Environmental Problems - Causes & Sustainability

“Environmental issues are defined as problems with the planet’s

systems (air, water, soil, etc.) that have developed as a result of
human interference or mistreatment of the planet.”

Air

Land Water
Valuation of Ecosystem Goods and Services
Interaction of Anthropocene Risk with Traditional Notions

Our environment grapples with a

myriad of challenges, and a
considerable number of these
predicaments exhibit a concerning
trajectory of exacerbation, thrusting
us into an era of genuine
environmental crisis.

Consequently, it is of escalating
importance to heighten awareness
regarding the existence of these
challenges and elucidate potential
measures to mitigate their adverse
impacts.

Source: Nature Sustainability

 Planetary Boundaries

• Planetary boundaries are a

framework to describe limits to the
impacts of human activities on the
Earth system.

• Beyond these limits, the environment

may not be able to self-regulate
anymore. This would mean the Earth
system would leave the period of
stability of the Holocene, in which
human society developed.
Environmental Pollution

The contamination of air, water,

and soil by pernicious substances
such as plastics, heavy metals,
and nitrates is attributed to
diverse sources, including
emissions and effluents from
industrial facilities, combustion of
fossil fuels, acid rain, oil spills,
and discharge of industrial
waste.
Global Climate Change

Anthropogenic activities emitting

greenhouse gases contribute to
global warming, instigating
temperature elevations that
subsequently result in heightened
sea levels, polar ice cap
dissolution, flash floods, and the
expansion of arid regions.
Overpopulation

The burgeoning global

population strains finite resources
like food, water, and fuel,
particularly in developing
nations.

Paradoxically, attempts to
alleviate the resource shortage
through intensive agriculture
exacerbate the predicament by
introducing chemical fertilizers,
pesticides, and insecticides.
Rapid Population Growth
As populations surge, there's an increased demand for food, water, and energy, exacerbating
environmental concerns. Urbanization accelerates, leading to challenges in housing and employment.
Addressing the consequences of rapid population growth requires sustainable policies, education,
and access to family planning resources.
Population Growth Rate
• Determined by four principle components:
r = (b - d) + (i - e)
Where
b = birth rate
d = death rate
i = immigration rate
e = emigration rate

• Growth is also exponential

P = Po ert
Where
P = future size of population
Po = current size of population
t = number of years
r = assumed constant growth rate
Factors Affecting Population Growth
Global Population Growth
World Population by World Regions
Global Population Growth
Inadequate Waste Management

The excessive generation and

improper disposal of waste, pose
significant environmental threats.

Notably perilous are nuclear

waste, plastics, and electronic
waste.
Tragedy of Commons

• The Tragedy of the Commons highlights the

challenges associated with managing finite,
shared resources and the need for collective
action or governance mechanisms to prevent
overexploitation and ensure sustainability.

• The concept has been applied to various

environmental issues, such as overfishing,
deforestation, and pollution, as well as to
broader discussions about the management
of common-pool resources in economics and
social science.
Tragedy of Commons

• The tragedy of the commons is an

economic theory by Garrett Hardin,
which states that individuals acting
independently and rationally according
to each’s self-interest behave contrary
to the best interests of the whole group
by depleting some common resource.

• It is this logic that has led to the current

situation in ocean fisheries, the Amazon
rain forest, and global climate change.
This graph shows number of Earths required to provide the resources
used by humanity and to absorb their emissions for each year since
1960.
Natural Capital Use and Degradation

Today humanity
uses the
equivalent of 1.6
Earths to provide
the resources we
use and absorb
our waste.

(Data from Worldwide Fund for Nature, Global Footprint Network, Living Planet Report 2008.)
Exceeding Our Limits

Humanity’s Ecological Footprint against Earth’s biocapacity

Urbanization | Understanding its concept and Implications
Urban Population | Trends

• ~1 % land surface BUT

• 60-70% of anthropogenic greenhouse gas
emissions
• Concentration of:
• Population
• Economic activities
• Demand for food, energy, water,
materials
• Urban areas drive global land use changes
Cities & Urbanization| The Big Picture

• More than half of the world’s population

lives in cities, and many urbanites reside in
one of the 33 “megacities” with at least 10
million inhabitants.

