1. Toward a Sustainable Future
Chapter 1

2. Easter Island
Dutch ships arriving in 1772 found the island to be in ruins.
Polynesians who colonized around A.D. had deforested the island for agriculture, structural materials, etc. The soil eroded and became baked in the sun from lack of root structure.
When a society fails to care for its environment the civilization colapses.

3. 4 Global Trends Population growth and economic development
Decline of vital life-support ecosystems
Global atmospheric changes
Loss of biodiversity

4. Population growth and economic development
Population growth is occurring at an exponential rate almost all of which is in developing countries.
What problems might this cause?
Extreme poverty billion people lack the ability to meet their basic needs of food, shelter and clothing. Disease, starvation, civil unrest…

5. Millennium Development Goals
MDG
United Nations Human Development Program
Year 2000
Reduce extreme poverty and its effects on human well being
Goal 1 of 8…entire MDG goals in table 6-2

6. PAGE Pilot analysis of Global Ecosystems
World Resources Institute (“environmental think tank”)
Put together an analysis to represent the “big picture” of the human impact on the five major ecosystems that provide all the goods and services.

7. MA Millennium ecosystem Assessment
Launched on “World Environment Day” 2001
1360 scientists from 95 countries
Gathering, analyzing and synthesizing information focusing on the link between goods and services and human well-being

8. Montreal Protocol
1987
Aimed at curbing pollution from the release of chlorofluorocarbons (CFC’s) into the atmosphere.
Spray style hairspray went off the market for a short period of time.
What else might have to change to comply?

9. Vocab-Anthropogenic
Human caused

10. Kyoto Protocol 166 nations Kyoto, Japan December 1997
Reduce the amount of CO2 and other greenhouse gases by to pre-1990 levels.
US withdrew in 2001 (George W. Bush-same year he was first inaugurated)

11. Ratified in 2004 and is effect in most industrialized nations.
Continued…
Ratified in 2004 and is effect in most industrialized nations.
Following the protocol became issue for the US
conflicting issue of short-term economic concerns and long-term climate change.
levied restrictions only on the developed nations of the world, and not on developing countries like China, India, and Brazil.

12. Biodiversity What are the risks when biodiversity is lost?
Agricultural crops could dwindle
Medication research could be harmed
Stability of and ability of natural ecosystems to recover
Aesthetic and moral reasons to sustain biodiversity.

13. Three Strategic themes
Sustainability
Can be continued indefinitely
Stewardship
Caring for something on behalf of someone else
Science
A way of gaining knowledge: scientific method

14. Sustainability Sustainable yields Sustainable ecosystems
Sustainable society
Sustainable development

15. Stewardship Scientists and everyday people
Refuse to engage in the conspicuous consumption constantly being urged on them by commercials.
The story of stuff video
Environmental justice movement

16. Three integrative themes
Ecosystem capital
Natural and managed systems that provide all the goods and services
Policy and politics
Human decisions and policy that determine what happens to the natural world
Globalization
Interconnectedness of human economics, ideas, and cultures

17. Figure 1-8

18. What concerns they have
Economist-growth, efficiency, and the optimum use of resources
Sociologists- human needs and concepts like equity, empowerment, social cohesion and cultural identity
Ecologists- preserving the integrity of natural systems

19. To a sustainable future???
What will it take? There is broad agreement on two factors
A demographic transition from a continually increasing human population to one that is stable
A resource transition to an economy that relies on nature’s income and protects capital from depletion.

20. STOP Stop TOxic Pollution
Draws attention to toxic waste and health problems and to acquire assistance from organizations like superfund and the EPA.

21. WTO
World Trade Organization
Negotiates world trade agreements

22. Three components of Science
Data
Gathering information
Theories
Models that are used to represent how a system would work
Shaping principles
The world view a scientist brings with his work

23. Why Controversy? New information constantly being brought to attention
Complex phenomena
Bias
Subjective values

24. Three sectors of the market
Agriculture, forestry, and fishing account for 50% of all jobs worldwide and 70% of all the jobs in sub-Saharan Africa, eastern Asia, and the Pacific islands.

25. Purpose of Policy Goals Addresses two sets of issues
Improvement of human welfare
protection of natural resources
Addresses two sets of issues
Prevention or reduction of air, water, and land pollution
Use of natural resources like forests, fisheries, oil, land, etc.

26. WSSD Johannesburg, South Africa, 2002
World Summit on Sustainable Development
United Nations attempted to address that the UNCED (1992) were implemented weakly.
Generating clean water and sanitation, providing energy services, reversing deterioration of agriculture, protecting marine fisheries, addressing toxic chemicals and human health affects and protecting biodiversity

28. UNCED
Included agenda 21- a blueprint to guide sustainable development.

29. Environmental racism
Placement of waste sites and other hazardous industries in towns and neighborhoods in which most of the residents are nonwhite while wealthier, more politically active and often predominately white communities receive a greater share of facilities.

30. EPA
Environmental Protection Agency

31. Sustainable yields
Because natural systems reproduce at rates faster than required to keep their populations stable in the event of disaster, it is possible to harvest a certain percentage every year without depleting the source (fish, trees, etc.)

32. Sustainable ecosystems
Natural systems that persist and thrive by recycling nutrients and maintaining a diversity of species in balance.

33. Applied to human systems
Sustainable society
Applied to human systems
A society in balance with the natural world, neither depleting its resource base nor producing pollution in excess of nature’s ability to absorb them

34. Sustainable development
A form of development or progress that meets the needs of the present without compromising the the ability of future generations to meet their own needs

35. CO2 Three fossil fuels releasing CO2 into the atmosphere: Crude oil
Natural gas
Coal

36. other greenhouse gases
water vapor
carbon dioxide
nitrous oxide
methane
chlorofluorocarbons
ozone

37. 5 Major ecosystems Coastal/Marine Freshwater Agricultural Grasslands
Forests