Generation Anthropocene: Peak Phosphorus
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
Five things you may not know about phosphorus (but probably should): 1) It’s an essential element to all life on Earth – so it’s a critical ingredient for industrial fertilizers. 2) The vast majority of our phosphorus supply comes from phosphate rock, mined from geologic deposits. 3) Those geologic deposits are concentrated in just 5 countries, and Morocco alone controls 75% of known reserves. 4) The rate at which we’re consuming phosphorus is flat out unsustainable, to say the least. Experts warn that at current rates we may run out of it this century. 5) If all that weren’t enough, many commercial farms over-apply phosphorus-rich fertilizers, which has catastrophic consequences for freshwater and coastal ecosystems around the world. So, wow, right?! Who knew phosphorus was so important? And given that pretty much no one is talking about the issue of peak phosphorus, what are we going to do? Will we be able to better manage the world’s phosphorus supply before we run out and cause widespread environmental damage, all while continuing to feed the billions of people on the planet?
Guest: Dana Cordell. Interviewer: Leslie Chang. Producers: Michael Osborne, Miles Traer, and Leslie Chang.
Description
Type of resource | sound recording-nonmusical |
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Date created | June 21, 2016 |
Creators/Contributors
Contributing author | Cordell, Dana | |
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Contributing author | Chang, Leslie | |
Contributing author | Osborne, Michael | |
Contributing author | Traer, Miles |
Subjects
Subject | Generation Anthropocene |
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Subject | phosphorus |
Subject | essential element |
Subject | Morocco |
Subject | fertilizer |
Subject | peak phosphorus |
Subject | Dana Cordell |
Genre | Sound |
Bibliographic information
Related item | |
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Location | https://purl.stanford.edu/kk148gk6632 |
Access conditions
- Use and reproduction
- User agrees that, where applicable, content will not be used to identify or to otherwise infringe the privacy or confidentiality rights of individuals. Content distributed via the Stanford Digital Repository may be subject to additional license and use restrictions applied by the depositor.
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial No Derivatives 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC-ND).
Preferred citation
- Preferred Citation
- Osborne, Michael, Traer, Miles, Chang, Leslie. (2016). Generation Anthropocene: Peak Phosphorus. Stanford Digital Repository. Available at: http://purl.stanford.edu/kk148gk6632
Collection
Generation Anthropocene
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- Contact
- genanthropocene@gmail.com
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