Living Within A Fair Share Ecological Footprint

Author : Robert Vale
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1136456066
Total Pages : 280 pages
Book Rating : 4.60/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Living within a Fair Share Ecological Footprint written by Robert Vale and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-09-02 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: According to many authorities the impact of humanity on the earth is already overshooting the earth’s capacity to supply humanity’s needs. This is an unsustainable position. This book does not focus on the problem but on the solution, by showing what it is like to live within a fair earth share ecological footprint. The authors describe numerical methods used to calculate this, concentrating on low or no cost behaviour change, rather than on potentially expensive technological innovation. They show what people need to do now in regions where their current lifestyle means they are living beyond their ecological means, such as in Europe, North America and Australasia. The calculations focus on outcomes rather than on detailed discussion of the methods used. The main objective is to show that living with a reduced ecological footprint is both possible and not so very different from the way most people currently live in the west. The book clearly demonstrates that change in behaviour now will avoid some very challenging problems in the future. The emphasis is on workable, practical and sustainable solutions based on quantified research, rather than on generalities about overall problems facing humanity.

Author : Mathis Wackernagel
Publisher : New Society Publishers
ISBN 13 : 086571312X
Total Pages : 178 pages
Book Rating : 4.23/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Our Ecological Footprint written by Mathis Wackernagel and published by New Society Publishers. This book was released on 1998-07-01 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Our Ecological Footprint presents an internationally-acclaimed tool for measuring and visualizing the resources required to sustain our households, communities, regions and nations, converting the seemingly complex concepts of carrying capacity, resource-use, waste-disposal and the like into a graphic form that everyone can grasp and use. An excellent handbook for community activists, planners, teachers, students and policy makers.

Author : N.F. Gray
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 3319201468
Total Pages : 406 pages
Book Rating : 4.67/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Facing Up to Global Warming written by N.F. Gray and published by Springer. This book was released on 2015-08-18 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this volume, Professor N.F. Gray offers a comprehensive primer on climate change, sustainability, and how the two concepts are related. This book consists of fifteen chapters, each treating a specific aspect of the current global crisis, including scientific background as well as an up to date appraisal of the issue at hand. It covers the reasons behind climate change and the effect it will have on the planet and on the reader directly. Gray also presents readers with the means to assess their own environmental impact and details positive individual and community actions to address global warming. “Climate change,” “global warming,” and “sustainability” are phrases that almost everyone has heard, whether on the news or around the dinner table. The increasing frequency of major events such as droughts, severe storms, and floods are beginning to make these concepts inescapable, and being fully informed is an absolute necessity for students and indeed for us all. Nick Gray (PhD, ScD) is a founding member of the Environmental Sciences Unit (1979) at Trinity College Dublin, which was the first center for postgraduate research and training in environmental science and technology in Ireland. He has written a number of books and over 150 research papers and book chapters, and currently serves as the Director of the Trinity Centre for the Environment.

Author : Fabricio Chicca
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1315529122
Total Pages : 238 pages
Book Rating : 4.27/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Everyday Lifestyles and Sustainability written by Fabricio Chicca and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-04-09 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The impact of humanity on the earth overshoots the earth’s bio-capacity to supply humanity’s needs, meaning that people are living off earth’s capital rather than its income. However, not all countries are equal and this book explores why apparently similar patterns of daily living can lead to larger and smaller environmental impacts. The contributors describe daily life in many different places in the world and then calculate the environmental impact of these ways of living from the perspective of ecological and carbon footprints. This leads to comparison and discussion of what living within the limits of the planet might mean. Current footprints for countries are derived from national statistics and these hide the variety of impacts made by individual people and the choices they make in their daily lives. This book takes a ‘bottom-up’ approach by calculating the footprints of daily living. The purpose is to show that small changes in behaviour now could avoid some very challenging problems in the future. Offering a global perspective on the question of sustainable living, this book will be of great interest to anyone with a concern for the future, as well as students and researchers in environmental studies, human geography and development studies.

