World Resource Use

A schematic diagram of world resource use is depicted in Figure 3.1. Reserves are extracted, they are sold as market stocks, used in society, scrapped and lost or recovered. The fluxes were estimated using scientifically published sources together with less formal industrial information available to us.When Harald was a young engineer in Sweden, he learned about pollution cleanup and treatment. Today this is called end-of-pipe solution; it does not have the high status it once had. More recently, focus has moved on to pollution prevention by smart design and cleaner production; we have thus moved up the causal chain as illustrated in the causal loop diagram (Fig. 3.1). Even more recently, focus has been on cleaner production and design for less resource use. Less consumption, however, always ends up as more; even if everyone consumed less, as if consumer goods were produced more efficiently, demand keeps on going up faster than resource use, and therefore total consumption rises. Population size is a major driver in the system. Thus, the population of the Earth sets the total volume of resouces we use.

The impact of consumption on resource use is governed by a very simple equation by Ehrlich et al. (1992). The impact variable (I) of the Ehrlich-equation stands for “impact” or for the consumption rate in our version of it. We can then write:

I = P * A * (1-XR) * E (3.1)

The equation states that there are four different parameters we need in order to adjust the consumption rate to a sustainable level:

1. A is affluence or net consumption per capita,

2. P represents population or more specifically the number of consumers, 3. XR stands for the degree of recycling of the amount supplied to society,

and

4. E is the resource efficiency of producing the affluence A.

By recycling and improving efficiencies and yields (E), we may reduce net consumption per capita (A), however if that is less than the increase in popula- tion (P) or recycling (XR), we are not conserving resources. The larger the effi-

ciency, the lower the impacts. Our observation is that this is the case we can see in the world today. The improvements that can be made on recycling (XR) and

efficiencies (E) have clear limitations, whereas so far the population (P) has been steadily going up, to a point where the consumption volume has exceeded the

planetary supply capacity. E can only move between 0 and 95 % in reality and it has linear impact on a system that can grow exponentially. XR has a value for iron

in the 25-50 % range, and values above 80 % have not been realistic except for precious metals that are very valuable and do not corrode. For iron, a substantial amount is lost irreversibly through corrosion. Zinc is a critical element for curbing corrosion of steel and iron by galvanisation, and if zinc were to become scarce, corrosion would have to be counted in at substantially higher rates. Thus, popu- lation management must be a part of sustainability policy and strategy, and any policy not dealing with population size will be insufficient. The FoF-model is an integrated population dynamics and phosphorus supply model that was used to prepare for the global population size scenarios underlying the demand calcula- tions as below (Ragnarsdottir et al., 2011; Sverdrup and Ragnarsdottir, 2011).

Figure 3.1 Sustainability of resource use has moved from end-of-pipe solutions (fighting pollution <1>) to the root cause (overpopulation <4>). Attention has over time moved from end-of-pipe solutions <1> to more focus on recycling and clean production <2>, slimmer consumption patterns and sustainable production <3>. Ultimately the issue of population size must be addressed <4>. B1-B6 are different balancing loops that can be introduced into the system by policies (Ragnarsdottir et al., 2012).

The capacity to extract resources has increased with technological devel- opment. This has a deceiving effect by offsetting the feedback from exhaustion of the resource. The final result is that it looks as if the resource is increasing. Removing early warnings of exhaustion may cause exhaustion to apparently set in unnoticed. This has been observed in fisheries where the increase in catching

technology has gone faster than fish stock decline. The result has been total near collapse of the fisheries without warning once the stocks were fully depleted. This is demonstrated in Dennis Meadow´s 2001 FishBanks© _{game which is widely}

used in systems dynamics teaching – for example by John Sterman at MIT (http:// mitsloan.mit.edu/sustainability/profile/fishbanks).

There are delays in the system. A maximum in prospecting typically occurs about 40 years before the production peak (Sverdrup et al., 2013a). Because of rising resource prices, the income revenue from resource extraction commonly occurs 10-20 years after the production maximum. The system collapses occur about 15-30 years later. Over time, sustainability of resource use moves from end- of-pipe solutions (fighting pollution) to the root cause (overpopulation; Fig. 3.1). We have compiled earlier estimates of the Earth’s ability to feed people. Many of the assumptions taken in these earlier studies violate the basic princi- ples of living on a finite planet. We have made a large compilation, building on the compilation by Cohen (1995), and not re-listed all references here. Figure 3.2 shows estimates of the population the Earth can sustain using our total compi- lation; the estimates were made by researchers from 1675 and to the present. The diagram consists of their low (blue and open circles) and high (red dots and red line) estimates. The black line is the past record of the Earth’s popula- tion, and beyond 2014 it is the UN Business As Usual estimate, made assuming endless food and resources. The figure demonstrates that the predicted trend for the carrying capacity is becoming lower and lower (Fig. 1.12). In contrast, the actual population is increasing. The three lines are the UN population estimate assuming no food limitation, our runs with the FoF model described later, with food limited by phosphorus, shows an earlier population decline. The lowest curve is the population curve from the Limits to Growth study. The data show that there is a long-term convergence for the predicted Earth population carrying capacity estimates; the sustainable global population is by many considered to be in the range between 1.5-2.5 billion people for the low estimate, and that the high estimates converge in the range of 4-6 billion people. We conclude that the world is at population overshoot, and therefore not much time is left to create the necessary change. Figure 3.2 suggests that there will be serious challenges in the near future (again, see Fig. 1.12). The population simulations from the FoF model, now a submodule in WORLD, was used to estimate demand in the assessments for metals discussed later.

Politicians across the world do not like to discuss the global population size issues; it would be fair to say that there is a taboo on population discussions. We have both been to many conferences to see that this is so, and the antagonism towards the question is real. At UN conferences the issue cannot be discussed because religious and conservative forces block every attempt. The reasons for this are several, but since global population size is such a central component in magnitude for resource use, at some point this issue must be tackled regardless of whether we want to or not. Paul Ehrlich (Ehrlich and Ehrlich, 2013) at Stanford University once said “either we deal with the issue, or it will deal with us.”

Population can be influenced in many ways, one way that appears to work, within the frame of democracy, is giving women their full human rights and making sure they have access to education. Unfortunately, that issue is very difficult for many, as demonstrated by recent blocking by Saudi Arabia of the Swedish foreign minister, who intended to address human rights at the Arab League summit, resulting in a full blown diplomatic crisis between the two countries.

Figure 3.2 Estimates of the population the Earth can carry, made between 1675 and the present by different researchers as compiled into a diagram by the authors. The diagram consists of low (blue dots) and high (red triangles) estimates. The black line is the past record of the Earth’s population and beyond 2014 is the UN Business-As-Usual scenario. The UN estimate (black line) is assuming no resource limitations.

Figure 3.3 Trophic levels in societal systems are analogous to ecosystems. The upper levels depend causally on the levels below.