Geography 210: Physical Geography

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Geography 210 Physical Geography Environmental
Issues

• Lecture 19 A Sustainable Future

http//geog-www.sbs.ohio-state.edu/courses/G210/
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The final stretch

• Last chapters BK 27 30
• s sustainability
• Last lecture Thurs 30 Nov next class!!
• Lab Friday 01 Dec Review for final
• Itll pay to be there ?
• Remember, final lab grade is best 7 of 8
• FINAL EXAM Tues 05 Dec 930-1118 am

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The Economic Importance of the Environment (BK
27)

• Environmental Economics
• The study of relationships of the importance of
  the environment to the economy
• Includes
• The impact of environment as a result of economic
  activity
• Regulation of the economy and economic processes
• The objective of balancing environmental and
  economic goals of society
• Development of economic policy to minimize
  environmental degradation
• Finding solutions to environmental problems

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Environmental D-making

• Decision making involves analysis of tangible and
  intangible factors
• Environmental economics task develop methods of
  evaluating intangibles that
• Provide good guidelines
• Easy to understand
• Quantitatively credible

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Case study Can mahogany be harvested sustainably
profitably?

• A highly valued wood native to Latin America
• Ecology affects production economics
• Seedlings need clearings 120 yrs for marketable
  growth
• Natural low density growth
• Traditional logging is selective, not enough
  clearance for regrowth
• Roads ? increased development ? rainforest
  ecosystem threatened

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• Option 1 ban all mahogany products restrict
  intl trade
• Rainforest Action Network
• Critics say boycott ? devalues forest ?
  encourages agriculture ? destroys forest
• Option 2 logging carefully
• Rio Bravo, Belize experiment remove more trees,
  but monitor ecological impacts by studying birds,
  butterflies
• Cost benefit analysis of harvest methods
• Critics say only 1/3 less destructive
• Option 3 grow mahogany in plantations leave
  old-growth alone
• International Institute of Tropical Forestry,
  Puerto Rico
• May not help livelihood of Latin American people

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The Environment as a Commons

• Commons
• Land or another resources owned publicly with
  public access for private uses
• People using common natural resources often do
  not seek sustainability, despite long-term best
  interestwhy??

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British Ocean Territory a commons

• Great Chagos Bank largest atoll
• Tuna fishery
• Coral reefs
• Biodiversity

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Short-term profits vs. long-term resource
sustainability

• Profit motive alone will not always promote
  actions in best environmental interest 2
  reasons
• The tragedy of the commons Garrett Hardin,
  ecologist
• Personal profit share from exploitation gtgt loss
  of resource
• Low growth rate and thus low productivity of
  resource
• Maximizing immediate profit can seem reasonable
  practical if low growth rate diminishes long-term
  sustainable harvest of resource

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Whaling sustainability vs profits
Bowhead whales killed 1849-1914 low growth ?
exploitation
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Externalities

• Externality (Indirect Cost)
• An effect not normally accounted for in the
  cost-revenue analysis of producers and often not
  recognized by them as part of their costs and
  benefits
• Costs (or benefits) that dont show up in the
  price tag
• Direct Costs
• Those borne by the producer and passed directly
  on to the user or purchaser
• E.g. whaling externalities
• Loss of revenue to tourist boats
• Loss of ecological role in marine ecosystems
• Without true costs revealed, consumer cannot
  behave rationally

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Consider Atmospheric pollution externality

• Problem 1 What is the true cost of clean air?
• Everyone agrees it to be larger than zero
• But, effectively traded and dealt with as if
  value 0
• How to get value of clean air/water recognized
  socially gt 0?
• Quantitative evaluation of tangible resources
  prior to development is standard procedure
• Problem 2 Who should bear burden of these
  costs?
• Environmental ecological costs could be
  included in production costs through fees or
  taxation
• Borne by corporation and/or consumer
• Or shared by entire society through general tax

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Natural capital

• Public service functions of Nature are often
  overlooked, and not really valued until lost from
  our environment
• Forests absorb particulates salt marshes convert
  toxic compounds wetlands treat sewage
• Bees pollinate an estimated 20 billion crops
  annually in US
• Bacteria fix N and clean water air
• Estimates of economic value 3 to 33 trillion
  per year!
• Ecological systems providing these benefits are
  natural capital
• But what about (intangible) beauty of naturehow
  do we arrive at a price, or assess value, of
  landscape aesthetics?

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How is the future valued?

