Low-carbon economy

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-carbon_economy 

Environmental economics
Concepts
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Policies
Environmental pricing reform Environmental tariff Free public transport Pigovian tax
Dynamics
Green paradox Green politics Marginal abatement cost Pollution haven hypothesis
Climate change
Climate change mitigation Carbon footprint Green New Deal Food miles
Carbon pricing
Carbon price Carbon tax Carbon emission trading Carbon credit Carbon fee and dividend Carbon finance Carbon offset Climate finance Ecotax Emissions trading Personal carbon trading Social cost of carbon
Energy transition
Sustainable energy 2000-watt society Carbon leakage Carbon neutrality Carbon-neutral fuel Feed-in tariff Low-carbon economy Net metering Renewable energy commercialization

Wind Turbine with Workers - Boryspil - Ukraine

A low-carbon economy (LCE) or decarbonised economy is an economy based on energy sources that produce low levels of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. GHG emissions due to anthropogenic (human) activity are the dominant cause of observed climate change since the mid-20th century. Continued emission of greenhouse gases may cause long-lasting changes around the world, increasing the likelihood of severe, pervasive, and irreversible effects for people and ecosystems.

Shifting to a low-carbon economy on a global scale could bring substantial benefits both for developed and developing countries. Many countries around the world are designing and implementing low-emission development strategies (LEDS). These strategies seek to achieve social, economic, and environmental development goals while reducing long-term greenhouse gas emissions and increasing resilience to the effects of climate change.

Globally implemented low-carbon economies are therefore proposed as a precursor to the more advanced, zero-carbon economy. The GeGaLo index of geopolitical gains and losses assesses how the geopolitical position of 156 countries may change if the world fully transitions to renewable energy resources. Former fossil fuel exporters are expected to lose power, while the positions of former fossil fuel importers and countries rich in renewable energy resources is expected to strengthen.

Rationale and aims

Nations may seek to become low-carbon or decarbonised economies as a part of a national climate change mitigation strategy. A comprehensive strategy to mitigate climate change is through carbon neutrality.

The aim of an LCE is to integrate all aspects of itself from its manufacturing, agriculture, transportation, and power generation, etc. around technologies that produce energy and materials with little GHG emission, and, thus, around populations, buildings, machines, and devices that use those energies and materials efficiently, and, dispose of or recycle its wastes so as to have a minimal output of GHGs. Furthermore, it has been proposed that to make the transition to an LCE economically viable we would have to attribute a cost (per unit output) to GHGs through means such as emissions trading and/or a carbon tax.

Some nations are presently low carbon: societies that are not heavily industrialized or populated. In order to avoid climate change on a global level, all nations considered carbon-intensive societies and societies that are heavily populated might have to become zero-carbon societies and economies. EU emission trading system allows companies to buy international carbon credits, thus the companies can channel clean technologies to promote other countries to adopt low-carbon developments.

Benefits

Low-carbon economies present multiple benefits to ecosystem resilience, trade, employment, health, energy security, and industrial competitiveness.

Ecosystem resilience

A view of southern Central Park in New York, NY.

Low emission development strategies for the land use sector can prioritize the protection of carbon-rich ecosystems to not only reduce emissions, but also to protect biodiversity and safeguard local livelihoods to reduce rural poverty - all of which can lead to more climate resilient systems, according to a report by the Low Emission Development Strategies Global Partnership (LEDS GP). REDD+ and blue carbon initiatives are among the measures available to conserve, sustainably manage, and restore these carbon rich ecosystems, which are crucial for natural carbon storage and sequestration, and for building climate resilient communities.

Economic benefits

Job creation

Transitioning to a low-carbon, environmentally and socially sustainable economies can become a strong driver of job creation, job upgrading, social justice, and poverty eradication if properly managed with the full engagement of governments, workers, and employers’ organizations.

Estimates from the International Labour Organization’s Global Economic Linkages model suggest that unmitigated climate change, with associated negative impacts on enterprises and workers, will have negative effects on output in many industries, with drops in output of 2.4% by 2030 and 7.2% by 2050.

Transitioning to a low-carbon economy will cause shifts in the volume, composition, and quality of employment across sectors and will affect the level and distribution of income. Research indicates that eight sectors employing around 1.5 billion workers, approximately half the global workforce, will undergo major changes: agriculture, forestry, fishing, energy, resource intensive manufacturing, recycling, buildings, and transport.

Business competitiveness

Low emission industrial development and resource efficiency can offer many opportunities to increase the competitiveness of economies and companies. According to the Low Emission Development Strategies Global Partnership (LEDS GP), there is often a clear business case for switching to lower emission technologies, with payback periods ranging largely from 0.5–5 years, leveraging financial investment.

Improved trade policy

Trade and trade policies can contribute to low-carbon economies by enabling more efficient use of resources and international exchange of climate-friendly goods and services. Removing tariffs and nontariff barriers to trade in clean energy and energy efficiency technologies are one such measure. In a sector where finished products consist of many components that cross borders numerous times - a typical wind turbine, for example, contains up to 8,000 components - even small tariff cuts would reduce costs. This would make the technologies more affordable and competitive in the global market, particularly when combined with a phasing out of fossil fuel subsidies.

Energy policy

Renewable energy and energy efficiency

See also: Renewable energy commercialization

 

Worldwide installed wind power capacity 1997–2020 [MW], history and predictions. Data source: WWEA

 

Solar array at Nellis Solar Power Plant. These panels track the sun in one axis.

Recent advances in technology and policy will allow renewable energy and energy efficiency to play major roles in displacing fossil fuels, meeting global energy demand while reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Renewable energy technologies are being rapidly commercialized and, in conjunction with efficiency gains, can achieve far greater emissions reductions than either could independently.

Renewable energy is energy that comes from natural resources such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides, and geothermal heat, which are renewable (naturally replenished). In 2015, about 19% of global final energy consumption came from renewables. During the five years from the end of 2004 through 2009, worldwide renewable energy capacity grew at rates of 10–60 percent annually for many technologies. For wind power and many other renewable technologies, growth accelerated in 2009 relative to the previous four years. More wind power capacity was added during 2009 than any other renewable technology. However, grid-connected photovoltaics increased the fastest of all renewables technologies, with a 60 percent annual average growth rate for the five-year period.

Energy for power, heat, cooling, and mobility is the key ingredient for development and growth, with energy security a prerequisite economic growth, making it arguably the most important driver for energy policy. Scaling up renewable energy as part of a low emission development strategy can diversify a country's energy mixes and reduces dependence on imports. In the process of decarbonizing heat and transport through electrification, potential changes to electricity peak demand need to be anticipated whilst switching to alternative technologies such as heat pumps for electric vehicles.

Installing local renewable capacities can also lower geopolitical risks and exposure to fuel price volatility, and improve the balance of trade for importing countries (noting that only a handful of countries export oil and gas). Renewable energy offers lower financial and economic risk for businesses through a more stable and predictable cost base for energy supply.

Energy efficiency gains in recent decades have been significant, but there is still much more that can be achieved. With a concerted effort and strong policies in place, future energy efficiency improvements are likely to be very large. Heat is one of many forms of "energy wastage" that could be captured to significantly increase useful energy without burning more fossil fuels.

Sustainable biofuels

Main article: Sustainable biofuel

Biofuels, in the form of liquid fuels derived from plant materials, are entering the market, driven by factors such as oil price spikes and the need for increased energy security. However, many of the biofuels that are currently being supplied have been criticised for their adverse impacts on the natural environment, food security, and land use.

The challenge is to support biofuel development, including the development of new cellulosic technologies, with responsible policies and economic instruments to help ensure that biofuel commercialization is sustainable. Responsible commercialization of biofuels represents an opportunity to enhance sustainable economic prospects in Africa, Latin America and Asia.

Biofuels have a limited ability to replace fossil fuels and should not be regarded as a ‘silver bullet’ to deal with transport emissions. However, they offer the prospect of increased market competition and oil price moderation. A healthy supply of alternative energy sources will help to combat gasoline price spikes and reduce dependency on fossil fuels, especially in the transport sector. Using transportation fuels more efficiently is also an integral part of a sustainable transport strategy.

