Our well-being on planet Earth depends on three main essential drivers, i.e. Water, Energy and Natural Resources (fossil minerals and renewables including biosphere and its eco-systems) ‘WENR’. To achieve sustainability and resilience in our societies and to promote prosperity requires using and sharing our common 'WENR' capital with consideration to the complex and multi-layered NEXUS, i.e. the interactions and processes within and between these three drivers 'WENR’. Currently, Earth is facing existential threats caused by us collectively. Scaling-Up and Scaling-Out 'Science, Technology and Innovation' of the WENR-systems and coupling them to the 'Socio-Economic-Environment' pillars of our societies as defined by the UN-SDGs are one of the very few means to mitigate existing and future threats and bring full vitality in the functioning and metabolism of all life forms and processes on Earth. Sustain-earth.com is an open access online platform that allows active contributions and feeback.
Category: Environment & Climate
All sectors of modern society can have impacts from environment and climate changes. There are two “groups” of waste and pollution, those with general impacts on the environment and quality of life, and the other group with specific impacts on climate and weather through the so-called global warming. However, there can be some overlapping between these two groups and induced effects therein. Achieving sustainable socio-economic developments depends on keeping good records and information on how our environment and climate are changing in terms of space and time. Air, water and ecological qualities are very much related to the consumption pattern of our common natural resources on the earth, also how we deal with our waste from household, agriculture and industries. Furthermore, waste and pollution can exist in different forms (gas, liquid and solid), originate from various sources and follow different paths of dispersion, and ultimately have different fates. Upon dispersion in the atmosphere, hydrosphere, ecosphere and in aquatic systems, pollution continues to interact with the biotic and abiotic components of the environment. Such interactions introduce degradation in climate, weather and the environment. Greenhouse gases, primarily from fossil fuel burning, cause global warming. Other types of pollution, e.g. heavy metals, toxic chemicals, acidic gases, agricultural and industrial waste, cause degradation of life quality and other damaging effects on the environment, water and ecological systems. Because of the existing and emerging competition on natural resources, and the diverse consumption pattern by stakeholders and industries, there are constant needs for developing treaties, conventions, regulations and agreements on all levels and sectors to protect the climate and environment and to promote sustainable socio-economic developments.
Currently, sustainability is generally treated in a theoretical manner with demonstrations of the negative impacts of over-consumption and the miss-management of natural resources. However, in a world with increasing population we can hardly continue with “business as usual”. We need to go over to practical solutions, i.e. “Applied Sustainability”. Transformation to more sustainable approaches worldwide and in all society sectors will not take place over-night.
You may have felt poor up-dating of the Blog “farideldaoushy.wordpress.com” and major interruptions in the activities. The wide-range of interests within the Blog “farideldaoushy.wordpress.com” made it necessary to up-date the layout and construction of the Blog. Also, to have own domain with representative name that reflects the content and extent. The new “Sustain-Earth.com” will also allow us to fulfill our wish to improve the communication with the visitors and readers and to provide new services. It will, also, provide platform for professionals and expertise within society sectors to share knowledge and contribute in topic discussions.
This Blog “farideldaoushy.wordpress.com” will get a new address “sustain-earth.com”.
The change to the new address will take place within one week.
We have a new layout and construction of the Blog to make it easier to follow the Posts and the content much easier as well as to contribute in discussions as well.
The new construction will involve a number of new interactive functions where guest Bloggers, expertise and professional will contribute as well as interacts with the media to discuss and answer their questions. The Categories of the Blog are kept wide enough to deliver solutions and approaches in all society sectors.
Even if we can ignore the reality, we can never ignore its consequences. Economic models and scientific discoveries have promoted an ever accelerating consumption of the earth’s natural resources with little consideration to population growth and the associated damage of all forms of life on the Earth. Depletion of important resources, the increasing waste and pollution combined with an accelerating population have caused poverty, disease, malnutrion and above all the definite fact of an approaching total annihilation of life on the whole planet. Survival of humans and newcomers has continuously forced impoverised people to destroy their environment. It is the very nature of humans, no one can go hungry without commiting a “crime” to fill the stomach!
