Editors Daniel E. Vasey, Divine Word College, Emeritus; Sarah E. Fredericks,
University of North Texas; SHEN Lei, Chinese Academy of Sciences;
Shirley Thompson, University of Manitoba
Editors
Editors
Daniel E. Vasey
Divine Word College, Emeritus
Sarah E. Fredericks
University of North Texas
SHEN Lei
Chinese Academy of Sciences
Shirley Thompson
University of Manitoba
Associate Editor
Patricia Wouters
Centre for Water Law, Policy & Science, University of Dundee
Advisory Board
Ray Anderson, Interface, Inc.; Lester Brown, Earth Policy Institute; John Elkington, SustainAbility; Eric Freyfogle, University of Illinois, Urbana–Champaign; Luis Gomez Echeverri, United Nations Development Programme; Brent Haddad, University of California, Santa Cruz; Daniel Kammen, University of California, Berkeley; Ashok Khosla, International Unionfor Conservation of Nature; Christine Loh, Civic Exchange, HongKong; Cheryl Oakes, Duke University
Contents
List of Entries v
Reader’s Guide ix
List of Contributors xiii
Series List: The Encyclopedia of Sustainability xx
Introduction xxi
“Agriculture Developing World” through “Wise Use Movement” 1–500
Index 501–518
List of Entries
A
Agriculture—Developing World
Agriculture—Genetically Engineered Crops
Agriculture—Organic and Biodynamic
Alfalfa
Algae
Aluminum
Animal Husbandry
Aquifers
B
Bamboo
Bioenergy and Biofuels
Bushmeat
C
Cacao
Carbon Capture and Sequestration
Chromium
Coal
Coffee
Coltan
Conflict Minerals
Conservation Value
Copper
Cotton
D
Dams and Reservoirs
Desalination
Design, Product and Industrial
Drug Production and Trade
Dung
E
Ecotourism
Electronics Raw—Materials
F
Fertilizers
Fiber Crops
Fish
Food in History
Food Security
Food, Frozen
Food, Value-Added
Forest Products—Non-Timber
Forest Products—Timber
G
Gemstones
Geothermal Energy
Glaciers
Gold
Grains
Grasslands
Green Revolution
Greenbelts
Greenhouse Gases
Guano
H
Heating and Cooling
Heavy Metals
Hemp
Honeybees
Hydrogen Fuel
I
Indigenous and Traditional Resource Management
Industrial Ecology
Insects—Beneficial
Insects—Pests
Iron Ore
L
Lead
Lighting, Indoor
Lithium
Local Food Movements
M
Malnutrition
Manganese
Manure, Animal
Manure, Human
Materials Substitution Medicinal Plants
Mineral Sands
Minerals Scarcity
Mining—Metals
Mining—Nonmetals
Mountains
N
Nanotechnology
Natural Gas
Natural Resource Economics
Natural Resource Law
Nickel
Nitrogen
O
Oceans and Seas
P
Parks and Preserves—Marine
Parks and Preserves—National
Parks and Preserves—Wilderness Areas
Pest Management, Integrated (IPM)
Petroleum
Phosphorus
Platinum Group Metals
Poaching
Potassium
R
Ranching
Rare Earth Elements
Recreation, Outdoor
Recycling
Rice
Rivers
Root Crops
Rubber
S
Salt
Sands and Silica
Silver
Soil
Solar Energy
Soybeans
Sugarcane
Sulfur
T
Tea
Thorium
Tin
Titanium
Tourism
U
Uranium
W
Waste Management
Water (Overview)
Water Energy
Wetlands
Wind Energy
Wise Use Movement
Reader’s Guide: Articles by Category
Note:most articles appear in more than one category
CoNCEPTS,THEORIES,AND MoVEMENTS
Conservation Value
Design,Product and Industrial
Food Security
Green Revolution
Greenbelts
Indigenous and Traditional Resource Management
Industrial Ecology
Local Food Movements
Natural Resource Economics
Natural Resource Law
Wise Use Movement
GEOGRAPHICAL FEATURES AND BIOMES
Aquifers
Dams and Reservoirs
Glaciers
Grasslands
Mountains
Oceans and Seas
Rivers
Water(Overview)
Wetlands