Nuclear power

Nuclear power has been offered as the primary means to achieve a LCE. In terms of large industrialized nations, mainland France, due primarily to 75% of its electricity being produced by nuclear power, has the lowest carbon dioxide production per unit of GDP in the world and it is the largest exporter of electricity in the world, earning it approximately €3 billion annually in sales.

Concern is often expressed with the matter of spent nuclear fuel storage and security; although the physical issues are not large, the political difficulties are significant. The liquid fluoride thorium reactor (LFTR) has been suggested as a solution to the concerns posed by conventional nuclear.

France reprocesses their spent nuclear fuel at the La Hague site since 1976 and has also treated spent nuclear fuel from France, Japan, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands.

Some researchers have determined that achieving substantial decarbonization and combating climate change would be much more difficult without increasing nuclear power. Nuclear power is a reliable form of energy that is available 24/7, relatively safe, and can be expanded on a large scale. Nuclear power plants can replace fossil fuel-based power plants — shifting to a low carbon economy.

As of 2021, the expansion of nuclear energy as a method of achieving a low-carbon economy has varying degrees of support. Agencies and organizations that believe decarbonization is not possible without some nuclear power expansion include the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, the International Energy Agency (IEA), the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the Energy Impact Center (EIC). Both IEA and EIC believe that widespread decarbonization must occur by 2040 in order mitigate the adverse effects of climate change and that nuclear power must play a role. The latter organization suggests that net-negative carbon emissions are possible using nuclear power to fuel carbon capture technology.

Smart grid

One proposal from Karlsruhe University developed as a virtual power station is the use of solar and wind energy for base load with hydro and biogas for make up or peak load. Hydro and biogas are used as grid energy storage. This requires the development of a smart intelligent grid hopefully including local power networks than use energy near the site of production, thereby reducing the existing 5% grid loss.

Decarbonisation technologies

There are five technologies commonly identified in decarbonisation:

1. Electrifying heat as furnaces are powered by electricity rather than burning fuels. Green energy must still be used.
2. The use of hydrogen as a furnace steam, a chemical feedstock, or a reactant in chemical processes.
3. The use of biomass as a source of energy or feedstock. In other words, replacing coal with bio coal or gas with bio-gas. One example is charcoal, which is made by converting wood into coal and has a CO₂ footprint of zero.
4. Carbon capture and storage. This is where greenhouse gases are isolated from other natural gases, compressed, and injected into the earth to avoid being emitted into the atmosphere.
5. Carbon capture and usage. The aim of this method is to turn industrial gases into something valuable, such as ethanol or raw materials for the chemical industry.

Decarbonisation plans that get to zero CO₂ emissions

A comprehensive decarbonisation plan describes how to generate enough green energy to replace coal, oil, and natural gas; and takes into consideration factors such as increasing GDP, increasing standard of living, and increasing efficiencies. Each year the world consumes 583 exajoules (EJ) of heat energy. This corresponds to 56,000 TWh of electricity when heat is converted to electricity via a 35% efficient turbine. To decarbonise, the world needs to generate this energy without emitting CO₂. To get a sense of how large this is, one can look at how many Hoover Dams, London Arrays and nuclear reactors corresponds to this amount of energy:

• 22,600 London Arrays, a wind farm with 175 large windmills
• 13,500 Hoover Dams, a large hydroelectric dam in Nevada (based on average production between 1999 and 2008)
• 21-times more than the world's current installed base of 400 GWe of nuclear power

Below are example global decarbonization plans:

• Chapter 11 of How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, by Bill Gates
• Power Electronics' Plan To Get to Zero CO₂ Emissions
• A Global Decarbonization Plan, by the Manhattan 2 Project

Below are example plans that decarbonize the United States:

• The Net-Zero America Project, by Princeton University
• Getting To Zero, by the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions
• America's Zero Carbon Action Plan, by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network
• "Energy Decarb" scenario within DOE's 2021 Solar Futures Study.

Tools that create decarbonization plans are in various stages of development:

• C-Roads Climate Policy Simulator
• Power Electronics' Develop Your Own Decarbonization Plan

Carbon-neutral hydrocarbons

Main article: Carbon-neutral fuel

Carbon capture and storage

Global proposed vs. implemented annual CO₂ sequestration. More than 75% of proposed gas processing projects have been implemented, with corresponding figures for other industrial projects and power plant projects being about 60% and 10%, respectively.

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) or carbon capture and sequestration is the process of capturing carbon dioxide (CO₂) before it enters the atmosphere, transporting it, and storing it (carbon sequestration) for centuries or millennia. Usually the CO₂ is captured from large point sources, such as coal-fired power plant, a chemical plant or biomass power plant, and then stored in an underground geological formation. The aim is to prevent the release of CO₂ from heavy industry with the intent of mitigating the effects of climate change. Although CO₂ has been injected into geological formations for several decades for various purposes, including enhanced oil recovery, the long-term storage of CO₂ is a relatively new concept. Carbon capture and utilization (CCU) and CCS are sometimes discussed collectively as carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration (CCUS). This is because CCS is a relatively expensive process yielding a product with an intrinsic low value (i.e. CO₂). Hence, carbon capture makes economically more sense when being combined with a utilization process where the cheap CO₂ can be used to produce high-value chemicals to offset the high costs of capture operations.

CO₂ can be captured directly from an industrial source, such as a cement kiln, using a variety of technologies; including absorption, adsorption, chemical looping, membrane gas separation or gas hydration. As of 2020, about one thousandth of global CO₂ emissions are captured by CCS. Most projects are industrial.

Storage of the CO₂ is envisaged either in deep geological formations, or in the form of mineral carbonates. Pyrogenic carbon capture and storage (PyCCS) is also being researched. Geological formations are currently considered the most promising sequestration sites. The US National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) reported that North America has enough storage capacity for more than 900 years worth of CO₂ at current production rates. A general problem is that long-term predictions about submarine or underground storage security are very difficult and uncertain, and there is still the risk that some CO₂ might leak into the atmosphere. Opponents point out that many CCS projects have failed to deliver on promised emissions reductions. Additionally, opponents argue that rather than focusing on carbon removal, carbon capture and storage is a justification for indefinite fossil fuel usage disguised as marginal emission reductions. One of the most well-known failures is the FutureGen program, partnerships between the US federal government and coal energy production companies which were intended to demonstrate ″clean coal″, but never succeeded in producing any carbon-free electricity from coal.

Combined heat and power

Combined Heat and Power (CHP) is a technology which by allowing the more efficient use of fuel will at least reduce carbon emissions; should the fuel be biomass or biogas or hydrogen used as an energy store then in principle it can be a zero carbon option. CHP can also be used with a nuclear reactor as the energy source; there are examples of such installations in the far North of the Russian Federation.

Decarbonisation activity by sector

Primary sector

Agriculture

See also: Low carbon diet

Most of the agricultural facilities in the developed world are mechanized due to rural electrification. Rural electrification has produced significant productivity gains, but it also uses a lot of energy. For this and other reasons (such as transport costs) in a low-carbon society, rural areas would need available supplies of renewably produced electricity.

Irrigation can be one of the main components of an agricultural facility's energy consumption. In parts of California, it can be up to 90%. In the low carbon economy, irrigation equipment will be maintained and continuously updated and farms will use less irrigation water.

Livestock operations can also use a lot of energy depending on how they are run. Feedlots use animal feed made from corn, soybeans, and other crops. Energy must be expended to produce these crops, process, and transport them. Free-range animals find their own vegetation to feed on. The farmer may expend energy to take care of that vegetation, but not nearly as much as the farmer growing cereal and oil-seed crops.

Many livestock operations currently use a lot of energy to water their livestock. In the low-carbon economy, such operations will use more water conservation methods such as rainwater collection, water cisterns, etc., and they will also pump/distribute that water with on-site renewable energy sources (most likely wind and solar).

Due to rural electrification, most agricultural facilities in the developed world use a lot of electricity. In a low-carbon economy, farms will be run and equipped to allow for greater energy efficiency. Changes in the dairy industry include heat recovery, solar hearing, and use of biodigesters:

Replacing livestock with plant-based alternatives is another way of reducing our carbon emissions. The carbon footprint of livestock is large - it provides just 18% of total calories but takes up 83% of farmland.

