Deseret Morning News Graphic
Posted on 06/28/2007 7:48:22 PM PDT by Utah Girl
An activist group says Utahns are living beyond their means, or beyond its "ecological footprint."
Deseret Morning News Graphic |
The group Utah Vital Signs examined the amount of the world's resources used by residents in a nine-month study. The study, "Utah Vital Signs 2007: The Ecological Footprint of Utah" was released on Wednesday. It is posted on the Internet at utahpop.org/vitalsigns.
Utah Vital Signs, which is a project of the Utah Population and Environment Coalition, released the report Tuesday during a press conference at This Is the Place Heritage Park, where a pioneer village re-creates the early days of Utah settlement when pioneers were self-sufficient.
The ecological footprint involves measuring the state's self-sufficiency. Among factors considered, according to the report, are capacity to grow food, grazing, forest products, fishing, housing and the ability of the land to absorb waste such as carbon dioxide that is converted to oxygen by trees.
"In 2003, the global ecological footprint was 14.1 billion global hectares, or 2.2 global hectares per persons," the report says.
In Utah, said Helen Peters, who helped assemble the report, "we are using 9.9 global hectares per person." This area was described as equal to about 20 football fields without end zones, needed to supply each Utahn's consumption of food, housing, energy, goods and services.
However, the report and presenters said, Utah's land supplies only the amount of goods produced on 8.9 hectares per person. The group calculated that Utah is in "overshoot" by the difference between those amounts.
In other words, the group contends, Utahns use 11 percent more than the state's land can provided on a renewable basis.
"Utah is using more of nature's resources than nature provides," said Peters. "We are drawing down resources that future generations make take advantage of."
"The state has gone into ecological default," said Sandra McIntyre, project director. "We are in an overshoot situation as of 2003."
Figures from 1990 show the state was living within its ecological means, the group said. But by 2003, the population of Utah grew from 1.7 million to 2.4 million. Members pointed to the 40-percent population increase as involved in the change of the state's ecological footprint.
Part of the increase was because Utahns had the highest reproduction rate in the country, the group said.
What wasn't mentioned was how in-migration from other states might affect Utah's ecological footprint, whether that change reduces the other states' footprints or if Utah should get an ecological footprint credit for taking in people from other states.
Also not clearly explained was why it's bad for a desert state to import much of its foodstuffs from places that are more suited to mass agricultural production, such as the Midwest or California.
A group member said it's better to have denser housing, like a close-living community with common green grounds, than a subdivision with large lots. When a reporter asked if New York City, with relatively little common greenery, is better than a Utah subdivision, one of the speakers said that was a complex issue.
What is more obvious to the group is that a change has occurred with Utah's footprint.
"It's important to think about how much we produce," said Wayne Martinson, a member of the UPEC board of directors, "how self-sufficient we are. ...
"I'd like to see major proposals take into account ecological footprint."
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
((Thank you to all the Firemen/women!!!!!!!!))
So called “environmentalists” are just the usual useful idiot leftists using another trumped up so called “issue” as one more bludgeon against America, freedom and Western civilization. It’s just a cover for the usual treasonous BS. It’s war by other means.
There IS a giant left wing conspiracy.
Good. I see future conservative voters.
Yep. The poorer countries in the world have much larger ecological footprints because they don’t have the technological advances or the money that we enjoy. It is about redistribution of wealth and elitism.
Well, Utah also has the highest birthrate in the US per capita. Now there’s a real crime. /sarcasm
Then once we are all poor and in tents - then the "final solution......". These insaniacs are just that - insane! And must be stopped!
Dear Utah Vital Signs: bend over, I’ll show you an ecological footprint.
OH NO - plural.
OH NOs = ONOZ
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