The Earth gives us all the benefits we want.
The air interacts with the soil and plants grow that are vital for us.
Water cycles partly through the ground and sustains us every day.
The ground is the source of the things we use to take cover: houses and clothes.
Everything in our households originates from the ground.
Our vehicles are made e.g. of metals, petroleum, sand, wood, and leather, which originate from the ground.
Housing
We started with simple huts.
Such shelters are recyclable to the highest degree and such villages have caused smaller imbalances in the environment. The smaller the imbalances we cause, the shorter our environment takes to recover and the smaller the repercussions on the quality of our life.
We can discuss how to build with a smaller environmental footprint and have us build this way.
Clothing
Some people are happy: they live naked. Some of them have amazing bodies.
Why’s this man dressed in a forest that has left no mark on this woman’s body?
Somehow we have decided to cover our bodies. Maybe we focused on bedding first: we took shelter at night and during storms. We started with raw plants and we’ve processed them in more and more complex ways: cotton, flax, hemp, jute, ramie, bamboo and other wood.
We’ve also used materials from animals, e.g. silk, down, wool, fur, and leather. Fur is maybe the least used material. We use leather more for shoes and upholstery than for clothes.
A study of the biodegradability of cellulose fabrics: “It was shown that biodegradability decreased in the following order: rayon > cotton ≫ acetate.”
We’ve invented some fibers, and their main advantage seems that they hold water for less time than natural fibers. Their main disadvantage might be that we’ve created them and poisoned the air, the water, and the soil in the process. Seafood comes with them.
You can ask for information about e.g. flax, hemp, and bamboo. We can deliver garments that are sourced more sustainably than those made of cotton or synthetic fibers.
We try to use clothes with cooling devices.
It might be more effective than cooling entire rooms.
Rory Carroll wrote: “In summer temperatures soar, partly because air-conditioned trains are pumping out heat.”
They have proven that we’re heating the air with “conditioners”. We must also consider that we’re burning e.g. coal to power these machines, so we’re heating the air more across more areas than shown by this study. How do feel about people who suggest that you pay them to cool the air and they warm it? Do you want to take legal action?
Rory also wrote: “energy providers often implore people to reduce their use of air conditioners and other devices to avoid crashing the grid.” We’re using so much electrical energy, that we’ll miss it when we need it for the most important things. You can ask one of my teams to help you (re)design your electrical installation and plan your activities so that you avoid downtimes.
Stephen Buranyi wrote: “In the mid-1980s, Geneva, which has a warmer climate than much of the US, the local government banned the installation of air conditioning except by special permission.” Do the Swiss understand air conditioning better?
He also wrote that Costa Constantinides is trying to reduce emissions from buildings. My team can help with this.
He quotes Rajan Rawal, a professor of architecture and city planning at Cept University in Ahmedabad: “Developers were building without thinking,” You can do better by hiring our teams for design, building, and urban planning.
He also quotes Ashok Lall: building is “driven by speculation and land value”. I haven’t found his social profile, but you can discuss with me how land value influences your construction business. Do you focus on land prices? Do you try to estimate the land value over several years? As one can see once again, focusing on the profit from one transaction can impact one’s business negatively. When one builds, should they make your air unbearably hot? Should they make your energy consumption unsustainable?
Here are some actions one can take to use less electrical energy and avoid heating the air more.
Furniture
We make furniture e.g. out of wood, metal, plastic, and glass.
The composition and energy requirement of plastics show that their use is not sustainable. A main reason is that there is little petroleum left, which will be more and more difficult to use. It seems that between 1870 and 2017 we consumed 2,067,436 TWh equivalent of crude oil, which may mean that we’ve consumed 1,232b barrels of it. They say that we could consume the rest of 1,650b barrels within 47 years. So almost 3 trillion barrels in almost 200 years.
Wood renews the fastest and it’s the most requested material.
You can order with us furniture that is made more sustainably.
Who doesn’t like them? We nest in them. But I can’t focus on them now.
Machines, devices, and tools
We dig for ore and separate it from the surrounding earth and rocks e.g. by washing them. We carry them around the world to plants that turn it into raw materials, components, and products. We treat it physically and chemically in unnatural processes using also unnatural substances. We move many things in unnatural flows and are changing how things at the Earth’s surface mix and move. The new compositions and moves of air, water, and soil harm us, and the beings and things that we love.