Forestry

Main article: Wood economy

Protecting forests provides integrated benefits to all, ranging from increased food production, safeguarded local livelihoods, protected biodiversity and ecosystems provided by forests, and reduced rural poverty. Adopting low emission strategies for both agricultural and forest production also mitigates some of the effects of climate change.

In the low-carbon economy, forestry operations will be focused on low-impact practices and regrowth. Forest managers will make sure that they do not disturb soil-based carbon reserves too much. Specialized tree farms will be the main source of material for many products. Quick maturing tree varieties will be grown on short rotations in order to maximize output.

Mining

Flaring and venting of natural gas in oil wells is a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions. Its contribution to greenhouse gases has declined by three-quarters in absolute terms since a peak in the 1970s of approximately 110 million metric tons/year, and in 2004 accounted for about 1/2 of one percent of all anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions.

The World Bank estimates that 134 billion cubic meters of natural gas are flared or vented annually (2010 datum), an amount equivalent to the combined annual gas consumption of Germany and France or enough to supply the entire world with gas for 16 days. This flaring is highly concentrated: 10 countries account for 70% of emissions, and twenty for 85%.

Secondary sector

A factory in Sweden releases pollution into the air.

Basic metals processing

• high efficiency electric motors
• induction furnaces
• heat recovery

Nonmetallic product processing

• variable speed drives
• injection molding - replace hydraulic with electric servo motors

Wood processing

• high efficiency motors
• high efficiency fans
• dehumidifier driers

Paper and pulp making

• variable speed drives
• high efficiency motors

Food processing

• high efficiency boilers
• heat recovery e.g. refrigeration
• solar hot water for pre-heating
• bio fuels e.g. tallow, wood

Tertiary sector

Building and Construction

In 2018, building construction and operations accounted for 39% of global greenhouse gas emissions. The construction industry has seen marked advances in building performance and energy efficiency over recent decades, but there continues to be a large need for additional improvement in order to decarbonize this sector. International and government organizations have taken actions to promote the decarbonization of buildings, including the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) signed in 1992, the Kyoto Protocol signed in 1997, and many countries' Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) of the Paris Climate Agreement which was signed in 2016.

The largest contributor to building sector emissions (49% of total) is the production of electricity for use in buildings. To decarbonize the building sector, the production of electrical energy will need to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels such as coal and natural gas, and instead shift to carbon-free alternatives like solar, wind, and nuclear. Currently many countries are heavily dependent on fossil fuels for electricity generation. In 2018, 61% of US electricity generation was produced by fossil fuel power plants (23% by coal and 38% by natural gas).

Of global building sector GHG emissions, 28% are produced during the manufacturing process of building materials such as steel, cement (a key component of concrete), and glass. The conventional process inherently related to the production of steel and cement results in large amounts of CO₂ emitted. For example, the production of steel in 2018 was responsible for 7 to 9% of the global CO₂ emissions. However, these industries lend themselves very well for carbon capture and storage and carbon capture and utilization technology as the CO₂ is available in large concentration in an exhaust gas, which is considered a so-called point source. GHG emissions which are produced during the mining, processing, manufacturing, transportation and installation of building materials are referred to as the embodied carbon of a material. The embodied carbon of a construction project can be reduced by using low-carbon materials for building structures and finishes, reducing demolition, and reusing buildings and construction materials whenever possible.

The remaining 23% of global building sector GHG emissions are produced directly on site during building operations. These emissions are produced by fossil fuels such as natural gas which are burned on site to generate hot water, provide space heating, and supply cooking appliances. These pieces of equipment will need to be replaced by carbon-free alternatives such as heat pumps and induction cooktops to decarbonize the building sector.

Retail

Retail operations in the low-carbon economy will have several new features. One will be high-efficiency lighting such as compact fluorescent, halogen, and eventually LED light sources. Many retail stores will also feature roof-top solar panel arrays. These make sense because solar panels produce the most energy during the daytime and during the summer. These are the same times that electricity is the most expensive and also the same times that stores use the most electricity.

Transportation

Elements of Low-Carbon Urban Development

Sustainable, low-carbon transport systems are based on minimizing travel and shifting to more environmentally (as well as socially and economically) sustainable mobility, improving transport technologies, fuels and institutions. Decarbonisation of mobility by means of:

• More energy efficiency and alternative propulsion:
  • Increased focus on fuel efficient vehicle shapes and configurations, with more vehicle electrification, particularly through battery electric vehicles (BEV) or all-electric vehicles
  • More alternative and flex-fuel vehicles (based on local conditions and availability)
  • Driver training for more fuel efficiency.
  • Low-carbon biofuels cellulosic (biodiesel, bioethanol, biobutanol)
  • Petroleum fuel surcharges will be a more significant part of consumer costs.
• Less international movement of physical objects, despite more overall trade (as measure by value of goods)
• Greater use of marine and electric rail transport, less use of air and truck transport.
• Increased non-motorised transport (i.e. walking and cycling) and public transport usage, less reliance on private motor vehicles.
• More pipeline capacity for common fluid commodities such as water, ethanol, butanol, natural gas, petroleum, and hydrogen (in addition to gasoline and diesel).

Sustainable transport has many co-benefits that can accelerate local sustainable development. According to a series of reports by the Low Emission Development Strategies Global Partnership (LEDS GP), low carbon transport can help create jobs, improve commuter safety through investment in bicycle lanes and pedestrian pathways, make access to employment and social opportunities more affordable and efficient. It also offers a practical opportunity to save people's time and household income as well as government budgets, making investment in sustainable transport a 'win-win' opportunity.

Health services

There have been some moves to investigate the ways and extent to which health systems contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and how they may need to change to become part of a low-carbon world. The Sustainable Development Unit of the NHS in the UK is one of the first official bodies to have been set up in this area, whilst organisations such as the Campaign for Greener Healthcare are also producing influential changes at a clinical level. This work includes

• Quantification of where the health services emissions stem from.
• Information on the environmental impacts of alternative models of treatment and service provision

Some of the suggested changes needed are:

• Greater efficiency and lower ecological impact of energy, buildings, and procurement choices (e.g., in-patient meals, pharmaceuticals, and medical equipment).
• A shift from focusing solely on cure to prevention, through the promotion of healthier, lower-carbon lifestyles, e.g. diets lower in red meat and dairy products, walking or cycling wherever possible, better town planning to encourage more outdoor lifestyles.
• Improving public transport and liftsharing options for transport to and from hospitals and clinics.

Tourism

Low-carbon tourism includes travels with low energy consumption, and low CO₂ and pollution emissions. Change of personal behavior to more low-carbon oriented activities is mostly influenced by both individual awareness and attitudes, as well as external social aspect, such as culture and environment. Studies indicate that educational level and occupation influence an individual perception of low-carbon tourism.

Actions taken by countries

A good overview of the history of international efforts towards a low-carbon economy, from its initial seed at the inaugural UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm in 1972, has been given by David Runnals. On the international scene, the most prominent early step in the direction of a low-carbon economy was the signing of the Kyoto Protocol, which came into force in 2005, under which most industrialized countries committed to reduce their carbon emissions. Europe is the leading geopolitical continent in defining and mobilising decarbonisation policies. For instance, the UITP - an organisation advocating sustainable mobility and public transport - has an EU office, but less well developed contacts with, for example, the US. The European Union Committee of the UITP wants to promote decarbonisation of urban mobility in Europe. However, the 2014 Global Green Economy Index™ (GGEI) ranks 60 nations on their green economic performance, finding that the Nordic countries and Switzerland have the best combined performance around climate change and green economy.

China

Main article: Renewable energy in China

In China, the city of Dongtan is to be built to produce zero net greenhouse gas emissions.

The Chinese State Council announced in 2009 it aimed to cut China's carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP by 40%-45% in 2020 from 2005 levels. However carbon dioxide emissions were still increasing by 10% a year by 2013 and China was emitting more carbon dioxide than the next two biggest countries combined (U.S.A. and India). Total carbon dioxide emissions were projected to increase until 2030.

Costa Rica

Costa Rica sources much of its energy needs from renewables and is undertaking reforestation projects. In 2007, the Costa Rican government announced the commitment for Costa Rica to become the first carbon neutral country by 2021.

