Sustainability satisfied

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Sustainability satisfied

There’s a choice between quality of life and environmental degradation

 

As the World future Energy Summit came to a close last week I was again reminded about the sustainability debate. This past year, more attention has been paid to China’s increasingly important position in the world economy. It was also noted that our planet’s population surpassed the seven billion mark. A good guess is that this person was from China or India and among the great many that will be entering its exponentially growing middle class, a euphemism for getting a car and starting to eat significantly more meat and fried foods.

It is a contradiction that the most significant lifestyle changes resulting from higher income and living standards are the same that cause the greatest damage to perceived quality of life: time spent in traffic, environmental pollution and obesity-related illnesses. Combustible engines and farming of livestock are the most environmentally-destructive practices our species engages in.

The issues of farming and increased motor traffic in developing nations have significantly greater impact on global sustainability than all the world’s combined feel-good campaigns for making token gestures such as switching off our lights.

Put simply, sustainability is a sheer matter of dividing resources between people and nations. It is dictated by demographics. The size of a nation’s population and its GDP growth determines the increase in its energy consumption.

It is politically insensitive to suggest that billions of people in developing nations should be denied ‘development’ for the sake of our planet’s greater good. Yet, looking favourably on a growing middle class in developing nations is nonetheless starkly incongruent with being against environmental catastrophe.

Irrespective of our lofty morals, it is clear that our objections to benefit our own welfare at the expense of other people rarely go much beyond our urge for the new iPhone. As long as the factories are not in our own countries or with workers that look too similar to ourselves we will not give it much thought.

Pretending or believing that we have solidarity with all people equally is dangerous if not outright counterproductive. It obstructs us from seeing, and much less dealing with, the bigger problem at hand.

Leaps in technological innovation for more efficient use and generation of energy will not solve our energy problems. Coal makes up 70% of China’s power generation and is its fastest-growing source for energy in real terms. Comparatively, increasing the efficiency of these coal plants is more critical than all PV panels in the world. Yet, to make a coal plant even slightly more efficient in the next decades would be a major improvement.

Ultimately, we need to find a way for the absolute majority of the world’s population to settle with the little they have and not expect more. Inequality is nothing new, and mankind was not designed for voluntary self-sacrifice. Though we shun from admitting the reality of these intrinsic qualities in ourselves, dealing with them is the key for our long-term survival. This needs to include a degree of inequality between nations and people. Negotiating this order and dividing resources, peacefully or otherwise, is what civilisation has always been about.

The correlation between global trade and increased industrialism cannot be argued against. It is also obvious how reversing and oppressing the trend of economic expansion would be the most effective environmental initiative. Imagine a counter-industrial revolution where the pursuit of consumption is not the main measure of success. Can we radically redefine our universal model for social and economic success to slow down industrial activity and economic expansion? It is possible that this is inevitable and will occur regardless of any conscious actions we take for or against it. My guess is that this will not be voluntary or in our lifetimes. People only tend to change when left with no other option. Then we adapt.