Let’s discuss the benefit-cost ratio of using machinery!
What benefits do you seek?
How well can we understand the costs? How well can you be informed about the costs and how well have your current providers informed you about them?
Vehicles
Vehicles are machines, so we can have a similar discussion.
For several decades people have tried to power mainly road vehicles using electric motors. How much are these motors helping?
Land cover
Here’s a good view! Data from 2015:
- trees: 43.57m km2 (the largest area)
- crops: 19.36m km2
- artificial surfaces: 0.55m km2
- barren soil: 19.23m km2
- grass: 18.22m km2
- shrubs: 16.77m km2
- sparse vegetation: 8.88m km2
- herbaceous vegetation, aquatic or regularly flooded: 1.89m km2
- snow and glaciers: 14.46m km2
- mangroves: 0.19m km2
- water bodies: 3.77m km2
From the Global Resources Outlook (GRO) written by the International Resource Panel of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in 2019:
“The continents cover 134 million km2 (not including Antarctica and Greenland). In 2010, these were mainly covered by forest (31.7%); grassland, shrubland and savannah (19.1%); intensively managed pastures (12.2%), cropland (11.4%); and barren land (14%) (figure 2.36). In the light of varying definitions and methods of measurement, it seems reasonable to assume that built-up areas covered by settlements and infrastructure account for 1 to 3% of the total area (based on Potere et al., 2009; UNEP, 2014).”
“Global pasture area has decreased slightly from 31.3 million to 30.9 million km². While slight increases can be observed in North America, Latin America and Africa, there was a decrease in Europe and more significantly in Asia (figure 2.38). Globally in 2000, 53% of this area was intensively managed pasture, 47% were grassland, savannahs, shrubland and barren land that were extensively grazed. Up to 2010, these proportions hardly changed.”
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) wrote that we use 46m km2 for livestock grazing, which should mean the land covered by grass, shrubs, and herbaceous and sparse vegetation. When we add the cropland and the artificial surfaces (mainly settlements), we realize that we are using more than 65.91m km2 (44%) of land; 8930 m2 / person. We also use a part of the area of the inland water bodies together with other beings. We’re not really using the areas covered by snow, but we’re warming and polluting them. We’re using some areas with sparse vegetation. We use barren areas by mining e.g. for salt, sand, and coal. In 2020 we have lost 18.200 km2 of forest, we have lost 24,500 km2 of land to erosion, and 42,000 km2 of land have become desertic. This would mean that we degrade some 250,000 km2 of land per year. How good are we at turning deserts into forests? Land erosion is threatening our lives. In order for us to live, many other species must live, so we need the forests. Forests and ecosystems, not sparse trees. By no criterion does it seem sustainable to divide land use as 40% to one species and 60% to the rest of them.
The per-capita cropland dropped by more than 50% between 1961 and 2016. Darrin Qualman wrote: “Bringing new land into production (Amazon rainforest, for example) emits huge plumes of GHGs as soil carbon is released by tillage.” To the extent that we take such actions, we worsen life; e.g. we become more tense and less healthy. So we must have fewer children. Many children die, are sick, or have insufficient chances of fulfillment. Darrin indicates that there’s little chance for more food, so we must use food and the agricultural land more efficiently. He asks: “Should we continue to make bad food out of good — producing millions of tonnes of nutritionally disfigured foods such as soft drinks, cocoa puffs, and potato chips?” No!
How do we pollute e.g. with greenhouse gases (GHG) when we use the land?
It seems that in 2016 we emitted 49.36 Gt of CO2-equivalent GHG: 36.7 Gt of CO2, 8.55 Gt as CH4, 3.1 Gt as N2O, and 1.1 Gt as fluorinated greenhouse gases.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the USA wrote:
“25% of 2010 global greenhouse gas emissions: The burning of coal, natural gas, and oil for electricity and heat is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions.” To this they add: “10%: This source of greenhouse gas emissions refers to all emissions from the energy sector which are not directly associated with electricity or heat production, such as fuel extraction, refining, processing, and transportation.”
“21%: Greenhouse gas emissions from industry primarily involve fossil fuels burned on site at facilities for energy. This sector also includes emissions from chemical, metallurgical, and mineral transformation processes not associated with energy consumption and emissions from waste management activities.”
