Search

This paper investigates the determinants of environmental degradation in Australia from 1990 to 2017, using ecological footprint analysis and the well-established logarithmic mean Divisia index (LMDI) decomposition method. Additionally, decoupling factor analysis was performed to examine the link between environment related variables (CO2 emissions and ecological footprint) and their determinants such as real income and population. The decomposition analysis considered the impact of five different factors on CO2 emissions: income effect, population, energy intensity, energy structure, and carbon intensity. For decoupling factor analysis, the link between ecological footprint and its two determinants, real income and population, was examined. Furthermore, the possible decoupling between CO2 emissions and these determinants was also analyzed, because CO2 emissions are the main cause of the country's increasing ecological footprint. The present study has a more comprehensive approach because it analyzes the factors affecting environmental degradation in Australia by assigning two proxies (CO2 emissions and ecological footprint) as dependent variables. The results confirmed that Australia's ecological reserve substantially declined over the past three decades due to deforestation and energy industries. The LMDI results demonstrated that income effect, population, and carbon intensity were the main factors that raised Australia's CO2 emissions, whereas the energy intensity factor substantially curbed them. The reducing impact of energy structure on CO2 emissions was minimal; thus, Australia was not able to prevent an upward trend in CO2 emissions. Lastly, an analysis of Australia's CO2 emissions according to economic activities was conducted for the period between 1990 and 2017 in order to understand other factors that may have affected environmental sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the issue of how students might learn about sustainability in technology––education classrooms and the relevance of problem-solving in that learning. One of the emerging issues in technology education research is the nature of problem-solving specified in curriculum documents and the kinds of learning activities undertaken by students in technology education classrooms. In parallel with our developing understanding of the characteristics of good technology education programs is the inclusion in recent curriculum documents of the concept of sustainability or sustainable development. However, as yet there is little information about how technology students think about sustainability and how they might best learn about it. This is of particular interest because in technology education, sustainability is often described in curriculum documents as an issue that is intended to be integrated within design projects and activities, rather than being the topic of a classroom lesson as might happen in a subject such as environmental studies. This paper explores current understanding of the issue generally and within technology education. It concludes that the design, problem-solving approach that is common to technology education classrooms provides many affordances to students engaging meaningfully with ideas of sustainability and of developing strong understandings of its scope and significance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While people support long term sustainability and intergenerational equity in water allocation in Australia it is hard to get agreement on how that should be achieved especially when water is taken away from some users and either given to others or to the environment. Governments hope that this difficulty will be alleviated by uncertainties being dealt with by improved science and evidence based decision making. This paper suggests that while it is true that acceptance of plans relies on judgments of certainty in issues of sustainability, uncertainty can come from social, institutional and economic as well as from ecological and biophysical uncertainty. It is likely that the human based uncertainties significantly exceed those of science, certainly in terms of developing water reform. This is particularly the case when intergenerational issues are at stake. Human tendencies to discount the future and moral obligations to those not close to their interests are universal. Thus even when considering future generations self motivated judgments of what is fair are likely. Nevertheless, some delegation to others (including the government) can be achieved when the ongoing procedural justice of decision making allows groups to activate trust and fairness based heuristics. These heuristics create a diminution of uncertainty in relation to complex issues such as water allocation. How uncertainty could be managed through collaborative planning is discussed. Without attention to these basic human uncertainties the conflict observed in relation to Australian water plans is likely to continue with likely negative outcomes to all concerned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]