Iceland

Main article: Renewable energy in Iceland

Iceland began utilising renewable energy early in the 20th century and so since has been a low-carbon economy. However, since dramatic economic growth, Iceland's emissions have increased significantly per capita. As of 2009, Iceland energy is sourced from mostly geothermal energy and hydropower, renewable energy in Iceland and, since 1999, has provided over 70% of the nation's primary energy and 99.9% of Iceland's electricity. As a result of this, Iceland's carbon emissions per capita are 62% lower than those of the United States despite using more primary energy per capita, due to the fact that it is renewable and low-cost. Iceland seeks carbon neutrality and expects to use 100% renewable energy by 2050 by generating hydrogen fuel from renewable energy sources.

Peru

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) estimates that economic losses related to climate change for Peru could reach over 15% of national gross domestic product (GDP) by 2100. Being a large country with a long coastline, snow-capped mountains and sizeable forests, Peru's varying ecosystems are extremely vulnerable to climate change. Several mountain glaciers have already begun to retreat, leading to water scarcity in some areas. In the period between 1990 and 2015, Peru experienced a 99% increase in per capita carbon emissions from fossil fuel and cement production, marking one of the largest increases amongst South American countries.

Peru brought in a National Strategy on Climate Change in 2003. It is a detailed accounting of 11 strategic focuses that prioritize scientific research, mitigation of climate change effects on the poor, and creating Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) mitigation and adaptation policies.

In 2010, the Peruvian Ministry of Environment published a Plan of Action for Adaptation and Mitigation of Climate Change. The Plan categorises existing and future programmes into seven action groups, including: reporting mechanisms on GHG emissions, mitigation, adaptation, research and development of technology of systems, financing and management, and public education. It also contains detailed budget information and analysis relating to climate change.

In 2014, Peru hosted the Twentieth Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC COP20) negotiations. At the same time, Peru enacted a new climate law which provides for the creation of a national greenhouse gas inventory system called INFOCARBONO. According to the Low Emission Development Strategies Global Partnership (LEDS GP), INFOCARBONO is a major transformation of the country's greenhouse gas management system. Previously, the system was under the sole control of the Peruvian Ministry of the Environment. The new framework makes each relevant ministry responsible for their own share of greenhouse gas management.

United Kingdom

Main article: Greenhouse gas emissions by the United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, the Climate Change Act 2008 outlining a framework for the transition to a low-carbon economy became law on November 26, 2008. It was the world's first long-term legislation to reduce carbon emissions. This act requires an 80% cut in the UK's carbon emissions by 2050 (compared to 1990 levels), with an intermediate target of between 26% and 32% by 2020. Thus, the UK became the first country to set such a long-range and significant carbon reduction target into law.

A meeting at the Royal Society on 17–18 November 2008 concluded that an integrated approach, making best use of all available technologies, is required to move toward a low-carbon future. It was suggested by participants that it would be possible to move to a low-carbon economy within a few decades, but that 'urgent and sustained action is needed on several fronts'.

In June 2012, the UK coalition government announced the introduction of mandatory carbon reporting, requiring around 1,100 of the UK's largest listed companies to report their greenhouse gas emissions every year. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg confirmed that emission reporting rules would come into effect from April 2013 in his piece for The Guardian.

In July 2014, the UK Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) came into force. This requires all large businesses in the UK to undertake mandatory assessments looking at energy use and energy efficiency opportunities at least once every four years.

The low carbon economy has been described as a "UK success story", accounting for more than £120 billion in annual sales and employing almost 1 million people. A 2013 report suggests that over a third of the UK's economic growth in 2011/12 was likely to have come from green business. This data is complementary to the strong correlation between GDP per capita and national rates of energy consumption.

Western culture

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_culture 

Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man. Based on the correlations of ideal human proportions with geometry described by the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius in Book III of his treatise De architectura.

 

Plato, along with his student Aristotle and teacher Socrates, helped to establish Western philosophy.

Western culture, also known as Western civilization, Occidental culture, or Western society, is the heritage of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, belief systems, political systems, artifacts and technologies of the Western world. The term also applies beyond Europe to countries and cultures whose histories are strongly connected to Europe by immigration, colonization, or influence. For example, Western culture includes countries in the Americas and Oceania. Western culture is most strongly influenced by Greek philosophy, Roman law, and Christian culture.

Ancient Greece is considered the birthplace of many elements of Western culture, including the development of a democratic system of government and major advances in philosophy, science and mathematics. The expansion of Greek culture into the Hellenistic world of the eastern Mediterranean led to a synthesis between Greek and Near-Eastern cultures, and major advances in literature, engineering, and science, and provided the culture for the expansion of early Christianity and the Greek New Testament. This period overlapped with and was followed by Rome, which made key contributions in law, government, engineering and political organization.

Western culture is characterized by a host of artistic, philosophic, literary and legal themes and traditions. Christianity, primarily the Roman Catholic Church, and later Protestantism has played a prominent role in the shaping of Western civilization since at least the 4th century, as did Judaism. A cornerstone of Western thought, beginning in ancient Greece and continuing through the Middle Ages and Renaissance, is the idea of rationalism in various spheres of life developed by Hellenistic philosophy, scholasticism and humanism. Empiricism later gave rise to the scientific method, the scientific revolution, and the Age of Enlightenment.

Western culture continued to develop with the Christianisation of European society during the Middle Ages, the reforms triggered by the Renaissance of the 12th century and 13th century under the influence of the Islamic world via Al-Andalus and Sicily (including the transfer of technology from the East, and Latin translations of Arabic texts on science and philosophy), and the Italian Renaissance as Greek scholars fleeing the fall of the Byzantine Empire after the Muslim conquest of Constantinople brought classical traditions and philosophy. Medieval Christianity is credited with creating the modern university, the modern hospital system, scientific economics, and natural law (which would later influence the creation of international law). Christianity played a role in ending practices common among pagan societies, such as human sacrifice, slavery, infanticide and polygamy. The globalization by successive European colonial empires spread European ways of life and European educational methods around the world between the 16th and 20th centuries. European culture developed with a complex range of philosophy, medieval scholasticism, mysticism and Christian and secular humanism. Rational thinking developed through a long age of change and formation, with the experiments of the Enlightenment and breakthroughs in the sciences. Tendencies that have come to define modern Western societies include the concept of political pluralism, individualism, prominent subcultures or countercultures (such as New Age movements) and increasing cultural syncretism resulting from globalization and human migration.

Terminology

Further information: Western world

 

Post-1990 Huntington's major civilizations (Western is colored dark blue).

The West as a geographical area is unclear and undefined. More often the ideology of a state's inhabitants is what will be used to categorize it as a Western society. There is some disagreement about what nations should or should not be included in the category and at what times. Many parts of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire are considered to be distinct from the west and eastern by most scholars, since the Byzantine empire was primarily influenced by eastern practices due to its proximity and cultural similarity to Iran and Arabia, thus lacking features seen as "Western". The traditions of scholarship around Plato, Aristotle, and Euclid had been forgotten in the West and were rediscovered by Italians during the Renaissance from scholars fleeing the collapse of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire. Thus, the culture identified with East and West itself interchanges with time and place (from the ancient world to the modern). Geographically, the "West" of today would include Europe (especially the states that collectively form the European Union, the United Kingdom, Norway, and Switzerland) together with extra-European territories belonging to the English-speaking world, the Hispanidad, the Lusosphere; and the Francophonie in the wider context. Since the context is highly biased and context-dependent, there is no agreed definition of what the "West" is.

It is difficult to determine which individuals fit into which category and the East–West contrast is sometimes criticized as relativistic and arbitrary. Globalism has spread Western ideas so widely that almost all modern cultures are, to some extent, influenced by aspects of Western culture. Stereotypical views of "the West" have been labeled Occidentalism, paralleling Orientalism—the term for the 19th-century stereotyped views of "the East".

It has been disputed by some philosophers whether Western culture can be considered a historically sound, unified body of thought. For example, Kwame Anthony Appiah points out that many of the fundamental influences on Western culture, such as those of Greek philosophy are also shared by the Islamic world to a certain extent. Appiah argues that the origin of the Western and European identity can be traced back to the Muslim invasion of Iberia where Christians would form a common Christian or European identity. Contemporary Latin chronicles from Spain described the victors in the Frankish victory over the Umayyads at the Battle of Tours as Europeans according to Appiah, denoting a shared sense of identity.

