Experts want to determine the city's ecological footprint to show how sustainable – or otherwise – current consumption and production patterns are within the Welsh capital.
An ecological footprint is a measure of the demand of human population on nature. It provides a valuable tool for planners to link economic growth and environmental protection.
The footprint calculates how much land area an average citizen requires for everything they consume (products, resources) and produce (waste, emissions, pollution) per year. It is expressed in global hectares (gha) of 'earthshare'.
Studies have shown that our real 'earthshare' – how much resource there is to go around - is 2.18 gha per person on the planet, but national footprints show that western lifestyles are unsustainable. A citizen of the USA has a footprint of 9.6 gha. For Wales, the figure is 5.25 gha, but in India it is just 1 gha.
Dr. Alan Netherwood has been seconded from his post as Sustainable Development Co-ordinator at Cardiff Council to work on the project as a Visiting Research Fellow in the BRASS Centre (for Business, Relationships, Accountability, Sustainability and Society) at Cardiff University.
"This is going to be a very important piece of work for the city," said Dr Netherwood. "The information we gather will help the council's transport planners, waste managers and economic development team. It will also help the council's work on air quality, climate change, housing, food and procurement, providing valuable data to plan for more sustainable futures."
"The Welsh footprint was measured in 2000 through an initiative by World Wildlife Fund Cymru and the Welsh Assembly," said Dr. Netherwood. "However, it relied heavily on proxy data from the rest of the UK, and our work – along with a sister project in Gwynedd Council–will help other Welsh local authorities to use the footprinting tool in the future."
This more sophisticated study has been made possible by a £300,000 BiffaAward grant to a partnership of organisations including the Assembly, WWF Cymru, Welsh Development Agency, Countryside Commission for Wales, and the Environment Agency. Stockholm Environment Institute based in York, will undertake a materials flow analysis of resources coming in and out of the city, and this will provide a current state of play of natural resource use in the city.
Cardiff University will then work with the Council to develop a series of sustainable scenarios to reduce the city's footprint, covering transport, energy, waste, resource use and education. The work will be completed by late 2004.
Some other UK cities have already measured their ecological footprints. London's figure was 6.63 gha per resident and York's 6.91 gha per resident. Among the findings, those studies found that 28% of London's water is wasted through leakage, and in York, 22% of food is wasted and goes to landfill.
"We are not going to start guessing at what Cardiff's figure might be," said Dr Netherwood. "The important thing is that it gives us a vital tool to plan for the future."