Ecological Footprint of the Modern Economy and the Ways to Reduce It

Ecological Footprint of the Modern Economy and the Ways to Reduce It PDF Author: Bruno S. Sergi
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3031497112
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description

Ecological Footprint of the Modern Economy and the Ways to Reduce It

Ecological Footprint of the Modern Economy and the Ways to Reduce It PDF Author: Bruno S. Sergi
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3031497112
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description


Our Ecological Footprint

Our Ecological Footprint PDF Author: Mathis Wackernagel
Publisher: New Society Publishers
ISBN: 086571312X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 178

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Book Description
Our Ecological Footprint presents an internationally-acclaimed tool for measuring and visualizing the resources required to sustain our households, communities, regions and nations, converting the seemingly complex concepts of carrying capacity, resource-use, waste-disposal and the like into a graphic form that everyone can grasp and use. An excellent handbook for community activists, planners, teachers, students and policy makers.

Living within a Fair Share Ecological Footprint

Living within a Fair Share Ecological Footprint PDF Author: Robert Vale
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136456074
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 342

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Book Description
According to many authorities the impact of humanity on the earth is already overshooting the earth’s capacity to supply humanity’s needs. This is an unsustainable position. This book does not focus on the problem but on the solution, by showing what it is like to live within a fair earth share ecological footprint. The authors describe numerical methods used to calculate this, concentrating on low or no cost behaviour change, rather than on potentially expensive technological innovation. They show what people need to do now in regions where their current lifestyle means they are living beyond their ecological means, such as in Europe, North America and Australasia. The calculations focus on outcomes rather than on detailed discussion of the methods used. The main objective is to show that living with a reduced ecological footprint is both possible and not so very different from the way most people currently live in the west. The book clearly demonstrates that change in behaviour now will avoid some very challenging problems in the future. The emphasis is on workable, practical and sustainable solutions based on quantified research, rather than on generalities about overall problems facing humanity.

Building a Sustainable and Desirable Economy-in-Society-in-Nature

Building a Sustainable and Desirable Economy-in-Society-in-Nature PDF Author: Peter Victor
Publisher: ANU E Press
ISBN: 192186205X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 98

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Book Description
The world has changed dramatically. We no longer live in a world relatively empty of humans and their artifacts. We now live in the “Anthropocene,” era in a full world where humans are dramatically altering our ecological life-support system. Our traditional economic concepts and models were developed in an empty world. If we are to create sustainable prosperity, if we seek “improved human well-being and social equity, while significantly reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities,” we are going to need a new vision of the economy and its relationship to the rest of the world that is better adapted to the new conditions we face. We are going to need an economics that respects planetary boundaries, that recognizes the dependence of human well-being on social relations and fairness, and that recognizes that the ultimate goal is real, sustainable human well-being, not merely growth of material consumption. This new economics recognizes that the economy is embedded in a society and culture that are themselves embedded in an ecological life-support system, and that the economy cannot grow forever on this finite planet. In this report, we discuss the need to focus more directly on the goal of sustainable human well-being rather than merely GDP growth. This includes protecting and restoring nature, achieving social and intergenerational fairness (including poverty alleviation), stabilizing population, and recognizing the significant nonmarket contributions to human well-being from natural and social capital. To do this, we need to develop better measures of progress that go well beyond GDP and begin to measure human well-being and its sustainability more directly.

Our Ecological Footprint

Our Ecological Footprint PDF Author: Mathis Wackernagel
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 184

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Book Description
Presents a comprehensive analysis of the ecological resources and technologies required for sustaining households, communites, regions, and nations.

Living within a Fair Share Ecological Footprint

Living within a Fair Share Ecological Footprint PDF Author: Robert Vale
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136456066
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
According to many authorities the impact of humanity on the earth is already overshooting the earth’s capacity to supply humanity’s needs. This is an unsustainable position. This book does not focus on the problem but on the solution, by showing what it is like to live within a fair earth share ecological footprint. The authors describe numerical methods used to calculate this, concentrating on low or no cost behaviour change, rather than on potentially expensive technological innovation. They show what people need to do now in regions where their current lifestyle means they are living beyond their ecological means, such as in Europe, North America and Australasia. The calculations focus on outcomes rather than on detailed discussion of the methods used. The main objective is to show that living with a reduced ecological footprint is both possible and not so very different from the way most people currently live in the west. The book clearly demonstrates that change in behaviour now will avoid some very challenging problems in the future. The emphasis is on workable, practical and sustainable solutions based on quantified research, rather than on generalities about overall problems facing humanity.

