Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Samenvatting Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Les 1. Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Les 2.1 SDGs and Cultural Heritage
Les 2.2 Natural World Heritage Sites and sustainability
Les 3.1 SDGs and Climate Action
Les 3.2 Climate Change and Urban Heat Islands
Les 4. Climate Change Risks for Heritage
Les 5. Mitigation and Adaptation
Les 6. Embodied and operational carbon
1
, Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Les 1. Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Content
• What is sustainability
• Relation between sustainability and the UNESCO Agenda 2030 = SDG’s
o What does this relation mean for heritage
• Climate and climate change
o Policy and Instruments
o Climate Emergency
o Climate change risk assessments for cultural heritage
o Climate Action
o Climate change and built heritage (cases)
• Guest lectures
o Dr. Blen Gemenda (27.02)
o Dr. Steven Caluwaerts (05.03)
Sustainable development
Brundtland Report (1987)
How does sustainability relate to the future?
The term has been used for quite some time:
first definition in the Brundtland Report 1987
‘sustainable development is any development that meets the needs of the present
without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’
We meet the standards of today,
and making sure that future generations can meet their needs as well
Not about doing less, but about doing things in a way that they can be kept for future generations
- Brundtland Report 1987 was a tipping point in mainstreaming ‘sustainable development’
- After this it became an item on the political agenda
- At that moment it had an indirect focus on ‘people, planet, profit’ aspects
o People as in the social structures
o Planet as in the general environment
o Profit as in economic development
The text had a long description of sustainable development
It came down to some key problems poverty & unsustainable production/consumption
(none about climate!)
Their ambitions: equity (everybody had the same chances, same needs)
through change (political change, changing the social system, top-down changes)
either by developing technology and through different social (and institutional) organizations
2
, Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
This tipping point, the Brundtland Report 1987,
brought a definition of what was already happening:
mankind has always pursued sustainability, either on purpose or not.
But the focus of how we look at sustainability has evolved:
Pre-industrial: environmental conservation
middle ages:
people live in close association with their environment, to ensure they have long-term survival
Triple Farming System (example of environmental sustainability from the past)
3 farm grounds: every year you use the same grounds for a different purpose
(summer crops, winter crops, 1 year no farming to let soil repair)
you have to be in balance with your environment if you want to survive
example of unsustainable practice from the past:
Dune swallowed Abbey
• Dunes migrate with wind
• Dune vegetation keeps dune stable
• They chopped down the vegetation to use for their needs
• But this was not sustainable: created issues for the future
• The dune swallowed the abbey
Unsustainable issues also happen without industrial technology.
3
, Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Early Industrial: environmental and resource conservation
1. Resource availability
2. Environmental quality (air pollution, water contamination)
Evolution from purely environmental to resource conservation made people think “the power
of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man”
Industrial revolution: more production: food
because we have food, people have more children (times are good)
but because we have more people, we fall in scarcity again
leads to more consummation and more production paradox
Post WWII: Economic development
New tipping point:
Sustainability is shifting towards economic development
After WWII a lot of efforts are done to restore local economies, but also globalize economies
‘how do we leverage the economy of less developed countries?’
Shift from sustainable development from environmental, to resources, to economic development.
