Building a better future

This discussion paper says the antidote解毒劑 to fears about resources is what's known as material efficiency; that's making the things we want, but with less material.

The researchers say we could use half as much cement水泥 in buildings, for instance例子,比方, if we designed and built them with more time and care. We don't do it now because labour's dear and materials are cheap. We could drastically顯著 reduce steel鋼鐵 in cars, if governments deterred阻止 the trend towards bigger, more powerful vehicles.

The researchers say material efficiency is vital重要 for tackling climate change, too. For the UK, for instance, to generate clean energy so materials are produced in current quantities, would need the equivalent of a four-fold increase in nuclear power or a 40-fold increase in wind power. That's barely幾乎 feasible行不通, they say, so resource efficiency is the only way ahead.

The researchers say the trick will be to make sure that good design allows people to continue getting the things they want but simply made from less. For the transition過渡 to happen fully they urge督促 governments to shift taxation稅收 away from people and on to resources. This would be controversial爭論的 but the researchers predict預測 it will create jobs for people to manufacture製造 goods in a more intelligent way.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language/wordsinthenews/2013/01/130128_witn_resource_shortage.shtml