the natural capital
that supplies it.
LIVING MORE SUSTAINABLY
… the study of how the earth works, how we
interact with the earth and how to deal with
environmental problems.
Figure 1-2
What is Environmental Science?
 The
goals of environmental science are to
learn:




how nature works.
how the environment effects us.
how we effect the environment.
how we can live more sustainably without
degrading our life-support system.
Environment, Ecology, &
Environmental Science

Environment - all external conditions and factors
that affect living organisms
 Ecology - study of relationships between living
organisms and their environment
 Environmental Science - examines the effect of
humans on the earth’s environment
Capital
Wealth – to an economist
 Solar capital – energy from the sun


Direct sunlight and indirect forms such as windpower,
hydroelectric, and biomass
Natural capital – (natural resources) air, water, soil,
biodiversity, etc. Also called natural resources.
 Our existence depends completely on the sun and
the earth.

1-2 How Can Environmentally
Sustainable Societies Grow
Economically?
 Concept
1-2 Societies can become more
environmentally sustainable through
economic development dedicated to
improving the quality of life for everyone
without degrading the earth's life support
systems.
Sustainability: The Integrative Theme
 Sustainability,
is the ability of earth’s various
systems to survive and adapt to
environmental conditions indefinitely.
 The steps to sustainability must be
supported by sound science.
Figure 1-3
POPULATION GROWTH,
ECONOMIC GROWTH, AND
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
 Economic
growth provides people with more
goods and services.

Measured in gross domestic product (GDP) and
purchasing power parity (PPP).
 Economic
development uses economic
growth to improve living standards.

The world’s countries economic status
(developed vs. developing) are based on their
degree of industrialization and GDP-PPP.
What is economic
development?
Improvement of living standards
by economic growth
Developed Countries
 Highly
industrialized
 High per capita GNI
 Have 20% of world’s population
 Have 85% of world’s wealth and income
 Use 88% of its natural resources
 Generate 75% of its pollution & waste
Developing Countries
 Low
to moderate industrialization
 Low per capita GNI
 Most are in Africa, Asia, and Latin America
 Have 80% of the world’s population
 Have 15% of its wealth and income
 Use only 12% of its natural resources
Development
 The
change from a largely rural society,
mainly agricultural, illiterate, and poor with a
rapidly growing population to one that is
mostly urban, industrial, educated, and
wealthy with a slow-growing population..
1-3 How Are Our Ecological
Footprints Affecting the Earth?
 Concept
1-3 As our ecological footprints
grow, we are depleting and degrading more
of the earth’s natural capital.
Types of resources

PERPETUAL renewed continuously



SOLAR ENERGY
WIND, TIDES,
FLOWING WATER
RENEWABLE - can be
replenished fairly
rapidly

AIR, WATER, SOIL,
BIODIVERSITY

NONRENEWABLE exist in a fixed quantity

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FOSSIL FUELS
METALLIC MINERALS
NONMETALLIC
MINERALS
Tragedy of The Commons
by Garrett Hardin
The Tragedy of the Commons
 1968
- Garrett Hardin
 “If I don’t use it, someone else will”
 Overusing that which belongs to all or us


Air, water, ocean
Called COMMON PROPERTY OR FREEACCESS RESOURCES
Nonrenewable resource
 Exist
in fixed amounts in the earth’s crust and
can be completely used up



Include energy resources such as coal, oil
natural gas & uranium
Metallic mineral resources - iron, copper
Nonmetallic mineral resources - salt, sand, clay
 Mineral
- hard, crystalline material formed
naturally
 Also called exhaustible resources
Economic depletion
 When
80% of a mineral is used up and it
becomes more expensive to retrieve it than
the mineral is worth.
 Five choices at this point:

Reduce or use less, reuse or recycle existing
supply - does not apply to nonrenewable energy
sources- use less or try to find a substitute or do
without.
Recycling - collect and reprocess
resource into new products.
Reuse - Use resource over & over
again.
Cannot recycle nonrenewable
energy sources
Reserve - known deposit from which a
useable mineral can be extracted at a
profit at current prices.
Our Ecological Footprint
 Humanity’s
ecological
footprint has exceeded
earths ecological
capacity.
Figure 1-7
Ecological Footprint
 The
amount of land needed to produce the
resources needed by the average person in a
country.


