Sustainability

Posted on Jun 20, 2019 in Other subjects

Week 1: What is Sustainability?

  • EPA definition

    • Sustainability – ideas, aspirations and values that inspire public and private organizations to become better stewards of the environment and that promote positive economic growth and social objectives

    • Sustainable Development – implies that environmental protection does not preclude economic development and that economic development must be ecologically viable now and in the long run

  • Three periods of Environmental Policy

    • American Conservation Movement (1850s to 1930s)

      • Resource efficiency group

        • Issue was poor agricultural practice, solution was scientific method

      • Transcendental movement

        • Response to urbanism, valued individualism

      • Organized industrial interests

        • Railroad and steamboat transportation, commons viewed as infinite, political will to preserve areas for public use


    • Environmental Risk Management (1960 to 2000)

    • Sustainability and Public Policy


Week 2: What is Sustainable Development?

  • Environmental Contamination & Risk

    • 1920-1950: global conflicts and economic uncertainty took precedence

    • Wide scale mismanagement of natural resources

  • Sanitation Risk

    • Cholera in the 1850s

    • Chlorination of drinking water in 1908

  • Worker Risk

    • Tax on phosphorus

    • Overall industrial hygiene standard

    • Toxicological research on solvents, vapors etc.

  • Dust Bowl, Clear Cutting, & poor water quality byproducts of mismanagement

  • Environmental Risk Management ( 1960-2000)

    • NEPA – national goal to create and maintain conditions where humans and nature can exist to fulfill social, economic, and requirements for future generations

  • New Complex Issues Arose

    • Urbanization/sprawl

    • Infrastructure renewal

    • Stromwater management

    • Malaria, Acid rain, and ozone depletion were unintended consequences

  • Malaria

    • Half a million deaths

    • Affected 91% of Africa

    • Technology solution: bed nets

    • Malaria is third biggest killer of children globally

    • Nets used for fishing and found to be uncomfortable

  • Command & Control

    • Permit based emissions

  • Market Driven

    • Marginal costs to equal benefits

    • Allocate costs to equal marginal benefits

    • Incentive to innovate

  • Societal needs were met with a technological fix and lead to unintended consequences

    • Cleaner air > taller stacks> acidification

  • Ozone depletion was caused by CFCs

    • Montreal Protocol was successful

    • Ozone hole now shrinking

Week 3: Climate Change & Sustainable Energy

  • Sustainability Challenges

    • Env pollution

    • Limited energy resources

    • Uneven geographical distribution of energy

  • Env. Impacts of Coal

    • Air emissions

    • Water resource use

    • Water discharge

    • Solid waste

  • Fracking

    • Groundwater contamination

    • Air quality degradation

    • Can trigger small earthquakes

Week 5: Hunger and Sustainable Agriculture

  • Over 1/3 of all food produced worldwide is lost or wasted

  • 800 million people today remain food insecure

    • Periodically hungry


  • Group 1: Poverty challenge

    • 2 billion people are employed in agriculture

      • Women make up the majority of agricultural workers in many developing countries

  • Group 2: Deforestation and drought

    • Trees take up moisture from the soil and transpire it – 1 tree releases 1000 liters of water vapor/day

      • Skyborne river carries more water than the Amazon river

  • Group 3: Climate change challenge

    • The production of crops and animal products today releases roughly 13% of global greenhouse gas emissions

      • We must boost production of agriculture while cutting current levels of emissions

  • Group 4: Biodiversity challenge

    • Croplands and pasture occupy roughly half the global land that is not covered by ice, water, or desert.

      • expansion of cropland and pastures is the primary source of ecosystem degradation and biodiversity loss.

  • Group 5: Pasture challenge

    • To meet projected crop needs just by increasing production and without expanding the annual area harvested, crop yields on average would need to:

      • grow by 32 percent more from 2006 to 2050 than they did from 1962 to 2006


  • Concentrated ANIMAL FEEDING OPERATIONS (CAFO)

    • Plants do not exist for animal waste

    • Spraying of manure

      • Nutrients, pathogens, heavy metals, and other potentially toxic agents in the waste can make their way into local watersheds, with implications for drinking water and aquatic ecosystems.

      • Watersheds don’t matter.


Week 6: Fucking shit load of trash (solid waste management)

  • Single use

    • The transition to throwaway containers started before WWII and was completed in the 1980s

  • Solid waste

    • Garbage or refuse

    • •Sludge from water or wastewater treatment

    • plants, or air pollution control facilities

    • Other discarded material including solid, liquid, semi-solid or contained gaseous material resulting from industrial, commercial, mining, and agricultural operations and from community activities

    • •  Surplus to the economy

    • •  Can be hazardous or non-hazardous

  • Recycling

    • New Jersey

    • •  NJ Statewide Mandatory Source Separation and Recycling Act (1987)

    • Plastic market – resin is cheaper than recycled material


  • Sustainable materials management

    • Start with extraction of natural resources and material processing through product design and manufacturing then the product use stage followed by collection/processing and final end of life (disposal).

    • By examining how materials are used throughout their life cycle, an SMM approach seeks to use materials in the most productive way with an emphasis on using less; reducing toxic chemicals and environmental impacts throughout the material’s life cycle; and assuring we have sufficient resources to meet today’s needs and those of the future.


  • Circular Economy