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1 Donella Meadows, Dennis Meadows, Jorgen Randers and William
Behrens 3rd. Ed. 1972. The Limits of Growth. Universe Books. German: Die Grenzen des Wachstums. DVA: Stuttgart 1972 2 Ugo Bardi, Extracted. How the Quest for Mineral Wealth is Plundering the Planet, Chelsea Green Publishing 2014, ISBN 9781603585415. German: Der geplünderte Planet. Die Zukunft des Menschen im Zeitalter schwindender Ressourcen, Munich 2013, ISBN 9078-3-86581-410-4. 3
International Resource Panel. 2011. Metal Stocks and Recycling Rates. (Lead author: Thomas E. Graedel). Nairobi: UNEP; ISBN 978-92-807-3182-0.
Physicist and biologist Prof. Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker, Co-President of the Club of Rome, is one of the most astute, forward-thinking participants in the debate about sustainability. For years he has said that growth must be decoupled from resource consumption. Here, in a guest comment for RESEARCH AND LIFE, he sketches out some suggestions for improved resource efficiency that will ruffle the feathers of contemporary politicians. The Club of Rome was made famous in 1972 by its study „The Limits of Growth“1. However, the central scenario from this global best-seller was in fact a message of doom and gloom. The earth‘s crust is full of mineral resources, but the richest veins of ore are exhausted fi rst, so that less and less ore is mined from year to year. Even now there is a real scarcity of some chemical elements such as indium, phosphorus and the rare „heavy metals“. Ugo Bardi, a member of the Club of Rome, has shown in a new report 2 that energy consumption and localized impurities per ton of metal have steadily increased over the last decades as a consequence of the undesired but growing ratio of rock to metal. Recovery rates are catastrophically poor, i.e. less than one percent, for almost all high-technology metals, as Thomas Graedel and his team at Yale University discovered as part of the Metals Task Force of the International Resource Panel. 3 This means that the human race allows itself the luxury of throwing about 99 percent of metals found geologically only in highly diluted form into the waste container after only a single use. Both of these scene-setting statements are intended to serve as a basis for the argument that an improvement of resource productivity is devoutly to be wished – and feasible too. Increasing recycling rates is basically a question of product design and the technology
The University of Stuttgart
used to separate out technical waste products. The situation with plastics differs from that of metals. Resource efficiency regarding the former means fi rst using plastics for energy efficiency, i.e. thermal insulation and lighter-weight automobiles and airplanes, and secondly increasing the longevity and reuseability of plastics. It goes without saying that toxicity must also be considered, for example with regard to fi re and recycling. Polystyrene, long hailed as ideal for thermal insulation, is now regarded more critically, among other things due to the toxicity of substances used for incendiary protection. On the other hand, Professor Bouten in his
Diagram from: The Club of Rome
REFLECTIONS
Why „Resource Efficiency“ At All? Technological development and the political arena must work hand-in-hand.
The standard scenario from the global bestseller „The Limits of Growth“. Note above all the green line, showing the steep drop in availability of natural resources.
remarks on page 66 gives examples of the vast complexity and wonderful potential for practical application of polymers and the plastics derived from them. My own political proposal for increasing resource efficiency is somewhat original and goes against the grain of today‘s political machinery. I dare to say that the potential for increased resource productivity is absolutely gigantic. A quintupling