NATURAL RESOURCE USE:SYMPTOMS AND SoLUTIONS
Bushmeat
Carbon Capture and Sequestration
Conflict Minerals
Dams and Reservoirs
Greenbelts
Greenhouse Gases
Lighting,Indoor
Malnutrition
Minerals Scarcity
Parks and Preserves—Marine
Parks and Preserves—National
Parks and Preserves—Wilderness Areas
Pest Management,Integrated(IPM)
Poaching
Recycling
Waste Management
NATURAL RESOURCES—ABIOTIC
Aluminum
Chromium
Coltan
Copper
Conflict Minerals
Electronics—Raw Materials
Gemstones
Gold
Greenhouse Gases
Heavy Metals
Hydrogen Fuel
Iron Ore
Lead
Lithium
Manganese
Mineral Sands
Minerals Scarcity
Mining—Metals
Mining—Nonmetals
Nickel
Nitrogen
Petroleum
Phosphorus
Platinum Group Metals
Potassium
Rare Earth Elements
Salt
Sands and Silica
Silver
Soil
Solar Energy
Sulfur
Thorium
Tin
Titanium
Uranium
Water(Overview)
Water Energy
Wind Energy
NATURAL RESOURCES—BIOTIC
Alfalfa
Algae
Bamboo
Bioenergy and Biofuels
Bushmeat
Cacao
Coal
Coffee
Cotton
Dung
Fiber Crops
Fish
Forest Products—Non-Timber
Forest Products—Timber
Grains
Guano
Hemp
Honeybees
Insects—Beneficial
Insects—Pests
Manure,Animal
Manure,Human
Medicinal Plants
Natural Gas
Petroleum
Rice
Root Crops
Rubber
Soybeans
Sugarcane
Tea
PROCESSES,ACTIVITIES,AND UsAGE
Agriculture—Developing World
Agriculture—Genetically Engineered Crops
Agriculture—Organic and Biodynamic
Animal Husbandry
Bioenergy and Biofuels
Coal
Dams and Reservoirs
Desalination
Drug Production and Trade
Ecotourism
Fertilizers
Food in History
Food,Frozen
Food,Value-Added
Geothermal Energy
Heating and Cooling
Hydrogen Fuel
Indigenous and Traditional Resource
Industrial Ecology
Lighting,Indoor
Materials Substitutior
Medicinal Plants
Mining—Metals
Mining—Nonmetals
Nanotechnology
Natural Gas
Ranching
Recreation,Outdoor
Recycling
Solar Energy
Tourism
Uranium
Waste Management
Water Energy
Wind Energy
Introduction to Natural Resources and Sustainability
In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries,human consumption of natural resources multiplied—most of it unsustainably,and on a global scale.If we now rely on developing renewable resources(rather than depleting those derived from fossil fuels,for instance),how many people might those resources support,how well,and for how long?This volume,the fourth of the ten-volume Berkshire Encyclopedia of Sustainability,is a vital reference for everyone engaged with or interested in these questions.
About two-thirds of the articles in this volume cover specific primary resources—that is,those we exploit as raw materials or energy sources.”Minerals Scarcity,”for instance,provides an overview of the mining industry’s practices and technologies,the economics of mineral accessibility,issues of supply and demand in the early twenty-first century(especially in Asia but specifically in China),and the impact of mining restrictions on geological supplies.”Natural Gas,”on the other hand,takes a close look at how the last widely adopted fossil fuel,and the third-most used in world energy consumption,has become increasingly easy to exploit due to improved extraction methods,processing,and transport.The articles on primary resources in this volume divide about evenly between renewable and nonrenewable resources.Between the two,renewables are the more likely to support sustainable consumption,but other factors demand consideration,such as how methods of utilizing them affect the biosphere.
