Identifying regional drivers of future land-based biodiversity footprints

Biodiversity footprints quantify the impacts on ecosystems caused by final consumption in a region, accounting for imports and exports. Up to now, footprint analyses have typically been applied to analyze past or present consumption patterns. Here, we quantify future land-based biodiversity footprints associated with three diverging Shared Socio-economic Pathways (SSPs), using loss in Biodiversity Intactness Index (BII) as an indicator of biodiversity loss. For each SSP, we retrieved socio-economic and land use projections to 2100 from the IMAGE-MAGNET model and calculated associated biodiversity footprints for seven aggregated world regions. We then compared these with the functional diversity component of the biosphere integrity planetary boundary. Our results indicate that the global land-based biodiversity impact stays below the boundary (tentatively set at 90% of original BII) in all scenario-year combinations. Contrastingly, the per capita boundary is transgressed in one, four and five out of the seven world regions in 2100 for SSP1 (‘sustainability’), SSP2 (‘middle of the road’) and SSP3 (‘regional rivalry’), respectively. These results indicate a strong difference in the biodiversity impact of final consumption between the regions and between SSPs. Even in the ‘sustainability’ scenario, the per capita biodiversity footprint of consumption in North America needs to be reduced to meet the per capita boundary. Thus, policy-making to safeguard the environment would benefit from adopting region-specific strategies: focusing on realizing agricultural efficiency gains in regions with unexploited potential, while focusing on promoting dietary changes towards less animal-based consumption in regions with limited potential for additional efficiency gains.     

The scale and drivers of carbon footprints in households,cities and regions across India

The carbon footprint (CF) has emerged as an important yardstick to understand the total contribution of countries, sectors and individuals to climate change. In contrast to conventional emissions accounting which captures only territorial or local production activities, the CF includes the emissions imposed by consumption across global supply chains for goods and services. Recent interest has grown in the application of CF assessment for municipalities owing to their large contribution to global carbon emissions and the limited coverage of existing data to monitor their climate pledges. By linking household-level consumer surveys to a global supply chain database, spatially-explicit CF assessment is possible at a district and household scale. To date, such technique has exposed otherwise unforeseen differences in consumer carbon footprints in developed countries. Within this study we calculate and compare the household carbon footprints 623 districts in India, based on micro consumption data from 203,313 households and explain their variation by economic, cultural and demographic factors. We show the eradication of extreme poverty does not conflict with ambitious climate change mitigation in India. However, our analysis suggests CF reduction policies within India need to target high-expenditure households which are responsible for nearly seven times the carbon emissions than low-expenditure households (living on $1.9 consumption a day). These vast disparities between the carbon footprint of citizens in India highlights the need to differentiate individual responsibilities for climate change in national and global climate policy.     

Allocating planetary boundaries to large economies: Distributional consequences of alternative perspectives on distributive fairness

The planetary boundaries (PBs) framework proposes global quantitative precautionary limits for human perturbation of nine critical Earth system processes. Together they define a global safe operating space for human development. Translating the global limits to the national level increases their policy relevance. Such translation essentially divides up the global safe operating space. What is considered fair distribution is a political decision and there is no globally agreed principle that can be applied. Here, we analyse the distributional consequences of alternative perspectives on distributive fairness. We scale the global limits of selected PBs to resource budgets for the EU, US, China and India, using three allocation approaches from the climate change literature. Furthermore, we compare the allocated budgets to 2010 environmental footprints of the four economies, to assess their performance with respect to the selected PBs. The allocation approaches are based on (1) current shares of global environmental pressure (‘grandfathering’); (2) ‘equal per capita’ shares, and (3) ‘ability to pay’ to reduce environmental pressure. The results show that the four economies are not living within the global safe operating space. Their 2010 environmental footprints are larger than the allocated budgets for all approaches and parameterisations analysed for the PBs for climate change and biogeochemical flows, and, except for India, also for the PB for biosphere integrity. Grandfathering was found to be most favourable for the EU and US for all PBs, and ability to pay as least favourable. For climate change and biogeochemical flows, ability to pay even resulted in negative resource budgets for the two economies. In contrast, for China and India, equal per capita allocation and ability to pay were most favourable. Results were sensitive to the parameterisation. Accounting for future population growth in the equal per capita approach benefits India, with lower budgets for the EU, US and China, while accounting for future economic growth in ability to pay benefits the EU and US, with lower budgets for China and India. Our results underline the need for all four economies to act, while hinting at diverging preferences for specific allocation approaches. The methodology and results may help countries to define policy targets in line with global ambitions, such as those defined by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), accounting for differences in countries’ circumstances and capacities. Further attention is required for PB-specific allocation approaches and integration of biophysical and socioeconomic considerations in the allocation.     