• Can we place a value on future existence of
  anything?
• Spending present on environment diverts
  resources from other productive investment
• With more wealth, we tend to value environmental
  assets moreso is conserving now robbing the poor
  for future rich?

General rule dont discard or destroy anything
irreplaceable if you are unsure of future value.
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Risk-Benefit Analysis

• Evaluation of the riskiness of a present action
  in terms of its possible outcomes
• Acceptable risk is socially, ethically,
  psychologically relative
• How much are we willing to pay to reduce risk?
• We tend to accept higher levels of risk for
  non-essential activities (e.g. recreational
  sports)
• Impossible ethically to put value on human life,
  but we can survey amount people are willing to
  pay for certain risk reduction or probability of
  longevity (e.g. Rand Co. 32,000/life
  1600/year)
• The relation between risk and benefit affects our
  willingness to pay for an environmental good

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Do we improve quality of life (reduce pollution)
for living or extend life expectancy regardless
of quality of life?
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• Evaluation of environmental intangibles is
  becoming more common in environmental analysis
• When quantitative, such evaluation balances the
  more traditional economic evaluation and helps
  separate facts from emotion in complex
  environmental problems
• Take a Closer Look at Risk Benefit analysis
  and DDT (BK 27.1 p. 593)

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How Do We Achieve an Environmental Goal?

• Means to implement a societys policies are
  policy instruments
• Moral suasion (publicity, social pressure)
• Direct controls (regulations)
• Market processes (prices, taxes, subsidies,
  licenses)
• Government investment (research education)
• Many controls have been applied to the use of
  desirable resources and the control of pollution

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Marginal Costs and the Control of Pollutants

• Marginal Costs the cost to reduce one additional
  unit of pollutant
• Often increases rapidly (e.g. exponentially for
  BOD reduction from petroleum refining) as
  reduction percentage increases
• 3 methods of direct control of pollution
• Setting maximum levels of emission
• Needs careful monitoring costly, difficult
• Requiring processes and procedures
• Required methodology may cost lots, restrict
  production, or go obsolete
• May increase efficiency (e.g. Japan uses only 5
  MJ/1 GDP, while US uses 12 MJ)
• Charging fees for emission

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BK Chp 30 Imagine a sustainable future
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Case Planning future of Chankanab Lagoon, Mexico
Limestone geology Pollution vulnerability Importin
g sand lagoon restoration
Tourism and ecological management
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Ecotopia qualities

• A stabilized or even decreased population
• Sustainable living resources and harvest
• Recreation enjoyment of nature open to all,
  with minimized pollution
• Risk of species extinction minimized
• Enough public servicing ecosystems
• Enough wilderness for recreation
• Sustain representatives of natural ecosystems in
  dynamic ecological states

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...if you reflect on our change from thoughtless
trash-tossing to virtually universal recycling,
or from the past in which smokers didn't hesitate
to blow smoke in anybody's face to our present
restrictions on smoking in public places, it's
clear that shared ideas about acceptable or
desirable behavior can change markedly. Such
changes occurred without anybody getting arrested
in the dark of night. Further changes will
come... Ernest Callenbach, 1975
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Developing a sustainable future A new paradigm

• Evolutionary, not revolutionary
• Change in values involving lifestyle, social,
  economic environmental justice
• Inclusive, not exclusive
• All people of Earth to higher standard of living
  without compromising environ
• Proactive, not reactive
• Plan for change events rather than awaiting
  surprises
• Attracting, not attacking
• Sound science appropriate values should be just
  right
• Assisting the disadvantaged, not taking advantage
• All people have a right to live work in safe,
  clean environment

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Planning a nations landscapes

• What is necessary at a national scale to achieve
  goals?
• John Wesley Powells vision organized around
  watersheds, not state boundaries use but not own
  or sell water
• 1902 Congress water rights sold large dams
  canals constructed

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The Wildlands Project

• America needs rewilding
• Larger parks needed for umbrella species of
  large predators
• Managed around big predators, providing core
  areas, corridors buffers
• Controversy of science values
• fundamental threat to democracy?
• Flawed science?

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Process of future planning

• Two qualities of formal land use planning
  processes
• A set of rules requiring paper work procedures
• An imaginative attempt to use land resources in
  beautiful, economically beneficial and
  sustainable ways
• All human civilization plans land use planning
  is a social experiement
• Democracy involves tug-a-war between individual
  freedoms and societal welfare
• Who speaks for nature? Who legally represents the
  environment?