The remaining articles in the volume—and here are just one or two examples from each category mentioned—cover methods of production(“Animal Husbandry”),end products and services(“Food Security”and “Materials Substitution”),natural features and ecosystems(“Oceans and Seas”),and technologies or movements that promote sustainable use of resources(“Ecotourism”and “Recycling”)or mitigate the effects of consumption(“Carbon Capture and Sequestration”and”Waste Management”).
When Is Consumption Sustainable?
Humans consume natural resources in unsustainable ways.Lands that were green centuries or millennia ago lie barren,gullied by erosion—their forests gone,their mines empty,their towns ghosts or mounds that archaeologists explore.The inhabitants have moved on.
In order to avoid a similar outcome—our proud skyscrapers and factories standing as empty relics —experts have warned that industrial civilization must change course.They include the human ecologist William Catton,with his 1980 classic Overshoot:The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change,and Jared Diamond with his 2005 bestseller Collapse:How Societies Choose To Fail or Suceed.Both books point to populations and civilizations such as Easter Island and the Classic Maya that grew and fourished for a time,but subsequently collapsed.Like us,they were ingenious in their technology and development of intensive forms of production,but could not sustain those levels of consumption.
Technically,all consumption of nonrenewable resources is unsustainable,but whether depletion should concern us depends on resource size.Often the resource is called“vast,”implying—and sometimes stating—that depletion is no worry.Indeed,some nonrenewables could outlast humankind.Limestone,for instance,makes up whole mountain ranges and underlies enormous tracts of land.Quarrying may be unsustainable because it destroys overlying land,but it only nibbles the resource base.To all resources the no-free-lunch adage applies.At present harnessing most resources involves unsustainable consumption of other resources.For example,projects such as building wind turbines and hydropower dams,drilling oil wells,and digging mines draw equipment and fuel from an industrial complex that makes unsustainable resource demands.We chase fish using diesel trawlers.
Renewal does not necessarily put a resource beyond harm.It does with some,of course.The sun shines and the wind blows,mindless of what we did with them the day before,and when we borrow nitrogen from the atmosphere to make fertilizers and industrial products,it cycles back through decay.On the other hand,we invade ecosystems,overfish,cut forests faster than they grow,and practice agriculture in ways that degrade soils.
Those resources that we can and do overexploit may recover,but not quickly.A badly damaged forest may shift to a degraded ecosystem that persists for decades,even centuries.If soil erosion exposes rock,recovery would presumably take as long as formation of the original soil,which in some environments spanned thousands of years.
Yet mounting demands threaten resources whose supplies once seemed limitless.Coal is an instructive example.According to data from a World Coal Association website in 2011,proven world reserves amount to 119 times present annual consumption.While researchers are convinced more coal resources exist and consider other coal supplies probable,the question of how much coal will become economically recoverable is subject to wide disagreement.A middle estimate among many is that recoverable resources amount to 175 times current annual consumption.
If correct,that would not mean we have sufficient coal for another 175 years.For one,consider growing consumption.The US Energy Information Agency,in its International Energy Outlook 2010,anticipates that from 2007 to 2030 coal consumption will grow at an average annual rate of 1.6 percent.Were that to continue beyond 2030,175 years of coal would shrink to 83.In the real world recoverable coal cannot flow unabated until the hour it vanishes.Instead,a peak or plateau would occur decades before 83 years elapse,followed by a long decline,as production at old mines stops,and new mines fail to compensate.Persons alive today would feel the rippling effects of coal shortages.
The same cautions apply to other natural resources from the ground.Stories abound in the popular media and the blogosphere claiming that a resource will“last”some number of years.But careful vetting of the original sources reveals that nearly always these studies calculate years at current rates of consumption.Reporting that number as “years remaining”wrongly implies that business can go on as usual for so long.
Resource“Peaks”
Several vital resources that we take from the ground appear to exist in large supply when matched with current consumption,but there are predictions—and equally denials—that peaks will occur within the next few decades.Besides coal,they include petroleum,natural gas,iron ore,and rock phosphate;all are subjects of articles in this volume.
