Prof. dr. Louise E.M. Vet, Director Netherlands Institute of Ecology, wants to strive for a circular economy. She’s sick and tired of the crisis. ,,That’s just really a symptom of something much larger. We’re in a system crisis, we’re using the earth in a wrong way.” Every world citizen needs 1.8 hectare of the earth. Yet in Holland people are using 4.4 hectare, and in the USA it’s twice as much: 9.6 hectare.
,My ecologist heart bleeds because we’re destroying our ecosystems. These ecosystems give us services that we don’t even know until we lose them.” We already need 1.3 planet, Vet said. And this is just the beginning, since other countries want our consumption pattern as well and will also need more than 1.8 hectare. In short: the earth doesn’t have enough resources for the way we live now.
,,Energy is not the problem, just a political choice”, said Vet. ,,We have the wrong economy, a linear one.” We make stuff, use it, and then throw it away. We have to stop with that. ,,Fossil fuel is finished, who cares?”, asked Vet. We can better worry about colton, which we use for mobile phones. That’s almost done and there is a war going on about that in Congo. Or copper. 39 years and it will be done. Copper theft from railways will become normal.
Another resource that should be on the political agenda is phosphorus. It’s in your DNA, in your bones, it’s needed for any form of life. We waste it. World wide we’re disturbing the phosphorus circle and we only have for 80 years left before it’s done. As soon as that happens, we can’t have any artificial fertilizers anymore, which will be disastrous for the food production.
So we face a rather big challenge. ,,We have to make it a fun challenge though. We can learn lessons from ecology”, Vet said:
- There’s no waste in nature. Why don’t we copy that? We would have a circular economy. Make the products come back. Like technical recycle.
- Energy comes from the sun. There’s enough energy from the sun. It’s a choice to use it. Uranium is a limited recourse, so why are we using that? Focus on biodiesel instead. We could use microalgae, since it doesn’t have any other purpose (If you use corn, food prices will rise). Or try photosynthesis. Innovate in those areas.
- Adaption through diversity. Use local resources: think global, but act local. One size doesn’t fit all in the world.
An example of what happens when you learn from ecology is the NIOO building in Wageningen. The people there are using the sun for energy and recycle their own waste. ,,We invite everybody to come poo in our building”, Vet said. ,,So that they we can get the minerals from the feces.”
Vet: ,,It’s time for a Green New Deal. We have to focus on solutions. It’s a new challenge for man kind. After the discovery of fire, of agriculture, and after the industrial revolution, we now have to look for the new pot of gold. It’s not at the end of the rainbow, it’s in you.”
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