In 2009, a team of prominent environmental scientists published a paper in Nature proposing that there were nine biophysical limits on human civilization beyond which there could be potentially "catastrophic" consequences. Planetary boundaries quickly became a paradigm célèbre. And yet, from the moment it was published, scientists leveled tough criticisms, publicly and privately. Early this month, the Breakthrough Institute published a report based on a thorough review of the literature that found little scientific support for the planetary boundaries hypothesis. By late last week, United Nations negotiators had stripped out all references to planetary boundaries from the Rio+20 text. More...

In the developed world, where most people's basic material needs are met, there is a growing trend among academics and policy makers to determine poverty in relative terms. Poverty is thus defined as relative lack of access to health care, or education, or material comforts, etc. The result is that poverty becomes a subjective indicator -- poverty for some might be luxury for others. If we care about health care or education or various material comforts we should track these outcomes on their own merits. But let's not label these issues "poverty." More...

Long before Malthus, "the population bomb", "population overshoot" and the "planetary boundaries", ancient sages portrayed humanity as confronted with imminent collapse in the face of environmental limits. This remains the core message behind the efforts of many of those concerned with improving environmental decision-making, both locally and globally. The current human situation is certainly riskier than ever. Yet there are multiple reasons why the conventional environmental message will not move us towards a more sustainable approach to Earth stewardship. More...

The International Energy Agency has released a new analysis that helps to demonstrate the systemic failure of policy analyses focused on carbon dioxide emissions reductions. The IEA projects that by 2030 the world will be emitting about 45 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide. Yet, in 2008, just 4 years ago the IEA was projecting 40 Gt CO2 for 2030. Where did the extra projected 5 Gt CO2 for 2030 (just about equal to an extra United States) come from over the past 4 years? More...

The Breakthrough Institute has stirred international debate over the controversial "planetary boundaries" hypothesis, which has been proposed for adoption at this month's United Nations Earth Summit in Brazil. The Economist writes that criticisms of the concept in a new Breakthrough Institute report released this week "have merit" and concluded that planetary boundaries have "numerous drawbacks" as a framework for environmental management. "The Breakthrough Institute, by contrast, argues for ordering things according to a calculation of the needs of human welfare, rather than just aping what has happened in the past," The Economist writes. More...

The planetary boundaries hypothesis - embraced by United Nations bodies and leading nongovernmental organizations like Oxfam and WWF - has serious scientific flaws and is a misleading guide to global environmental management, according to a new report by the Breakthrough Institute. The hypothesis, which will be debated this month at the UN Earth Summit in Brazil, posits that there are nine global biophysical limits to human development. But after an extensive literature review and informal peer review by leading experts, the Breakthrough Institute has found the concept of "planetary boundaries" to be a poor basis for policy and for understanding local and global environmental challenges. More...