Sustainability in Surrey ?

Overview - Surrey vs Las Vegas

Sustainability is a buzzword nowadays for government, though it is difficult to define. (there is a page of quotes from Government policies on sustainability here).

Most definitions of the term are quite vague, such as:-
Meeting the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. As defined by the Brundtland Commission, 1987. (Link)

This (deliberately) does not give a time-scate of how far in the future we need to look - the way we live now may be sustainable for the next 20 years, but it is very hard to imagine it continuing for 100 years. Eventually, we may be forced to live much more frugally.

The figures on the right show that the level of sustainability in Surrey is negligible. Figures are given for Surrey's level of food production, energy production, waste disposal, and manufactures. These are perhaps similar to those for Las Vegas, which I assume to be the least sustainable place on earth. In Surrey's favour, it has a lot of trees and may not be an overall producer of Carbon Dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Las Vegas would essentially be uninhabitable without climate control (air conditioning, etc.) - at least Surrey is inhabitable !

In the definition, sustainability refers to the ability of a region to meet the needs of future generations - Surrey seems to have no ability to do this, unless it is

1. able to maintain its level of wealth (*),
2. remains able to continue buying what it needs from other people,
3. and that there is a working system to deliver the products.

If it fails to do any of these, it will have major problems. Surrey is drawing in the earth's resources of energy and food, emitting wastes, and providing little in return. What does Surrey provide in return ? Please try to explain this to me in the sustainability page of the EcoSurrey forum !

(*) The UK now has about 74,000 milionaires, and it is likely that Surrey has more than 5,000 of them

In Surrey, we have:

• 1.06 million people
• 0.52 cars/person (550,000 total)
• the cars use 350,000 tons petrol
• we use 550,000+ tons of oil for domestic and business (gas, electric, coal, etc.)
  
• our agriculture grows an estimated 1% of the food consumed
• our industries produce an estimated 1% of the products used
• we produce 580,000 tons of household waste a year plus more waste from shops, offices, etc
• about 18% is recycled
• we produce 580,000 tons sewage
• we use 58 million tons water
• we have about 12 million trees

If Surrey were a country, its balance of payments would be disastrous - how does Surrey remain so prosperous, and how does it generate its wealth ?