Author : Emilio Garcia
Publisher : Springer Nature
ISBN 13 : 3030777839
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.38/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Collapsing Gracefully: Making a Built Environment that is Fit for the Future written by Emilio Garcia and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2021-07-24 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This innovative book investigates the concept of collapse in terms of our built environment, exploring the future transition of modern cities towards scenarios very different from the current promises of progress and development. This is not a book about the end of the world and hopeless apocalyptic scenarios. It is about understanding change in how and where we live. Collapse is inevitable, but in the built environment collapse could imply a manageable situation, an opportunity for change or a devastating reality. Collapsing gracefully means that there might be better ways to coexist with collapse if we learn more about it and commit to rebuild our civilisations in ways that avoid its worst effects. This book uses a wide range of practical examples to study critical changes in the built environment, to contextualise and visualise what collapse looks like, to see if it is possible to buffer its effects in places already collapsing and to propose ways to develop greater resilience. The book challenges all agents and institutions in modern cities, their designers and planners as well as their residents and users to think differently about built environment so as to ease our coexistence with collapse and not contribute to its causes. .

Author : Karl Coplan
Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 0231549164
Total Pages : 289 pages
Book Rating : 4.65/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Live Sustainably Now written by Karl Coplan and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2019-12-31 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Any realistic response to climate change will require reducing carbon emissions to a sustainable level. Yet even people who already recognize that the climate is the most urgent issue facing the planet struggle to understand their individual responsibilities. Is it even possible to live with a sustainable carbon footprint in modern American society—much less to live well? What are the options for those who would like to make climate awareness part of their daily lives but don’t want to go off the grid or become a hermit? In Live Sustainably Now, Karl Coplan shares his personal journey of attempting to cut back on carbon without giving up the amenities of a suburban middle-class lifestyle. Coplan chronicles the joys and challenges of a year on a carbon budget—kayaking to work, hunting down electric-car charging stations, eating a Mediterranean-style diet, and enjoying plenty of travel on weekends and vacations while avoiding long-distance flights. He explains how to set a personal carbon cap and measure your actual footprint, with his own results detailed in monthly diary entries. Presenting the pros and cons of different energy, transportation, and lifestyle options, Live Sustainably Now shows that there does not have to be a trade-off between the ethical obligation to maintain a sustainable carbon footprint and the belief that life should be fulfilling and fun. This powerful and persuasive book provides an individual-level blueprint for a carbon-sustainable tweak to the American dream.

Author : Peter Dauvergne
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262535149
Total Pages : 232 pages
Book Rating : 4.44/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Environmentalism of the Rich written by Peter Dauvergne and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2018-02-09 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What it means for global sustainability when environmentalism is dominated by the concerns of the affluent—eco-business, eco-consumption, wilderness preservation. Over the last fifty years, environmentalism has emerged as a clear counterforce to the environmental destruction caused by industrialization, colonialism, and globalization. Activists and policymakers have fought hard to make the earth a better place to live. But has the environmental movement actually brought about meaningful progress toward global sustainability? Signs of global “unsustainability” are everywhere, from decreasing biodiversity to scarcity of fresh water to steadily rising greenhouse gas emissions. Meanwhile, as Peter Dauvergne points out in this provocative book, the environmental movement is increasingly dominated by the environmentalism of the rich—diverted into eco-business, eco-consumption, wilderness preservation, energy efficiency, and recycling. While it's good that, for example, Barbie dolls' packaging no longer depletes Indonesian rainforest, and that Toyota Highlanders are available as hybrids, none of this gets at the source of the current sustainability crisis. More eco-products can just mean more corporate profits, consumption, and waste. Dauvergne examines extraction booms that leave developing countries poor and environmentally devastated—with the ruination of the South Pacific island of Nauru a case in point; the struggles against consumption inequities of courageous activists like Bruno Manser, who worked with indigenous people to try to save the rainforests of Borneo; and the manufacturing of vast markets for nondurable goods—for example, convincing parents in China that disposable diapers made for healthier and smarter babies. Dauvergne reveals why a global political economy of ever more—more growth, more sales, more consumption—is swamping environmental gains. Environmentalism of the rich does little to bring about the sweeping institutional change necessary to make progress toward global sustainability.

