Sustainocene

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Governance supporting interdependence of Ecology, Society and Economy in the Sustainocene

The concept of a ‘Sustainocene’ was developed by the Canberra-based Australian physician Bryan Furnass in March 2012.[1][2] It refers to a postulated future period of over a billion years where policy and governance structures, as well as science, technology and ethics, coordinate to achieve the social virtues of ecological sustainability and environmental integrity as influentially propounded by eco-economists such as EF Schumacher (with his concept of ‘small (and local) is beautiful’) and Kenneth Boulding (with his idea of ‘Spaceship Earth’ as a closed economy requiring recycling of resources), as well as Herman Daly with his notion of ‘steady state’ economies drawing upon the laws of thermodynamics and the tendency of the universe to greater entropy (dispersal of energy).[3] The length of the Sustainocene has been suggested to be over a billion years to correspond with the legacy that life has given humans to this point and that species moral obligation to reciprocate with its stewardship and use technology to provide for its own needs [4][5] and so pave the way to according Rights of Nature [6]

Canberra Eco-Physician Bryan Furnass who created the concept of a Sustainocene

Sustainocene and planetary medicine

One area of academic research and policy development that fits well with “Sustainocene’ thinking is that centred on the idea that this planet should be treated not just as a distinct living entity (James Lovelock’s Gaia Hypothesis), but as a patient. ‘Planetary medicine’ as this field has become known has become a symbolic rubric focusing not just public and governmental attention on the interaction between human health, technological development and sustainability of the biosphere. In this emerging discipline, characteristic features of the Anthropocene epoch such as anthropogenic climate change and environmental degradation, as well as gross societal imbalances in poverty as well as lack of necessary fuel, food, medicines, security and access to nature, are targeted as intrinsically global pathologies the resolution of which requires concerted efforts to implement a wide range of not just renewable energy technologies (such as those using nanotechnology) but bioethical principles including those related to protecting the interests of future generations and preservation of biodiversity.[7] It has been argued that transition to the Sustainocene requires a concerted approach rather than piecemeal actions to support ecosystem resilience.[8]

Artificial photosynthesis may facilitate harmony between human interests and ecology in the Sustainocene. Photo: Bob Pemberton

Artificial photosynthesis powering the sustainocene

It has been suggested that in the Sustainocene, human structures (such as roads, buildings and vehicles) will cease "bludging" off ecosystems and "pay their own way" by incorporating artificial photosynthesis which will take pressure off humanity's economic need to over-exploit natural photosynthesis. This concept involves all human structures using sunlight to split water as a source of hydrogen (which when burnt as a fuel produces water) and to absorb carbon dioxide and use it to make food or fertilizer. One of the reasons for focusing on this as the main energy supply of the Sustainocene is that more solar energy strikes the Earth's surface in one hour of each day than the energy used by all human activities in one year.[9][10][11] Arguably, there is a simple public policy message at the core of a vision such as that of the Sustainocene. "It involves telling people that nanotechnology will be used to make buildings function like trees. A device that can do this and is available to cheap purchase and installation, like the mobile phone or internet, by providing decentralised power equitably could rapidly transform society to one that is more community and values-oriented."[12] In the Sustainocene, "instead of the cargo-cult ideology of perpetual economic growth through corporate pillage of nature, globalised artificial photosynthesis will facilitate a steady state economy and further technological revolutions such as domestic nano-factories and e-democratic input to local communal and global governance structures. In such a world, humans will no longer feel economically threatened, but rather proud, that their moral growth has allowed them to uphold rights of nature."[13]