Optimists either deny the usefulness of the peak concept or believe peaks lie too far into the future to be a concern.They have faith that exploration and advances in technology will enlarge proven oil,gas,and coal reserves,and they point out that nonfuel minerals like iron exist in the Earth’s crust in quantities that dwarf our consumption of them.Those who predict early peaks counter that the easily exploited deposits are running down.As production shifts to low-grade,hard-to-access or remote deposits,the flow will slow,and the costs of exploitation in money and energy will become forbidding.
If resources do run short,or we act before that happens,what steps would we take?The possibilities are resource substitution and recycling.Obviously a burned fossil fuel is gone.That leaves substitution with nuclear energy,renewable energy—or another fossil fuel.
Among the fossil fuels,most experts agree that petroleum is in shortest relative supply,though they argue how short.Falling back on the other fossil fuels would be an easy course.Already millions of vehicles run on compressed natural gas,and factories convert coal or natural gas to liquid fuels,technologies that cost less than installing equivalent solar,wind,or nuclear power and modifying end uses accordingly.But synthesizing liquid fuels is inefficient.When coal is the feedstock,the process loses more than half the original energy.Conversion would thus speed the day when all fossil fuels decline.A possible exception is in-situ conversion of otherwise inaccessible coal seams to gas,and the gas to liquid fuel,though the net efficiency of the process is particularly low,and the potential energy contribution of the coal should be discounted accordingly.
Iron is recyclable,and substitution with other metals is possible in many applications.The percentage of scrap steel recycled rises and falls with the price of iron ore.Because collecting large pieces is viable,recycling could become highly effective.But some iron ends up beyond the reach of easy recycling,in fallen rust or scattered pieces.It is questionable,therefore,whether a modern industrial economy could readily do without iron ore.Substitute metals offer less strength for the money,and producing the main candidate,aluminum,requires large amounts of energy.
Doing without rock phosphate would limit agricultural production.Ninety percent of it goes into the production of phosphorus fertilizers.Plants require phosphorus—no element can take its place—and its availability from mineral sources is one of the factors permitting today’s high crop yields.Large losses occur while recycling phosphorus and will continue so long as we grow crops on soils and consume them far away.Whether added to soils in chemical fertilizers or in manures and composts,phosphorus becomes available over several seasons,but losses occur to groundwater and through erosion.Harvesting removes much of what the crops absorb from the soil;the phosphorus in them scatters to garbage dumps—and to the bones and excreta of the livestock and humans who consume the harvest.
Among renewable resources that are under pressure,this volume includes articles on soil,fisheries,and two on forest products.In a sense we recycle eroded soil by cultivating accumulations downslope or downwind,but most ends up in the sea or deposited across uncultivable land.As natural fisheries decline,we are substituting aquaculture:where a fish’s lunch used to be free,now it comes from agricultural products.The recycling of one important forest product,paper,is progressing.Synthetic substitutes for paper surround us,but there’s a drawback.Nonrenewable petroleum is the main feedstock for the most copious substitute:plastic.
The Economics of Sustainable Resource Consumption
In the view of many free-market economists,when demand for a resource outruns supply,and prices rise,a sufficient correction follows.Experience backs the argument.On price rises,gold mines reopen,and oil and gas interests explore and apply enhanced extraction techniques,rejuvenating old fields and opening new ones.
For those reasons many predicted resource limits in the past have proven to be mirages.In the mid-nineteenth century the economist William Stanley Jevons wrote The Coal Question,warning that depletion of the most readily exploited domestic coal deposits would soon curb Britain’s economy.Instead the British successfully exploited the more difficult domestic reserves and substituted oil and gas from domestic sources and imports.But in a physical universe,capital cannot free resources ad infinitum.Volume 2 of this encyclopedia,The Business of Sustainability,includes two articles,”Ecological Economics”and “Natural Capitalism,”which argue that the apparent ability to do so exists only in the early stages of an industrial revolution.
If a vital resource dwindles,and no substitute is available in time,countries that import t would pay consequences in reduced supply,raised price,or both.Exporting countries would eventually lose income,but not necessarily right away.That the price of an essential,globally traded resource rises by more than its supply decreases is a lesson learned through past oil shocks.Countries that export dwindling natural resources could thus accumulate capital.An intriguing (and somewhat unsettling)speculation is what those countries will do when even they have no more resources to sell.
