Download Nooshin Akrami (School of the Built Environment and Engineering

ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
N Akrami
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
What is sustainability?
 What defines a Sustainable Development?
 How Sustainable Development relates to
Environment?
 What else may implicate and may be implicated by
a Sustainable Development?
 Can these elements function in isolation?
So,....
 What is it that we need to sustain?!!!

WHAT IS SUSTAINABILITY?

Bell & Morse (2008):
“People differ in the environmental , social and
economic conditions within which they have to live,
and having a single definition that one attempts to
apply across this diversity could be both
impractical and dangerous”.
(Measuring the Immeasurable)

Why? And How?!!!
CONFERENCES:
During the latter part of the 20th century many
international conferences were convened for the
purpose of debating the various environmental
issues.
 Bergen, Norway (1990)
o The conference at which the slogans "Agenda for
action" and "Action for a common future" became
known.
 New Delhi, India (1990)
o This conference was used to establish a policy for
action across south east Asia and focused attention
on sustainable development and local participation
in environmental improvements.

o
o
o
o
o
o
o
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (1992)
178 countries met at the UN Conference on Environment
and Development (UNCED or otherwise known as the
Earth Summit).
At this unique gathering, nations signed up to a number of
agreements including:
Agenda 21 (UNCED, 1992a),
the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development
(UNCED, 1992b)
Two treaties were also agreed:
Convention on Biological Diversity
UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
Agenda 21
o The delegation of responsibility for the global picture to
local communities is essential to the success of an
Agenda 21 strategy.
 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
o Each nation to formulate and implement plans to counter
global warming; developed nations were to reduce
emissions and to contribute to the cost of measures
undertaken by developing countries.
o The Conference of the Parties was established to review
progress.


o
o

o
Kyoto, Japan (1997)
Emission targets were negotiated at the Third
Conference of the Parties.
The conference summarized how the targets could be
met and developed countries were asked to provide
financial assistance and technology transfer to help
developing countries reduce emissions.
Johannesburg, S Africa (2002)
Put resources and sustainability at the top of the
international agenda with clean water being one of the
major issues. President Bush did not attend.
Copenhagen Climate Change 2009
o “...,while the Copenhagen negotiations "didn't
produce the final cake", they did leave countries
"with all the key ingredients to bake a new one".
Although the proof of the pudding, as they say, is in
the eating.” (Guardian, 29 Jan 2010)
 Cancun Climate Change 2010
o “...after two weeks of negotiating, rich and poor
countries agreed a compromise that will see all
countries committed to cutting emissions for the
first time.
o The "Cancun package" also sets up a "green fund"
to help poor countries cope with climate change
and a new scheme to halt deforestation.”
(Telegraph, 11 Dec 2010)

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

“...development that meets the needs of the present without
compromising the ability of future generations to meet their
own needs’’. (WCSD, 1987)

“The goal of sustainable development is to enable all people
throughout the world to satisfy their basic needs and enjoy a
better quality of life, without compromising the quality of life of
future generations…
…for the UK Government and the Devolved Administrations,
that goal will be pursued in an integrated way through a
sustainable, innovative and productive economy that delivers
high levels of employment; and a just society that promotes
social inclusion, sustainable communities and personal
wellbeing. This will be done in ways that protect and enhance
the physical and natural environment, and use resources and
energy as efficiently as possible.” (The UK’s Sustainable
Development Commission)
PROFITABILITY V ENVIRONMENTAL DEBATE

a.
b.
Strong Sustainability (SS) (Neumayer, 2003):
Implies that that the environment is critical for our and
our children’s survival, and any damage will have
negative consequence.
Preserving natural capital in value term, which does
not demand preserving the nature as it is, rather
implies reinvesting non-renewable resources in
development of renewable sources in order to keep
the aggregate value of total nature resources stock
constant.
Preserving the Physical stock of those forms of natural
capital which is regarded as non-substitutable, i.e.
Critical Natural Capital. This interpretation does one
allow substitutability between different forms of critical
natural capital, while however, it does not mean
preserving the nature as it is.
PROFITABILITY V ENVIRONMENTAL DEBATE

