Ecological footprint

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The phrase "ecological footprint" is a metaphor used to depict the amount of land and water area a human population would hypothetically need to provide the resources required to support itself and to absorb its wastes, given prevailing technology. The term was first coined in 1992 by Canadian ecologist and professor at the University of British Columbia, William Rees.

Footprinting is now widely used around the globe as an indicator of environmental sustainability. It can be used to measure and manage the use of resources throughout the economy. It is commonly used to explore the sustainability of individual lifestyles, goods and services, organisations, industry sectors, regions and nations.

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[edit] Ecological footprint analysis

Ecological footprint analysis approximates the amount of ecologically productive land, sea and other water mass area required to sustain a population, manufacture a product, or undertake certain activities, by accounting the use of energy, food, water, building material and other consumables. The calculations used typically convert this into a measure of land area used in 'global hectares' (gha) per capita.

It is a way of determining relative consumption for the purpose of educating people about their resource use and, sometimes, triggering them to alter their consumption. It can be combined with overpopulation concerns and stated as "the number of Earths it would take to support every human living exactly the way you do." Ecological footprints have been used to argue that current lifestyles are not sustainable. For example, the average "earthshare" available to each human citizen is approximately 1.9 gha per capita. The US average footprint is 9.5 gha per capita, and that of Switzerland 4 gha, whilst China's is circa 1.5 gha per head.[1] A number of NGO websites allow estimation of one's ecological footprint (see Footprint Calculator, below).

[edit] Changing consumption patterns

Contrary to many assumptions, it is human use of renewable resources, not of non-renewable ones, that poses the real sustainability crisis.[citation needed] Nature can restore renewable resources at a certain rate. Humans consistently and increasingly consume renewables faster than ecosystems can restore them.

This state of excessive ecological burden eventually threatens those very ecosystems by not allowing them sufficient time to "recharge." Furthermore, humans can clearly live without nonrenewable resources such as metals or fossil fuels, as we have done in the not-so-distant past. It is the renewable resource base on which we and all species depend. The ecological footprint approach can introduce the concept of resource recharge and the rate at which we use resources as key elements in more sustainable human societies. This time element helps us understand that it's not just what we use, or even how much, but how fast, and over what period of time. This meshes with other movements to "slow down" human consumption and help people disengage from that acceleration of actions and expectations that has been a crucial feature of industrial societies.

[edit] Population Biology

The field of Population biology, the study of populations of organisms in their environments, states that no unused niche will remain unused if an population that can fill it has access. Thus, any decrease in worldwide footprint will eventually result in an increase in population, as the newly unused resources are re-claimed by new humans. A formula demonstrating this phenomenon is

Population = Land/ecological footprint

[edit] Criticisms

Calculated footprints can be inaccurate due to simplifying assumptions. Many factors of the calculations are based on crude estimates and the numbers may not be applicable to all places (the method is biased to Northern Hemisphere lifestyles). Also, the model generally does not count multiple uses of land: a forest is a carbon sink and the same area is not counted for food production.

The bioproductivity-based Ecological Footprint method rewards the increase of high-productivity monocultures by assigning a higher biocapacity to that region. The bioproductivity-Footprint has to be complemented with a biodiversity-Footprint.

The per-person nature of footprinting is questionable. For example, the model favors households with more children: A large house with ten children has a smaller per-person footprint than a house half its size with only one person. This could be a perverse result, since having more children might add to global overpopulation, with high ecological costs in the future. This would only occur if most of the world had or began having large families. Currently many countries are experiencing slow or even negative population growth (ex.Bulgaria, Latvia, Estonia, Germany, and Poland). To counter these uncertainties, the models of ecological footprinting are constantly being refined. However, not all criticisms can be resolved (van den Bergh and Verbruggen, 2000).

[edit] Ecological Footprint Studies in the United Kingdom

The UK's average ecological footprint is 5.45 global hectares per capita (gha) with variations between regions ranging from 4.80 gha (Wales) to 5.56 gha (East England).[1] Two recent studies have examined relatively low-impact small communities. BedZED a new-build urban community in London designed by Bill Dunster Architects for the Peabody Trust was found to have a footprint of 3.20 gha. Findhorn Ecovillage, a rural community in Moray, Scotland, had a total footprint of 3.86 gha, including both the many guests and visitors who travel to the community to undertake residential course there and the nearby campus of Cluny Hill College. However, the residents alone have a footprint of 2.78 gha, a little over half the UK national average and the lowest ecological footprint of any community measured so far in the industrialised world.[2]

[edit] References

  • William Rees (1992) Ecological footprints and appropriated carrying capacity: what urban economics leaves out Environment and Urbanisation Vol 4 no 2 Oct 1992
  • Wackernagel, M. and W. Rees. 1996. Our Ecological Footprint: Reducing Human Impact on the Earth. Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers. ISBN 0-86571-312-X
  • Lenzen, M. and Murray, S. A. 2003. "The Ecological Footprint - Issues and Trends". ISA Research Paper 01-03
  • Chambers, N., Simmons, C. and Wackernagel, M. 2000. Sharing Nature's Interest: ecological footprints as an indicator of sustainability. Earthscan, London ISBN 1-85383-739-3 (see also http://www.ecologicalfootprint.com)
  • J.C.J.M. van den Bergh and H. Verbruggen (1999), Spatial sustainability, trade and indicators: an evaluation of the ‘ecological footprint’, Ecological Economics, Vol. 29(1): 63-74.
  1. ^ a b Chambers, N. et al (2004) Scotland’s Footprint. Best Foot Forward. ISBN 0-9546042-0-2.
  2. ^ Tinsley, S. and George, H. (2006) Ecological Footprint of the Findhorn Foundation and Community. Moray. Sustainable Development Research Centre, UHI Millennium Institute.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

[edit] General

[edit] Calculators

Energy and Sustainability Status   Edit
Ecological footprint | Ecosystem services | Kardashev scale | TPE | Human Development Index | Value of Earth | Appropriate technology | Infrastructural capital
Sustainability and Development of Energy   Edit
Conversion | Development and Use | Sustainable Energy | Conservation | Transportation
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