manxiememe Posted April 11, 2009 Share Posted April 11, 2009 UK 'moving into ecological debt' http://news.aol.co.uk/uk-moving-into-ecolo...rsp=uk_environm QUOTE: The UK will go into "ecological debt", having used up all the natural resources the country can provide for the year, on Easter Sunday, research revealed. Calculations from the New Economics Foundation (NEF) revealed that because of rising consumption of products such as food and energy from abroad, we start "living off" the rest of the world just a third of the way through the year. And because our total consumption is growing and putting increased pressure on ecosystems, the day the UK effectively starts living outside its means is creeping earlier each year. In 1961, it was July 9 and by 1981 it was May 14. This year it falls on April 12 - Easter Sunday. The calculation is based on the UK's ecological footprint - the amount of natural resources it has compared to the amount it consumes and the amount of waste, such as greenhouse gases, it produces. The levels of consumption and waste are far outstripping what the country can naturally sustain, a pattern that is mirrored on a global level. The think-tank warned that the UK is becoming increasingly reliant on imports at a time when economic instability, climate change, competition for resources and growing consumption elsewhere in the world means the chances of the rest of the world providing for us is lessening. According to a new edition of Andrew Simms' book Ecological Debt, countries such as the UK are running up huge environmental debts through the amount of fossil fuels we burn to power our homes and lives, the goods we buy and the waste we create. As a result international problems such as climate change will not be solved without changes in the UK. Mr Simms said: "Uncontrolled growth of financial debt is currently laying waste to large parts of the global economy. An explosion of ecological debt looks set to do the same to a biosphere friendly to human civilisation. A Department of Energy and Climate Change spokeswoman said: "The reality is we live in a globally interconnected world. As a planet, we must live within our environmental means and it's wrong to look at the UK in isolation... We're leading the way in committing to reduce our carbon dependency by 80%, but what's important is to get all countries committed to change in parallel. This is why we're looking for a global deal in Copenhagen this December." Does anyone know where this leaves us? Tina Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tempus Fugit Posted April 11, 2009 Share Posted April 11, 2009 about 5th January one incinerator energy from waste plant and a tiny hydro plant and a few logs ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moghrey Mie Posted April 11, 2009 Share Posted April 11, 2009 Not even spuds and herrin' these days. Most things are brought in by boat or plane. But there is constant wind blowing across the island that could be used to make electricity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manshimajin Posted April 11, 2009 Share Posted April 11, 2009 The UK is doing an excellent job of reducing consumer demand which should lead to a big improvement in the ecological debt. Car industry sales down about 70%, flights down about 10%, major exporting nations' trade down about 25%, international shipping in freefall, retailers dropping like 9 pins as consumer sales plummet, massive reduction in new home building. The future is bright and getting brighter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manxiememe Posted April 11, 2009 Author Share Posted April 11, 2009 Does anyone have any idea when the IOM goes into ecological debt each year? Is it even earlier...? Tina Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moghrey Mie Posted April 11, 2009 Share Posted April 11, 2009 I should have thought so. What do we produce here? Very little as a proportion of what we eat, consume and use. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinahand Posted April 11, 2009 Share Posted April 11, 2009 The last time I really looked into this sort of thing was about 10 years ago so it may be out of date, but Bjørn Lomborg seriously criticized parts of the ideas behind an environmental audit. The biggest problem is that it presumes all economic activity must be compensated by planting trees to sequestor an equal amount of carbon. This totally ignores any energy production from non-fossil fuel means - also this assumes that techonology in the future won't be able to offset the carbon actually produced in the economic activity over the 100 or so years the trees will be growing. This is a big, big flaw - and produces results exactly what those raising environmental conciousness want - an image of human activity swamping the earth. Basically at current levels of output on the earth you need another two or so earths just to grow all the trees. This isn't scientific, and basically alarmist. The entire assumption of renewable energy - wind, solar, tidal, water, fusion, fision etc - is that it replaces output - you don't need to plant trees to compensate for this production - its carbon neutral. I believe the figures used at the top of the thread assume no output is carbon neutral and so you have to replace it via planting trees - it also ignores alternative approaches to carbon sequestration other than trees - ie burial, what Craig Venter wants to do with Microbes etc etc - all ignored, or totally discounted. I believe in humanity working to use its ingenuity to overcome our problems - that contribution is totally ignored here - it says the only answer is to plant more trees, and that there isn't enough earth left to do that. I agree - without inspiration and innovation humanity is doomed - but it has been so since agricultural was invented, but by using