Ludwig, I haven’t failed to answer your “schitzoid” point, just given an answer you don’t agree with.

You say “Aha! So does this mean that you consider 40 million to be an upper reasonable limit for Australia’s population in 30 years’ time”. No. In the past 100 years, Australia’s population growth averaged 1.6%. If we sustain that for the next 30 years, our population will be about 32 million in 30 years time. The fastest prolonged (10 year) growth we ever recorded was in the post war years (1946 to 1956), when population growth averaged 2.4% a year. Growth at that rate would see our population reach 41 million in 30 years time.

I think it extremely unlikely we’ll average population growth of that magnitude for the next 30 years. So 30 to 40 million is not a “reasonable” upper limit, just an extreme upper band of plausible population. As the trend has been for slowing growth, and this is projected to continue, I’d expect the population in 2036 to be less than 30 million. The ABS medium growth “series B” projection of Australia’s population is 26.5 million by 2036, rising to 30 million only in the second half of the century. Even its rapid-growth “Series A” projection would have a population of just under 30 million by 2036.

http://www.ausstats.abs.gov.au/ausstats/subscriber.nsf/0/73D26920772F929ECA25718C001518FB/$File/32220_2004%20to%202101reissue.pdf

Divergence, I didn’t intend that the letter writer should more to a smaller centre, only to point out that his choice of living in Adelaide probably reflects the fact that he enjoys the benefits of living in a large population centre. These benefits increase as population increases – larger population concentrations make better public transport viable, reduce the average cost of infrastructure, attract a deeper and more diverse range of services, and offer wider opportunities.

Talk to the residents on many regional country towns and they’d love a higher population.

“Ludwig, I haven’t failed to answer your “schitzoid” point, just given an answer you don’t agree with.”

Rhian, I don’t think so. Your response does not address the fact that allowing increasing numbers of people while at the same time pushing hard to decrease each person’s consumption is entirely nonsensical.

If we can see that certain resources are under great enough stress to impose strong restrictions on their usage at the personal level, as with water in SEQ, then how on earth can we condone an increasing number of consumers?

SURELY a moratorium (or at least concerted attempts to slow the growth rate) on population growth MUST accompany such a resource crisis……unless of course the authorities are striving to prop up growth at all costs, and are lying to us about any sustainability motives.

Your response is about technology and efficiency and not at all about increasing numbers of consumers. It just doesn't address the 'schizoid' issue. Technology and improved efficiencies are essential parts of sustainability and a healthy future, but not in isolation from population growth.

Fester writes; “Just be thankful that we don't have the wisdom of the Easter Islanders' Gods.”

Well, I think we predominantly do! It seems that the more resource crises come upon us, the more determined we are to appease the great growth god I the sky…..or in the minds of economists and politicians!

continued

Rhian, I appreciate your explanation of growth rates and population projection 30 years hence. But how can we accept a 50 to 100% increase in population, which all else being equal will mean a doubling of pressure on our environment and resource base?

OK so technological advances will no doubt reduce the per-capita effect quite a bit. But they are not likely to go anywhere near reducing the effect by 33 to 50% for all resources and environmental impacts. And even if by some miracle they did, we would only break even with the current situation!

SURELY we should stabilise population, and develop technologies to the point that we can be confident of increased efficiencies to the extent of protecting the viability of vital resources and repairing environmental damage. Then and only then should we increase population, and only if we are totally confident that it can be done without undoing the technological / efficiency gains.

Ludwig,

I’m happy to say no serious policy maker is pushing hard to decrease consumption. That’s your ideological hobbyhorse. The inconsistencies you see are between what YOU think policymakers should be aiming for and what they’re doing, not between what THEY think they should be aiming for and what they’re doing.

Apart from other options (water trading, build more dams, groundwater) SE QLD and any other major coastal population centre can get as much desalinated sea water as it likes for well under $1.50 a kilolitre – more that we pay now, but hardly prohibitive.

For other resources, see previous posts – I do not accept your assumed linear relationship between population and resource use.

"Apart from other options (water trading, build more dams, groundwater) SE QLD and any other major coastal population centre can get as much desalinated sea water as it likes for well under $1.50 a kilolitre – more that we pay now, but hardly prohibitive."

This comment is very misleading, as domestic water usage accounts for less than 10% of total water usage: From the rest is derived Australia's economic activity. Looked at from a virtual water perspective, e.g. "VIRTUAL WATER IN FOOD PRODUCTION AND GLOBAL TRADE
REVIEW OF METHODOLOGICAL ISSUES AND PRELIMINARY RESULTS
Daniel ZIMMER(1) and Daniel RENAULT(2)
World Water Council, (2) FAO-AGLW" one quickly realises that desalinated water produced at 80 cents per kilolitre holds very little economic promise, and in any event is useless for agriculture.

Desalinated water might give people a drink, but it wont give them a livelihood.

http://www.worldwatercouncil.org/fileadmin/wwc/Programs/Virtual_Water/VirtualWater_article_DZDR.pdf

“I’m happy to say no serious policy maker is pushing hard to decrease consumption.”

Rhian I presume you mean that you are happy to acknowledge that no serious policy maker is pushing hard to decrease consumption, and not that you happy that this is happening.

“I do not accept your assumed linear relationship between population and resource use.”

Crikey, I just said in my last post that “technological advances will no doubt reduce the per-capita effect quite a bit.”

It is not a linear relationship!

Alright so you are not going to have a bar of the ‘schizoid’ issue. That is, you are not going to acknowledge that the increasing number of consumers works directly against efforts to decrease consumption and that population stabilisation or at least reduction in growth rate is eminently sensible in the face of resource stress. Well in that case, I think we’ve found the crux of the issue and need not continue this discussion.

Thankyou for a polite and interesting debate