Ecological footprint of people in developed
countries is large compared to people in
developing countries.
If all people in the world consumed what we do in
the U.S. it would take three planets to support
them.
1-4 What Is Pollution and What Can
We Do about It?
 Concept
1-4 Preventing pollution is more
effective and less costly than cleaning up
pollution.
POLLUTION
 Found
at high enough
levels in the
environment to cause
harm to organisms.


Point source
Nonpoint source
Figure 1-9
Pollution

Any addition to air,
water, soil or food that
threatens the health,
survival, or activities of
humans or others
 Can be natural such as
a volcano or
anthropogenic - due to
human activities

POINT SOURCES come from a single
identifiable source - a
wastewater treatment
plant
 NONPOINT SOURCES
- come from sources
that are difficult to
identify.
Pollution
 Pollutants
can have three types of unwanted
effects:
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

Can disrupt / degrade life-support systems.
Can damage health and property.
Can create nuisances such as noise and
unpleasant smells, tastes, and sights.
Solutions: Prevention vs. Cleanup
 Problems



with relying on cleanup:
Temporary bandage without improvements in
control technology.
Often removes a pollutant from one part of the
environment to cause problems in another.
Pollutants at harmful levels can cost too much to
reduce them to acceptable levels.
Love Canal, New York
1-5 Why Do We Have Environmental
Problems? (1)
 Concept
1-5A Major causes of
environmental problems are population
growth, wasteful and unsustainable resource
use, poverty, exclusion of environmental
costs of resource use from the market prices
of goods and services, and attempts to
manage nature with insufficient knowledge.
1-5 Why Do We Have Environmental
Problems? (2)
 Concept
1-5B People with different
environmental worldviews often disagree
about the seriousness of environmental
problems and what we should do about them.
SOLAR
CAPITAL
EARTH
Goods and services
Heat
Human Capital
Natural Capital
Human
Economic
and
Cultural
Systems
Depletion of
nonrenewable resources
Degradation of
renewable resources
Pollution and waste
Fig. 1-10, p. 17
Key Environmental Problems
FIVE ROOT CAUSES
•
•
•
•
Overpopulation
Waste of resources
Poverty
Not including
environmental costs
of economic goods
and services in their
market prices
• Trying to manage and
simplify nature with
too little knowledge of
how nature works.
Poverty and Environmental Problems
1
of 3 children
under 5, suffer
from severe
malnutrition.
Figure 1-12 and 1-13
Results
 Developing
countries have more people but
use less resources / person
 Developed countries have less people but
use more resources/person
 Ends up that both have effects on
environment
Resource Consumption and
Environmental Problems
 Overconsumption

Affluenza: unsustainable addiction to
overconsumption and materialism.
CULTURAL CHANGES AND THE
ENVIRONMENT
 Agricultural

revolution
Allowed people to stay in one place.
 Industrial-medical


revolution
Led shift from rural villages to urban society.
Science improved sanitation and disease control.
 Information-globalization

revolution
Rapid access to information.
Case Study: The Environmental
Transformation of Chattanooga, TN
 Environmental
success story: example of
building their social capital
 1960: most polluted city in the U.S.
 1984:
Vision 2000
 1995:
most goals met
 1993:
Revision 2000
SUSTAINABILITY AND
ENVIRONMENTAL WORLDVIEWS
 Technological

suggest that human ingenuity will keep the
environment sustainable.
 Environmental

optimists:
pessimists:
overstate the problems where our environmental
situation seems hopeless.
1-6 What Are Four Scientific
Principles of Sustainability?
 Concept
1- 6 Nature has sustained itself for
billions of years by using solar energy,
biodiversity, population control, and nutrient
cycling—lessons from nature that we can
apply to our lifestyles and economies.
Four Scientific Principles of
Sustainability: Copy Nature
 Reliance
on Solar
Energy
 Biodiversity
 Population Control
 Nutrient Recycling
Figure 1-16
Chapter 25
Environmental
Worldviews, Ethics, and
Sustainability
Core Case Study:
Biosphere 2 - A Lesson in Humility