“24%: Greenhouse gas emissions from land use come mostly from agriculture (cultivation of crops and livestock) and deforestation. This estimate does not include the CO2 that ecosystems remove from the atmosphere by sequestering carbon in biomass, dead organic matter, and soils, which offset approximately 20% of emissions from this sector.”
“14%: Greenhouse gas emissions from transportation primarily involve fossil fuels burned for road, rail, air, and marine transportation. Almost all (95%) of the world’s transportation energy comes from petroleum-based fuels, largely gasoline and diesel.”
“6%: Greenhouse gas emissions from building arise from onsite energy generation and burning fuels for heat in buildings or cooking in homes.”
The IPCC wrote in 2014 that through land use we may have emitted way over 700 Gt of CO2 between 1750 and 2011.
They show in figure 11.7 that forestry and other land uses accounted for about 3.1 Gt of CO2 per year between 2000 and 2009. So these other land uses may have accounted for 2.2 Gt of CO2 per year. Figure 11.8 shows net emissions of more than 4 Gt.
In 2010 we emitted 13.92 Gt of CO2 by using solid fuels, so 13 Gt mainly by using coal. We emitted 11.47 Gt of CO2 by using petroleum. We also emitted 1.64 Gt of CO2 using cement.
Forestry
FAO wrote in 2010, when we emitted 33.5 Gt of CO2:
“In 2007, approximately 3.6 billion cubic metres of roundwood were removed from the world’s forests.”
“53% of this was used as fuelwood, 90% of which is used in developing countries, primarily for heating and cooking.” 1.91b m3 / year, 5.23m m3 / day.
“69% of the harvesting of industrial roundwood takes place in North America and Europe.” 32.43% of all roundwood.
“Global production of wood and paper products amounts to approximately 710 million tonnes per year, about 54% of which is paper and paperboard products.” 383.4m tonnes of paper products.
“In addition to wood, the forest products industry uses large amounts of recovered fibre. Approximately 50% (191m tonnes) of the paper and paperboard produced globally is recovered, and most of this is recycled to make paper and paperboard.”
“Total greenhouse gas emissions from the forest products value chain are estimated to be 890 million tonnes CO2 equivalent per year, not considering the sequestration accomplished in the value chain. Of these, 33 percent are from manufacturing facilities, 22 percent are associated with purchased electricity, 10 percent are related to production of non-fibre inputs to manufacturing, 2 percent are related to wood production, 6 percent are transport related and 27 percent are associated with the end of the product’s life, almost entirely methane emissions from landfills receiving used products.”
“The emissions intensity of the forest industry would be higher if biomass fuels were not used so extensively — they comprise over one-half of the fuel used by the industry.”
We can decrease these emissions by less than 28% (250m tonnes) by powering factories and vehicles otherwise.
423m tonnes are stored in forest products in use and in landfills, while 240m tonnes rise into the atmosphere as disabling methane. We must improve recycling into our buildings and the environment.
“On an annual basis, the use of wood-based building materials avoids, via substitution effects, emissions of 483 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent per year. Also, by displacing fossil fuels, burning used products at the end of the life cycle avoids the emission of over 25 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent per year. These avoided emissions could be increased to 135 million tonnes CO2 equivalent per year by diverting material from landfills.” We can also build more with wood.
Mengpin Ge indicated that we emitted 3.22 Gt of GHG from forestry and land-use change in 2016. Do changes in land use account for at least 2 Gt?
The IPCC wrote: “The estimated tropical deforestation and degradation fire emissions were 1.39 Gt CO2eq / year during 1997 to 2009 (total carbon including CO2, CH4, CO and black carbon), 20% of all fire emissions.” So fire emissions would amount to 7 Gt / year. They wrote: “Approximately 90% of the gases emitted from forest fires is CO2.” They add: “the annual global GHG emissions from forest fires range between 7–16 Gt CO2-eq, with a most likely value of 11 Gt CO2-eq.” This is a huge amount. We must prevent what wildfires we can.
GRO 2019: “About two-thirds of world forests are extensively used, 6% are intensively managed (for example, fast-growing plantations), while 28% remain largely intact.”
Agriculture
We seem to raise mainly these animals, mostly in Asia:
- 23.71b poultry
- almost 2b sheep and goats
- more than 1.5b cattle
- almost 1b pigs
0.13 pigs (18 kg), 3.25 poultry, and 2.1 cattle per person.
