Ecological footprint
noun
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 A measure of how much biologically productive land and water area an individual, population or activity requires to produce all the resources it consumes and to absorb the waste it generates using prevailing technology and resource management practices.
"Cities are graphically represented as a human foot to make a straightforward connection between the ecological footprint metaphor and the impact of urban life on local and distant environments."
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"Cities are graphically represented as a human foot to make a straightforward connection between the ecological footprint metaphor and the impact of urban life on local and distant environments."
Etymology
First used by William E. Rees in 1992 and further refined by Mathis Wackernagel in his PhD thesis.