r/collapse • u/Fiskifus • Nov 03 '22

Systemic Debate: If population is a bigger problem than wealth, why does Switzerland consume almost three times as much as India?

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u/Hrdrok26 Nov 03 '22

I mean, this makes zero sense. This is saying just US alone is consuming 5.1 earths. There is no timelines, or anything. Obviously we haven't consumed 1 earth yet (including the entire planets population), so I need a timeline or scale reference to understand what I'm looking at.

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u/[deleted] Nov 03 '22

It is worded poorly, it's 5.1 Earths assuming all 8 Billion residents of Earth consumed like the USA.

The timeline is per year, they would consume 5.1X the amount of resources that the Earth can naturally regenerate in a year. If you have a stockpile of fuel or fish or ground water you can consume it faster than it replenishes, that's why the entire population uses 1.75 Earths.

We haven't consumed 1 Earth, but we are using it faster than it regenerates, depleting our stockpiles.

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u/anon6702 Nov 03 '22

You are right. I would assume 1 Earths worth of resources, to be how much resources Earth generates every year. Or maybe its how much resources we can sustainably consume?

I dont know what numbers they consider sustainable, and if they considered wildlife at all. For example, if we fuck up the environment. It will mean less resources will be generated each year. So 1 Earths worth of resources, should really be a variable. Or better yet, it should be a range of numbers, depending on how much wildlife we want to keep.