[The first complete ‘scientific health check’ shows that most
global systems are now beyond the stable range in which modern
civilization emerged ]
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EARTH ‘WELL OUTSIDE SAFE OPERATING SPACE FOR HUMANITY’,
SCIENTISTS FIND  
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Damian Carrington
September 13, 2023
Guardian
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_ The first complete ‘scientific health check’ shows that most
global systems are now beyond the stable range in which modern
civilization emerged _

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Earth’s life support systems have been so damaged that the planet is
“well outside the safe operating space for humanity”, scientists
have warned.

Their assessment found that six out of nine “planetary boundaries”
had been broken because of human-caused pollution and destruction of
the natural world. The planetary boundaries are the limits of key
global systems – such as climate, water and wildlife diversity –
beyond which their ability to maintain a healthy planet is in danger
of failing.

The broken boundaries mean the systems have been driven far from the
safe and stable state that existed from the end of the last ice age,
about 10,000 years ago, to the start of the industrial revolution. The
whole of modern civilisation arose in this time period, called the
Holocene.

The assessment was the first of all nine planetary boundaries and
represented the “first scientific health check for the entire
planet”, the researchers said. Six boundaries have been passed and
two are judged to be close to being broken: air pollution and ocean
acidification. The one boundary that is not threatened is atmospheric
ozone, after action to phase out destructive chemicals in recent
decades led to the ozone hole shrinking.

The scientists said the “most worrying” finding was that all four
of the biological boundaries, which cover the living world, were at,
or close to, the highest risk level. The living world is particularly
vital to the Earth as it provides resilience by compensating for some
physical changes, for example, trees absorbing carbon dioxide
pollution.

The planetary boundaries are not irreversible tipping points beyond
which sudden and serious deterioration occurs, the scientists said.
Instead, they are points after which the risks of fundamental changes
in the Earth’s physical, biological and chemical life support
systems rise significantly. The planetary boundaries were first
devised in 2009 and updated in 2015, when only seven could be
assessed.

Prof Johan Rockström, the then director of the Stockholm Resilience
Centre who led the team that developed the boundaries framework, said:
“Science and the world at large are really concerned over all the
extreme climate events hitting societies across the planet. But what
worries us, even more, is the rising signs of dwindling planetary
resilience.”

Rockström, who is now joint director of Potsdam Institute for Climate
Impact Research in Germany, said this failing resilience could make
restricting global heating to the 1.5C climate goal impossible and
could bring the world closer to real tipping points. Scientists said
in September that the world was on the brink of multiple disastrous
tipping points
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Prof Katherine Richardson, from the University of Copenhagen who led
the analysis, said: “We know for certain that humanity can thrive
under the conditions that have been here for 10,000 years – we
don’t know that we can thrive under major, dramatic alterations
[and] humans impacts on the Earth system as a whole are increasing as
we speak.”

She said the Earth could be thought of as a patient with very high
blood pressure: “That does not indicate a certain heart attack, but
it does greatly raise the risk.”

The assessment, which was published in the journal Science Advances
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2,000 studies, indicated that several planetary boundaries were passed
long ago. The boundary for biosphere integrity, which includes the
healthy functioning of ecosystems, was broken in the late 19th
century, the researchers said, as destruction of the natural world
decimated wildlife. The same destruction, particularly the razing of
forests, means the boundary for land use was broken last century.

Climate models have suggested the safe boundary for climate change was
surpassed in the late 1980s. For freshwater, a new metric involving
both water in lakes and rivers and in soil, showed this boundary was
crossed in the early 20th century.

Another boundary is the flow of nitrogen and phosphorus in the
environment. These are vital for life but excessive use of fertilisers
mean many waters are heavily polluted by these nutrients, which can
lead to algal blooms and ocean dead zones
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According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization data, three
times the safe level of nitrogen is added to fields every year.

The boundary for synthetic pollution, such as pesticides, plastics and
nuclear waste, was shown to have been passed by a 2022 study
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The Richardson-led analysis assessed air pollution for the first time,
which affects plant growth and monsoon rains. It found air pollution
has passed the planetary boundary in some regions such as south Asia
and China, but not yet globally. Ocean acidification is also assessed
as getting worse and being close to exceeding the safe boundary.

The scientists said: “This update finds that six of the nine
boundaries are transgressed, suggesting that Earth is now well outside
of the safe operating space for humanity.”

Rockstrom said: “If you want to have security, prosperity and equity
for humanity on Earth, you have to come back into the safe space and
we’re not seeing that progress currently in the world.”

Phasing out fossil fuel burning and ending destructive farming are the
key actions required.

The planetary boundaries are set using specific metrics, such as the
level of CO2 in the atmosphere for climate change. The Earth’s
systems are resilient to some level of change, so most of the
boundaries have been set at a level higher than that which persisted
over the last 10,000 years. For example, CO2 was at 280 parts per
million until the industrial revolution but the planetary boundary is
set at 350ppm.

Prof Simon Lewis, at University College London and not part of the
study team, said: “This is a strikingly gloomy update on an already
alarming picture. The planet is entering a new and much less stable
state – it couldn’t be a more stark warning of the need for deep
structural changes to how we treat the environment.”

“The planetary boundaries concept is a heroic attempt to simplify
the world, but it is probably too simplified to be of use in
practically managing Earth,” he continued. “For example, the
damage and suffering from limiting global heating to 1.6C using
pro-development policies and major investments in adapting to climate
change would be vastly less than the damage and suffering from
limiting warming to 1.5C but doing this using policies that help the
wealthy and disregard the poor. But the concept does work as a
science-led parable of our times.”

A related assessment published in May examined planetary boundaries
combined with social justice issues
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found that six of these eight “Earth system boundaries” had been
passed.

The researchers said more data was needed to deepen the understanding
of the current situation, as well as more research on how the passing
of planetary boundaries interact with each other. They said the
Earth’s systems had been pushed into disequilibrium and, as a
result, “ultimate global environmental conditions” remained
uncertain.

A separate initiative to define the end of the Holocene and the start
of a new age dominated by human activities moved forward in July, when
scientists chose a Canadian lake as the site to represent the
beginning of the Anthropocene
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This group settled on a date of 1950, significantly later than the
dates indicated by most of the planetary boundaries.

_Damian Carrington
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environment editor at the Guardian. @dpcarrington
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