As Europeans discovered the wider world, old concepts adapted. The area that had formerly been considered the Orient ("the East") became the Near East as the interests of the European powers interfered with Meiji Japan and Qing China for the first time in the 19th century. Thus the Sino-Japanese War in 1894–1895 occurred in the Far East while the troubles surrounding the decline of the Ottoman Empire simultaneously occurred in the Near East. The term Middle East in the mid-19th century included the territory east of the Ottoman Empire, but West of China—Greater Persia and Greater India—is now used synonymously with "Near East" in most languages.

History

Further information: History of Western civilization

 

History of Western philosophy
The School of Athens fresco by Raphael
Western philosophy
By era Ancient Medieval Renaissance Modern early modern late modern Contemporary
By century 16th 17th 18th 19th 20th 21st
See also
Religious philosophy Buddhist Christian Hindu Islamic Jain Jewish Sikh
Eastern philosophy Chinese Indian Iranian Japanese Korean
Western culture Western world

The earliest civilizations which influenced the development of Western culture were those of Mesopotamia; the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran: the cradle of civilization. Ancient Egypt similarly had a strong influence on Western culture.

The Greeks contrasted themselves with both their Eastern neighbours (such as the Trojans in Iliad) as well as their Western neighbours (who they considered barbarians). Concepts of what is the West arose out of legacies of the Western Roman Empire and the Eastern Roman Empire. Later, ideas of the West were formed by the concepts of Latin Christendom and the Holy Roman Empire. What is thought of as Western thought today originates primarily from Greco-Roman and Germanic influences, and includes the ideals of the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and the Enlightenment, as well as Christian culture.

Classical West

Alexander the Great

While the concept of a "West" did not exist until the emergence of the Roman Republic, the roots of the concept can be traced back to Ancient Greece. Since Homeric literature (the Trojan Wars), through the accounts of the Persian Wars of Greeks against Persians by Herodotus, and right up until the time of Alexander the Great, there was a paradigm of a contrast between Greeks and other civilizations. Greeks felt they were the most civilized and saw themselves (in the formulation of Aristotle) as something between the advanced civilizations of the Near East (who they viewed as soft and slavish) and the wild barbarians of most of Europe to the west. During this period writers like Herodotus and Xenophon would highlight the importance of freedom in the Ancient Greek world, as opposed to the perceived slavery of the so-called barbaric world.

Alexander's conquests led to the emergence of a Hellenistic civilization, representing a synthesis of Greek and Near-Eastern cultures in the Eastern Mediterranean region. The Near-Eastern civilizations of Ancient Egypt and the Levant, which came under Greek rule, became part of the Hellenistic world. The most important Hellenistic centre of learning was Ptolemaic Egypt, which attracted Greek, Egyptian, Jewish, Persian, Phoenician and even Indian scholars. Hellenistic science, philosophy, architecture, literature and art later provided a foundation embraced and built upon by the Roman Empire as it swept up Europe and the Mediterranean world, including the Hellenistic world in its conquests in the 1st century BCE.

Following the Roman conquest of the Hellenistic world, the concept of a "West" arose, as there was a cultural divide between the Greek East and Latin West. The Latin-speaking Western Roman Empire consisted of Western Europe and Northwest Africa, while the Greek-speaking Eastern Roman Empire (later the Byzantine Empire) consisted of the Balkans, Asia Minor, Egypt and Levant. The "Greek" East was generally wealthier and more advanced than the "Latin" West. With the exception of Italia, the wealthiest provinces of the Roman Empire were in the East, particularly Roman Egypt which was the wealthiest Roman province outside of Italia. Nevertheless, the Celts in the West created some significant literature in the ancient world whenever they were given the opportunity (an example being the poet Caecilius Statius), and they developed a large amount of scientific knowledge themselves (as seen in their Coligny Calendar).

Representation of Jesus of Nazareth, central figure of Christianity.

 

The Maison Carrée in Nîmes, one of the best-preserved Roman temples.

 

The Roman Empire (red) and its client states (pink) at its greatest extent in 117 AD under emperor Trajan.

For about five hundred years, the Roman Empire maintained the Greek East and consolidated a Latin West, but an east–west division remained, reflected in many cultural norms of the two areas, including language. Eventually, the empire became increasingly split into a Western and Eastern part, reviving old ideas of a contrast between an advanced East, and a rugged West.

From the time of Alexander the Great (the Hellenistic period), Greek civilization came in contact with Jewish civilization. Christianity would eventually emerge from the syncretism of Hellenic culture, Roman culture, and Second Temple Judaism, gradually spreading across the Roman Empire and eclipsing its antecedents and influences. The rise of Christianity reshaped much of the Greco-Roman tradition and culture; the Christianised culture would be the basis for the development of Western civilization after the fall of Rome (which resulted from increasing pressure from barbarians outside Roman culture). Roman culture also mixed with Celtic, Germanic, and Slavic cultures, which slowly became integrated into Western culture: starting mainly with their acceptance of Christianity.

Medieval West

Mosaic of Justinian I with his court, circa 547–549, Basilica of San Vitale (Ravenna, Italy)

 

Two main symbols of the medieval Western civilization on one picture: the gothic St. Martin's cathedral in Spišské Podhradie (Slovakia) and the Spiš Castle behind the cathedral

 

Stone bas-relief of Jesus, from the Vézelay Abbey (Burgundy, France)

 

Notre-Dame, the most iconic Gothic cathedral, built between 1163 and 1345

The Medieval West referred specifically to the Catholic "Latin" West, also called "Frankish" during Charlemagne's reign, in contrast to the Orthodox East, where Greek remained the language of the Byzantine Empire.

After the fall of Rome, much of Greco-Roman art, literature, science and even technology were all but lost in the western part of the old empire. However, this would become the center of a new West. Europe fell into political anarchy, with many warring kingdoms and principalities. Under the Frankish kings, it eventually, and partially, reunified, and the anarchy evolved into feudalism.

Much of the basis of the post-Roman cultural world had been set before the fall of the Western Roman Empire, mainly through the integration and reshaping of Roman ideas through Christian thought. The Greek and Roman paganism gradually was replaced by Christianity, first with its legalisation with the Edict of Milan and then the Edict of Thessalonica which made it the State church of the Roman Empire. Roman Catholic Christianity, served as a unifying force in Christian parts of Europe, and in some respects replaced or competed with the secular authorities. The Jewish Christian tradition out of which it had emerged was all but extinguished, and antisemitism became increasingly entrenched or even integral to Christendom. Much of art and literature, law, education, and politics were preserved in the teachings of the Church. The Eastern Orthodox Church founded many cathedrals, universities, monasteries and seminaries, some of which continue to exist today.

After the fall of the Roman Empire, many of the classical Greek texts were translated into Arabic and preserved in the medieval Islamic world. The Greek classics along with Arabic science, philosophy and technology were transmitted to Western Europe and translated into Latin, sparking the Renaissance of the 12th century and 13th century.

Thomas Aquinas, a Catholic philosopher of the Middle Ages, revived and developed natural law from ancient Greek philosophy

Medieval Christianity is credited with creating the first modern universities. The Catholic Church established a hospital system in Medieval Europe that vastly improved upon the Roman valetudinaria and Greek healing temples. These hospitals were established to cater to "particular social groups marginalized by poverty, sickness, and age," according to the historian of hospitals, Guenter Risse. Christianity played a role in ending practices common among pagan societies, such as human sacrifice, slavery, infanticide and polygamy. Francisco de Vitoria, a disciple of Thomas Aquinas and a Catholic thinker who studied the issue regarding the human rights of colonized natives, is recognized by the United Nations as a father of international law, and now also by historians of economics and democracy as a leading light for the West's democracy and rapid economic development. Joseph Schumpeter, an economist of the twentieth century, referring to the Scholastics, wrote, "it is they who come nearer than does any other group to having been the 'founders' of scientific economics."

