Population and Environment

adaptation to climate change

- "Further climate change is unavoidable. It will stress people physically and economically, particularly in poor countries. - Adapting requires robust decision making — planning over a long time horizon and considering a broad range of climate and socioeconomic scenarios. - Countries can reduce physical and financial risks associated with variable and extreme weather. They can also protect the most vulnerable. - Some established practices will have to be expanded — such as insurance and social protection — and others will have to be done differently — such as urban and infrastructure planning. - These adaptation actions would have benefits even without climate change. Promising initiatives are emerging, but applying them on the necessary scale will require money, effort, ingenuity, and information."

Julian Simon

- (1932-1998): an American professor of economics - 'the ultimate resource (1981): people are the ultimate resource (the main idea of his book that became a catch phrase) - increasing wealth and technology make more resources available: although supplies may be limited physically they may be viewed as economically indefinite as old resources are recycled and new alternatives are assumed to be developed by the market - population is the solution to resource scarcities and environmental problems, since people and markets innovate - conrnucopians or boomsters: scientists that believe that continued advances in technology will help solve environmental issues related to the population growth

carrying capacity

- (of a biological species in an environment): the maximum population size of the species that the environment can sustain indefinitely, given the food, habitat, water, and other necessities - the maximum impact (population size) the environment can sustain

reliance on fossil fuel

- Between 1950 and 2000 the world's population increased by roughly 140%, but the rise in fossil fuel energy consumption during the same period was almost 400% - We have a lot of people in so-called developing countries. As these countries develop, their levels of per capita energy consumption will increase as well - The economic development happens much faster - less time for climate to absorb negative consequences - Poor countries are more concerned about their economic development than environmental issues and less technologically advanced to adopt "green" technologies

food shortages 2

- High demand for grains (driven by population growth and economic development): - Direct consumption of grains - Increased consumption of meat - Biofuel - Water shortages: - Water diverted to cities - Overuse of ground water - Reliance on non-renewable aquifers - Erosion of top soils: - Overuse of agricultural land - Use of less suitable land - Plateauing agricultural yields - Climate change will contribute to all of the above

IPAT

- I the impact on the environment - P the population size - A the affluence (consumption per capita) - T the technology factor - Neo-malthusians or 'doomsters' - scientists who believe that population growth and the increase in consumption will lead to depletion of the resources and environmental collapse

Barriers to energy efficiency

- Low or underpriced energy. low energy prices undermine incentives to save energy. - Regulatory failures: Consumers who receive unmetered heat lack the incentive to adjust temperatures, and utility rate-setting can reward inefficiency. - Weak institutional capacity: Energy-efficiency measures are fragmented. Without an institutional champion to coordinate and promote energy efficiency, it becomes nobody's priority. There are few energy-efficiency service providers, and their capacity will not be established overnight. - Absent or misplaced incentives: Utilities make a profit by generating and selling more electricity, not by saving energy. For most consumers, the cost of energy is small relative to other expenditures. Because tenants typically pay energy bills, landlords have little or no incentive to spend on efficient appliances or insulation.

impact of population

- Most climate models account only for population size - Population composition matters because different groups have different consumption patterns: - Aging - Household size - Urban/suburban/rural residence - Difficulties: - Effects may not be not uniform - Interactive and/or non-linear effects

migration as adaptation to climate change

- Negative aspects: - Settlement of immigrants in high-risk areas - Trapped population - Stretch on existing urban infrastructure - Psycho-social consequences of displacement - Social exclusion of migrants - Positive aspects: - "Most effective way to diversify income and build resilience" - Opportunity to build denser and better designed cities - Opportunity to create environmental "buffer zones"

food shortages

- Overuse of water and land resources coupled with climate changes make further increase of food production difficult - Expansion of agriculture will further increase emission of CO2 and further climate changes

Paul ehrlich

- Paul Ehrlich born 1932: an American biologist and a professor at Stanford - population bomb (1968) - the existing population was not being fed adequately, and as it was growing rapidly it was unreasonable to expect to produce enough food to feed everyone in the future - growing population places escalating strains on all aspects of the natural world and is a major course of environmental problems - "we must rapidly bring the world population under control, reducing the growth rate to zero or making it negative.. simultaneously we must, at least temporarily, greatly increase our food production"

environmental policies

- Reduce CO2 emission - increase absorption CO2 - Sustainable food production (and consumption) - Sustainable water usage - Adaptation for climate change