The EPA estimated the GHG emissions from agriculture at about 5 Gt of CO2 equivalent for every year between 2006 and 2011 (about 2 Gt in Asia). The largest quantities, almost 2 Gt each, from how we work the soil and from enteric fermentation, so cattle is a main source of CO2 in agriculture. It means that a cow might put out 1.25 tonnes of CO2 equivalent (50 kg of methane) per year, maybe 0.14 kg CH4 / day. Much of the enteric fermentation takes place in Asia and Latin America, less than 0.6 Gt and 0.5 of CO2 equivalent (24 and 20 Mt CH4) respectively.
Mengpin Ge indicated that we emitted 5.8 Gt of GHG from agriculture in 2016.
The IPCC wrote in 2014 that we have drained more than 0.5m km2 of peatlands, putting 1.1–1.3 Gt of CO2 per year into the air between 1990 and 2008. Dry peat catches fire easily and more CO2 rises into the atmosphere; in June 2019, “Arctic fires emitted 50 megatonnes of CO2, equal to Sweden’s total annual emissions”.
Mining
The International Resource Panel (IRP) of the United Nations Environment Programme reported in 2019: “The impact of mining is small in comparison to other land uses (IRP, 2017a), but it can lead to local biodiversity loss, especially because some mining sites are located in valuable and vulnerable ecosystems. This includes large mining projects as well as informal mining activities in rainforests. In addition to direct land use, there are also biodiversity impacts from building streets and cities in remote mining areas. Furthermore, increasing resource demand and depletion of easily accessible reserves pushes up mining activities in remote areas, including tropical forests and fragile areas (Allegrini et al., 2015; IRP, 2018a).”
The Environmental Assessment Agency of Netherlands wrote that in 2018 we emitted 51.8 Gt of GHG: 37.5 Gt of CO2, CH4 equivalent to 9.73 Gt of CO2, N2O equivalent to 2.82 Gt of CO2, and fluorinated greenhouse gases equivalent to 1.71 Gt of CO2. We emitted 39% of CO2 by burning coal, 31% by burning petroleum, and 18% by burning gas; 14% of CH4 by producing natural gas, 9% by producing petroleum, and 10% by mining for coal; 13% of N2O by using synthetic fertilizers and 11% by burning fossil fuels. This means that we emitted 88% of CO2 (33 Gt) through activities related to mining, 33% of CH4 (3.21 Gt) by mining, and 24% of N2O (0.68 Gt) through activities related to mining, which total 36.89 Gt of CO2-equivalent GHG. Did the IRP focus on the several Gt emitted through the primary activities?
I continue to quote from the GRO of the IRP:
“During the period 1970 to 2017, annual global extraction of materials grew from 27.1 billion tons to 92.1 billion tons (average annual growth of 2.6%). The global average of material demand per capita grew from 7.4 tons in 1970 to 12.2 tons per capita in 2017.” A human consumes 33.4 kg of materials / day, of which 8.75 kg of biomass, 3.3 kg of metals, 15.9 kg of non-metals.
What materials do we actually need?
“Domestic material consumption patterns have changed rapidly in the last 50 years. In 1970, Asia and the Pacific, Europe, and North America each required equal shares of primary materials of about a quarter of the global total. In 2017, Asia and the Pacific accounted for almost 60% of the global total.”
“The extraction and processing of materials, fuels and food make up about half of global greenhouse gas emissions (not including climate impacts related to land use) and more than 90% of biodiversity loss and water stress. Agriculture is the main driver of biodiversity loss and water stress, while all types of resources carry a significant share of the climate change and health impacts from particulate matter.”
“the build-up of infrastructure was the main driver for the increase of climate change.”
This means that Romanians should change their plans to build highways. We should focus on what has a better benefit-cost ratio. We must travel less. We can use computers for trading and part of our communication. Part of education can be done over the Internet.
“The material footprint of high-income regions is greater than their domestic material consumption, indicating that consumption in these countries relies on materials from other countries through international supply chains. Material footprints in high-income countries are around 27 tons per person; 60% higher than the upper-middle income group in 2017; and more than 13 times the level of the low-income group (2 tons). Per-capita impacts of consumption in high-income countries are, depending on the impact category, between three and six times larger than those of low-income countries.”
We can help you focus on what you need most, so that you improve your financial plan. The pressure to earn large sums of money can decrease. We can help you avoid overpriced services and benefit more from your money.