Affluence drives the global displacement of land use

Increasing affluence is often postulated as a main driver for the human footprint on biologically productive areas, identified among the main causes of biodiversity loss, but causal relationships are obscured by international trade. Here, we trace the use of land and ocean area through international supply chains to final consumption, modeling agricultural, food, and forestry products on a high level of resolution while also including the land requirements of manufactured goods and services. In 2004, high-income countries required more biologically productive land per capita than low-income countries, but this connection could only be identified when land used to produce internationally traded products was taken into account, because higher-income countries tend to displace a larger fraction of land use. The equivalent land and ocean area footprint of nations increased by a third for each doubling of income, with all variables analyzed on a per capita basis. This increase came largely from imports, which increased proportionally to income. Export depended mostly on the capacity of countries to produce useful biomass, the biocapacity. Our analysis clearly shows that countries with a high biocapacity per capita tend to spare more land for nature. Biocapacity per capita can be increased through more intensive production or by reducing population density. The net displacement of land use from high-income to low-income countries amounted to 6% of the global land demand, even though high-income countries had more land available per capita than low-income countries. In particular, Europe and Japan placed high pressure on ecosystems in lower-income countries.     

Country-specific dietary shifts to mitigate climate and water crises

Undernutrition, obesity, climate change, and freshwater depletion share food and agricultural systems as an underlying driver. Efforts to more closely align dietary patterns with sustainability and health goals could be better informed with data covering the spectrum of countries characterized by over- and undernutrition. Here, we model the greenhouse gas (GHG) and water footprints of nine increasingly plant-forward diets, aligned with criteria for a healthy diet, specific to 140 countries. Results varied widely by country due to differences in: nutritional adjustments, baseline consumption patterns from which modeled diets were derived, import patterns, and the GHG- and water-intensities of foods by country of origin. Relative to exclusively plant-based (vegan) diets, diets comprised of plant foods with modest amounts of low-food chain animals (i.e., forage fish, bivalve mollusks, insects) had comparably small GHG and water footprints. In 95 percent of countries, diets that only included animal products for one meal per day were less GHG-intensive than lacto-ovo vegetarian diets (in which terrestrial and aquatic meats were eliminated entirely) in part due to the GHG-intensity of dairy foods. The relatively optimal choices among modeled diets otherwise varied across countries, in part due to contributions from deforestation (e.g., for feed production and grazing lands) and highly freshwater-intensive forms of aquaculture. Globally, modest plant-forward shifts (e.g., to low red meat diets) were offset by modeled increases in protein and caloric intake among undernourished populations, resulting in net increases in GHG and water footprints. These and other findings highlight the importance of trade, culture, and nutrition in diet footprint analyses. The country-specific results presented here could provide nutritionally-viable pathways for high-meat consuming countries as well as transitioning countries that might otherwise adopt the Western dietary pattern.     

Environmental and resource footprints in a global context: Europe’s structural deficit in resource endowments

