‘The Production of Space’, in: Frans Jacobi, Imagine, Space Poetry, Copenhagen, 1996, unpaginated.

The Production of Space

We have developed a new global food emissions database (EDGAR-FOOD) estimating greenhouse gas (GHG; CO2, CH4, N2O, fluorinated gases) emissions for the years 1990–2015, building on the Emissions Database of Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR), complemented with land use/land-use change emissions from the FAOSTAT emissions database. EDGAR-FOOD provides a complete and consistent database in time and space of GHG emissions from the global food system, from production to consumption, including processing, transport and packaging. It responds to the lack of detailed data for many countries by providing sectoral contributions to food-system emissions that are essential for the design of effective mitigation actions. In 2015, food-system emissions amounted to 18 Gt CO2 equivalent per year globally, representing 34% of total GHG emissions. The largest contribution came from agriculture and land use/land-use change activities (71%), with the remaining were from supply chain activities: retail, transport, consumption, fuel production, waste management, industrial processes and packaging. Temporal trends and regional contributions of GHG emissions from the food system are also discussed. Data on GHG emissions from the food system are mostly scattered across sectors and remain unavailable in many countries. EDGAR-FOOD, a globally consistent food emission database, brings together emissions from food-related land use and land-use change, production, processing, distribution, consumption and residues over 1990–2015 at country level.

Food systems are responsible for a third of global anthropogenic GHG emissions

The Spirit Level: why equality is better for everyone, edited by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, London, Penguin, 2010, 368 pp., £7.99, ISBN 9780141032368 I once submitted an article to an Amer...

The Spirit Level: why equality is better for everyone

Digitalization and energy consumption. Does ICT reduce energy demand

Many writers either glorify globalization or vilify it, particularly for its destructive environmental effects. In this book environmental sociologist Arthur Mol provides a more balanced understanding of the relationship between globalization and environmental quality. Mol bases his arguments on his theory of ecological modernization, which holds that although processes of modernization and globalization often result in environmental degradation, they also can encourage policies and programs designed to arrest degradation and improve environmental quality. Building on earlier ecological modernization studies that focused on Europe, North America, and East and Southeast Asia, Mol takes here a more global perspective. He also addresses the increasing roles of nonstate actors, especially international institutions, nongovernmental organizations, popular movements, and transnational corporations. After examining the confusion created by the failure to distinguish among globalization, global capitalism, and neoliberalism, Mol analyzes both globalization's destructive environmental consequences and its contribution to global environmental reform. Elaborating on the subject of reform, he focuses on three case studies, one involving the economic triad of the European Union, the NAFTA region, and Japan; one involving the relationship between the triad and developing countries; and one involving three developing countries: Vietnam, the Netherlands Antilles, and Kenya.

Globalization and Environmental Reform: The Ecological Modernization of the Global Economy

In a case study of a Norwegian heavy-duty truck transport company, we analyzed data generated by the online fleet management system Dynafleet. The objective was to find out what influenced fuel consumption. We used a set of driving indicators as explanatory variables: load weight, trailer type, route, brake horsepower, average speed, automatic gearshift use, cruise-control use, use of more than 90% of maximum torque, a dummy variable for seasonal variation, use of running idle, use of driving in highest gear, brake applications, number of stops and rolling without engine load. We found, via multivariate regression analysis and corresponding mean elasticity analysis, that with driving on narrow mountainous roads, variables associated with infrastructure and vehicle properties have a larger influence than driver-influenced variables do. However, we found that even under these challenging infrastructure conditions, driving behavior matters. Our findings and analysis could help transport companies decide how to use fleet management data to reduce fuel consumption by choosing the right vehicle for each transportation task and identifying environmentally and economically benign ways of driving.