“A scenario developed by the International Resource Panel on Historical Trends of material use shows that, unless a fundamental change drives natural resource use away from the status quo, this use will continue to grow to 190 billion tons and over 18 tons per capita by 2060. Moreover, under Historical Trends greenhouse gas emissions increase by 43% from 2015 to 2060, industrial water withdrawal increases by up to 100% from 2010 levels, and the area of agricultural land increases by more than 20% in that time, reducing forests by over 10% and other habitat (such as grasslands and savannahs) by around 20%.” Does this mean that forests will cover only 39m km2?
This can mean that some people will fight over water and that hunger and diseases will become more common. We can help you to avoid these things as soon as you want to discuss your goals and plans, being open to new information and to methods that you haven’t devised.
It seems (page 61) that the USA needs water from Canada and that Russia and central Africa will have the most water; Australia might resort to its aquifers, while what some call Oceania will remain paradisal. India stands out as a huge nation with little water and much cropland.
They suggest “absolute reductions in resource use in high-income countries” and that we use “resource efficiency policies based on scientific research and development, climate mitigation and carbon removal policies, as well as widespread biodiversity protection measures.” These “are complemented by societal change, marked by healthier diets and reduced food waste”.
We are building a global network for research and development with the following goals:
- improve communication and collaboration,
- maintain the availability and quality of water and food at balanced levels,
- improve energy management,
- improve healthcare,
- improve regional planning,
- improve well-being and its definition.
How do you want our scientists and engineers to serve you?
The IRP advocate “resource efficiency, sustainable consumption and production, and a circular economy”. We are making the economy circular:
- we have online and offline discussions about it,
- we provide software to improve data management and make it easier to cycle resources,
UNEP wrote in 2014: “The absence of global data on aggregates mining makes environmental assessment very difficult and has contributed to the lack of awareness about this issue.” We can help you collect data and preserve your land.
- we provide energy from renewable sources,
- we build with renewable materials,
- we manage others’ waste. (E.g. you can buy recyclable materials from one of our teams.)
They recommend “emerging business models and leapfrogging technologies”.
You can use a new business model by subscribing to use buildings, vehicles, and computers made available by us.
You can leap from the electrical energy created with coal to solar energy and from dissatisfying software to future-proof software.
The IRP suggest that we make national “plans for climate change mitigation and adaptation, as well as for the protection, conservation, and sustainable use of biodiversity”.
“International exchanges and cross-country cooperation can accelerate transitions towards sustainable natural resource use, support national decision-making and create a level playing field for goods and services from different countries.”
“These different aspects call for a global discussion.” I’ve been having it for many years. Let’s continue it here!
“Using a systems approach helps to identify solutions for improving natural resource use.” That’s why you’d consult with our specialists in resource management.
“Global material productivity (the efficiency of material use) has grown substantially slower than labour and energy productivity. Global material productivity started to decline around the year 2000, and has stagnated in recent years. Even though material productivity improved rapidly in both the old and new industrialized countries, the simultaneous shift in shares of global production away from economies that have a higher material productivity to economies that have a lower material productivity explains how difficult it is to bring about a rapid improvement in global material efficiency.”
We can help you to use materials more efficiently e.g. by providing superior personnel at least for a transition period, by helping you use better methods, and by improving your supply chain.
“Although slight relative decoupling of water use from population growth began in the 1990s, global water use is increasing and 30% of global river basin area — excluding hyper-arid zones and Antarctica — have been under severe and mid water stress since 2010.”
“The integration of economic and environmental policies needs to continue to facilitate improvements in resource productivity, and to promote production and consumption systems that provide essential services such as housing, transport, food and energy, with much lower material and energy throughputs and lower levels of emissions.”
“the total tonnage of biomass demand increased from 9.1 to 24.1 billion tons between 1970 and 2017. This is an average 2.1% increase per year, considerably higher than the corresponding growth rate of global population of 1.6% per year. Crop harvest has grown at an annual rate of 2.2% over the last five decades and was the most important component of biomass extraction in 2017 (9.5 billion tons accounting for 40% of the total). Grazed biomass for livestock animals has grown at a similar average rate, reflecting the growing importance of an animal-based diet for the expanding middle class in many parts of the world (Myers and Kent, 2003). The rate of growth has been slowest in biomass sub-categories for which non-biomass alternatives are most easily substituted (such as wood — as fuel and building material) and where there are hard limits on yields that are not easily improved by advancing technology (such as for wild-caught fish).” 3.2 tons of biomass / person / year, 8.75 kg / day.
