above: fossile fuels
below: renewable energy sources
absolute distribution of different energy sources grouped by renewability
change from ~15% renewables in 2005 to ~70% in 2050
plan, dated 2012 (all numbers onwards are projections)
plan also shows no more nuclear power from 2025 and plans to rid of coal completely until 2050
the main renewable energy carrier is supposed to be wind power, then photovoltaics and biomass
biocapacity: the availability of natural resources etc.
footprint: amount of natural resources etc. consumed, multiples of what is actually available ⇒ ideally, footprint is 1 or less (we cannot sustain using more than 100% of the resources available to us)
graph shows ratio of footprint of different countries
world total is 1.7 (70% more resources are used than there are available)
some countries have much larger footprints (Japan 7, South Korea almost 9 ⇒ might be due to very small amount of natural resources available in that area vs. a big population)
same for Italy, UK, China and Switzerland ⇒ less amount natural resources than the population needs, around 4x to 5x
Spain, Germany, U.S.A., France ⇒ high population and much resource use to being industrial countries, but also lots of natural resources so only 2x-3x
India ⇒ very high population, but not that much industrialization
The bar chart titled ”Ecological overshoot”, published in 2017 by the Global Footprint Network National Footprint Account shows the absolute ratio of the ecological footprint of a country relative to their own biocapacity and compared to the world average.
The source seems reliable, and the data is recent enough to still be applicable. However, the selection of countries seems odd, so it is probable that the graph only shows a selected amount of data points.
The countries shown on the chart can be grouped into three major groups. At the very top of the South Korea and Japan lead with values of 8.8 and 7.1 respectively. In the middle, Italy, the UK, China and Switzerland have footprints ranging from 3.9 to 4.3. At the bottom, Spain, Germany and the U.S. have values spanning from 2.3 to 2.5. Below them are France and the World average both with a value of 1.7.
Repeating what is touched on in the introduction, the values represent the ecological footprint of a country relative to their biocapacity. The biocapacity describes the amount of natural resources a country may use within a year sustainably, meaning all resources used over this limit cannot be regenerated within the year, if at all.
The respective data points of the countries can be explained using three major factors: the country’s degree of industrialization, the country’s population and the amount of natural resources available to them. In the case of the first group, the high values can be explained by a highly industrialized, large population living in a comparatively small space with little natural resources. This also applies to the second and third groups, which have higher and higher natural resources and partially lower population whilst still being highly industrialized. The outlier here is India, which is less industrialized but still has a higher value compared to the world average due to its immense population.
In summary, we can see that humans use more natural resources than sustainably possible, depleting our planet’s resources irreversibly over time. However, since the graph shows values relative to a country’s own resource usage, we cannot say that small nations are “resource hogs” simply because they have a higher footprint. On the contrary, it can be seen that western industrialized nations use copious amounts of resources, since countries like the U.S. have enormous amounts of natural resources but still use almost 150% more resources than they can sustain.