There is no Planet B - Climate Change
Did you ever wonder, how the New Climate Changed reality could look and feel like at its worst? Then, we may right now be getting a flavour of exactly that. Ukraine's resource richness may be an important variable in a globalised world that will increasingly be struggling to access necessary resources in the decades to come. Because, after all, and as we learned when we played monopoly: Whomever controls the resources controls the game.
Circle - Perpetuity - Forever
It is quite astonishing: all the different contexts that the term ‘circularity’ or ‘circular economy’ is being used. They key point mostly is of course the waste reduction promises inherent in the term, and the subsequent lower dependency on finite resources. But, in addition to reducing waste, carbon – or rather carbon footprint – is a key factor. Unfortunately, the reality is sobering: taking fashion as example, at best between 3% and 6% of the industry's carbon footprint could be remedied that way. And even worse: in order to realise the potential, three fundamental hurdles must be addressed. Some efforts are underway, of course, but a steep hill remains to climb.
Planetary Boundaries - Stockholm Resilience Centre
Overconsumption or ‘simply’ consumption? Fair resource use, or resource depletion? Fair share, equal share or acquired share of resources? Those are questions that pop up when the Planetary Boundaries are being discussed. “Is Europe living within the limits of our planet?: An assessment of Europe's environmental footprints in relation to planetary boundaries”, published in April 2020 does exactly that: it evaluates and calculates the European performance for planetary boundaries by taking a consumption-based (footprint-based) perspective. This is turn is interesting as it relates environmental pressures to final demands for goods and services. And the results are ... shall we say: a stark call to action.