The European Union (EU) has proposed in its Resource-efficiency roadmap a ‘dashboard of indicators’ consisting of four headline indicators for carbon, water, land and materials. The EU recognizes the need to use a consumption-based (or ‘footprint’) perspective to capture the global dimension of resources and their impacts. In this paper, we analyse how the EU’s footprints compare to those of other nations, to what extent the EU and other major economies of the world rely on embodied resource imports, and what the implications are for policy making based on this comparison. This study is the first comprehensive multi-indicator comparison of all four policy relevant indicators, and uses a single consistent global Multi-Regional Input Output (MRIO) database with a unique and high level of product detail across countries. We find that Europe is the only region in the world that relies on net embodied imports for all indicators considered. We further find that the powerful economies of China and others in the Asia-Pacific already dominate global resource consumption from a footprint perspective, while they still haven’t reached the prosperity of developed countries. Competition for resources is hence likely to increase, making Europe even more vulnerable. A hot spot analysis suggests that final consumption of food, transport and housing are priorities for reduction efforts along the life cycle. Further, countries with a similar Human Development Index can have very different footprints, pointing at societal organisation at macro-level as option for improvement. This points at options for countries for lowering their footprint, becoming less dependent on embodied imports, while maintaining a high quality of life.     

基于混合LCA的新疆地区电力生产水足迹分析及碳中和目标下的变化

新疆是我国电力生产的主要地区,同时存在严重的水资源短缺问题。作为综合评价指标,水足迹可以用来量化分析电力生产中的水资源消耗及其水环境影响。文中基于投入产出和生命周期的混合生命周期模型对新疆地区2012年和2017年电力生产水足迹进行了量化研究,并对不同发电技术的水足迹贡献部门进行了分析。结果发现：因电力生产结构的变化和燃煤发电技术革新,新疆电力生产的单位水足迹由2012年的4.26×10^-3 m³/(kW∙h)下降到2017年的3.08×10^-3 m³/(kW∙h)。对不同发电技术的水足迹贡献部门分析发现,煤电和水电的间接水足迹分别主要来自采矿业和重工业,占比分别为60.3%和52.8%。风电和光伏发电的间接水足迹分别主要来自重工业和轻工业,占比分别为38.1%和56.0%。最后针对碳中和目标下新疆电力结构转型带来的水足迹变化进行分析,2017—2050年高比例的可再生能源发电将使新疆电力生产单位水足迹下降75%。     

The effect of industrialization and globalization on domestic land-use: A global resource footprint perspective

Land-use activities are increasingly globalized and industrialized. While this contributes to a reduction of pressure on domestic ecosystems in some regions, spillover effects from these processes represent potential obstacles for global sustainable land-use. This contribution scrutinizes the complex global resource nexus of national land-use intensity, international trade of biomass goods, and resource footprints in land-use systems. Via a systematic account of the global human appropriation of net primary production (HANPP) and input–output modelling, we demonstrate that with growing income countries reduce their reliance on local renewable resources, while simultaneously consuming more biomass goods produced in other countries requiring higher energy and material inputs. The characteristic 'outsourcing' country appropriates 43% of its domestic net primary production, but net-imports a similar amount (64 gigajoules per capita and year) from other countries and requires energy (11 GJ/cap/yr) and material (~400 kg/cap/yr) inputs four to five times higher as the majority of the global population to sustain domestic land-use intensification. This growing societal disconnect from domestic ecological productivity enables a domestic conservation of ecosystems while satisfying growing demand. However, it does not imply a global decoupling of biomass consumption from resource and land requirements.     

Telecoupled environmental impacts of current and alternative Western diets

Low-meat and no-meat diets are increasingly acknowledged as sustainable alternatives to current Western food consumption patterns. Concerns for the environment, individual health or animal welfare are raising consumers’ willingness to adopt such diets. Dietary shifts in Western countries may modify the way human-environment systems interact over distances, primarily as a result of existing trade flows in food products. Global studies have focused on the amount of water, land, and CO₂ emissions embodied in plant-based versus animal-based proteins, but the potential of alternative diets to shift the location of environmental impacts has not yet been investigated. We build on footprint and trade-based analyses to compare the magnitude and spatial allocation of the impacts of six diets of consumers in the United States of America (USA). We used data on declared diets as well as a stylized average diet and a recent dietary guideline integrating health and environmental targets. We demonstrate that low-meat and no-meat diets have a lower demand for land and utilize more crops with natural nitrogen fixation potential, yet also rely more widely on pollinator abundance and diversity, and can increase impacts on freshwater ecosystems in some countries. We recommend that governments carefully consider the local impacts of the alternative diets they promote, and minimize trade-offs between the global and local consequences of dietary shifts through regulation or incentives.     