In a broader sense, the Middle Ages, with its fertile encounter between Greek philosophical reasoning and Levantine monotheism was not confined to the West but also stretched into the old East. The philosophy and science of Classical Greece were largely forgotten in Europe after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, other than in isolated monastic enclaves (notably in Ireland, which had become Christian but was never conquered by Rome). The learning of Classical Antiquity was better preserved in the Byzantine Eastern Roman Empire. Justinian's Corpus Juris Civilis Roman civil law code was created in the East in his capital of Constantinople, and that city maintained trade and intermittent political control over outposts such as Venice in the West for centuries. Classical Greek learning was also subsumed, preserved, and elaborated in the rising Eastern world, which gradually supplanted Roman-Byzantine control as a dominant cultural-political force. Thus, much of the learning of classical antiquity was slowly reintroduced to European civilization in the centuries following the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.

The rediscovery of the Justinian Code in Western Europe early in the 10th century rekindled a passion for the discipline of law, which crossed many of the re-forming boundaries between East and West. In the Catholic or Frankish west, Roman law became the foundation on which all legal concepts and systems were based. Its influence is found in all Western legal systems, although in different manners and to different extents. The study of canon law, the legal system of the Catholic Church, fused with that of Roman law to form the basis of the refounding of Western legal scholarship. During the Reformation and Enlightenment, the ideas of civil rights, equality before the law, procedural justice, and democracy as the ideal form of society began to be institutionalized as principles forming the basis of modern Western culture, particularly in Protestant regions.

In the 14th century, starting from Italy and then spreading throughout Europe, there was a massive artistic, architectural, scientific and philosophical revival, as a result of the Christian revival of Greek philosophy, and the long Christian medieval tradition that established the use of reason as one of the most important of human activities. This period is commonly referred to as the Renaissance. In the following century, this process was further enhanced by an exodus of Greek Christian priests and scholars to Italian cities such as Venice after the end of the Byzantine Empire with the fall of Constantinople.

The discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus.

From Late Antiquity, through the Middle Ages, and onwards, while Eastern Europe was shaped by the Eastern Orthodox Church, Southern and Central Europe were increasingly stabilized by the Catholic Church which, as Roman imperial governance faded from view, was the only consistent force in Western Europe. In 1054 came the Great Schism that, following the Greek East and Latin West divide, separated Europe into religious and cultural regions present to this day. Until the Age of Enlightenment, Christian culture took over as the predominant force in Western civilization, guiding the course of philosophy, art, and science for many years. Movements in art and philosophy, such as the Humanist movement of the Renaissance and the Scholastic movement of the High Middle Ages, were motivated by a drive to connect Catholicism with Greek and Arab thought imported by Christian pilgrims. However, due to the division in Western Christianity caused by the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment, religious influence—especially the temporal power of the Pope—began to wane.

From the late 15th century to the 17th century, Western culture began to spread to other parts of the world through explorers and missionaries during the Age of Discovery, and by imperialists from the 17th century to the early 20th century. During the Great Divergence, a term coined by Samuel Huntington the Western world overcame pre-modern growth constraints and emerged during the 19th century as the most powerful and wealthy world civilization of the time, eclipsing Qing China, Mughal India, Tokugawa Japan, and the Ottoman Empire. The process was accompanied and reinforced by the Age of Discovery and continued into the modern period. Scholars have proposed a wide variety of theories to explain why the Great Divergence happened, including lack of government intervention, geography, colonialism, and customary traditions.

Early modern era

The United States Constitution

Coming into the modern era, the historical understanding of the East–West contrast—as the opposition of Christendom to its geographical neighbors—began to weaken. As religion became less important, and Europeans came into increasing contact with far-away peoples, the old concept of Western culture began a slow evolution towards what it is today. The Age of Discovery faded into the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century, during which cultural and intellectual forces in European society emphasized reason, analysis, and individualism rather than traditional lines of authority. It challenged the authority of institutions that were deeply rooted in society, such as the Catholic Church; there was much talk of ways to reform society with toleration, science and skepticism.

Philosophers of the Enlightenment included Francis Bacon, René Descartes, John Locke, Baruch Spinoza, Voltaire (1694–1778), David Hume, and Immanuel Kant. influenced society by publishing widely read works. Upon learning about enlightened views, some rulers met with intellectuals and tried to apply their reforms, such as allowing for toleration, or accepting multiple religions, in what became known as enlightened absolutism. New ideas and beliefs spread around Europe and were fostered by an increase in literacy due to a departure from solely religious texts. Publications include Encyclopédie (1751–72) that was edited by Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert. The Dictionnaire philosophique (Philosophical Dictionary, 1764) and Letters on the English (1733) written by Voltaire spread the ideals of the Enlightenment.

Coinciding with the Age of Enlightenment was the scientific revolution, spearheaded by Newton. This included the emergence of modern science, during which developments in mathematics, physics, astronomy, biology (including human anatomy) and chemistry transformed views of society and nature. While its dates are disputed, the publication in 1543 of Nicolaus Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres) is often cited as marking the beginning of the scientific revolution, and its completion is attributed to the "grand synthesis" of Newton's 1687 Principia.

Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in the period from about 1760 to sometime between 1820 and 1840. This included going from hand production methods to machines, new chemical manufacturing and iron production processes, improved efficiency of water power, the increasing use of steam power, and the development of machine tools. These transitions began in Great Britain and spread to Western Europe and North America within a few decades.

A Watt steam engine. The steam engine, made of iron and fueled primarily by coal, propelled the Industrial Revolution in Great Britain and the world.

The Industrial Revolution marks a major turning point in history; almost every aspect of daily life was influenced in some way. In particular, average income and population began to exhibit unprecedented sustained growth. Some economists say that the major impact of the Industrial Revolution was that the standard of living for the general population began to increase consistently for the first time in history, although others have said that it did not begin to meaningfully improve until the late 19th and 20th centuries. The precise start and end of the Industrial Revolution is still debated among historians, as is the pace of economic and social changes. GDP per capita was broadly stable before the Industrial Revolution and the emergence of the modern capitalist economy, while the Industrial Revolution began an era of per-capita economic growth in capitalist economies. Economic historians are in agreement that the onset of the Industrial Revolution is the most important event in the history of humanity since the domestication of animals, plants and fire.

The First Industrial Revolution evolved into the Second Industrial Revolution in the transition years between 1840 and 1870, when technological and economic progress continued with the increasing adoption of steam transport (steam-powered railways, boats, and ships), the large-scale manufacture of machine tools and the increasing use of machinery in steam-powered factories.

After the Industrial Revolution

Tendencies that have come to define modern Western societies include the concept of political pluralism, individualism, prominent subcultures or countercultures (such as New Age movements) and increasing cultural syncretism resulting from globalization and human migration. Western culture has been heavily influenced by the Renaissance, the Ages of Discovery and Enlightenment and the Industrial and Scientific Revolutions.

In the 20th century, Christianity declined in influence in many Western countries, mostly in the European Union where some member states have experienced falling church attendance and membership in recent years, and also elsewhere. Secularism (separating religion from politics and science) increased. Christianity remains the dominant religion in the Western world, where 70% are Christians.

The West went through a series of great cultural and social changes between 1945 and 1980. The emergent mass media (film, radio, television and recorded music) created a global culture that could ignore national frontiers. Literacy became almost universal, encouraging the growth of books, magazines and newspapers. The influence of cinema and radio remained, while televisions became near essentials in every home.

By the mid-20th century, Western culture was exported worldwide, and the development and growth of international transport and telecommunication (such as transatlantic cable and the radiotelephone) played a decisive role in modern globalization. The West has contributed a great many technological, political, philosophical, artistic and religious aspects to modern international culture: having been a crucible of Catholicism, Protestantism, democracy, industrialisation; the first major civilisation to seek to abolish slavery during the 19th century, the first to enfranchise women (beginning in Australasia at the end of the 19th century) and the first to put to use such technologies as steam, electric and nuclear power. The West invented cinema, television, the personal computer and the Internet; developed sports such as soccer, cricket, golf, tennis, rugby, basketball, and volleyball; and transported humans to an astronomical object for the first time with the 1969 Apollo 11 Moon Landing.

Arts and humanities

Detail of the Bayeux Tapestry showing William the Conqueror (centre), his half-brothers Robert, Count of Mortain (right) and Odo, Bishop of Bayeux in the Duchy of Normandy (left). The Bayeux tapestry is one of the supreme achievements of the Norman Romanesque.