• Urbanization can threaten the quality of life,

but cities also provide the testbeds needed
to come up with related solutions.
Urbanization

• Almost all population growth expected

in cities & towns of developing countries.
• By 2050:
>70 % China’s population urban
>China: +30 cities >1 million people
>50 % India’s population urban
• India: +26 cities >1 million people

• Urban growth will require 100-200

million hectares (~equivalent to 2010
global urbanized area)
Future of Urbanization
Earth Overshoot Day

Earth Overshoot Day marks the date

when humanity has exhausted nature's
budget for the year.

For the rest of the year, we are

maintaining our ecological deficit by
drawing down local resource stocks and
accumulating carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere. We are operating
in overshoot.

Source: https://www.wwf.org.hk/en/news/?19280/Feature-Story-Earth-Overshoot-Day-arrives-worryingly-early
Earth Overshoot Day
Earth Overshoot Day

(Planet’s Biocapacity / Humanity’s Ecological Footprint) x 365 = Earth Overshoot Day

Earth Overshoot Day 2023: 2 August
Earth Overshoot Day | Country-wise

Switzerland’s Overshoot Day 2023

is on 13th May. From this date
onwards, Switzerland is living on
credit at the expense of future
generations. If the world’s
population had the same lifestyle as
Swiss citizens, the resources of three
planets would be necessary to
ensure its existence.
Poverty and Environment

Schematic representation of a poverty-environment trap that increase chronic poverty

Poverty and Environment
Poverty and Environment | Developing Countries
Debunking the ‘Environmental Kuznets Curve’

‘Environmental Kuznets Curve’ (EKC)

hypothesis:

Environmental assets are degraded in the

early stages of economic development, only
to improve after some income threshold has
been passed.

Environmental Kuznets Curve

Source: www.povertyenvironment.net/pep
Poverty and Environment

Source: https://www.worldvision.org.nz/getmedia/26362f6f-eb18-47a7-a1dd-a6c33c38bfd7/topic-sheet-
poverty_and_the_environment/
Population, Poverty and Environment Degradation
Programmatic Approach to Poverty-Environment Mainstreaming

• The Poverty-Environment Initiative delivers financial

and technical support for sustained capacity
building to governments and other actors who take
on the challenge of mainstreaming poverty-
environment linkages into national development
policy, planning and budgeting processes.

• For example, the Initiative assists planning

agencies to consider poverty-environment linkages,
including climate change, in formulating economic
and development policies, and helps environment
agencies to engage with these policy processes
more effectively.

• Poverty-Environment Initiative also supports civil

society to engage in planning processes, making
sure the voice of the poor is heard. Source: https://www.unpei.org/poverty-environment-mainstreaming/
Poverty | Harmful Effect
Carrying Capacity of the System

• It refers to the upper limit of population or

community size ( e.g., biomass) imposed through
environmental resistance .

• In nature, this resistance is related to the

availability of renewable resources, such as
food, and non renewable resources, such as
space, as they affects biomass through
reproduction, growth and survival.
Environmental Impact Model | IPAT Equation

I=PAT
Total Human
Impact
Population

Affluence = Goods & Services

Person Impact
Technology =
Goods & Services
Environmental Impact Model | IPAT Equation
Cause of the problem Cleaning up

I=PAT
To lower impact

1. Lower the consumers

2. Lower Consumption

3. Produce Green
 IPAT Equation | Inputs through Casual Loop Diagram
Art
Literacy

Ethics Policy
Gender equity
Birth rate
Spirituality Non-sustainable development

Economic good Pollutant

Impact = Population  
Population Economic good

Sustainable development
Source: The Systemic Correlation Between Mental Models and Sustainable Design Implications for Engineering Educators
Affluenza

• Affluenza is the unsustainable addiction to

over-consumption and materialism exhibited
in the lifestyle of affluent consumers in the
United States and other developed
countries.
• Affluenza is usually described as an
endorsement of the flow of wealth that
causes a division of classes, and loss of
financial, environmental and emotional
balance.
• It is an important reason of environmental
change, scarcity of biodiversity and the
heritage of leaving offspring.

