Defining Scales and Goals of Sustainability
Written as a senior research project at CU Boulder. Advised by Prof. Wil Srubar. Incomplete. See this article with citations.
Introduction
Ecosystems across the world are faced with increasing pressure from climate change, nutrient-induced eutrophication, land use, resource extraction, and many other consequences of human activity. A 2007 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences came to the astonishing conclusion that in 2000, compared to a scenario free of human disturbance, global Net Primary Production (NPP), essentially a measure of carbon fixation and therefore ecosystem productivity, decreases by an average of 6 kg per person per day. This is equivalent to 20% of the Earth’s biomass over the course of a year (15.6 Pg). Increasing industrialization and globalization is likely to continue exacerbating these stresses in the coming decades. As early as 1972, the Limits to Growth report predicted a collapse of global economic and ecological systems in the middle of this century. However, the thermodynamic limits of the Earth system have yet to impose significant constraints for global behavior. If we are to succeed as a species, we would do best to self-impose constraints before the finitude of the world catches up to us. However, due to the linkages in the global system, it is not often straightforward to…