Biosphere 2, was designed to be self sustaining lifesupporting system for eight people sealed in the
facility in 1991. The experiment failed because of a
breakdown in its nutrient cycling systems.
Figure 26-1
25-1 What Are Some Major
Environmental Worldviews?
 Concept
25-1 Major environmental
worldviews differ on which is more
important—human needs and wants, or the
overall health of ecosystems and the
biosphere.

Environmental
worldview - how people
think the world works,
their role, and right and
wrong behavior
(environmental ethics)

Planetary management
worldview- humans are
the most important and
should manage the
planet
 Environmental wisdom
worldview - we are a
part of nature and
resources are limited.
We must manage.
Environmental Worldviews
Planetary Management
Stewardship
Environmental Wisdom
• We are apart from the rest of
nature and can manage nature to
meet our increasing needs and
wants.
• We have an ethical
responsibility to be caring
managers, or stewards,
of the earth.
• We are a part of and totally
dependent on nature and nature
exists for all species.
• Because of our ingenuity and
technology we will not run out of
resources.
• We will probably not run out of
resources, but they should not be
wasted.
• The potential for economic
growth is essentially unlimited.
• We should encourage
environmentally beneficial forms
of economic growth & discourage
environmentally harmful forms.
• Our success depends on how
well we manage the earth's life
support systems mostly for our
benefit.
• Our success depends on how
well we manage the earth's life
support systems for our benefit
and for the rest of nature.
• Resources are limited, should
not be wasted, and are not all
for us.
• We should encourage earth
sustaining forms of economic
growth & discourage earth
degrading forms.
• Our success depends on
learning how nature sustains
itself and integrating such lessons
from nature into the ways we
think and act.
Fig. 26-3, p. 617
25-2 What Is the Role of Education in
Living More Sustainably?
 Concept
25-2 The first step to living more
sustainably is to become environmentally
literate, partly by learning from nature.
25-3 How Can We Live More
Sustainably?
 Concept
25-3A We can live more
sustainably by using certain guidelines to
convert environmental literacy and concerns
into action.
 Concept
25-3B We can live more
sustainably by living more simply and lightly
on the earth and by becoming informed and
active environmental citizens.
LIVING MORE SUSTAINABLY
 Some
affluent people are voluntarily adopting
lifestyles in which they enjoy life more by
consuming less.
Figure 26-7
LIVING MORE SUSTAINABLY
 We
can help make the world a better place
by not falling into mental traps that lead to
denial and inaction and by keeping our
empowering feelings of hope ahead of any
immobilizing feeling of despair.
Living More Lightly on the Earth:
The Sustainable Dozen
 Agriculture
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Reduce you meat consumption.
Buy locally grown and produced food.
Buy more organic food and grow your own.
Don’t use pesticides.
 Transportation
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Drive an energy-efficient vehicle.
Walk, bike, carpool, or take mass transit.
Work at home or live near work.
Living More Lightly on the Earth:
The Sustainable Dozen
 Home


Energy Use
Caulk leaks, add insulation, use energy efficient
appliances.
Try to use solar, wind, flowing water, biomass for
home energy.
 Water

Use water-saving showers and toilets, use drip
irrigation, landscape yard with natural plants that
do not require excess water.
Living More Lightly on the Earth:
The Sustainable Dozen
 Resource

Consumption
Reduce your consumption and waste of stuff by
at least 10%: Refuse and Reuse.
Figure 26-5