Sometime in the early 1970s, three environmentalists were deep in debate about how to measure the impact humans have on the planet. One of the three, Barry Commoner, argued that the impact was purely a result of technological innovation following WWII. The other two, Paul Ehrlich and John Holdren, argued that the most important aspects of our impact were population growth and our increasing affluence. As all good environmentalists would they created an equation with which to codify this debate. The result was the IPAT equation. For the uninitiated, IPAT is an accounting equation (I = P x A x T) which states that human impact (I) is a product of our population (P) multiplied by our affluence (A) multiplied by our technology (T). Affluence represents our consumption and technology represents how resource intensive our affluence is to produce. I admit that I'm over-simplifying here. For a much more detailed analysis of the equation, its many adaptations, and its limitations, simply google "IPAT equation."
Just a few months ago this was nothing more than a theoretical concept to me. At the time, I argued that the most important factor fueling our impact was population. If you have fewer people, then OF COURSE! you will have a lower impact. My time in India has only cemented that idea. Despite our technological innovations and growing affluence, I believe more than ever that our main problem is population. For example, the city where I'm living this summer (Bangalore) has grown 200% in the past decade compared to the 3% growth rate of New York over the same time period. As I wrote in my last blog post, this growth has led to a number of problems: traffic, air and water pollution, low power quality, decaying infrastructure, homelessness, etc., etc. all of which has had a negative impact on the environment. Ehrlich and Holdren were right! It's population!
Or is it? What do you think? How has your WDI experience informed your perspective on this issue? If it is population, how do we deal with it? If it's not population, then what is it? And how do we deal with it?
Just a few months ago this was nothing more than a theoretical concept to me. At the time, I argued that the most important factor fueling our impact was population. If you have fewer people, then OF COURSE! you will have a lower impact. My time in India has only cemented that idea. Despite our technological innovations and growing affluence, I believe more than ever that our main problem is population. For example, the city where I'm living this summer (Bangalore) has grown 200% in the past decade compared to the 3% growth rate of New York over the same time period. As I wrote in my last blog post, this growth has led to a number of problems: traffic, air and water pollution, low power quality, decaying infrastructure, homelessness, etc., etc. all of which has had a negative impact on the environment. Ehrlich and Holdren were right! It's population!
Or is it? What do you think? How has your WDI experience informed your perspective on this issue? If it is population, how do we deal with it? If it's not population, then what is it? And how do we deal with it?
A friend emailed this to me as a response (she was too shy to post a response here):
ReplyDeleteFood for thought on supporting the Affluence part of the equation from NPR this morning
http://www.npr.org/2012/ +06/20/155411564/study-fat-people-burden-earths-resources
Great post, Adam. Though population is certainly a major factor when it comes to our environmental impact, I strongly believe that technology is actually a larger culprit. Even if we use India as an example, despite having a population four times that of the US, they still only emit 1/3 of the CO2 into the atmosphere . . . and why is that?! TECHNOLOGY. Take a look at the most recent example in this article:
ReplyDeletehttp://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/26/a-novel-way-to-clean-wastewater/
Jevon's paradox in full effect - new technology that cleans water discharged from fracking (a good thing), yet simultaneously enables more and more fracking and removes a key argument from those of us who oppose it!
Nice try, but I'm sticking with Commoner on this one;)
Nice discussion guys.
ReplyDeleteI think that Mr. Gerding does bring up a good point. However, I personally think that it is population (P) that is the major driver.
While Commoner, Ehrlich and Holdren developed the IPAT equation to figure out which of these three factors – Population (P), Affluence/Consumption per capita (A), Technology (T) – has the most impact on the environment, I think the IPAT equation is fundamentally flawed.
As written, IPAT seems to assume that P, A, and T are independent variables. I think that both A and T can be correlated, to an extent, to P.
If you look at the IPAT equation, you could make the case that A or T are major drivers, but if you remove P from the equation then the questions become:
1. Who’s driving demand for a better life and therefore resources (A).
2. Who’s developing technology to maximize the use of our natural resources (T)?
After all, people will always have basic needs. Do we really think that the planet can sustain 15 billion people even if we all make a commitment to living a sustainable life?
At the end of the day we have a planet with finite resources and a population that keeps on increasing. P in my opinion is the true driver the IPAT equation, however, T and A will affect the rate at which we deplete our natural resources.
Hey team,
ReplyDeleteI thought about this question a lot over the weekend. It was 115F in Ahmedabad. A week after clucking my tongue at this article: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/21/world/asia/global-demand-for-air-conditioning-forces-tough-environmental-choices.html?emc=eta1, suffering from a touch of heat stroke, I found myself thanking everything for the A/C unit sticking out of my bedroom window. An identical one stuck out of each room in the house. But this was a very wealthy household, so they could afford to be comfortable (and by extension healthy and productive). I don't have any answers, but each letter in the acronym was certainly present. Javier, your point about the variables being dependent is spot-on. I'd also argue that in most cases, A&T are closely correlated as well.