Planetary Boundaries (3)

Question 1

What do we mean by planetary response?

Answer 1

We refer to how the planet Earth has responded to the rapid increases from the Great Acceleration.

Question 2

What are the planetary responses? (10)

Answer 2

• CO2 concentration.
• N20 concentration.
• CH4 concentration.
• N. hemisphere surface temp.
• Ozone depletion.
• Tropical rainforest + woodland loss.
• Natural climatic disasters.
• Coastal zone N2 flux.
• Biodiversity loss.
• Great acceleration.

Question 3

What is threshold?

Answer 3

The point where small changes in a social/environmental driver produce large responses in the ecosystem.

Question 4

What is a tipping point?

Answer 4

A threshold where a relatively small change in conditions leads to a strong change in the state of a system.

Question 5

What is resilience?

Answer 5

The capacity of a system to absorb disturbance & reorganize while undergoing change to retain the original state.

Question 6

Eg of threshold?

Answer 6

Climate change.

Question 7

Why did N20 concentration increase?

Answer 7

More fertilizer usage.

Question 8

Why did CH4 concentration increase?

Answer 8

More people, more food, more fertilizer.
&
More cattle + More melting of frozen ground, more release of CH4.

Question 9

Why did ozone depletion increase?

Answer 9

More greenhouse gas emission, more O3 in atmosphere.

Question 10

Why did tropical rainforest & woodland loss increase?

Answer 10

More housing construction, more deforestation.

Question 11

Why did natural climatic disasters increase?

Answer 11

More droughts, more hurricanes.

Question 12

Why did biodiversity loss increase?

Answer 12

More harvesting, more overuse of natural resources.

Question 13

What did we observe in the Great Acceleration dashboard?

Answer 13

We observed increases in socio-economic trends (things we love to see increase) & increases in earth system trends (things we definitely want to avoid due to harmful effect in long run).

Question 14

What does WEF (World Economic Forum) involve?

Answer 14

Involves world leaders meeting up annually in Switzerland to discuss global risks.

Question 15

Top 5 Global risks fall under which category?

Answer 15

Environmental risks.

Question 16

What do we mean when we talk about a resilient Earth system?

Answer 16

We talk about the ability of Earth to bounce back to its original/natural state due to its high diversity & slow changes that have been occurring over time.

Question 17

What do we mean when we talk about a reduced resilience in Earth’s system?

Answer 17

We talk about Earth struggling to bounce back to it’s natural state due to low diversity & rapid changes that have been occurring over time.

Question 18

What do we mean by Planetary Boundaries?

Answer 18

We refer to safe operating spaces for humanity that have thresholds that we should not pass.

Question 19

What are the 9 key variables regarding planetary boundaries?

Answer 19

• Climate change.
• Ozone depletion.
• Atmospheric aerosol loading.
• Ocean acidification.
• Global freshwater use.
• Novel entities.
• Land system change.
• Biosphere integrity.
• Biochemical flows.

Question 20

What does Atmospheric aerosol loading mean?

Answer 20

It involves greenhouse gas emissions & air quality.

Question 21

What does ocean acidification relate to?

Answer 21

CO2 emissions.

Question 22

What does Global freshwater usage lead to?

Answer 22

It may lead to a global shortage of water over time.

Question 23

What are Novel entities?

Answer 23

They involve the use of a combination of chemicals contained in paint, washing powder, etc.

Question 24

What does Land system change involve?

Answer 24

It involves changing land use & land cover which affects water infiltration and albedo.

Question 25

What does Biosphere integrity involve?

Answer 25

It involves genetic & functional diversity to maintain Earth’s resilience.

Question 26

What do Biochemical flows involve?

Answer 26

They involve P loading, which relates to more fertilizer use, more P & N, more water & soil contamination.

Question 27

What are the 2 core planetary Boundaries?

Answer 27

• Climate change.

* Biosphere integrity.

Question 28

Why are the 2 core planetary Boundaries the considered to be most important?

Answer 28

It’s because they are both likely to cause Earth to shift to a new state if their thresholds are exceeded.

Question 29

What could this new state of Earth be characterized by?

Answer 29

• Less hospitable.
• Damage efforts to reduce poverty.
• Deterioration of human well-being.

Question 30

What is the Donup model?

Answer 30

A model that takes into consideration both social foundation & environmental ceiling & emphasizes that the social foundation must be met in order for us to be able to maintain the environments aspect.

Question 31

What 2 factors do we consider regarding resilience?

Answer 31

• Adaptation.

* Transformation.

Question 32

What do we mean by adaptation regarding resilience?

Answer 32

We mean that we will have to adapt to environmental impacts to enable our survival.

Question 33

What do we mean by transformation regarding resilience?

Answer 33

We mean that we will have to change the way we do things completely to enable our survival.

Question 34

Eg of transformation regarding resilience?

Answer 34

COVID-19 pandemic.

- where changes had to be made to how employees & employers clocked into work/working remotely.