xiii
be pursued indefi nitely within the resource and carrying capacity of the planet. A
promising approach to defi ning and perhaps quantifying this space has been proposed by Rockström et al. (2009) who articulated the idea of ‘a safe operating space
for humanity’ lying within ‘Planetary Boundaries’. ‘Social equity’ represents the
ethical imperative implicit in the original Brundtland articulation of the idea of sustainable development (WCED 1987) as development that:
meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to
meet their needs.
This idea of sustainability has been summed up in some policy statements (e.g.
DETR 1999) along the lines of
the simple idea of ensuring a better quality of life for everyone, now and for generations to
come.
A sustainable future must lie within all three of the operating spaces in Fig. 1 .
Thus ‘sustainable’ living is represented by the region at the centre of the fi gure.
While the current human economy generally operates within the Techno-economic
Effi ciency lobe, as indicated by point X, it obviously does not lie within either of the
other spaces; for example, Rockström et al. (2009) have identifi ed domains in which
planetary boundaries are already exceeded, while obvious disparities in quality of
life between different populations and regions show that the global economy does
not operate with the ‘Social equity’ lobe. ‘Sustainable development’ is then represented by a trajectory moving from present practice to the ‘sustainable region’.
Industrial ecology aspires to guide this trajectory.
Some of the discussion around sustainable living has been framed in terms of the
so-called IPAT equation (Ehrlich and Holdren 1971), and several chapters in this
book refer to it. The IPAT equation is actually an expression of a conceptual relationship rather than a formal equation
ENVIRONMENTAL
COMPATIBILITY
SOCIAL EQUITY
TECHNO-ECONOMIC
EFFICIENCY
X
Fig. 1 Sustainability and sustainable development (adapted from Clift 1995 and Clift et al. 2013)
Introduction
be pursued indefi nitely within the resource and carrying capacity of the planet. A
promising approach to defi ning and perhaps quantifying this space has been proposed by Rockström et al. (2009) who articulated the idea of ‘a safe operating space
for humanity’ lying within ‘Planetary Boundaries’. ‘Social equity’ represents the
ethical imperative implicit in the original Brundtland articulation of the idea of sustainable development (WCED 1987) as development that:
meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to
meet their needs.
This idea of sustainability has been summed up in some policy statements (e.g.
DETR 1999) along the lines of
the simple idea of ensuring a better quality of life for everyone, now and for generations to
come.
A sustainable future must lie within all three of the operating spaces in Fig. 1 .
Thus ‘sustainable’ living is represented by the region at the centre of the fi gure.
While the current human economy generally operates within the Techno-economic
Effi ciency lobe, as indicated by point X, it obviously does not lie within either of the
other spaces; for example, Rockström et al. (2009) have identifi ed domains in which
planetary boundaries are already exceeded, while obvious disparities in quality of
life between different populations and regions show that the global economy does
not operate with the ‘Social equity’ lobe. ‘Sustainable development’ is then represented by a trajectory moving from present practice to the ‘sustainable region’.
Industrial ecology aspires to guide this trajectory.
Some of the discussion around sustainable living has been framed in terms of the
so-called IPAT equation (Ehrlich and Holdren 1971), and several chapters in this
book refer to it. The IPAT equation is actually an expression of a conceptual relationship rather than a formal equation
ENVIRONMENTAL
COMPATIBILITY
SOCIAL EQUITY
TECHNO-ECONOMIC
EFFICIENCY
X
Fig. 1 Sustainability and sustainable development (adapted from Clift 1995 and Clift et al. 2013)
Introduction