Our current approach to development is unsustainable. We are over-exploiting resources, creating pollution, changing habits and driving species to extinction.
Global climate change and emissions of greenhouse gases are a contributory factor. The 2006 Stern Review outlined the costs of inaction in addressing the problem of climate change. It forecast that spending one per cent of global gross domestic product (GDP) now on tackling climate change would help preclude a loss of up to 20% global GDP and avoid almost certain global economic disaster. The report also outlined the human cost of massive social upheaval caused by climate change and the environmental legacy for future generations.
Civil engineering plays a crucial role in creating the infrastructure needed for modern life around the world. Practitioners in the civil engineering sector apply knowledge and experience to create projects that meet human needs and clean up environmental problems. As a result, how the civil enginering sector works has significant impact on progress toward sustainable development.
Civil engineering already contributes - but must contribute much more - to sustainable development along the entire chain of modern production and consumption, including:
- extracting and developing natural resources
- processing and modifying resources
- designing and building infrastructure
- meetings the needs of consumers
- recovering and reusing resources
- producing and distributing energy