Principles of Environmental Sciences (ESA-20806)
Wageningen University, Sharelle Verheij, October 2017
Book 8th Editoo
Natural Sciences
Main principles of environmental sciences (Cpt. 1&2)
- Environmental problems
- Environmental quality
- Sustainability
- DPSIR
Environment = Circumstances or conditons that surround an organism or group of organisms
= Social or cultural conditons that afect an individual or community
Environmental problems
= Human induced changes/’natural’ fuctuatons in the state of the environment
(quality) leading to negatve ecological and socio-economic consequences.
= A known process within the (state of) environment which has adverse efects on
the sustainability of the environmental quality necessary for the wellbeing of the
organisms living in it.
Environmental quality
= What the state could/should be in order to assess and value the actual state of the
environment, with the use of a norm / standard / adoptng a reference.
= The diference between actual state and reference state
Standard = State of the environment by which the functon is fully/suuciently satsaed.
Sustainability = Search for ecological stability and human progress that can last over the long term.
Sustainable development = Meetog the oeeds of the preseot withoutt compromisiog the abilito
of futtutre geoeratoos to meet their owo oeeds.
Solviog sutstaioabilito problems:
1. Environmental change issues
1. Past, present and future trends
2. Understanding systems: oceans, urban deltas, biogeochemical cycles
3. Knowing role of sectors & issues: health, food, water, biodiversity
2. Environmental change assessments & 3. System dynamics and sustainability
1. Deaning / quantfying / atributng change
2. Monitoring systems and indicators 4. Science-policy assessments & informing policies
3. Appraising vulnerabilites and risks 5. Assessing trade-ofs, synergies and uncertaintes
4. Sustainability governance and transformaton
1. Societal change over tme 4. Public-private partnerships
2. Pro-poor approaches to sustainability 5. Wealth (natural + human + physical assets)
3. Internatonal collaboraton 6. Green economy
5. Sustainable challenges
1. Planetary boundaries 5. Compromises in the food-water-energy nexus
2. Solutons 6. Improving distributonal justce
3. Vulnerabilites 7. Environmental security
4. Adaptaton versus mitgaton
6. Sustainability science
1. Tools, methods and theories 4. Co-design and co-producton
2. Analytcal frameworks to assess sustainability 5. Capacity building
3. Interdiciplinarity and transdisciplinarity 6. Science communicaton & outreach
, DPSIR provides a framework for ao iotegrated aoalosis
D Driving force Social or economic developments that lead to a pressure (cause of problem)
P Pressure Societal interventon that leads to a change in the state
S State /change State of atmosphere, biosphere, lithosphere or aquasphere (environ. quality)
I Impact Societal (ecological) efect of a change in the state
R Response Societal response that feeds back on the D, P, S or I.
DPSIR for Environmental Problem Chain
D Social developments: populaton/economic growth, technology development, urbanizaton
Societal actvites: agriculture, industry, transport, energy supply
P emission, depleton, damage
S water, air and soil quality; quality biosphere
I health, economy, values
R e.g. for traosport bo cars: iotrodutciog ‘greeo taxes’ to redutce car utse
Biodiversity loss (Cpt. 3&5)
- DPSIR for biodiversity loss
- Biodiversity components
- Quantfying (changes in) quality and quantty of biodiversity at spatal scales
- Interacton between diferent environmental problems
- Functons and values of biodiversity
- Citzen science and communicaton in biodiversity research
Biodiversity = the variety of living things, 3 kinds:
1. Genetc diversity variety of versions of the same genes within individual species
2. Species diversity nr. of diferent kinds of organisms within a community or ecosystem
3. Ecological diversity richness and complexity of a biological community
Problem: Lack of informaton on the state (Nr. of species? Populaton size?)
Habitat =
Place or set of environmental
conditons in which a partcular
organism lives
Ecological niche =
The role played by a species in a
biological community
&
The total set of environmental factors
that determine a species distributon
Biome =
Broad types of biological communites
with characteristc types of
environments that occur in diferent
conditons (temperature,
precipitaton)