Sentences with phrase «planetary boundaries as»

Other scientists have criticized the planetary boundaries as too generous (for example, allowing too much human appropriation of freshwater flows) or employing the wrong metric (atmospheric concentrations of CO2 rather than cumulative emissions of greenhouse gases).

Not exact matches

«The planetary boundaries framework is not a useful guide for policy or environmental management in any concrete sense, as it does not capture the challenges involved in most of the environmental problems it lists,» argues geographer Linus Blomqvist, policy associate at the institute's Conservation Program and co-author of the review.

And «critical transitions» or «tipping points» as suggested by the planetary boundaries concept may not exist for many of the cases because those shifts, if they exist, have already happened.

So for the policy - relevant issues, we generally focus on the physical atmosphere - ocean system, sometimes with coupled carbon - vegetation system, and treat the major ice sheets, orbital parameters and planetary topography as fixed boundary conditions.

Steffen et al (2015) revise the «planetary boundaries framework» initially proposed in 2009 as the «safe limits» for human alteration of Earth processes (Rockstrom et al 2009).

And all that acceleration (mostly since 1950, as I wrote yesterday) has pushed us out of four safe zones, according to the 18 authors of the updated assessment of environmental boundaries, published online today by the journal Science here: «Planetary Boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planboundaries, published online today by the journal Science here: «Planetary Boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planBoundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planet.»

In essence, the Planetary Boundary analysis simply identifies Earth System processes that — in the same manner as climate — regulate the stability of the Earth System, and if impacted too far by human activities potentially can disrupt the functioning of the Earth System.

This ought to be reassuring for Ellis et al. who portray implementation of Planetary Boundary thinking as a dark force of planetPlanetary Boundary thinking as a dark force of planetaryplanetary rule.

Yet the planetary boundaries (PB) framework — in its original form and as revised by Steffen et al — obscures rather than clarifies the environmental and sustainability challenges faced by humanity this century.

Furthermore, it uses the translated boundaries as benchmarks for EU environmental performance,, and offers a preliminary mapping of current EU environmental policy in order to identify possible entry points for mainstreaming the Planetary Bboundaries as benchmarks for EU environmental performance,, and offers a preliminary mapping of current EU environmental policy in order to identify possible entry points for mainstreaming the Planetary BoundariesBoundaries.

As the 21st century global economy hits natural resource limits and planetary boundaries, fundamental questions about fair shares will start to arise — and these questions will increasingly come to be seen as the new front line for international developmenAs the 21st century global economy hits natural resource limits and planetary boundaries, fundamental questions about fair shares will start to arise — and these questions will increasingly come to be seen as the new front line for international developmenas the new front line for international development.

Dr Lenton (who is also one of the creators of the planetary - boundaries concept) and Dr Watson suggest that energy might be used to change the hydrologic cycle with massive desalination equipment, or to speed up the carbon cycle by drawing down atmospheric carbon dioxide, or to drive new recycling systems devoted to tin and copper and the many other metals as vital to industrial life as carbon and nitrogen are to living tissue.

According to Lynas, Rockström and his associates — referred to by Lynas as the «planetary boundaries experts group» — believe that they have identified nine fundamental measures of the planet's ecological health that human development must not interfere with, if ecological catastrophe is to be avoided.

Despite his memorable description of the worst possible outcome of the Anthropocene as being «a Frankenstein planet stitched together by geological resurrection men» (p258), Morton's sympathies seem to lie closer to the Promethean scientists who seek to manage an unavoidable (and potentially even «good») Anthropocene, than with more precautionary scientists and environmentalists who use the term as a warning — a reason for humanity to pull back from scientifically identified «planetary boundaries» and lessen our interference.

(05/20/2013) Human - caused changes to our biosphere — the global total of the world's ecosystems — are now so great and alarmingly rapid that human lives and societies undoubtedly face epic challenges in the near future as our biosphere deteriorates, planetary boundaries are reached, and tipping points exceeded.

Although existing analyses have quantified the links between social performance and biophysical indicators such as energy use32, greenhouse gas emissions33 and ecological footprint34, these analyses have not considered the implications of planetary boundaries on social outcomes.

Physical needs such as nutrition, sanitation, access to electricity and the elimination of extreme poverty could likely be met for all people without transgressing planetary boundaries.

The nascent literature proposes a number of different ways that planetary boundaries could theoretically be downscaled to national equivalents7, taking into account factors such as geography, international trade and equity8.

Perlwitz et al. (2001) estimate that this feedback reduces the global dust load by roughly 15 %, as dust radiative forcing reduces the downward mixing of momentum within the planetary boundary layer, the surface wind speed, and thus dust emission (Miller et al., 2004a).

The ecological footprint and material footprint are not part of the planetary boundaries framework, and partially overlap with the climate change indicator (they both include fossil energy as a component).

Some authors see in these trends threats not just to other species but also to the «safe operating space» for humanity as the Earth nears or exceeds «planetary boundaries» (Rockström et al. 2009).

As the authors of the concept admit, six of the nine proposed «planetary boundaries» have no global limits at all.

The failure to account for different environments points to the main problem with the planetary boundaries framework: it only measures environmental change as negative — as progression toward supposed biophysical boundaries — and never as positive, either for humans (e.g., more food) or environments (e.g., higher yields resulting in less deforestation).

The planetary boundaries hypothesis may fall short as a scientific concept, but it excels as a political one, offering experts a way to couch what are really political decisions in the inviolable authority of science.