Does driving behavior matter? An analysis of fuel consumption data from heavy-duty trucks

Since the report “Our Common Future” launched sustainable development as a primary goal for society in 1987, both scientific and political discussions about the term’s definition and how to achieve sustainable development have ensued. The manifold negative environmental impacts of transportation are an important contributor to the so-far non-sustainable development in financially rich areas of the world. Thus, achieving sustainable mobility is crucial to achieving the wider challenge of sustainable development. In this article, we limit our sustainability focus to that of energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. We discuss whether rebound effects can reveal why sustainable mobility has not been reached. Rebound effects refer to behavioral or other systemic responses after the implementation of new technologies or other measures to reduce energy consumption. Three main strategies exist for achieving sustainable mobility: efficiency, substitution, and volume reduction. (1) The efficiency strategy is based on the idea that environmental problems caused by transport can be improved by developing new and more efficient technologies to replace old, inefficient, and polluting materials and methods; (2) The second strategy—substitution—argues for a change to less polluting means of transport; (3) The volume reduction strategy argue that efficiency and substitution are not sufficient, we must fundamentally change behavior and consumption patterns; people must travel less, and freight volumes must decrease. We found rebound effects associated with all three of the main strategies that will lead to offsetting expected savings in energy use and GHG emissions in the transport sector.

https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/6/12/9510/pdf

Can Rebound Effects Explain Why Sustainable Mobility Has Not Been Achieved

CO2 emissions from the transport of China's exported goods

The Paris agreement on climate took effect on 4 November 2016. The agreement plans on holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels. This paper compares an ecological modernisation (EM) development path with a degrowth development path, using urban and land-use planning impact on housing and transportation as cases. The two positions (EM and degrowth) agree on the need for a fundamental reduction in climate gases but disagree on which strategies should be pursued. EM transitions do not challenge the values associated with the capitalistic market economy and believe that policies, such as the right-price signals, should nudge producers and consumers in an environmentally benign direction. Conversely, degrowth rejects the EM belief in green growth, and holds that it will not be possible to decouple the economy from environmental loads to the necessary extent if the economy keeps growing. We conclude that we need a fundamental transformational change in society, i.e., a steering away from the growth ideology, and pursue policies that introduce maximum housing standards and limit mobility to succeed with the goals of the Paris agreement.

https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/9/1/20/pdf

Two Contrasting Scenarios for a Zero-Emission Future in a High-Consumption Society

This volume suggests rethinking current climate, energy and sustainability policy-making by presenting new insights into the rebound phenomenon; i.e. driving forces, mechanisms and extent of rebound effects and possible ways to mitigate these effects. It pursues an innovative and novel approach to the political and scientific rebound discourse and, hence, supplements the current state of knowledge discussed in the field of energy economics and recent reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Building on the realm of rebound publications from the past four decades, this volume contributes in three particular ways: Part I offers new aspects in rebound economics by presenting insights into issues that have so far not been satisfactorily researched, such as rebounds in countries of the Global South, rebounds at the producer side, as well as rebounds from sufficiency behaviour (as opposed to rebounds from technical efficiency improvements). Part II goes beyond the conventional economic rebound research and explores multidisciplinary perspectives on the phenomenon, in particular from psychology and sociology. Advancing such multidisciplinary perspectives delivers a more comprehensive understanding of rebound driving forces, mechanisms and policy options. Part III puts rebounds into praxis and presents several policy cases and sector-specific approaches, including labour markets, urban planning, tourism, information and communication technologies, and transport. The volume finally embeds the issue into a larger debate on decoupling, green growth and degrowth, and sketches out lessons learned for sustainable development strategies and policies at large. Employing such widespread and in-depth analysis, this volume makes an essential contribution to the discussion of the overall question: Can resource use, energy use and greenhouse gas emissions be substantially reduced without challenging economic growth?

Hans Jakob Walnum

Papers

Does driving behavior matter? An analysis of fuel consumption data from heavy-duty trucks

Can Rebound Effects Explain Why Sustainable Mobility Has Not Been Achieved

CO2 emissions from the transport of China's exported goods

Two Contrasting Scenarios for a Zero-Emission Future in a High-Consumption Society

Rethinking Climate and Energy Policies