Source: https://issuu.com/aaldrikadrievanderveen/docs/affluenza
Environmental Consequences of Per capita consumption
Human Impact on Environmental System

Complex &
interacting • Physical systems –
components
Biogeophysical atmosphere/climate
systems • Biogeochemical
cycles – N, C, P, Fe

• Water
• Minerals Natural
Biodiversity
• Fossil fuels resources
• Land productivity • Mass extinctions
• Pollution/manufacture • Biodiversity loss
d products • Invasive species
 Ecological Footprint

Ecological Footprint - The amount of land

area and water required to produce
sustainably the resources or ecological
services needed to support a defined
population at a set standard of living
• Vancouver - population 1.7 million
ecological footprint - 19 times its area
• Netherland - 14 times its area
• Australia has one of the highest footprints
at 6.25 ha/person

http://www.wwf.org.au/our_work/people_and_theenvironment/human_footprint/footprint_calculator/

CARBON
Represents the amount of
forest land that could
sequester CO2 emissions from
the burning of fossil fuels.
GRAZING LAND
Represents the amount of
grazing land used to raise
livestock for meat, dairy, hide
and wool products.
FOREST
Represents the amount of
forest required to supply
timber products, pulp
and fuel wood.
The Ecological Footprint
measures the biological
productive area that people
need for provision of renewable
resources, occupy with
infrastructure, or require for
absorption of CO2 waste, using
global hectare (gha) as the unit
of measurement.
What are the components of the
footprint?
BUILT-UP LAND
Represents the amount of land
covered by human
infrastructure, including
transportation, housing,
industrial structures and
reservoirs for hydropower.
CROPLAND
Represents the area used to
grow crops for food and fibre
for human consumption as well
as the area for animal feed.
FISHING GROUNDS
Calculated from the estimated
primary production required to
support the fish and seafood
caught.
Ecological Footprint | Calculations

Source: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1470160X14004312
Global Footprint
Bioproductivity and Biocapacity
• Bioproductivity is the amount and rate of production which occur in a given ecosystem over a
given time period.
• Biocapacity quantifies nature’s capacity to produce renewable resources, provide land for
built-up areas and provide waste absorption services such as carbon uptake.
Sustainability

• Sustainability
Merriam –Webster definition: (1) of , relating to , or being a method of harvesting or
using a resource so that the resource is not depleted or permanently damaged.
• Sustainable Development
Brundtland Commission: Development which meets the needs of the present without
compromising the ability of the future to meets its needs.

• Sustainable Engineering : Design of human and industrial systems to ensure that

humankind’s use of natural resources and cycles do no lead to diminished quality of life
due to either to losses in future economic opportunities or to adverse impacts on social
condition, human health and the environment.
Sustainability
Sustainability | Human Need

Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs Max-Neef’s fundamental human

needs
Pillars of Sustainability
Principles of Sustainability

https://www.lambtononline.ca/en/visit-and-explore/sustainable-
lambton.aspx
Sustainable Development Matrix
2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
QUESTIONS

• What is Earth overshoot day?

• Calculate population growth in a country (assume input values)?
• What is Tragedy of commons?
• What is Ecological foot print and how do you compute this?
• How poverty and sustainable development are connected?
• What are Bioproductivity and Biocapacity?
• What is Environmental Impact model, IPACT?
• Explain Sustainable development and SDGs