Accelerating the Transition Towards Living well within ... · Accelerating the Transition Towards Living well within planetary boundaries | World Resources Forum WRF 25.10.2017, Geneva,

Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications DETEC Federal Office for the Environment FOEN

Accelerating the Transition Towards Living well within planetary boundaries

World Resources Forum, 25.10.2017, Geneva Andreas Hauser, Swiss FOEN

Economics section

Drawing by Sara Eisenegger, © FOEN

2 Accelerating the Transition Towards Living well within planetary boundaries| World Resources Forum WRF 25.10.2017, Geneva, Andreas Hauser, Swiss Federal Office for the Environment

Living well within Planetary Boundaries?

Safe Operating Space

• Transgressing the Safe Boundaries is risky for humanity. • Worldwide growth of population and affluence will further increase

human impact on Earth systems.

Drawing by Sara Eisenegger, © FOEN

Do our footprints fit into the 1 Planet we have?


Assessing footprints based on Planetary Boundaries: Results for Switzerland

4.8 109 ! Climate

0.16 0.3 Biodiversity !


Worldwide footprints are not 1-Planet-fit

Assessing footprints based on Planetary Boundaries: Results for the World


Incremental improvements will not do

Own figure, Inspired by Kendall 2016

Current pattern past

peers

peers

1-Planet-fit pattern

Incremental improvements

Systemic change


Incremental vs. Systemic: Example of mobility

Incremental improvements

Systemic change

• Further improve cars’ combustion engine • Cars remain heavy • Adress pressing jam problems by enlarging highways Optimize and thus stabilize the current, material-intensive system

• Make transport infrastructure smarter • Transform mobility to a combined, digitalized

service • Use electricity from renewable sources as fuel Change the rules of the game

What’s your vison of a 1-Planet fit mobility system?

Continuing on the road by looking into the rear view mirror


How to accelerate transition

Translate SDG’s to system of long-

and short-term targets

Policy measures on key leverage points:

e.g. nutrition, mobility, housing

Make sure long-term investments are

1-Planet-fit: infrastructure,

product lines etc.

Co-create visions of 1-Planet-fit

consumption & production patterns

andreas.hauserดbafu.admin.ch http://www.bafu.admin.ch/resource-consumption


Annex

© Marlon Hauser & Andreas Hauser


Switzerland: Efficiency Leader?

EEA (2016) «More from less»

... Yes if you define this is in a territorial perspective

GDP / DMC

Score reflects to a large extent Switzerland’s high share of the third sector


... But not in a footprint (consumption) perspective

Greenhouse gas footprint Land use footprint

Source: Tukker et al. 2014

Material footprint (RMC)

Switzerland: 17 t / capita EU-27: 14 t /capita

Source: FSO (2016)


Policy relevance of consumption footprints in a globalized world

Greenhouse gas footprint


The policy relevance of assessing footprints against Planetary Boundaries

We have time series for a greenhouse gas footprint, a biodiversity footprint, anitrogen footprint… but how much of a footprint would be sustainable?

Biodiversity footprint

How much is safe?


Lessons learnt: transfer / communication

Approach is easy to implement, clear message

Assessment of performance beyond mere numbers

• Takes account of trend (slow / rapidly deteriorating...) • and (data) confidence

Time perspective taken into account: shares over time / population scenarios

Clearly unsafe

Unsafe

Safe Drawing by Sara Eisenegger, © FOEN


Critical footprints, relevant areas

Clearly unsafe

Climate Change

Ocean Acidification

Biodiversity Loss

Nitrogen Losses

Relevant areas of consum-ption

Nutrition Housing Mobility

Housing Mobility (Nutrition)

Nutrition (Housing)

Nutrition (incl. animal feed)

Relevant economic Sectors (tentative)

Construction services, Chemical products, Wholesale and

retail trade, Energy sector

Agriculture and food industry

Agriculture

Cross: information technology, financial services, commodity trading

Relevant product groups

Imported electricity

Animal food, coffee, cocoa, buildings, palm oil, etc.

Animal foods, hotels, restaurants

Attention: «Relevance» is not to be confused with «lagging behind».

Documents

Accelerating the Transition Towards Living well within ... · Accelerating the Transition Towards Living well within planetary boundaries | World Resources Forum WRF 25.10.2017, Geneva,