According to a new study, the mass of what is produced by humans, such as buildings, roads, cars, now exceeds biomass. Which gives an idea of the stranglehold of our species on the planet.
For the first time, the mass of everything we make has exceeded that of all life on Earth. This is what researchers show in a study published on December 9 in Nature. To do this, they compared the mass of all dry matter in the living world – from plants and whales to insects – to that of all human production, dominated by concrete.
The first – the mass of living things – was estimated from various scientific studies, including satellite data, carried out between 1900 and 2018. It would amount to 1.1 teratons, or 1,100 billion tonnes. The estimate of the mass of manufactured products, including machines of all kinds, cars, buildings and other infrastructures, is taken from the work of Frindolin Krausman and his colleagues, which cover the period from 1900 to 1915. A comparison of the two has shown how “The evolution over the last 120 years has been spectacular”, highlighted Science.
A mass multiplied by two every twenty years
Over this period, the mass of what man produces has doubled every twenty years, so that the “tipping point” – the moment when the weight of manufactured products exceeds biomass – has just been reached (at more or less than six years). “Buildings and other infrastructure weigh heavier than the trees and shrubs on the planet, if researchers are to be believed. And the mass of plastic is double that of all animals ”, further details the scientific journal. For the authors of the study, “These results corroborate the concept of the Anthropocene”, an era when the human species dominates the planet.
This study “Brings new evidence of our impact on the planet”, notes Josh Tewksbury, director of Future Earth, an interdisciplinary research program focused on sustainable development. Of course, not all of these man-made things are created equal, either in terms of benefit to people or environmental cost.
In Science, Eduardo Brondizio, an environmental anthropologist at Indiana University, who was not involved in the study, points out that in developing countries, where cities lack adequate housing, wastewater treatment plants and other infrastructures, it is the shortage of human materials that creates inequalities and is harmful to the environment. “It’s not that the infrastructure is bad in itself, he said, it’s the way we build them that’s problematic. ”
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