Author : Tri Harso Karyono
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 3319496018
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.16/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Sustainable Building and Built Environments to Mitigate Climate Change in the Tropics written by Tri Harso Karyono and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-02-21 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a selection of the best papers presented during the International conference on Mitigating and Adapting Built Environments for Climate Change in the Tropics, held at Tanri Abeng University (TAU), Jakarta, Indonesia, March 2015. The book is divided into four main parts. The first part deals with the general issue of climate change, the cause and the ways to mitigate and to adapt the built environment for climate change in a number of countries. Part 2 deals with the conceptual ways to mitigate building for climate change. The ways to reduce cooling energy in tropical buildings by means of passive design. Part 3 offers papers that examine the way to overcome disasters in the city caused by climate change. The final part deals with the role of plants in mitigating and adapting built environments to climate change - the use of plants, trees and bushes to directly and indirectly reduce carbon emissions are discussed.

Author : Thom Brooks
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000222985
Total Pages : 104 pages
Book Rating : 4.82/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Climate Change Ethics for an Endangered World written by Thom Brooks and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-10-25 with total page 104 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Climate change confronts us with our most pressing challenges today. The global consensus is clear that human activity is mostly to blame for its harmful effects, but there is disagreement about what should be done. While no shortage of proposals from ecological footprints and the polluter pays principle to adaptation technology and economic reforms, each offers a solution – but is climate change a problem we can solve? In this provocative new book, these popular proposals for ending or overcoming the threat of climate change are shown to offer no easy escape and each rest on an important mistake. Thom Brooks argues that a future environmental catastrophe is an event we can only delay or endure, but not avoid. This raises new ethical questions about how we should think about climate change. How should we reconceive sustainability without a status quo? Why is action more urgent and necessary than previously thought? What can we do to motivate and inspire hope? Many have misunderstood the kind of problem that climate change presents – as well as the daunting challenges we must face and overcome. Climate Change Ethics for an Endangered World is a critical guide on how we can better understand the fragile world around us before it is too late. This innovative book will be of great interest to students and scholars of climate change, climate justice, environmental policy and environmental ethics.

Author : The Worldwatch Institute
Publisher : Island Press
ISBN 13 : 9781610914499
Total Pages : 292 pages
Book Rating : 4.9X/5 ( download)

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Download or read book State of the World 2013 written by The Worldwatch Institute and published by Island Press. This book was released on 2013-04-15 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every day, we are presented with a range of “sustainable” products and activities—from “green” cleaning supplies to carbon offsets—but with so much labeled as “sustainable,” the term has become essentially sustainababble, at best indicating a practice or product slightly less damaging than the conventional alternative. Is it time to abandon the concept altogether, or can we find an accurate way to measure sustainability? If so, how can we achieve it? And if not, how can we best prepare for the coming ecological decline? In the latest edition of Worldwatch Institute’s State of the World series, scientists, policy experts, and thought leaders tackle these questions, attempting to restore meaning to sustainability as more than just a marketing tool. In State of the World 2013: Is Sustainability Still Possible?, experts define clear sustainability metrics and examine various policies and perspectives, including geoengineering, corporate transformation, and changes in agricultural policy, that could put us on the path to prosperity without diminishing the well-being of future generations. If these approaches fall short, the final chapters explore ways to prepare for drastic environmental change and resource depletion, such as strengthening democracy and societal resilience, protecting cultural heritage, and dealing with increased conflict and migration flows. State of the World 2013 cuts through the rhetoric surrounding sustainability, offering a broad and realistic look at how close we are to fulfilling it today and which practices and policies will steer us in the right direction. This book will be especially useful for policymakers, environmental nonprofits, and students of environmental studies, sustainability, or economics.