Who will win the green race? In search of environmental competitiveness and innovation

As the world considers greener forms of economic growth, countries and sectors are beginning to position themselves for the emerging green economy. This paper combines patent data with international trade and output data in order to investigate who the winners of this “green race” might be. The analysis covers 110 manufacturing sectors in eight countries (China, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, South Korea, UK and the US) using date for the period 2005–2007. We identify three success factors for green competitiveness at the sector level: the speed at which sectors convert to green products and processes (measured by green innovation), their ability to gain and maintain market share (measured by existing comparative advantages) and a favourable starting point (measured by current output). We find that the green race is likely to alter the present competitiveness landscape. Many incumbent country-sectors with strong comparative advantages today lag behind in terms of green conversion, suggesting that they could lose their competitive edge. Japan, and to a lesser extent Germany, appear best placed to benefit from the green economy, while other European countries (Italy in particular) could fall behind. However, the green economy is much broader than the few flagship sectors on which the debate tends to focus, and each country has its niches of green competitiveness.     

The emperor's new clothes: redressing the Kyoto Protocol

Abstract

US President Bush repudiated the Kyoto Protocol because, in his view, it is ‘fatally flawed in fundamental ways’. This paper evaluates seven proposals to redress the protocol according to their potential to deal with three key issues that have reinforced US intransigence: hot air, cost uncertainty and developing country participation. It argues that negotiations on intensity targets hold the most promise. Because intensity targets limit hot air, but do not limit economic growth, and a high variance of carbon intensity exists among countries with similar GDP per capita, intensity targets based on best practice levels might be agreeable to developing countries and the US. If a protocol specifying such targets were implemented, less warming would be associated with larger world GDP than would otherwise be the case, and countries' carbon intensity and emissions per capita would tend to converge to best practice levels at every stage of development.     

Spatially-explicit footprints of agricultural commodities: Mapping carbon emissions embodied in Brazil's soy exports

Reliable estimates of carbon and other environmental footprints of agricultural commodities require capturing a large diversity of conditions along global supply chains. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) faces limitations when it comes to addressing spatial and temporal variability in production, transportation and manufacturing systems. We present a bottom-up approach for quantifying the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions embedded in the production and trade of agricultural products with a high spatial resolution, by means of the integration of LCA principles with enhanced physical trade flow analysis. Our approach estimates the carbon footprint (as tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents per tonne of product) of Brazilian soy exports over the period 2010–2015 based on ~90,000 individual traded flows of beans, oil and protein cake identified from the municipality of origin through international markets. Soy is the most traded agricultural commodity in the world and the main agricultural export crop in Brazil, where it is associated with significant environmental impacts. We detect an extremely large spatial variability in carbon emissions across sourcing areas, countries of import, and sub-stages throughout the supply chain. The largest carbon footprints are associated with municipalities across the MATOPIBA states and Pará, where soy is directly linked to natural vegetation loss. Importing soy from the aforementioned states entailed up to six times greater emissions per unit of product than the Brazilian average (0.69 t t⁻¹). The European Union (EU) had the largest carbon footprint (0.77 t t⁻¹) due to a larger share of emissions from embodied deforestation than for instance in China (0.67 t t⁻¹), the largest soy importer. Total GHG emissions from Brazilian soy exports in 2010–2015 are estimated at 223.46 Mt, of which more than half were imported by China although the EU imported greater emissions from deforestation in absolute terms. Our approach contributes data for enhanced environmental stewardship across supply chains at the local, regional, national and international scales, while informing the debate on global responsibility for the impacts of agricultural production and trade.     

