#1 One Million Bicycles

Amsterdam. Source

There are 1 million bicycles in Amsterdam, and 820,000 people.

It is true, we do like our bicycles. On average we each bike around 1000km a year. There are 10 synonyms in the Dutch language that mean ‘bike’. We’ve all taken and passed our bike exam.

And yet, this fact has always seemed odd to me. Why are there more bikes than people? You only really need one.

Indeed, all this is a metaphor: a metaphor for the excess, for overconsumption, the unsustainable flow of energy and material things. Currently humanity uses 1.6 Earths to satisfy our demands and absorb our wastes. This is problematic, seeing that we only have one.

So why have I chosen to use such a human invention to name an environmental blog? Why is it valuable to study overconsumption, such a social phenomenon, when we're considering the natural? While this will become apparent over the course of the blog, perhaps it’s valuable to introduce the answer by turning to Steffen et al.'s work on The Great Acceleration.

The Great Acceleration, simply put, refers to a period of time (post-1950s) in which several key trends of both the socioeconomic and biophysical spheres ‘greatly accelerated’. These key indicators are summarized as per the 24 diagrams below.

Source: Steffen et al., 2015 

On the left, what is immediately evident is the overall increase in economic activity. Real GDP has strongly increased in the 60 years displayed. This is both enabled by and enabling the growth of other indicators. On the right the Earth System trends exhibit similar acceleration; the three major GHGs – carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane - have all increased in atmospheric concentration. The link between primary energy use, atmospheric concentration of CO2 and surface temperature increase is now overwhelmingly clear – except for Scott Pruitt, of course.

Now, you may argue; yes these parameters are increasing, but what does human activity have to do with the changing structure of the Earth system? As it turns out - a lot, have a look at some of the evidence. Or, you may assert; are these changes necessarily so different than past states? I'd suggest reading up on the planetary boundary perspective, which maintains that there are critical boundaries that should not be crossed if we wish to sustain a safe operating space for humanity.

I look forward to discovering where this journey will take me!