But what is Sustainability and can we really achieve it, when we are regularly presented with a range of the so-called “sustainable” products and “green or organic” cleaning supplies to carbon offsets. With micro-economic markets keep supplying us with so much labeled as sustainable, the term has grown to become essentially a “bubble of sustainability”, at best indicating a practice or product slightly less damaging than the conventional alternative.
Sustainability can not be achieved by un-sustainable policies that are left over to the market without having appropriate instruments on all levels and sectors to strictly define, measure and control how sustainable is sustainable. How else can we can we achieve a goal that is not well-defined and regulated!
Energy left after the “Big Bang” was the origin of the Earth, water and all other natural resources on the earth including fossil fuel, wind-power and the solar-fuel. These are the fundamental drivers of the evolution of all forms of life on the earth. The dichotomy between natural resources and basic life-components that has facilitated our life, which seemed to us to be “endless”, promoted our consumption to the degree that we are running out of all resources. The dilemma of water and energy seems to be like the classical question “which came first, the chicken or the egg” and if they will disappear which will disappear first. We need energy to produce water and we need water to produce energy. Both resources are running out. As we are reaching Peak Oil, we also appear to approaching Peak Water. With the vanishing drivers of life, life itself will fade away. In other words, our planet is aging with us and the question who dies first!
The MENA region is facing major challenges to meet the growing pressures on its WE “Water and Energy” resources. This would require major transformation for shaping new policies to meet the accelerating demands not only on energy but also on water. Other drivers what regards energy are high insolation rates, young and empowered workforce. Among other drivers for achieving sustainable WE-policies are increasing awareness of cost, quality, market diversity and public services.
The World Top Ten: longest rivers, largest lakes, largest countries, deepest oceans and seas, countries with most airports.
http://oneclickfun.blogspot.se/2012/02/top-ten-of.html?m=1
Ten new Wetlands of International Importance are extremely important additions to the Ramsar List. They represent impressive array of under-represented wetland types typical of arid lands, including salt-bed chotts, oases, and “gueltas”. They are key geographical position for migratory birds during journeys across the Sahara. These wetlands sustained rich evolutionary adaptations to the harsh arid conditions in isolated circumstances. They are, also, of unique cultural significance. WWF’s Living Waters Campaign commended the Government of Algeria for these impressive designations.
Economic growth is a powerful instrument for empowering people and reducing poverty in the developing world. It is essential for creating jobs and market opportunities for people to support their families and build more sustainable futures. However, many developing countries face particular challenges and threats to achieve and maintain sustainable economic growth because of weak institutions, high unemployment, poor infrastructure for key public and private services (education, health, security, transport, water and energy), also a severe lack of access to financial services and unsuitable laws and regulations.
Among typical problems in environmental managent and associated socio-economic developments are: how up-stream and down-stream countries, or even communities, develop win-win solutions for certain conflicts arising from the use of joint water-land resources; also how polluting industries and water-management organizations can develop joint solutions to protect land-water resources; also how agriculture, agro-industries and end-users can sustain good levels of trust. Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) are of increasing political interest as this approach helps preserve ecosystems and the goods and services they provide. For proper synthesis of a functioning concept, certain prerequisites should be embodied such as legislation and institutional framework, property rights, contract designs etc.
Even though this concept has been in practice since the 80s, it is still a relatively new instrument for many parts of the world. For beneficial participation from ecosystem markets, awareness is important about what ecosystem services and how payment and compensation schemes work. There must be, also, sufficient local capacity of communities and other rural landowners to identify, approach and close deals with buyers of ecosystem services.
GRID, a Centre collaborating with UNEP, is engaged in promoting high-level environmental policies. The following has initiated important information for building the necessary infra-structure for policy-making to improve the socio-economic developments in Rwanda. During the preparation of the first Rwanda State of Environment and Outlook in 2009, it became evident that there is a lack of reliable core datasets and indicators on the environment. As such there is need for improved collaboration between institutions dealing with environmental information management. All institutions working in the natural resources sector will benefit from the creation of an infrastructure for sharing environmental data. An environmental information network that improves data access at all levels of society will in turn support the country’s sustainable development objectives.
GRID-Arendal is a centre collaborating with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Established in 1989 by the Government of Norway as a Norwegian Foundation. Its mission is to communicate environmental information to policy-makers and facilitate environmental decision-making for change. This is achieved by organizing and transforming available environmental data into credible, science-based information products, delivered through innovative communication tools and capacity-building services targeting relevant stakeholders.