The Coming Age:Uncertain Predictions about Sustainability
What form will sustainability take,in homes,communities,and lifestyles?The future is not entirely hidden;present knowledge allows some projections,beginning with population and basic needs.
World Population Prospects,the 2010 Revision,a 2010report of the United Nations,Department of Economic and Social Affairs,Population Division,projects that population will rise from its present 7 billion to 10 billion by the end of the century.Slight shifts in mortality or fertility would result in large deviations from that estimate,but it makes a reference point.
At a glance,the basic needs of 10 billion might seem easy to meet.Today cultivable land goes uncultivated,or the most productive forms of cultivation go unused.Despite that slack,present food crops and food sources independent of them,such as fishing and livestock grazing,could adequately feed twice the present world population,if all of it reached tables,a point developed in The Business of Sustainability article “Agriculture.”(This volume addresses food production and supplies in “Agriculture —Developing World,”Agriculture—Genetically Engineered Crops,”and “Agriculture—Organic and Biodynamic,”as well as“Food in History,”“Food Security,”“Food,Frozen,”“Food,Value-Added,”and “Local Food Movements.”)
A closer look reveals obstacles;unsustainable practices help support present yields,and our practice of diverting harvests away from direct consumption is growing.Fossil fuels support farm operations and the production of pesticides,herbicides,and fertilizers.Those fertilizers include phosphorus from rock phosphate,a resource of debated size.Grain and sugarcane go to ethanol biofuel production,and grain to livestock feeding,in which case edible products contain a fraction of the energy and protein of the original feed.Demand for meat and dairy is growing faster than population.Competition between food and biofuel extends to uncultivated land.One biofuel is switchgrass,touted because it thrives on land unsuited to annual food crops,but it also makes good pasture,and pasture relieves demands for feed grown on cropland.
Looking beyond the basic needs of the world’s population,modern amenities place an increasing demand on our resources as they continue to support our lifestyles.The largest consumers are heavy industry,buildings(including space heating),agriculture,and transport,but nearly everything that we do today draws down some resources.If 10 billion people are to live in large homes,become modern consumers,and roam the world,they will strain these resources.
Abundant energy could deliver those amenities to all by powering construction,transport,agriculture,and industry.It could stretch metal resources by supporting recycling at a distance and the mining of abundant lowgrade ores.Some environmentalists envision giant hydroponic farms,which could nearly eliminate phosphorus losses in food production but would take enormous energy and capital to build.From where would so much energy come,and how could its supply be sustainable?
Most visions of a high-energy future focus on nuclear power but are illusory unless the prevailing reactors change from present designs,which convert to energy less than1 percent of the original uranium(up to 2 percent with reprocessing of fuel rods).If10 billion people consumed as much energy per capita as residents of the United States,Canada,or Australia in 2011 do,and two-thirds of that came from nuclear power,we would need roughly sixty times as much nuclear generating capacity as at present.Accidents such as Chernobyl and Fukushima,and on a lesser scale,Three Mile Island,pose questions about the desirability of such a huge commitment to nuclear power.Fuel resources would soon run out unless the reactors were breeder reactors,a few of which are in operation,but have not yet provided affordable power.Potentially breeders could turn to energy nearly all the original uranium and add the more abundant radioactive element thorium as a fuel.For explanation and further discussion see “Uranium”and”Thorium”in this volume,as well as“Energy Industries—Nuclear”in The Business of Sustainability.
At the opposite pole are degrowth scenarios.While proponents do not reject all modern technology,they emphasize simple wants and simple solutions,agrarianism and self-reliant communities rather than urbanization,the preservation of nature rather than its subjugation,and crafts and light industry rather than heavy industry.Many advocate population reduction.The movement’s roots include Mohandas Gandhi’s simple living philosophy(“Gandhism”will appear in Volume 7,China,India,and East and Southeast Asia:Assessing Sustainability)and the limits-to-growth writing of,among others,E.J.Mishan and Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen.(In Volume1,The Spirit of Sustainability,“Sustainability Theory”discusses the 1972“Limits to Growth”report issued by the international think tank Club of Rome.The limits-to-growth philosophy will be covered as well in Volume 6,Measurements,Indicators,and Research Methods for Sustainability.)