国家自主决定贡献的减排力度评价

基于气候变化综合模型——全球变化评价模型（GCAM-TU),分析了2030年各国家/地区减排承诺下能源相关CO₂的全球排放路径与不同可能性下2℃温升目标对应的最优排放路径的差距。研究发现,当前减排承诺下的全球排放路径与最优路径仍存在一定差距,各国家/地区需加大2030年后的减排承诺力度。进一步分析了主要国家/地区在各自减排承诺下的碳强度下降率、减排成本和人均碳排放,得出中国在全球减排进程中的努力和贡献是巨大的,而南非、日本等国承诺力度不足。为实现自主决定贡献,中国终端能源消耗将较参考情景有所下降,能源结构将进一步优化。     

Trends in CO2 emissions in Israel—an international perspective

As a Party to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Israel conducts a periodical inventory of greenhouse gases emissions. These data allowed the generation of time series of CO₂ emissions per capita and per GDP for the period 1990–2004. It was found that CO₂ emissions per capita increased dramatically from 1990 to 2000, reflecting the rapid economic growth that was initiated by the massive immigration wave at the beginning of the nineties. These emissions remained stable between 2000 and 2004, reflecting the economic stagnation caused by the uprising in the Palestinian Territories, as well as stagnation in the global economy. CO₂ emissions per GDP (CO₂ intensity) remained stable along the whole reviewed period. This stability can be explained by a shift in electricity consumption from the industrial sector towards the commercial and the residential sectors, corresponding to an increase in the standard of living in the same period. A comparison was held with countries considered as developed for many years represented by the five largest economies (G-5) and recently developed countries (RDCs). Although Israel exhibits emission levels within the range of the G-5 countries, it does not fit the patterns demonstrated by these countries. Trends observed in Israel resemble these observed in other RDCs, such as Spain or Greece, confirming the classification of Israel in this category.     

主要发达经济体从碳达峰到碳中和的路径及启示

随着气候变化影响加剧,全球气候治理进程加速,实现碳达峰已经成为全球气候行动的核心,各国也相继制定碳中和目标并开展行动。中国在第75届联合国大会一般性辩论上提出了碳达峰碳中和目标,部分已实现碳达峰的发达经济体也提出了各自的碳中和承诺。文中从“整体-阶段”及“焦点-公平”视角分析了欧盟和美国等主要发达经济体碳达峰的历程和特点,以及其碳中和目标和规划。研究发现,发达经济体在碳达峰过程中普遍经历了较长的爬坡期（58~136年）和平台期（4~20年),在碳达峰时,发达经济体的能源结构以油气为主,油气占一次能源消费比重为57%~77%,其人均排放量、历史累计排放以及人均GDP也都处于较高水平,在碳达峰前后总体处于经济与碳排放脱钩状态。各发达经济体的碳中和路径均以能源转型为重点,采用了多元化的政策工具,并且注重低碳和负碳技术的革新。根据发达经济体的政策展望,在实现碳中和时,均难以将绝对排放量降为零,都需要通过碳移除手段进行抵消。通过对比分析,发现中国的碳达峰和碳中和目标是具有雄心的气候承诺,相较其他发达经济体需要付出更大努力。建议运用全面综合的政策工具支撑碳中和目标的有效落实,加快中国的气候立法,在兼顾公正转型的同时推动能源结构调整,注重可再生能源和能效方面的新技术开发应用。     

Post-2012 CDM multi-criteria analysis of industries in six Asian countries: Iranian case study

The prospects of the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and for carbon income, up to and beyond 2012, in the industrial sectors of Iran and five other Asian countries are investigated. The attractiveness and suitability of each host country, the status of their industrial sectors (based on four post-2012 scenarios), and the post-2012 potential of the CDM (or similar carbon projects) in these sectors are all examined. A multi-criteria analysis of Iran, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, China, and India, based on seven sets of criteria (institutional, regulatory, economic, political, social, CDM experience, and energy production/consumption), is conducted, and the post-2012 potential carbon incomes of each country – based on CO₂e emissions of industrial processes – are calculated. Finally, the Iranian industrial sector and the impact of deregulation of energy prices are examined. The post-2012 potential savings in the Iranian industrial sector are calculated based on energy savings, carbon income, and environmental savings. The results indicate that there is strong demand for investment and new technology in this sector to combat several-fold energy price increases. Moreover, high-priced carbon credits could play a meaningful role in post-2012 energy policies in this sector.