Correlation with geophysics

As a main sequence star, our sun's luminosity is rising by 1% every 110 million years.[14] In a billion years time (see Future of the Earth) the Sun is expected to be considerably more luminous, before the hydrogen fuel at its core begins to be exhausted in about 4 billion years and it passes through the subgiant stage and evolves into a red giant.[15] The increased luminosity and energy emitted from the sun will raise the global temperature of the Earth and increase the rate of weathering of silicate minerals, thus decreasing the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This means that before 1 billion years from now the concentration of atmospheric CO
2 will fall below the critical threshold needed to sustain C3 photosynthesis: about 50 parts per million. At this point, trees and forests in their current forms will no longer be able to survive.[16] The long term trend will be for all plant and animal life to die off.[17] Thus, carefully balancing atmospheric carbon dioxide, oxygen (as well as other planetary physiological boundaries[18]) will be one of the main tasks of human stewardship, governance and policy over technologies such as artificial photosynthesis in the Sustainocene.[19]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Furnass B. From Anthropocene to Sustainocene. Challenges and Opportunities. Public Lecture. Australian National University 21 March 2012. http://dea.org.au/images/general/Sustainocene_Furnass_(wth_text)_150512.ppt and What's on at ANU- Public Lecture From Anthropocene to Sustainocene - challenges and opportunities 21 March 2012 http://billboard.anu.edu.au/event_view.asp?id=85103 (accessed 21 April 2013)
  2. ↑ Bryan Furnass 'From Anthropocene to Sustainocene' http://www.anu.edu.au/emeritus/events/docs/From_Anthropocene_to_Sustainocene_text_only_150512.pdf (accessed 9 December 2013)
  3. ↑ Faunce, T 2012, 'Towards a global solar fuels project - Artificial photosynthesis and the transition from anthropocene to sustainocene', Procedia Engineering, vol. 49, no. 2012, pp. 348-356.
  4. ↑ World Future Society. Powering the World with Artificial Photosynthesis. The Futurist 2013; 47(3). http://www.wfs.org/futurist/2013-issues-futurist/may-june-2013-vol-47-no-3/powering-world-artificial-photosynthesis (accessed 21 April 2013)
  5. ↑ Daniel Nocera. Sustainocene. Harvard Leads a New Epoch for Humankind http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P232xezhRZg (accessed 21 April 2013)
  6. ↑ Vines T, Bruce A, Faunce TA. “Planetary Medicine and the Waitangi Tribunal Whanganui River Report: Global Health Law Embracing Ecosystems as Patients.” Journal of Law and Medicine 2013; 20: 528-541 http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2235935 (accessed 21 April 2013)
  7. ↑ Faunce, T 'Governing Planetary Nanomedicine: Environmental Sustainability and a UNESCO Universal Declaration on the Bioethics and Human Rights of Natural and Artificial Photosynthesis (Global Solar Fuels and Foods)', NanoEthics, 2012; 6(1):15-27.
  8. ↑ Ranganatham J, Irwin F. World Resources Institute. Letter. The Economist June 9, 2011 http://www.economist.com/node/18803255/print?story_id=18803255 (accessed 24 June 2013)
  9. ↑ Faunce TA. Nanotechnology for a Sustainable World. Global Artificial Photosynthesis as the Moral Culmination of Nanotechnology. Edward Elgar 2012.
  10. ↑ Faunce TA Global Artificial Photosynthesis. ANU Public Lecture 19 September 2012 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZ8qFS0kcbU (accessed 21 April 2013)
  11. ↑ Tom Faunce Towards a Global Solar Fuels Project - Governance and Scientific Challenges. Energy Futures Lab. Imperial College London 30 April 2012 http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/newsandeventspggrp/imperialcollege/administration/energyfutureslab/eventssummary/event_3-4-2012-16-7-18 (accessed 21 April 2013)
  12. ↑ Faunce TA 'Towards a global solar fuels project - Artificial photosynthesis and the transition from anthropocene to sustainocene', Procedia Engineering 2012; 49: 348-356.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877705812048047
  13. ↑ Thomas Faunce. 'Artificial Photosynthesis Could Extend Rights to Nature. The Conversation 2 July 2013. https://theconversation.com/artificial-photosynthesis-could-extend-rights-to-nature-15380 (accessed 2 July 2013).
  14. ↑ Schröder, K.-P.; Connon Smith, Robert (2008), "Distant future of the Sun and Earth revisited", Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 386 (1): 155–163, arXiv:0801.4031, Bibcode:2008MNRAS.386..155S, doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2008.13022.x
  15. ↑ ackmann, I.-Juliana; Boothroyd, Arnold I.; Kraemer, Kathleen E. (1993), "Our Sun. III. Present and Future", The Astrophysical Journal 418: 457–468, Bibcode:1993ApJ...418..457S, doi:10.1086/173407.
  16. ↑ O'Malley-James, J. T.; Greaves, J. S.; Raven, J. A.; Cockell, C. S., Swansong Biospheres: Refuges for life and novel microbial biospheres on terrestrial planets near the end of their habitable lifetimes, arXiv:1210.5721, Bibcode:2012arXiv1210.5721O.
  17. ↑ Ward, Peter Douglas; Brownlee, Donald (2003), The life and death of planet Earth: how the new science of astrobiology charts the ultimate fate of our world, Macmillan, ISBN 0-8050-7512-7.
  18. ↑ Rockström J (2010) Planetary Boundaries New Perspectives Quarterly, 27(1): 72–74.
  19. ↑ Faunce TA 'Towards a global solar fuels project - Artificial photosynthesis and the transition from anthropocene to sustainocene', Procedia Engineering 2012; 49: 348-356.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877705812048047

Further study

Furnass B. 'From Anthropocene to Sustainocene' March 2012 ANU.http://www.anu.edu.au/emeritus/events/event-120321.html

Wilton Park Conference on future trends for regions and states 2013. https://www.wiltonpark.org.uk/podcast/futures-wp1218/

Faunce TA 'Towards a global solar fuels project - Artificial photosynthesis and the transition from anthropocene to sustainocene', Procedia Engineering 2012; 49: 348-356.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877705812048047

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