And then we get to the big critical thinking:
Club of Rome: Limits to growth (1972)
In the 60’s: a lot of concern about social structures, environment
RISE OF MODERN ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT
Next big tipping point:
a publication by the Club of Rome (association of academics & critical thinkers)
manuscript called ‘Limits to growth’ 1972
In this they create a counter-discourse arguing that the
modern growth-based economy was unsustainable on a finite planet
Modern way of growing is unsustainable because the earth is finite: limits on the resources we use
Club of Rome predict tipping point 2000-2050
They argue that we have to change our ways: behavioural change
A lot of people are still convinced of this model and think behavioural change is important
But not everyone is convinced: they think technology will find a solution
Truthfully, it is somewhere in the middle
4
Samenvatting Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Les 1. Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Les 2.1 SDGs and Cultural Heritage
Les 2.2 Natural World Heritage Sites and sustainability
Les 3.1 SDGs and Climate Action
Les 3.2 Climate Change and Urban Heat Islands
Les 4. Climate Change Risks for Heritage
Les 5. Mitigation and Adaptation
Les 6. Embodied and operational carbon
1
, Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Les 1. Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Content
• What is sustainability
• Relation between sustainability and the UNESCO Agenda 2030 = SDG’s
o What does this relation mean for heritage
• Climate and climate change
o Policy and Instruments
o Climate Emergency
o Climate change risk assessments for cultural heritage
o Climate Action
o Climate change and built heritage (cases)
• Guest lectures
o Dr. Blen Gemenda (27.02)
o Dr. Steven Caluwaerts (05.03)
Sustainable development
Brundtland Report (1987)
How does sustainability relate to the future?
The term has been used for quite some time:
first definition in the Brundtland Report 1987
‘sustainable development is any development that meets the needs of the present
without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’
We meet the standards of today,
and making sure that future generations can meet their needs as well
Not about doing less, but about doing things in a way that they can be kept for future generations
- Brundtland Report 1987 was a tipping point in mainstreaming ‘sustainable development’
- After this it became an item on the political agenda
- At that moment it had an indirect focus on ‘people, planet, profit’ aspects
o People as in the social structures
o Planet as in the general environment
o Profit as in economic development
The text had a long description of sustainable development
It came down to some key problems poverty & unsustainable production/consumption
(none about climate!)
Their ambitions: equity (everybody had the same chances, same needs)
through change (political change, changing the social system, top-down changes)
either by developing technology and through different social (and institutional) organizations
2
, Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
This tipping point, the Brundtland Report 1987,
brought a definition of what was already happening:
mankind has always pursued sustainability, either on purpose or not.
But the focus of how we look at sustainability has evolved:
Pre-industrial: environmental conservation
middle ages:
people live in close association with their environment, to ensure they have long-term survival
Triple Farming System (example of environmental sustainability from the past)
3 farm grounds: every year you use the same grounds for a different purpose
(summer crops, winter crops, 1 year no farming to let soil repair)
you have to be in balance with your environment if you want to survive
example of unsustainable practice from the past:
Dune swallowed Abbey
• Dunes migrate with wind
• Dune vegetation keeps dune stable
• They chopped down the vegetation to use for their needs
• But this was not sustainable: created issues for the future
• The dune swallowed the abbey
Unsustainable issues also happen without industrial technology.
3
, Heritage: Climate and Sustainability
Early Industrial: environmental and resource conservation
1. Resource availability
2. Environmental quality (air pollution, water contamination)
Evolution from purely environmental to resource conservation made people think “the power
of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man”
Industrial revolution: more production: food
because we have food, people have more children (times are good)
but because we have more people, we fall in scarcity again
leads to more consummation and more production paradox
Post WWII: Economic development
New tipping point:
Sustainability is shifting towards economic development
After WWII a lot of efforts are done to restore local economies, but also globalize economies
‘how do we leverage the economy of less developed countries?’
Shift from sustainable development from environmental, to resources, to economic development.
And then we get to the big critical thinking:
Club of Rome: Limits to growth (1972)
In the 60’s: a lot of concern about social structures, environment
RISE OF MODERN ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT
Next big tipping point:
a publication by the Club of Rome (association of academics & critical thinkers)
manuscript called ‘Limits to growth’ 1972
In this they create a counter-discourse arguing that the
modern growth-based economy was unsustainable on a finite planet
Modern way of growing is unsustainable because the earth is finite: limits on the resources we use
Club of Rome predict tipping point 2000-2050
They argue that we have to change our ways: behavioural change
A lot of people are still convinced of this model and think behavioural change is important
But not everyone is convinced: they think technology will find a solution
Truthfully, it is somewhere in the middle
4