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Regional planning (TVA)

• 20th century experiment crossing state boundaries
• Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) 1933
• One of worlds best examples of regional planning
• FDR vision as govern corporation with flexibility
  initiative
• Multidimensional multilevel planning to manage
  land water resources
• Electrical power, flood control, navigation,
  recreation
• Central authority with considerable public input

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The TVA
Raccoon Mountain Dam
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Environment law

• US legal system derived from British common law
  system
• Custom, judgment, court decrees instead of
  legislation
• Protect individual freedom just give me a
  little land, a horse, and a gun and leave me
  alone.
• A caveat when individual behavior infringed on
  the property or well-being of others
• Public trust doctrine government is public
  guardian of natural resources

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History of federal environmental law

• 3 stages
• Convert public lands to private uses (early 19th)
• Conserved public lands for recreation, beauty,
  historic preservation
• National parks
• US Forest Service
• Primary environmental laws
• NEPA 1969 ? Water Quality

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Who stands for nature?

• 2 widely supported moral positions
• Public lands (resources) must be open to public
  use, and resources for economic benefit
• Public lands should serve society first,
  individuals secondly

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Skiing at Mineral King
Should our ethical values be extended to
non-human?
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How you can be an actor in legal processes

• Environmental litigation more access to courts ?
  policy
• Citizen actions
• Environmentalism to ecotage
• Civil disobedience

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Case Protecting Forests

• Julia Hill spent 2 years (1997-1999) in a 1000
  year old redwood tree to prevent it from being
  logged.

photos 1995-2000 Shaun Walker
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Mediation

• Negotiation between adversaries guided by neutral
  facilitator
• Classic case Storm King Mountain, Hudson River
• 1962 hydro plant
• 1965 lawsuit
• 1981 settlement

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International environmental law diplomacy

• No world government with enforcement authority
• Agreement with multinational issues
• Montreal Protocol, 1987, ozone
• Antarctica White Continent

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International Environmental Laws

• Montreal protocol (1987)
• international agreement to phase out
  stratospheric ozone destroying CFCs.
• Persistent Organic Pollutants
• persist in the environment, bioaccumulate through
  the food web, and pose a risk of causing adverse
  effects to human health and the environment
• Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) liver damage,
  cancer
• Following several years of negotations, 127
  nations in 2001 adopted a treaty to greatly
  reduce the use of toxic chemicals known to
  contribute to cancer and harm the environment.
• Kyoto Protocol (1997)
• Reduction of CO2 air pollution
• Not ratified by US and Australia

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Global security environment

• Terrorism comes in part from poverty,
  overcrowding, disease conflicts that have
  environmental significance
• Over 1 billion live in poverty with little hope
• 1992 Rio Earth Summit on Sustainable Development
  objective global environmental vs. economic
  problems
• Wealth gap is growing
• Environment remains under-funded
• 100 million/yr vs. 2 billion/day

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Euro Tunnel tunnel rubble to nature reserve

• Pros cons of innovative environmental change

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International Environmental Summit Meetings

• The UN has sponsored several meetings on
  environmental issues
• Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 1992
• The Rio Conference was a significant milestone
  that set a new agenda for sustainable
  development.
• A major theme was perceived threat of global
  warming.
• Kyoto, Japan, 1997
• Johannesburg, South Africa, 2002
• Climate Change Conference, Montreal, 2005

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US Role in Sustainable Development

• Rio de Janeiro, March 24, 1992
• The Bush I administration fears Greenhouse gas
  limits hinder economic growth
• Kyoto, Japan, 1997
• On October 22, 1997, Clinton announced that he
  would seek the establishment of an international
  emissions trading scheme as an alternative to
  carbon taxes as a means of reducing world
  emissions of greenhouse gases.
• Johannesburg , 26 February 2002
• American environmentalists urged President G. W.
  Bush to announce that he will go to Johannesburg
  to join with other countries in partnerships that
  can address the environmental challenges
  threatening long-term well-being and security.
• G. W. Bush sent Powell
• Current US position on sustainable development is
  non-committal.