Ecological Footprint

Ecological Footprint PDF Author: Mathis Wackernagel
Publisher: New Society Publishers
ISBN: 1550927043
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
The only metric that tracks how much nature we have – and how much nature we use Ecological Footprint accounting, first introduced in the 1990s and continuously developed, continues to be the only metric that compares overall human demand on nature with what our planet can renew — its biocapacity — and distils this into one number: how many Earths we use. Our economy is running a Bernie Madoff-style Ponzi scheme with the planet. We use future resources to run the present, using more than Earth can replenish. Like any such scheme, this works for a limited time, followed by a crash. Avoiding ecological bankruptcy requires rigorous resource accounting — a challenging task, but doable with the right tools. Ecological Footprint provides a complete introduction, covering: Footprint and biocapacity accounting Data and key findings for nations Worldwide examples including businesses, cities, and countries Strategies for creating regenerative economies Whether you’re a student, business leader, future-oriented city planner, economist, or have an abiding interest in humanity’s future, Footprint and biocapacity are key parameters to be reckoned with and Ecological Footprint is your essential guide. AWARDS SILVER | 2020 Eric Zencey Prize SILVER | 2019 Nautilus Book Awards: Ecology & Environment FINALIST | 2019 Foreword INDIES: Ecology & Environment

Quantitative Eco-nomics

Quantitative Eco-nomics PDF Author: Peter Bartelmus
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1402069669
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 339

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Book Description
This thought-provoking and colorful book cuts through the fog of vision and advocacy by comparing and applying new quantitative tools of both environmental and ecological economics. Environmental accounts and empirical analyses provide operational concepts and measures of the sustainability of economic performance and growth. The text raises doubts, however, about the measurability of sustainable development. Further reading sections are provided at the end of each chapter.

Managing Without Growth

Managing Without Growth PDF Author: Peter A. Victor
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 1848442998
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 269

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Book Description
Managing Without Growth offers a compelling argument for the need for a new policy focus in the rich nations. Peter Victor argues that it is time for our obsession with economic growth to end. A new focus on human well-being must replace our more is better philosophy. Brett Dolter, Briarpatch Magazine Peter Victor clearly presents the arguments as to why already relatively rich countries may have to manage low or no growth in their economies if they wish to address rather than continue contributing to global environmental problems. His modelling suggests that managing without growth need not be the economic disaster that is so often assumed. This is a lucid book that provides an excellent introduction to this important but neglected area. Paul Ekins, King's College London, UK At last, Managing Without Growth, a book that puts economics in its proper place within the real world and points the direction we must go in confronting the ecological crisis of the planet. As an economist, environmental studies professor Peter Victor is eminently qualified for the task. He examines some of our most fundamental assumptions and beliefs about the market, pricing, free trade and growth, prosperity and happiness that too often preclude a serious consideration of the environment and economy. His book couldn t be a more timely and important analysis of the destructive consequences of aspiring to endless growth and downloading the costs onto nature itself. He makes a powerful case for the need to work deliberately towards a steady state economy where the real world of the biosphere should set the limits to our activity. Victor s book should be at the basis for our discussion of these critical issues today. David Suzuki, broadcaster and activist Peter Victor analyses the critical policy question of our time, how to manage our economy equitably and efficiently without growing beyond biophysical limits. He reasons carefully and rigorously, yet pulls no punches in drawing conclusions that some will consider radical. A superb book! Herman E. Daly, University of Maryland, US Overcoming our addiction to economic growth is one of the most important challenges for the 21st century. Peter Victor s masterful summary of the history and fallacies of this particularly pervasive and increasingly dangerous addiction will be a great help in getting over it. A sustainable and desirable future requires clearly differentiating between bigger and better and a recognition that in the overdeveloped West these two have parted ways. Peter Victor s book will help us slow down by design, not disaster, and understand how that slowing down will in fact increase our quality of life. Robert Costanza, The University of Vermont, US Peter Victor s book is a carefully crafted argument for managing without growth . It is not only an up-to-date survey of the latest thinking on energy, climate, and population, it offers practical policy responses to these challenges. This book is a must read for academics and policymakers concerned with environmental integrity and human wellbeing. John Gowdy, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, US Peter Victor challenges the priority that rich countries continue to give to economic growth as an over-arching objective of economic policy. The challenge is based on a critical analysis of the literature on environmental and resource limits to growth, on the disconnect between higher incomes and happiness, and on the failure of economic growth to meet other key economic, social and environmental policy objectives. Shortly after World War II, economic growth became the paramount economic policy objective in most countries, a position that it maintains today. This book presents three arguments on why rich countries should turn away from economic growth as the primary policy objective and pursue more specific objectives that enhance wellbeing. The author contends that continued economic growth worldwide is unrealistic due to environmental and

Review of the Draft Fourth National Climate Assessment

Review of the Draft Fourth National Climate Assessment PDF Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309471699
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 207

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Book Description
Climate change poses many challenges that affect society and the natural world. With these challenges, however, come opportunities to respond. By taking steps to adapt to and mitigate climate change, the risks to society and the impacts of continued climate change can be lessened. The National Climate Assessment, coordinated by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, is a mandated report intended to inform response decisions. Required to be developed every four years, these reports provide the most comprehensive and up-to-date evaluation of climate change impacts available for the United States, making them a unique and important climate change document. The draft Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4) report reviewed here addresses a wide range of topics of high importance to the United States and society more broadly, extending from human health and community well-being, to the built environment, to businesses and economies, to ecosystems and natural resources. This report evaluates the draft NCA4 to determine if it meets the requirements of the federal mandate, whether it provides accurate information grounded in the scientific literature, and whether it effectively communicates climate science, impacts, and responses for general audiences including the public, decision makers, and other stakeholders.