Analysis of Complex Systems

A. Trends & Patterns:

• The majority of items (over use of resources, wasted energy, food availability, processing/ packaging, recycling, and composting) lead back to "food intake".
• A vast majority of items (non renewable sources: coal, natural gas, petroleum, propane)lead back to "Green House Gases".

B. Time Delays:

• Recycling- The substances which are being recycled will not be tranformed into their recycled state imidiatly, it takes time and energy to complete the process.
• Population- When you add to the gene pool with your offspring they do not immeditly become power crazed energy wasters, they start out young and innocent.
• Transportation- Currently we are using non renewable resources that will cause us in future times to be rushed into using renewable resources as our only option.

C. Feedback Loops:

• Food intake- The more food we eat, the more packeging is needed which then leads into more waste that needs to be recycled. The processing of the food leads to wasted energy.
• Population- More population leads to more food intake, leading to more waste, more packeging, more wasted energy.

D. Leverage Points:

• Life Expectancy- If people were to die sooner in life they would use less energy, processing, polution, food intake, packeging, and other unfor seen circustances.
• Energy Efficiency- Energy efficiency goes down wasted energy goes up.