Europe isn't the only place facing a debt crisis this week. Today marks the day the entire planet goes into ecological debt, according to the Global Footprint Network.
Dubbed “Earth Overshoot Day,” Sept. 27 marks the day when humans have used an entire year's worth of the planet's productivity, the Network calculates.
"That's like spending your annual salary three months before the year is over, and eating into savings year after year," Global Footprint Network President Mathis Wackernagel said in an AFP article, "Pretty soon, you run out of savings."
Human's depend on the Earth for everything from food to fuel and clothing, but since the 1970's humans have been using more resources than a single planet provides, the Network says. To keep up our current usage rates we would need between 1.3 to 1.5 Earths.
Since no one has a spare Earth sitting around, we are in ecological debt. And unlike the United States national debt, there is no way to raise the debt ceiling. Once the planet's resources are used up, we have no where else to go.
"From soaring food prices to the crippling effects of climate change, our economies are now confronting the reality of years of spending beyond our means," Wackernagel said.
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Earth Overshoot Day is not a precise measure, but tries to put humanity's impact on the Earth into an observable form. The Global Footprint Network's website notes that Sept. 27 is actually on the later end of the possible date range.
The Earth Overshoot Day concept was originally developed by the New Economics Foundation. The date is calculated by comparing human demand to Earth's supply. Calculations are influenced by Earth's natural productive ability, how much people consume, and how many people there are. The equation can be simplified to:
[world biocapacity / world Ecological Footprint ] x 365 = Earth Overshoot Day
That's a small equation for tremendous set of data. Can scientists really estimate the entire planet's productivity and the whole human species' resource use?
“It is possible to estimate it based on sunlight, rainfall, land area, and plant community,” Jan Weaver, biologist at the University of Missouri told Discovery News.
“It would be similar to how the UN Food & Agriculture Organization estimates crops and forest productivity,” Weaver said.
Other national and international agencies use a similar methodology to estimate energy and food needs, and the approach seems reasonable, she added.
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To keep tabs on all this data the Global Footprint Network uses National Footprint Accounts. According to their website:
National Footprint Accounts measure the ecological resource use and resource capacity of nations over time. Based on approximately 5,000 data points per country per year, the Accounts calculate the Footprints of 241 countries, territories, and regions from 1961 to the present. These accounts provide the core data that is needed for all Ecological Footprint analysis worldwide.
Just as the United States has a monstrous economic debt, they have a massive ecological debt as well. The US has a massive ecological footprint, an AFP story noted that it would take five Earths to meet humanity's needs if everyone used as many resources as the average American.
Europe and Canada have big footprints too. And China, India and other developing countries are catching up quickly. The Network estimates in the Living Planet Report 2010, that by 2030 humans will be using double the Earth's capacity.
IMAGE:
A composite satellite image of the Western Hemisphere. (NASA, Wikimedia Commons)
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