Policy relevance

This research is the first study to quantify the carbon market potentials in the industrial sectors of the selected Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) members. The Kyoto Protocol is considered by most OPEC countries to be a mixed bag of threats and opportunities and they have shown ambivalence towards it, mainly due to the threat a reduction of fossil fuel consumption poses to their economies. On the other hand, energy efficiency is a desirable goal for their industrial sectors. Iran, as an OPEC member country with vast energy resources, has mostly ignored the CDM during the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol and has performed poorly on CDM implementation. However, the current deregulation of energy prices in Iran, with profound cuts in energy subsidies, would definitely alter the perspective of its industrial decision makers on the post-2012 carbon potentials.     

石家庄市居民生活和出行的碳足迹及其环境影响因素分析

应用碳足迹方法和人类活动对环境影响评价方法,开展石家庄市城区1500户家庭的问卷调查,在此基础上,分析城市居民在各收入水平状况下的生活和出行碳足迹以及评价碳足迹的影响因素。研究结果显示：居民改善生活质量的过程也是碳足迹增加的过程,技术进步对降低居民生活碳足迹有积极作用。研究建议：通过推广节能型建筑和集中供热等措施,降低城镇居民的生活碳足迹;通过建立方便、舒适的城市公共交通系统,降低城镇居民的交通出行碳足迹。     

“十四五”中国分省经济发展、能源需求与碳排放展望——基于CMRCGE模型的分析

在梳理新常态以来各省经济布局发展以及能源需求特征的基础上,重点剖析了国家区域协调发展战略,并利用中国多区域动态可计算一般均衡模型（China Multi-Regional Computable General Equilibrium,CMRCGE）,对“十四五”时期各省经济社会发展、能源需求及碳排放进行了模拟分析。主要结论包括：(1)在区域协调发展战略指引下,预计到“十四五”末,中国将有13个省市人均GDP超过1.5万美元,16个省市人均GDP在1.0万~1.5万美元之间,各省经济有望实现平稳较快发展。(2)预计2025年各省能源需求总量可达54.5亿tce（由于数据原因,未测算西藏）,“十四五”年均增长约为1.5%,能源需求仍保持低速增长。同时能源需求的重心逐步从东部向中部转移,而西部地区能源大省的用能比重基本保持稳定,这与各地所处的经济发展阶段、区域协调发展战略导向基本一致。(3)“十四五”时期各省的碳排放（主要考虑能源利用碳排放）强度年均降幅约为5.4%,绝大部分省份降幅超过4.0%。近年来碳强度显著下降的趋势有望继续保持。     

A population health model for integrated assessment models

In this paper we present the initial results from a project to develop a population health model so we can extend the scenarios included in the IPCC’s Special Report on Emission Scenarios to include population health status. Our initial hypothesis was that some climatic variable, particularly temperature, would have a significant impact on health outcomes. After experiments – using the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) data on Years of Life Lost (YLL) and Years Lived with disability (YLD) both by WHO region and by five degree latitude band as outcome variables – failed, we settled on life expectancy (LE) as the best measure of health status. We discovered that there is a solid relationship between LE and the GBD data from our first experiments, allowing us to extend the results from the LE model. The LE model used cross section data on LE for 91 countries and included temperature, per capita income, access to clean water and sanitation, literacy, simple medical attention, nutrition, per capita medical expenditure, electricity use per capita, and automobiles per capita as independent variables. While all were individually associated with LE, our model of choice included literacy, access to clean water and sanitation, simple medical attention, an indictor variable for Sub-Saharan Africa and purchasing-power parity per capita income. Note that neither temperature nor calories enter into this model. The fit between life expectancy, as predicted by this model, and actual life expectancy was quite good (R ² =0.90), except for Rwanda, Uganda, and Madagascar; these countries accounted for one half of the unexplained variation in the model. The LE model was then used to develop trajectories of life expectancy in India for the four IPCC SRES storylines, where values for the independent variables were extrapolated based on the story line content. YLL and YLD estimates were created using the current cross relationship of these outcomes to LE. Given the lack of a general role for climate in our LE model, future work is planned to explore how to add detailed climate related impacts, to explore alternative nutritional variables, as well as extend the data set to allow a cross-section time-series approach.