Around 7 Gt of CO2-equivalent emissions stem from “biomass cultivation and processing, excluding land use change”. Maybe 290 g / kg of biomass.
20.5b tons seem to not be trees. Mainly grass, cereals, vegetables, and fruits?
“Fossil fuels — coal, petroleum, natural gas, oil shale and tar sands — have grown in absolute terms from 6.2 billion tons to 15 billion tons, but their share in global extraction decreased from 23% in 1970 to 16% in 2017. They grew by a yearly average of 1.9% between 1970 and 2017. Natural gas had an average yearly growth of 2.8% and coal displayed 2.1% yearly growth, which were higher than for petroleum: 1.3% yearly growth. This is mainly a reflection of the expanded electricity generation capacity of coal/gas-fired power stations. More recently, coal use has nevertheless stagnated as lower gas prices, a surge in renewables, and energy efficiency improvements have contributed to a slowdown in global coal consumption (IEA, 2017).”
Sharon Kelly quoted Steve Schlotterbeck on the fact that hydraulic fracturing is not profitable. Nicholas Cunningham gives us the example of Argentina, the country whose shale resources are second only to China’s. There’s little petroleum left and we won’t live in a gas chamber. So let’s go solar!
“Metal ores — iron, aluminium, copper and other non-ferrous metals — accounted for 9.5% of global material extraction (2.6 billion tons) in 1970, which grew slightly to around 10% (9.1 billion tons) in 2017. This represented average growth of 2.7% per year and reflects the importance of metals for the construction industry, energy and transport infrastructure, equipment, manufacturing and for many consumer goods. The extraction of ferrous ores grew much faster, at a yearly average of 3.5% compared to non-ferrous ores, which grew at 2.3% per year. The high average growth rates for ferrous metals and non-metallic minerals for construction reflect the major build-up of urban and transport infrastructure in transitioning countries.” 1.2 tons / person / year, 3.3 kg / day.
“Non-metallic minerals — including sand, gravel and clay — are the largest component of material use and posted the largest growth in relative terms up from 34% (9.2 billion tons) in 1970 to over 48% (43.8 billion tons) in 2017. This reflects the major shift in global extraction from biomass to mineral-based natural resources. While all minerals can be thought of as nonrenewable in human time scales, the bulk of non-metallic minerals are construction aggregates (essentially crushed rock with some sand). While there may be local shortages of these materials, there is no prospect of any major global supply constraints for centuries to come. This contrasts with some smaller but extremely important sub-categories, such as fertilizer minerals and minerals in the fossil fuel and metal ore categories.” 5.8 tons / person / year, 15.9 kg / day.
“With an estimated 40 to 50 billion metric tons per year, extraction of such large volume has a major impact on rivers, deltas, and coastal and marine ecosystems. It results in loss of land through river or coastal erosion, lowering of the water table and decreases in the amount of sediment supply.” What do you need first? Water or housing?
Fred Pearce wrote: “Sand mining is the world’s largest mining endeavor, responsible for 85% of all mineral extraction. It is also the least regulated, and quite possibly the most corrupt and environmentally destructive.” “While in Kerala in August 2018, researching the environmental factors behind recent floods, I found that sand is dredged from local rivers 40 times faster than the rivers can replace it. Riverbeds have been lowered by around 1.8 meters as a result.” “In September 2018, while visiting the Abijatta-Shalla National Park in Ethiopia’s Rift Valley, I watched as trucks drove into the park and loaded up with sand destined for building sites in Addis Ababa, 160 km away. It was illegal, but park officials shrugged their shoulders.”
UNEP wrote in 2014: “a conservative estimate for the world consumption of aggregates exceeds 40 billion tonnes a year. This is twice the yearly amount of sediment carried by all of the rivers of the world (Milliman and Syvitski, 1992), making humankind the largest of the planet’s transforming agent with respect to aggregates (Radford, 2005).” China and India are the main cement producers.
It seems that we’ll have to build less. Buildings wear slower than roads. It might become more and more difficult to maintain and use our roads.
