Term
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Definition
| direct solar energy, winds, tides, flowing water |
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Definition
| fossil fiels, metallic minerals, nonmetallic minerals |
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Term
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Definition
| fresh air, fresh water, fertile soil, plants and minerals |
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Term
| Major environmental problems |
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Definition
| air pollution, biodiversity depletion, water pollution, waste production, food supply problems |
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Term
| Basic causes to environmental degradation |
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Definition
| population growth, rising resource use, no environemtal sustainability, poverty |
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Term
| what these basiuc causes lead to |
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Definition
| introducing non-native species, hunting and poaching, overfishing, habitat loss |
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Term
| traditional decision making |
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Definition
| social, economic, and environemtal |
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Term
| decision making in sustainable society |
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Definition
| venn diagram overlapping social, economic, and environemtal, overlapped area was sustainable solutions |
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Term
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Definition
Ability of nations to identify long-range trends: population growth, resource use, environmental change, etc. And analyze how these trends interact over time
And making awareness of these long range trends, multiple impacting trends and integral part of the current policy and decision making process
Not prediction, it is a process for bringing better information into the decision making process |
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Term
| environemtal policy paradox |
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Definition
| We often understand what the best short and long term solutions to environemtal problems yet the task of implementing these solutions is left undone or too late |
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Term
| Commoner's four laws of ecology |
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Definition
everything is interconnected to everything else
everything must go somewhere
nature knows best
there is no such thing as a free lunch
nature bats last |
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Term
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Definition
| currently 6.7 billion people, may reach 7 billion in 2013. Population growth follows an exponential curve |
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Term
| The environmental equation |
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Definition
I=PAT
I= impact
P=population
A=Affluence
T=technology |
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Term
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Definition
Caryring capacity is the number of individuals of a certain population that can be supported ina certain area for a prolonged period of time by the resources in the area
when a population lives within its carrying capacity, it does not degrade the resources upon which it depends |
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Term
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Definition
While we are degrading our resources, we are globally producing enough food to feed our current population (although 15% is malnourished)
some people speculate that we have overshot our carrying capacity |
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Term
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Definition
Nothing grows unconstrained forever
predators
disease
food limits
resource limits
hits carying capacity and slows and has a soft landing |
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Term
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Definition
| Ecologists never found a complex species whose population followed the idealized growth curve. Instead most populations have overshoots and oscillations which stabilize or collapse |
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Term
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Definition
| human growth rate is faster than exponential specially most recently |
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Term
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Definition
The study of populations is called demongraphics
The U.N studies the world demographics and makes projections of future population growth
Projections are extrapolations of current trends, not guanrantees
U.N Projections do not consider whether future populations are sustainable |
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Term
| Growth in the poorest nations |
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Definition
Europe and Japan have reached maximum growth and will begin to decline
The poorest nations will continue to grow very rapidly |
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Term
| Age structures and population |
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Definition
Developing countries: Large fraction is very young. The country will see a substantial population increase even if fertility rates are low pyramid shaped
Developed countries: This country has a stable perhaps even declining population: even |
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Term
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Definition
Almost all future growth will be in the world's poorest nations
If the poorest nations manage continue to lower fertility rate, the world population should top out at around 9.5 billion in 2075
If fertility remains high, and again assuming disasters, population will reach 12-13 billion by 2075
Chances of getting that high withouth disaster are not good |
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Term
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Definition
U.N projections assume an idealized soft landing growth curve.
No other species is known to do this |
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Term
| consequences of overpopulations |
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Definition
overpopulation is putting increasing burdon on the earth's natural and environment
Resources which take millennia (soils) to hundreds of millions of years (ores) to accumulate are being consumed and dispersed on time scales of centuries to decades
The u.s has less than 5% of population but consumes 25% of world's resouces and 25% of waste |
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Term
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Definition
includes distibution of contraceptives, the availability of abortions, and promoting reproductinve rights of women.
These practices conflict with some religious values |
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Term
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Definition
| BEst ways to decrease growth rate is to increase educational and societal status of women. Results in better healthcare and nutritian and effective contraceptive use |
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Term
| Economic incentives and government regulation of childbearing |
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Definition
some govnmts have used economic incentives to promote population control.
Such as one child policy of china. |
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Term
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Definition
| An accounting tool that enables us to estimate the resource consumption and waste assimilation requirements of a defined population or economy in terms of a corresponding productive land area |
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Term
| Human consumption and sustainability |
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Definition
consume: To do away with completely, destroy
Consumption: a progressive wasting away of the body
Consumerism: The theory that an increasing consumption of goods is economically desirable
Consumer sovereignty: The absolute individual power to purchase a product or service |
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Term
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Definition
| A condition of overload, debt, anxiety, and waste resulting from the drogged pursuit of more |
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Term
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Definition
| A growing movement in contrast to the rapid expansion of consumerism, symbolized by the idea of a "downshift" in accumulating material possesions, while maintaining a high quality of life. |
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Term
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Definition
1: you can test how you're doing personally in staying well
2: You can help your community asess its own true health, using indicators of sustainability developed by several american cities
3: We can find a subsitute for our corrent measure of national health, our GDP for GPI |
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Term
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Definition
| General progress indicator. Measures general well being of the u.s and promotes new indicators of progress that reflect the social and ecological cost of economic activity. |
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Term
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Definition
Institutional problem: Leaves good and services provided by nature at zero. Public subsidy, externalities ignored
Ideological Problem: Overemphasizes materially-based growth and marginalizes environmental and social problems
Organizational Problem: Lack of recognition that problems are interconnected and need for systemic change |
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Term
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Definition
1) Resource depletion
2) Income distribution
3) Housework and nonmarket transactions
4) Changes in leisure time
5) Unemployment and underemployment
6) pollution
7) long term env. damage
8) Lifespan of consumer durables and infrastructure
9) Defensive expenditures
10) Sustainable investments |
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Term
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Definition
human: labor
Financial: cash, investments, etc
manufactured: infrastructure, machines, tools
natural: resources, living systems, etc. |
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Term
| Context for sustainable communities |
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Definition
Sustainable growth: getting bigger
sustainable development: getting better |
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Term
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Definition
living systems and any stock of natural assets that yields a flow of valuable services into the future
Example fish stocks are natural capital
"ecological bottom line is learning to live on the interest generated by remaining stocks of natural capital |
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Term
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Definition
The shared knowledge, understanding and patterns of interactions that a group of people bring to any productive activity through organizations, structures, and social relations independent of state and corperations
Building a sense of community on trust and commitment |
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Term
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Definition
first 200 years...people/labor scarce resources abundant. made people more productive
now: People/labor and abundant resources scarce. Make resources more productive |
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Term
| Four strategies of natural capitalism |
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Definition
1) Radical resource productivity
Using resources more effectively
2) Biomimicry
eliminating the idea of waste
3_ Service and flow economy
Changing the relationship between producer and consumer
4) Investing in natural capital
reinvesting to sustain, restore, and expand natural stocks. |
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Term
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Definition
| change in fertility. death rate declining and fertility staying high. We want to lower both and time in between is d.t |
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Term
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Definition
| The tragedy of the commons is a type of social trap that involves a conflict over resources between individual interests and the common good. It occurs when there is a tendency towards free access and unrestricted demand for a finite resource |
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