Planetary Boundaries and Resilience

Student Worksheet

Introduction

The methods of analysis and the related debates about the limits to human growth and
consumption have become more focused on providing information to support global policy
decisions in the last decade or so.

One of the most often cited approach was developed in Sweden by NGOs like The Natural
Step and more recently by scholars at the Stockholm Resilience Centre.

A paper in the prestigious British science journal, Nature in 2009 summarizes this
approach. It is closely related to analysis presented in The Limits to Growth but advances
the discussion by combining resource and ecosystem limits in the selection and evaluation
of the 9 critical planetary boundaries. The Planetary Boundaries approach points to 3 key
areas where rapid policy initiatives are needed.

Assignment

Watch the TED Talk video and use the article linked below for additional detail and
explanation:

Steffen, W. Rockström, J. Costanza, R. 2011. How Defining Planetary Boundaries Can

Transform Our Approach to Growth . Solutions. Vol 2, No. 3. pp. - -
http://www.thesolutionsjournal.com/node/935

A TED Talk video presentation of provides a similar presentation of this information:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgqtrlixYR4#t=37

Questions:

1. What is the Holocene? Why do the authors and TED presenter refer to that period of
geological history as the time when our “ecosystem capital accumulated”?
The Holocene is the name of our current epoch, the second of the Quaternary period following the
Pleistocene. Ecosystem capital are resources humans need to thrive and survive, socially and
economically. So we could say that much natural capital was being turned into ecosystem
services during the Holocene because that’s when humans began their dominance over the earth
and started controlling all the resources to best fit their needs.

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Copyright 2012. North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. .
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 2. What is the quadruple squeeze that Dr. Rockstrom describes?
There are four outstanding pressures the earth faces today, according to Dr. Rockstrom. The
dilemmas of human growth, climate, ecosystems loss, and surprise. Human growth has been
unchecked for the hundreds of years because we have not reached a tipping point, or if we have,
we’ve extended that point. Climate is obviously changing, and the planet is warming, which can
be largely attributed to humans for inducing that change. Ecosystems and biodiversity loss is
something we are seeing rapidly increasing lately with overfishing and habitat destruction
leading to extinction of species. Finally, surprise is an element because we cannot continue in our
lifestyle patterns and not expect possibly radical change right around the corner.
3. What is the Anthropocene? What evidence does Dr. Rockstrom offer for the
Anthropocene? When does he claim the Anthropocene begins?
The Anthropocene is a nickname for the epoch we are living in, where humans are the primary
drivers for change on a global level. He claims that we can take any parameter of human well-
being, not just carbon dioxide, and measure its hockey stick-like growth over the past few
decades. For example, nitrous oxide, methane, deforestation, overfishing, land degradation, loss
of species, and so on, all simultaneously branch of in the mid-1950s – which he postulates is when
the Anthropocene began.
4. Explain system tipping points (and also thresholds) and resilience using the diagrams
below:

Image credit: L. Schmalbeck

The “cups” in the graph represent thresholds between multiple stable states. The depth of the cup
represents the resilience of the system. The system loses resilience due to the factors discussed
earlier, at which the system becomes susceptible to sudden change when it may very well tip over
and flip into a new state. For example, Dr. Rockstrom uses the coral reefs. They were hard corals,
full of biodiversity and low nutrient levels and because of overfishing, unsustainable tourism, and
climate change, the system tipped over and the corals lost their resistance and soft, unhealthy
corals take over.

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 5. What does Rockstrom claim is sustainable development and why is “redundancy” part of
the solution?
Dr. Rockstrom champions a Venn Diagram that moves outside in. The largest circle,
encompassing the other factors, is Earth’s life support system. Everything we do has to be
supported by the earth because that is the controlling factor. Inside that is human
societies, who can thrive within the bounds of the earth’s limits, and on the very inside,
economies are dependent on the other two factors. The economy should not be the main
goal because sustainability should come first and the two often contradict each other’s’
best interest. Functional redundancy is the presence of many components that can
perform the same function within a system allows some to compensate for the loss or
failure of others. Sustainability requires this because often some things fail while others
succeed and it’s good to have a backup plan.
6. What is the planetary boundary framework? What are the components in the framework?
The planetary boundary framework is a decagon with factors for unsustainability listed. There is
a boundary that shows what the limits are without negative effects. The components are
phosphorous flow, nitrogen flow, biodiversity loss, agricultural land use, chemical pollution,
freshwater consumption, ocean acidity, atmospheric aerosol land, ozone depletion, and climate
change.
7. How does the planetary framework blend the approaches used in World3 and the
Ecological Footprint?
The World3 system had analyzed 12 different scenarios that showed possible patterns and
environmental outcomes of world development from 1900-2100. It is similar to the planetary
framework because it considers boundaries for impacts that have no negative effect on the earth
until the boundaries are surpassed and then it does. The Ecological Footprint measures how
much nature we have and how much nature we use. It measures the ecological assets that a given
population requires to produce the natural resources it consumes and to absorb its waste.
Basically, how fast we consume resources and generate waste, which is similar to the planetary
framework because it monitors how much output we have and what levels we reach regarding
them.

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Copyright 2012. North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. .
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