Mark Victor Caruso “identified the sand dunes that extend along the coast of eastern Pondoland and up to two kilometers inland as among the world’s 10 richest reserves of ilmenite, the ore that contains the metal titanium.” This was one of his human resources officers. “Some 300 people walked for miles to hear a report from the lawyers who were contesting the companies’ application for a mining license.” “There are killing fields in Pondoland, and they are part of a global pattern.” John GI Clarke wrote about this, too. We alloy titanium with steel. When you spend time in a box (building or vehicle), you can think about the fact that their makers may have killed people to get some materials.
“The transition in the material composition of the global economy from biomass and renewables towards minerals and non-renewable based systems has changed the nature of major environmental pressures, and increasingly moved impacts from the local to the global scale.” We’ve built things so that they last longer and ended up with pits that will outlast them by far. At the same time, they don’t last enough so that we can replace them for a long time.
How do we increase the quality of land?
The IPCC suggests that we:
1. manage forests better
1.1 control fire and pest outbreaks, e.g. by avoiding slash and burn agriculture
1.2 protect peatland forests
1.3 plant trees e.g. on agricultural lands
1.4 extend rotation cycles, reduce logging waste, conserve soil, use wood more efficiently
1.5 natural or artificial regeneration, rehabilitation of degraded lands, long-term fallows
“Conservation of wood (products) through more efficient use or replacement with recycled materials and replacing wood from illegal logging or destructive harvest with wood from certified sustainable forestry (Section 11.10) can save GHG emissions.”
You can order with us wood logged legally and sustainably and products from recycled wood.
Using wood instead of non-renewable resources, e.g. “emission-intensive materials such as aluminium, steel, or concrete in buildings”, can reduce GHG emissions.
You can ask us to help you switch to renewable resources, e.g. by building for you with more wood.
2. manage croplands better
2.1 increase variety of crops, improve crop rotation, use cover crops, perennial cropping
2.2 change the application rate and the type of fertilizers, as well as the time of fertilizations
2.3 till less intensely and retain residues
2.4 mid-season paddy drainage
2.5 rewet peatlands drained for agriculture
3. manage grazing land better
3.1 improve grass varieties / sward composition, e.g. deep rooting grasses, manage nutrients better; appropriate stocking densities, carrying capacity, fodder banks, and improved grazing management;
3.2 diversify fodder
3.3 manage animal waste better
3.4 prevent fires
3.5 revegetate land
3.6 reduce nitrogen inputs
3.7 soil carbon restoration on peatlands and avoided net soil carbon emissions using improved land management
3.8 land reclamation (afforestation, soil fertility management, water conservation, soil nutrients enhancement, improved fallow)
3.9 improve feed and dietary additives to reduce emissions from enteric fermentation
“Mixed production systems such as double-cropping systems and mixed crop-livestock systems can increase land productivity and efficiency in the use of water and other resources as well as serve carbon sequestration objectives. Perennial grasses (e.g. bamboo) can in the same way as woody plants be cultivated in shelter belts and riparian zones / buffer strips to provide environmental services and support C sequestration and biomass production.”
“Reduced losses in the food supply chain and in final consumption reduces energy use and GHG emissions from agriculture, transport, storage and distribution, and reduce land demand.”
Ask us to deliver to you food so that we avoid overproduction and you avoid throwing it away!
Preferring food items with lower GHG emissions per unit of product “can reduce GHG emissions. Such demand changes can reduce energy inputs in the supply chain and reduces land demand.”
We manage databases about food and food providers. Consult with us, as we can help improve diets!
In table 11.4, the IPCC indicated that we could reduce our yearly CO2-equivalent emissions from land use by several Gt / year.
GRO 2019: “measures for the simultaneous reduction of agricultural impacts include food waste reduction and shifts in diets towards less products from intensive livestock systems. Focusing on long-term material use of sustainably grown wood in the construction sector can lead to co-benefits in terms of climate change and biodiversity. Similarly, conserving valuable forest ecosystems and avoiding deforestation contribute to reducing both climate change and biodiversity impacts.” So we change focus from rocks to plants.
Application to a plot of land
We can prevent some harmful things from reaching your land. (Things that are not moved by beings are difficult to control: air, precipitation etc.)
We can take e.g. actions recommended by the IPCC.
We can remove some artefacts and waste from your land and let the soil recover.
We can manage plant residues, e.g. add some to certain soils.
We can create windbreaks.
We can in general plant vegetation e.g. in order to forest some land.