Below, an example is given on Uganda’s Environment and Natural Resources: Enhancing Parliament’s Oversight. Other publications can be down-loaded (PDF) free of charge, or directly viewed on-line.
Cape Peninsula, South Africa, gives an excellent example on “sustainable tourism” with the well-preserved nature of its bays, parks, mountain, beach and sea animals, Ostrich farms, recreation activities, open sea views, well-managed roads, shanty towns and most important high environmental standards. It has one of the most beautiful coastal mountain formations architected by historical evolution and successive carving of sea-level variations alternated by coastal depositions. The amazing action of nature and the strict rules of natural conservation and environmental protection policies sustained its biological hot-spots and made it home for diverse and rare animal, plant and bird (including penguin) and fish species though the harsh and delicate environments. Including the so-called Fynbos “fine bush” because of its many fine leafed plants, adapted to the extreme wet/dry climate and nutrient poor sandy soils. With the city of Cape Town, Table Mountains provide striking visual images of world famous flat top and steep falls. The geological diversity is enormous with most scenic oceanscapes in the world. At the southernmost point, Cape Agulhas, the two current from the Atlatic and Indian Oceans meets, where the warm-water Agulhas current meets the cold water Benguela current and turns back on itself.
The importance of rural communities and their engagement in promoting sustainable socio-economic developments is gaining an increasing attention. Improving the quality of life in rural regions and integrating them in the ongoing urbanization is imperative for achieving sustainability goals on the global scale. Initiatives similar to “World Bank Helps Communities Adapt to Climate Change Risks” (see the given link) can be taken in other region that suffer high risks for severe impacts from climate and environmental changes.
Hydro-electric power is classified among Renewable Energy Sources where no contributions to man-made global warming. But what how friendly is hydro-electric power? and what are the environmental threats associated with this source of energy?. So far, our accumulated knowledge demonstrates that the environmental threats were under-estimated. The hydropower seems to be viewed more favorably, despite historical concerns over biodiversity loss, long-term environmental impact and the social repercussions of massive community resettlement. Natural erossion at upstream lands that deliver fertile soils to low laying-land downstream has long-term impacts on soil quality with consequences for continuous use of fertilization, e.g. the case of the Nile delta. Inceasing of evaporation at the water-bodies behind dam constructions which is dominant in arid and regions, e.g. Lake Naser on the Nile. Dam building is expected to give rise to changes in local and regional hydrology of groundwater with risks for increasing salination, if this takes place in combination with increased use of groundwater. Also, power plants at upstream countries are usually associated with increasing waste and pollution from the industries, urbanization activities and household. Such emissions in many cases do not follow strict environmental protection recoomendations.
See more at:
http://chinawaterrisk.org/resources/analysis-reviews/hydropower-environmental-disaster-or-climate-saver/
Achieving sustainable socio-economic developments world-over depends on our understanding of the “Water-Energy nexus”, I call it WE-nexus. This is by no means the most important nexus for promoting golbal sustainability with considerable saving of WE-resources in terms of quality and quatity. How to use this nexus to get the magic-mix for best “quality and quantity” savings has no universal solution, it is dependent on how such resources can be managed through different levels of cooperation and shared responsibilty, e.g. on local, national, regional and global levels. Also, through adapting appropriate practices with consideration the geo-climatic conditions.
SHAI OSTER in his article “China: New Dam Builder for the World” says: “African and Asian delegations visiting China are taken each year to see the Three Gorges Dam as a model project even though it has been dogged by problems ranging from spiraling costs and unrest caused by forced relocation of more than a million citizens to rapid land erosion and increased pollution. Criticism of the dam — which is the largest in the world by many measures — has become so persistent that the Chinese government has recently begun to acknowledge the issues. But environmentalists and human-rights activists fret that China will repeat many of the same mistakes it has made with dams at home as it leads a dam revival abroad.”
Follow the story and join the discussion on how to improve achieving sustainable socio-economic developments around the world, in particular in the developing countries with very limited knowledge on environmental and climatic impacts and the how the ongoing manipulations in major transboundary water-bodies may mean for future generations.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119880902773554655.html
