The Green Wave, Part 6 - Hitting the Limits to Growth

In our last post, we said there are two reasons why the green wave — a wave of growing environmental concern — is hitting us now, rather than sooner or later.  The first was the 29th-day principle of exponential growth, which we described last time. 

Today we discuss the second reason:  the combination of population growth, technological growth and economic growth over the past couple of centuries has created a 29th-day situation for many environmental issues.

Among the first to recognize this, with an emphasis on resource depletion, was Club of Rome authors Donella Meadows, Jorgen Randers and Dennis Meadows in their 1972 Limits to Growth.  The specific numbers they plugged into their equations have needed repeated revision — as they themselves expected — but their basic argument still stands.  Their calculations, based on published resource estimates at the time, predicted that we would soon start running out of several key resources.

Here's why it's happening now.  Any aspect of the environment — oil reserves, atmospheric carbon, fish in the sea — exists in a finite quantity.  In some cases (iron deposits, diamonds) the quantity is relatively static, consisting of material that just stays there (until we remove it).  In other cases (river water, forests) the quantity can vary and is maintained by a dynamic balance of input and output.  In either case, if humans alter this aspect of the environment at a rate which accelerates exponentially, it will approach its limit in a curve that follows the pattern of the 29th day.

Over the past 300 years, the combination of industrialism, industrial agriculture and scientific medicine kicked human population growth into exponential overdrive.  Simultaneously, especially over the past century, commercialism, consumerism and advancing technology also drove per capita consumption exponentially.

Of course, everything consumed is made of materials extracted from the environment, and all of its byproducts eventually return to the environment.  So the exponential growth of both population and per capita consumption meant that the total human impact on the environment — impact/person x number of people — grew explosively during the 20th century.

This made it inevitable that in terms of the 29th-day principle, a whole host of environmental issues — from wilderness to resources to pollution — would reach the late 20s of their 30-day count during the 20th century.  It's no accident that the pioneers of environmentalism — Teddy Roosevelt, John Muir, Rachel Carson and so many others, on issue after issue — all sounded the alarm within the last 100 years.

The pioneers, of course, sounded the alarm around day 27, not day 29.  And so they were often ignored.  They were not the green wave, but they initiated it.  And as the century rolled on, and issue after issue hit day 29, it grew to a mighty swell.

So what day is it today?  It varies with the issue — for some it's just day 27, for others it's early 30 — but there's one thing we can be sure of.  The 21st century is crunch time.  As world population continues its mighty heave, while simultaneously capitalist commerce and consumerist culture sweep across the planet, we face an avalanche of 30th-day catastrophes that even today few can conceive.

But at least people are at last waking up.  Finally, in the nick of time, we can count on the green wave to save us.  Or can we?  Read our next post.

Keith Borden, Consultant
Brilliant Green Marketing