What is distinctive of European art is that it comments on so many levels-religious, humanistic, satirical, metaphysical, and the purely physical. Some cultural and artistic modalities are characteristically Western in origin and form. While dance, music, visual art, story-telling, and architecture are human universals, they are expressed in the West in certain characteristic ways. European art pays deep tribute to human suffering.

In Western dance, music, plays and other arts, the performers are only very infrequently masked. There are essentially no taboos against depicting a god, or other religious figures, in a representational fashion.

Music

For modern Western music, see Music industry.

In music, Catholic monks developed the first forms of modern Western musical notation to standardize liturgy throughout the worldwide Church, and an enormous body of religious music has been composed for it through the ages. This led directly to the emergence and development of European classical music and its many derivatives. The Baroque style, which encompassed music, art, and architecture, was particularly encouraged by the post-Reformation Catholic Church as such forms offered a means of religious expression that was stirring and emotional, intended to stimulate religious fervor.

The symphony, concerto, sonata, opera, and oratorio have their origins in Italy. Many musical instruments developed in the West have come to see widespread use all over the world; among them are the violin, piano, pipe organ, saxophone, trombone, clarinet, accordion, and the theremin. In turn, it has been claimed that some European instruments have roots in earlier Eastern instruments that were adopted from the medieval Islamic world. The solo piano, symphony orchestra, and the string quartet are also significant musical innovations of the West.

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  Claudio Monteverdi, 1567–1643

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  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi, 1678–1741

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  George Frideric Handel, 1685-1759

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  Johann Sebastian Bach, 1685-1750

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  Franz Joseph Haydn, 1732-1809

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  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 1756–1791

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  Ludwig van Beethoven, 1770–1827

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  Frédéric François Chopin, 1810-1849

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  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, 1840–1893

Painting and photography

Jan van Eyck, among other renaissance painters, made great advances in oil painting, and perspective drawings and paintings had their earliest practitioners in Florence. In art, the Celtic knot is a very distinctive Western repeated motif. Depictions of the nude human male and female in photography, painting, and sculpture are frequently considered to have special artistic merit. Realistic portraiture is especially valued.

Photography and the motion picture as both a technology and basis for entirely new art forms were also developed in the West.

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  Restoration of a fresco from an Ancient Roman villa bedroom, circa 50-40 BC, dimensions of the room: 265.4 x 334 x 583.9 cm, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York City)

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  Mona Lisa, by Leonardo da Vinci, circa 1503–1506, perhaps continuing until circa 1517, oil on poplar panel, 77 cm × 53 cm, Louvre, (Paris)

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  Las Meninas, by Diego Velázquez, 1656, oil on canvas, 318 cm × 276 cm, El Prado (Madrid)

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  Dance at Le moulin de la Galette, by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 1876, oil on canvas, height: 131 cm, Musée d'Orsay (Paris)

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  Photo of the interior of the apartment of Eugène Atget, taken in 1910 in Paris

Dance and performing arts

Classical music, opera and ballet: Swan Lake pictured

The ballet is a distinctively Western form of performance dance. The ballroom dance is an important Western variety of dance for the elite. The polka, the square dance, the flamenco, and the Irish step dance are very well known Western forms of folk dance.

Greek and Roman theatre are considered the antecedents of modern theatre, and forms such as medieval theatre, Passion Plays, morality plays, and commedia dell'arte are considered highly influential. Elizabethan theatre, with playwrights including William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, and Ben Jonson, is considered one of the most formative and important eras for modern drama.

The soap opera, a popular culture dramatic form, originated in the United States first on radio in the 1930s, then a couple of decades later on television. The music video was also developed in the West in the middle of the 20th century. Musical theatre was developed in the West in the 19th and 20th Centuries, from music hall, comic opera, and Vaudeville; with significant contributions from the Jewish diaspora, African-Americans, and other marginalized peoples.

Literature

The Divine Comedy is an epic poem by Dante Alighieri. Engraving by Gustave Doré

While epic literary works in verse such as the Mahabharata and Homer's Iliad are ancient and occurred worldwide, the prose novel as a distinct form of storytelling, with developed, consistent human characters and, typically, some connected overall plot (although both of these characteristics have sometimes been modified and played with in later times), was popularized by the West in the 17th and 18th centuries. Of course, extended prose fiction had existed much earlier; both novels of adventure and romance in the Hellenistic world and in Heian Japan. Both Petronius' Satyricon (c. 60 CE) and the Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu (c. 1000 CE) have been cited as the world's first major novel but they had a very limited long-term impact on literary writing beyond their own day until much more recent times.

The novel, which made its appearance in the 18th century, is an essentially European creation. Chinese and Japanese literature contain some works that may be thought of as novels, but only the European novel is couched in terms of a personal analysis of personal dilemmas.

As in its artistic tradition, European literature pays deep tribute to human suffering. Tragedy, from its ritually and mythologically inspired Greek origins to modern forms where struggle and downfall are often rooted in psychological or social, rather than mythical, motives, is also widely considered a specifically European creation and can be seen as a forerunner of some aspects of both the novel and of classical opera.

The validity of reason was postulated in both Christian philosophy and the Greco-Roman classics. Christianity laid a stress on the inward aspects of actions and on motives, notions that were foreign to the ancient world. This subjectivity, which grew out of the Christian belief that man could achieve a personal union with God, resisted all challenges and made itself the fulcrum on which all literary exposition turned, including the 20th–21st century novels.

Western literature encompasses literary traditions of Europe, as well as Northern America and Latin America.

Architecture

Important Western architectural motifs include the Doric, Corinthian, and Ionic columns, and the Romanesque, Gothic, Baroque, and Victorian styles are still widely recognised, and used even today, in the West. Much of Western architecture emphasizes repetition of simple motifs, straight lines and expansive, undecorated planes. A modern ubiquitous architectural form that emphasizes this characteristic is the skyscraper, their modern equivalent first developed in New York and Chicago. The predecessor of the skyscraper can be found in the medieval towers erected in Bologna.

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  The Parthenon under restoration in 2008, the most iconic Classical building, built from 447 BC to 432 BC, located in Athens

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  Stained glass windows of the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, completed in 1248, mostly constructed between 1194 and 1220

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  Saint Basil's Cathedral, built from 1555 to 1561, in the Red Square of Moscow, with its extraordinary onion-shaped domes, painted in bright colors

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  The Palais Garnier in Paris, built between 1861 and 1875, a Beaux-Arts masterpiece

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  Borgund Stave Church, built between 1180 and 1250 AD, displays a common palisade church building constructions once common in north-western Europe. Similar constructions are known from buildings from the Viking Age.

Cuisine

Western foodways were, until recently, considered to have their roots in the cuisines of Classical Rome and Greece, but the influence of Arab and Near Eastern cuisine on the West has become a topic of research in recent decades. The Crusaders, known mostly for fighting over holy land, settled in the Levant and acclimated to the local culture and cuisine. Fulcher of Chartres said "For we who were occidentals have now become orientals." These cultural experiences, carried back to France by notables like Eleanor of Aquitaine influenced Western European foodways. Many Oriental ingredients were relatively new to the Western lands. Sugar, almonds, pistachios, rosewater, and dried citrus fruits were all novelties to the Crusaders who encountered them in Saracen lands. Pepper, ginger and cinnamon were the most widely used spices of the European courts and noble households. By the end of the middle ages cloves, nutmeg, mastic, galingale and other imported spices had become part of the Western cuisine.

Saracen influence can be seen in medieval cookbooks. Some recipes retain their Arabic names in Italian translations of the Liber de Coquina. Known as bruet Sarassinois in the cuisine of North France, the concept of sweet and sour sauce is attested to in Greek tradition when Anthimus finishes his stew with vinegar and honey. Saracens combined sweet ingredients like date-juice and honey with pomegranate, lemons and citrus juices, or other sour ingredients. The technique of browning pieces of meat and simmering in liquid with vegetables is used in many recipes from the Baghdad cookery book. The same technique appears in the late-13th century Viandier. Fried pieces of beef simmered in wine with sugar and cloves was called bruet of Sarcynesse in English.

