Download Stanton graph v - Population Matters

WORLD POPULATION: TROUBLE AHEAD
Total human environmental impact on Planet Earth = average impact per person x number of people
Current growth rates: 80 million extra people per year, 1.5 million per week, 10,000 per hour
Natural resources (oil, water, soil etc.) per person = total resources ÷ number of people
Planet Earth’s ideal population (sustainable and in balance with the environment) would be about 2.7 billion
Enlarged in 2
Earth formed
First signs of life
(fossil algae,
Oldest known rocks bacteria)
5000
4000
10
?
Explosion of life
(Cambrian);
dinosaurs
3000
2000
1000
500
9
0
8
PEAK OIL
MILLION YEARS AGO
7
Queen Elizabeth II
2. APESAND MEN
Enlarged in 3
Primitive apes evolving
20
6
LAST COMMON
ANCESTOR OF MAN
AND CHIMPANZEES Man-like apes Hominids
15
10
7
5
5
0
INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
MILLION YEARS AGO
4
POPULATION (BILLIONS)
1. THE GEOLOGICAL RECORD
Queen Victoria
3
3. THE HUMAN POPULATION SPIKE
Queen Elizabeth I
Caused by exploitation, then exhaustion, of fossil fuels
2
1
Invention of Agriculture
Julius Caesar
Otzi ‘Iceman’
Black Death
Sustainable level?
0
10
9
8
STONE AGES
7
6
5
4
3
BRONZE AGE
1 BC 0 AD
2
1
2
2.5
3
IRON AGE
THOUSANDS OF YEARS
Population Matters is the working name of the Optimum Population Trust. Charity no.1114109 Join at www.populationmatters.org Graph by Dr. William Stanton