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United Nations Climate Change Conference agrees
on future critical steps to tackle climate change

• Montreal, 10 December 2005 - The United Nations
  Climate Change Conference closed with the
  adoption of more than forty decisions that will
  strengthen global efforts to fight climate
  change.
• The US is remains outside of the process

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Earth SummitJohannesburg, South Africa, 2002
Read Johannesburg Declaration on Sustainable
Development
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Outcome of Johannesburg Summit

• New York, 25 September 2002
• When the United Nations General Assembly
  authorized holding the World Summit on
  Sustainable Development, it was hardly a secret
  that progress in implementing sustainable
  development has been extremely disappointing
  since the 1992 Earth Summit, with poverty
  deepening and environmental degradation
  worsening. What the world wanted, the General
  Assembly said, was not a new philosophical or
  political debate but rather, a summit of actions
  and results.
• UN Division of Sustainable Development website

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Earth Summit on Sustainable Development 2002

• Continue work toward environmental social
  justice for all people
• Enhance the development of sustainability
• Minimize local, regional global environmental
  degradation
• Develop support international agreements to
  control global warming pollutants

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Challenge

• Solving our environmental problems will help
  build a more secure sustainable future
• As university graduates you will take on
  responsibility of transferring environmental
  knowledge taking responsible leadership

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Motivation

• present practices of energy and resource
  consumption are non-sustainable
• What on Earth will we leave for future
  generations?

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Non-sustainability

• An estimated 80 percent of global fish stocks are
  now fished at or beyond their sustainable limit.
• Despite the existence of alternative sources,
  more than 90 percent of paper still comes from
  trees - eating up about one fifth of the total
  wood harvest worldwide.
• Around 1.7 billion people worldwide - more than a
  quarter of humanity are entering the "consumer
  class,"
• adopting the diets, transportation systems, and
  lifestyles that were limited to the rich nations
  of Europe, North America, and Japan during most
  of the last century.
• In China alone, 240 million people have joined
  the ranks of consumers - a number that will soon
  surpass that in the United States.

http//www.worldwatch.org/press/news/2004/01/08
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Sustainability

• We could have a sustainable world of 8 billion
  with the average standard of living now found in
  Europe for all people by
• controlling population growth
• increasing fuel efficiency
• increasing reliance on renewable energies
• controlling pollution
• Scrubbers
• Reforestation
• Carbon sequestration
• promoting environmental protection

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Less is more

• Consumption
• "You don't own your possessions, your possessions
  own you.
• Urban redevelopment
• Less land consumed
• Driving Less
• Increased cash-flow
• More time
• Better health
• auto-related injuries In 2002
• 2.9 million nationally
• 42,815 deaths
• 800 / week
• 1,400 in Ohio.
• Less stress
• decreased freedom?

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Books on SimplyLiving.net
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more consumption ? more happiness

• About a third of Americans report being "very
  happy," the same share as in 1957, when Americans
  were only half as wealthy.
• Today, Americans are among the most worked people
  in the industrial world
• nine more weeks on the job each year than the
  average European.

http//www.worldwatch.org/press/news/2004/01/08
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Annual Conference of The Club of Rome in
co-operation with The Arab Thought Forum "In
Search for Common Ground for Peace and
Development8-10 October, 2003Amman, Jordan
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Final Statements from Annual Conference of The
Club of Rome

• Although there was hope that the process of
  globalizing markets would lead to more equity and
  the socio-economic inclusion of the poor, this
  has not come true. On the contrary, we are facing
  the crucial fact that the rich have become
  richer, the poor poorer.
• In the US, the top 5 percent has more wealth than
  the remaining 95 percent of the population put
  together.

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Special ReportThe 400 Richest Americans09.21.06,
1000 AM ET
http//www.forbes.com/lists/2006/54/biz_06rich400_
The-400-Richest-Americans_Rank.html
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Closing Thoughts

• optimistic view
• as the human population approaches the actual
  carrying capacity, there will be sufficient
  signals and we will collectively act on those
  signals in such a way as to prevent an overshoot
  and collapse from occurring.
• Evidence suggests we may have reached carrying
  capacity not just through population growth, but
  by increased consumption

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• signals of overshoot
• increasing prices for natural resources, which
  encourage a reduction in use through
  conservation, recycling, and increased
  efficiency.
• fossil fuels we rely on for most of our energy
  are produced too slow
• we cannot achieve a steady state condition for
  these energy resources.
• Thus, we will ultimately have to get all of our
  energy from sustainable sources such as solar,
  wind, and nuclear sources (nuclear fusion rather
  than fission, whose waste products are too
  problematic).
• Solar is the most attractive resource

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• example of how this adaptation can work
• the case of the 1970s energy crisis
• rapid changes occurred in response to the
  decrease in availability of petroleum.
• Unfortunately, most of these changes were
  reversed shortly after, once the flow of oil from
  the OPEC countries continued.
• we can change if we are convinced that we must
• especially if it is economically favorable to
  change.

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