Thomas malthus

- Thomas malthus (1766-1834): an English scholar in the fields of demography and political economy - 'essay on population growth' (1798) - increase of population is necessarily limited by the means of subsistence - population does invariable increase when the means of subsistence increase - but food production typically increases arithmetically while population can increase exponentially - malthusian catastrophe: a prediction that population growth will outpace food production

Barriers to energy efficiency 2

- consumer preferences: consumer decisions to purchase vehicles are usually based on size, speed, and appearance rather than on efficiency - Higher up-front costs: Many efficient products have higher up-front costs. Individual consumers usually demand very short payback times and are unwilling to pay higher up-front costs. Preferences aside, low-income customers may not be able to afford efficient products. - Financing barriers and high transaction costs: Many energy-efficiency projects have difficulty obtaining financing. Financial institutions usually are not familiar with or interested in energy efficiency, because of the small size of the deal, high transaction costs, and high perceived risks. - Products unavailable: Some efficient equipment is not available in low-income countries, where high import tariffs reduce affordability. - Limited awareness and information: Consumers have limited information on energy-efficiency costs, benefits, and technologies. Firms are unwilling to pay for energy audits that would inform them of potential savings.

consequences of climate change

- environmental refugees - higher death tolls from extreme environmental events - conflicts over scarce resources - economic damage from destroyed infrastructure, cost of evacuation, etc.

global warming

- facts: - earths temperature has been increasing - higher concentration of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere - melting of ice caps and glaciers - causes (most scientists agree on this): human activity, especially burning of fossil fuels - consequences (likely, but we don't know for sure): - flooding of costal areas - more extreme weather events - region-specific climate changes

climate change/global warming

- global warming: rising temperature of the earth and related climate changes - the national geographic global warming 101

why demographers were not more involved in environmental issues?

- historically, economic development and reduction of poverty were seen as more important than environmental issues - rapid population growth was seen as harmful for economic development (Malthus and ehrlich) - demographers focused more on ways to curb population growth (reducing fertility) - population was not see as an important factor in environmental problems (Simon) - social institutions, the efficiency of markets, patterns of income distribution, levels of technology and regulations - environmental problems involve expertise outside the demography (biochemistry, biology, climatology)

population, economy, environment

- modern economic development has been based on burning fossil fuels (coal, oil, gas) - large population + economic development (= burning a lot of fossil fuels) = increased emission of co2 and global warming - abrupt changes in climate - several negative changes occurring simultaneously and to cumulative adverse effect - nothing can be done to prevent this (ex. it is unlikely that we'll be able to limit world carbon emission fast enough)

malthusian positive v. preventative checks

- positive checks: - factors increasing death rate (hunger, disease, war, etc.) - preventative checks: - factors that lower birth rate (later age at marriage, sexual abstinence, etc.)

major sources of co2 worldwide

- power 26%: coal, oil, gas - industry 19%: petroleum, chemicals, primary metals, paper - land-use and forestry 17%: deforestation, agriculture, industrialization, urbanization - agriculture 14%: meat, grains - transportation 13%: road, air, sea

adaptation for climate change

- prepare for extreme events - build climate-smart cities - build resilient communities - provide 'safety net' for the most vulnerable - facilitate migration in response to climate change

Lorax (1971, 1972)

- problems: overproduction., industrial pollution, deforestation, extinction of species - scope: local - consequences for people: migration out of the polluted areas, inhabitable areas, unsustainability of business - solutions: environmental regulation, conservation, personal responsibility

wall-e (2008)

- problems: waste accumulation, climate change, extinction of renewable resources, extinction of life - scope: galactic - consequences for people: migration out of the earth, uninhabitable planet, changing human nature - solutions: limits and drawbacks of technology, restoring life on earth, restoring human nature

natural resources

- renewable: resources that can be replenished naturally - resources are classified as renewable only so long as the rate of replenishment/recovery exceeds that of the rate of consumption - water, air, wind, sunlight, top soils, ground water, seafood - non-renewable: either form slowly or do not naturally form in the environment. minerals are the most common resource included in this category - fossil fuels: their rate of formation is extremely slow (potentially millions of years), meaning they are considered non renewable