a.
b.
c.
Weak Sustainability (WS) (Bell & Morse, 2003):
Primary attention is on the cost of attainment of
sustainability and typically based on Cost Benefit
Analysis (CBA).
WS compared to a model of economic sustainability
(environmental economics) where the focus is on
allocation of resources and levels of consumption,
where financial value is a key element of system
quality.
In contrast to SS (Neumayer, 2008), in WS the
environmental quality can be compromised against
economic gain, in other word environment is valued in
monetary terms. Weak sustainability currently
dominates in the global economy.
ECONOMIC GROWTH


Measured primarily through
GDP (Gross Domestic
Products)
United Kingdom:
GDP – real growth rate:
(source: National Statistics, 2011)

GDP is the standard measure
of the value of the production
activity (including goods and
services) of resident producer
unit. (OECD, 2009)
GDP & ECONOMIC GROWTH

Nominal GDP equals current market value calculated as:
Consumption + Investment + Government spending + Net Exports

Real GDP measures the market value where adjustments
were made for any changes in price level. Hence:
Real GDP= (Nominal GDP/ GDP Deflator) x 100

Economic Growth is measured by growth in read GDP which
controls for any price changes.
%∆Real GDP=((Real GDP New-Real GDP Old)/ Real GDP Old) x100
%∆Real GDP > 0→ growth
%∆Real GDP < 0→ de-growth
if the %∆Real GDP shrinking for 2 consecutive quarters→ recession
if the %∆Real GDP shrinking for 8 consecutive quarters→ depression
CLOSED ECONOMY MODEL
CIRCULAR FLOW OF EXCHANGE VALUE
LIMITS TO GROWTH

The notion that the physical environment imposes
hard and fast limits to the scale of growth, or even
softer limits to its rate, is not widely shared.

While engineers and scientists understand the
limits in a closed system imposed by the laws of
thermodynamics, arguments abound as to whether
those limits are being approached at all!
LIMITS TO GROWTH

Human survival, through the processes of
production and consumption, involves converting
low-entropy matters such as fossil fuels to highentropy substances, namely waste.

Economic production is utterly dependent on the
availability of low-entropy input of natural
resources. Thus applying a systems perspective to
resources and environmental issues should
naturally start with thermodynamics .
ECOLOGICAL ECONOMIC WORLDVIEW
R=WR+WP+WC

a production processes generate waste at every
stage: the processing of resources generates waste
(WR), as with overburdened tips at coal mines;
production (or manufacturing) generates waste
(WP) in the form of industrial effluent, air pollution
and solid waste; consumption generates waste
(WC) in the form of sewage, litter and municipal
refuse. The amount of waste in any period is equal
to the amount of natural resources (R) (First Law
of Thermodynamics)
SECOND LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS

Although mass and energy cannot be destroyed,
the process of conversion will progressively destroy
the capacity of the matter to engine further
conversions owing to dissipation or dispersion by
friction , whilst within the economic system, there is
a whole category of resources that cannot be
recycled, to be precise, energy resources. This is
how entropy places a physical barrier in the way
of reshaping the economy as a closed and
sustainable system.
REFERENCES:


Bell, S.; Morse, S. (2008), Sustainability indicators: measuring
the immeasurable?, Earthscan
The Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jan/29/copenhagen-what-next



Neumayer, E (2003), Weak versus strong sustainability: exploring
the limits of two opposing paradigms, 2nd Ed., Edward Elgar
Publishing
OEDC (2009), OEDC Regions at a glance 2009, OEDC
Publishing.
Office for National Statistics (2011):
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=192

Sustainable Development Commission:
http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/pages/about-sustainable-development.html

The Telegraph:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/8196074/Cancun-meeting-reachesclimate-change-agreement.html#