our inventions we've overcome. Sure use these sort of things to scaremonger - to get populatons to lobby politicians and raise conciousness, but I believe it is fundamentally dishonest, and uses a veneer of science to make extravegant claims - you cannot say we've used up our earth by April the 12th. It's based on huge, and pessimistic assumptions - you should not bias your results - but make realistic assumptions on what we can achieve. Saying the ONLY solution is plant 2 planets worth of trees aint that - we have carbon neutral technologies now - and definitely will have better ones in the next 100 years - you should probablistically discount these, not totally ignore them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluemonday Posted April 12, 2009 Share Posted April 12, 2009 What do we produce here? Nauseating self praise in abundance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Tatlock Posted April 12, 2009 Share Posted April 12, 2009 I know most shops run out of easter eggs about April, so my guess it is sometime around then. Does anyone know where this leaves us? ...er...bored with this kind of meaningless psuedo-scientific calculation that can't possibly be applied here at the moment. By any measure the island just uses up resources, just look at: your car and it's petrol, every furniture item in your house, the place you work and all the stuff in it, the electricity/gas/oil you use, and the bulk of your shopping basket (including the basket itself). If there were no transport links to the island, (or a mass emergency elsewhere lasting a few weeks) - on the island there would be mass starvation in a matter of a few weeks and all the lights would go out after a similar period. We already have near food riots and near empty shelves if the boat doesn't run for just 2/3 days. Plus we are already living out the 'Lord of the Flies' script here (how culture created by man fails, using as an example a group of school-boys stuck on a deserted island who try to govern themselves with disastrous results). The Isle of Man model is so fundamentally flawed in so many ways - but at least we have a siren. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cliff Hazard Posted April 12, 2009 Share Posted April 12, 2009 Does anyone have any idea when the IOM goes into ecological debt each year? Is it even earlier...? Tina it was Pancake day this year, and Port erin Soap Box Derby day last year - I think Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manshimajin Posted April 12, 2009 Share Posted April 12, 2009 The fall in numbers using Ronaldsway may well "improve" the environmental audit situation if the number of flights fall too. So will all the shops closing at present. IMO the environmental lobby have been very quiet about the positive impact of recession on the world's climate - after all isn't this moving us towards the lower consumption society they want to achieve - and at a rate much faster than international meetings have achieved? Of course the politicians who have preached carbon reduction are now preaching fiscal stimulation! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moghrey Mie Posted April 12, 2009 Share Posted April 12, 2009 I think the Transition movement is urging people to live a simpler life and not use resources so thoughtlessly. But it will take a vast number of allotments to grow enough food for 75,000 people on the IOM. And we don't all like cabbage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sebrof Posted April 14, 2009 Share Posted April 14, 2009 But it will take a vast number of allotments to grow enough food for 75,000 people on the IOM. We do have farms you know, loads of sheep, and scallops. Yum. It's surprising how little land will feed a family. Especially if you keep a pig, and a few chickens. No wine of course, but we'd have beer (using hot-house hops). Reckon we'd do OK. S Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinahand Posted April 14, 2009 Share Posted April 14, 2009 But why would we want to do it! It is highly likely that someone elsewhere will have better land etc and so will be better at it than us. Why not let them get on with what they are better at, let us get on with what we are better at and trade. Certainly you've got to include the environmental cost of that trade, but purely and simply I'm not self-sustainable - I need other people to help me along. I don't think it makes any sense to draw an arbitary line around an island, or on a map, and say the population within this area has to do everything for themselves and not get any help from outside. Why not? As long as the environmental impact is properly thought about trade is good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sebrof Posted April 14, 2009 Share Posted April 14, 2009 But why would we want to do it! It is highly likely that someone elsewhere will have better land etc and so will be better at it than us. Why not let them get on with what they are better at, let us get on with what we are better at and trade. Certainly you've got to include the environmental cost of that trade, but purely and simply I'm not self-sustainable - I need other people to help me along. I don't think it makes any sense to draw an arbitary line around an island, or on a map, and say the population within this area has to do everything for themselves and not get any help from outside. Why not? As long as the environmental impact is properly thought about trade is good. I have always believed that a nation should try to feed itself. There are a number of good reasons for that, some of which Britain discovered during WWII. As oil prices and sea levels rise, we may quite soon be wishing that we were more self-sufficent here on the island. S Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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