Between nuclear megacities and self-reliant villages lie visions of highly efficient use of resources and a large role for renewable energy.Proponents of renewable energy maintain it can take over from fossil fuels at present consumption levels or higher.As for efficiency,the most bullish promoters maintain that renewable energy can achieve both sustainability and a high universal standard of living.Researchers,such as those at the Wuppertal Institute for Climate,Environment and the Rocky Mountain Institute,envision ultralight vehicles,an emphasis on passive solar and geothermal energy,buildings that stay at comfortable temperatures with little energy input,and a reduction of the distances that materials travel.Both solar and geothermal resources,of course,have been used since antiquity in civilizations around the world.In this volume,”Solar Energy”explores how new innovations in energy collection,storage,and transmission may allow solar power to be used in places and for purposes previously considered impractical,while “Geothermal Energy”describes how hot water found under the surface of the Earth,such as that which emerges in hot springs and geysers,or water injected into hot rock formations can be channeled to power heating and cooling systems and to produce electricity.”Heating and Cooling”examines many of these options and challenges in detail.
Whatever the energy source,the system must become ultimately self-sustaining,capable of producing its own replacement parts.Electricity from nuclear or renewable sources could deliver the high temperatures needed to work metals and to grind rocks and sinter them into cement.It could split water into hydrogen that could smelt metals.How much electricity such a system would demand or what it would cost to build and run are open questions.
Emerging but as yet unproven technologies,such as the three briefly described in this paragraph,could change prospects for renewable or nuclear energy.By producing gaseous or liquid fuels,for instance,artificial photosynthesis could concentrate and store abundant but dispersed and variable solar energy,thus removing obstacles to solar development.Thorium-fueled molten salt breeder reactors would be less prone to serious accidents than present reactors,their wastes would be comparatively low in long-lived radioisotopes,and they could turn thorium into a vast resource,if they prove economic to run.Finally,practical fusion energy perches on the distant horizon,where it has lingered for the last sixty years
The transition away from fossil fuels and other materials that might come up short will demand time.Deployment of existing technology,for example,the building of reactors,wind farms,and metal works,takes years.Infrastructure changes and development of new technologies can take decades.Crash programs to implement sustainable resource consumption would carry a large penalty.Much equipment wears out over periods often to thirty years;replacement before its time would raise costs.So would delaying the construction of alternative energy,if soaring fossil-fuel costs raise the price of concrete,metal,and other components of solar farms,wind turbines,and nuclear reactors.
Nevertheless,researchers and scientists still study(and imagine)the revolutionary potential of technology to conserve and preserve natural resources.Nanotechnology is one such field that has led to several fairly extreme predictions.As Michael Steinfeldt explains in this volume,the “radical green vision”sees nanotechnology as a crucial factor in solving all environmental pollution problems,but others predict that a“radical horror scenario”will play out when“all life on Earth [is]destroyed by nanobots gone wild.”Steinfeldt acknowledges that possible risks do exist when selectively fabricating and/or manipulating structures “in the transitional region between the atomic and mesoscopic levels.”And yet he presents evidence that nanotechnology-based products and processes have the potential to provide environmental relief.
A timely start toward sustainable resource consumption has never been more strongly in our interest.According to Paul Hawken,Amory Lovins,and Hunter Lovins,authors of the 1999bestseller Natural Capitalism,market forces alone will push entrepreneurs and consumers toward highly efficient and sustainable resource use.Other bets are on government action,and subsidies are in place in various countries for everything from renewable and nuclear energy to home insulation and natural resource prospecting.
If past predictions are any guide,no present forecast of a sustainable future or transition to it will be wholly correct.Berkshire Publishing has designed this encyclopedia as an up-to-date survey of information and ideas.If scholars examine copies in 2050—or in 2250—we hope they will see evidence that the right steps were being taken toward sustainability.
Daniel E.VASEY