Scientific and technological inventions and discoveries

Medieval Christians believed that to seek the geometric, physical and mathematical principles that govern the world was to seek and worship God. Detail of a scene in the bowl of the letter 'P' with a woman with a set-square and dividers; using a compass to measure distances on a diagram. In her left hand she holds a square, an implement for testing or drawing right angles. She is watched by a group of students. In the Middle Ages, it is unusual to see women represented as teachers, in particular when the students appear to be monks. She is most likely the personification of Geometry, based on Martianus Capella's famous book De Nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii [5th c.], a standard source for allegorical imagery of the seven liberal arts. Illustration at the beginning of Euclid's Elementa, in the translation attributed to Adelard of Bath.

 

A doctor of philosophy of the University of Oxford, in full academic dress. The typical dress for graduation are gowns and hoods or hats adapted from the daily dress of university staff in the Middle Ages, which was in turn based on the attire worn by medieval clergy.

 

The Greek Antikythera mechanism is generally referred to as the first known analogue computer.

 

Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin, Apollo Lunar Module pilot of the first crewed mission to land on the Moon, poses for a photograph beside the deployed United States flag during his Extravehicular Activity (EVA) on the lunar surface.

A notable feature of Western culture is its strong emphasis and focus on innovation and invention through science and technology, and its ability to generate new processes, materials and material artifacts with its roots dating back to the Ancient Greeks. The scientific method as "a method or procedure that has characterized natural science since the 17th century, consisting in systematic observation, measurement, and experiment, and the formulation, testing, and modification of hypotheses" was fashioned by the 17th-century Italian Galileo Galilei, with roots in the work of medieval scholars such as the 11th-century Iraqi physicist Ibn al-Haytham and the 13th-century English friar Roger Bacon.

By the will of the Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel the Nobel Prize were established in 1895. The prizes in Chemistry, Literature, Peace, Physics, and Physiology or Medicine were first awarded in 1901. The percentage of ethnically European Nobel prize winners during the first and second halves of the 20th century were respectively 98 and 94 percent. A study by the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) – Japan's equivalent of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) – concluded that 54% of the world's most important inventions were British. Of the rest, 25% were American and 5% Japanese.

The West is credited with the development of the steam engine and adapting its use into factories, and for the generation of electric power. The electrical motor, dynamo, transformer, electric light, and most of the familiar electrical appliances, were inventions of the West. The Otto and the Diesel internal combustion engines are products whose genesis and early development were in the West. Nuclear power stations are derived from the first atomic pile constructed in Chicago in 1942.

Communication devices and systems including the telegraph, the telephone, radio, television, communications and navigation satellites, mobile phone, and the Internet were all invented by Westerners. The pencil, ballpoint pen, Cathode ray tube, liquid-crystal display, light-emitting diode, camera, photocopier, laser printer, ink jet printer, plasma display screen and world wide web were also invented in the West.

Ubiquitous materials including aluminum, clear glass, synthetic rubber, synthetic diamond and the plastics polyethylene, polypropylene, polyvinyl chloride and polystyrene were discovered and developed or invented in the West. Iron and steel ships, bridges and skyscrapers first appeared in the West. Nitrogen fixation and petrochemicals were invented by Westerners. Most of the elements were discovered and named in the West, as well as the contemporary atomic theories to explain them.

The transistor, integrated circuit, memory chip, first programming language and computer were all first seen in the West. The ship's chronometer, the screw propeller, the locomotive, bicycle, automobile, and airplane were all invented in the West. Eyeglasses, the telescope, the microscope and electron microscope, all the varieties of chromatography, protein and DNA sequencing, computerised tomography, nuclear magnetic resonance, x-rays, and light, ultraviolet and infrared spectroscopy, were all first developed and applied in Western laboratories, hospitals and factories.

In medicine, the pure antibiotics were created in the West. The method of preventing Rh disease, the treatment of diabetes, and the germ theory of disease were discovered by Westerners. The eradication of smallpox, was led by a Westerner, Donald Henderson. Radiography, computed tomography, positron emission tomography and medical ultrasonography are important diagnostic tools developed in the West. Other important diagnostic tools of clinical chemistry, including the methods of spectrophotometry, electrophoresis and immunoassay, were first devised by Westerners. So were the stethoscope, the electrocardiograph, and the endoscope. Vitamins, hormonal contraception, hormones, insulin, beta blockers and ACE inhibitors, along with a host of other medically proven drugs, were first used to treat disease in the West. The double-blind study and evidence-based medicine are critical scientific techniques widely used in the West for medical purposes.

Euler is held to be one of the greatest mathematicians in history

In mathematics, calculus, statistics, logic, vectors, tensors and complex analysis, group theory, abstract algebra and topology were developed by Westerners. In biology, evolution, chromosomes, DNA, genetics and the methods of molecular biology are creations of the West. In physics, the science of mechanics and quantum mechanics, relativity, thermodynamics, and statistical mechanics were all developed by Westerners. The discoveries and inventions by Westerners in electromagnetism include Coulomb's law (1785), the first battery (1800), the unity of electricity and magnetism (1820), Biot–Savart law (1820), Ohm's Law (1827), and Maxwell's equations (1871). The atom, nucleus, electron, neutron and proton were all unveiled by Westerners.

The world's most widely adopted system of measurement, the International System of Units, derived from the metric system, was first developed in France and evolved through contributions from various Westerners.

In business, economics, and finance, double entry bookkeeping, credit cards, and the charge card were all first used in the West.

Westerners are also known for their explorations of the globe and outer space. The first expedition to circumnavigate the Earth (1522) was by Westerners, as well as the first journey to the South Pole (1911), and the first Moon landing (1969). The landing of robots on Mars (2004 and 2012) and on an asteroid (2001), the Voyager 2 explorations of the outer planets (Uranus in 1986 and Neptune in 1989), Voyager 1's passage into interstellar space (2013), and New Horizons' flyby of Pluto (2015) were significant recent Western achievements.

Media

Main article: Western media

The roots of modern-day Western mass media can be traced back to the late 15th century, when printing presses began to operate throughout wealthy European cities. The emergence of news media in the 17th century has to be seen in close connection with the spread of the printing press, from which the publishing press derives its name.

In the 16th century, a decrease in the preeminence of Latin in its literary use, along with the impact of economic change, the discoveries arising from trade and travel, navigation to the New World, science and arts and the development of increasingly rapid communications through print led to a rising corpus of vernacular media content in European society.

After the launch of the satellite Sputnik 1 by the Soviet Union in 1957, satellite transmission technology was dramatically realised, with the United States launching Telstar in 1962 linking live media broadcasts from the UK to the US. The first digital broadcast satellite (DBS) system began transmitting in US in 1975.

Beginning in the 1990s, the Internet has contributed to a tremendous increase in the accessibility of Western media content. Departing from media offered in bundled content packages (magazines, CDs, television and radio slots), the Internet has primarily offered unbundled content items (articles, audio and video files).

Religion

Main article: Western religions

The native religions of Europe were polytheistic but not homogenous – however, they were similar insofar as they were predominantly Indo-European in origin. Roman religion was similar to but not the same as Hellenic religion – likewise for indigenous Germanic polytheism, Celtic polytheism and Slavic polytheism. Before this time many Europeans from the north, especially Scandinavians, remained polytheistic, though southern Europe was predominantly Christian from the 5th century onwards.

Western culture was at some level influenced by the Judeo-Christian and Greco-Roman traditions. These cultures had a number of similarities, such as a common emphasis on the individual, but they also embody fundamentally conflicting worldviews. For example, in Judaism and Christianity, God is the ultimate authority, while Greco-Roman tradition considers the ultimate authority to be reason. Christian attempts to reconcile these frameworks were responsible for the preservation of Greek philosophy. Historically, Europe has been the center and cradle of Christian civilization.

As in other areas, the Jewish diaspora and Judaism exist in the Western world.

Religion has waned in Europe, where people who are agnostic or atheist make up about 18% of the European population today. In particular, over half of the populations of the Czech Republic (79% of the population was agnostic, atheist or irreligious), the United Kingdom (52%), Germany (25–33%), France (30–35%) and the Netherlands (39–44%) are agnostic or atheist.

However, per another survey by Pew Research Center from 2011, Christianity remains the dominant religion in the Western world where 70–84% are Christians, According to this survey, 76% of Europeans described themselves as Christians, and about 86% of the Americas' population identified themselves as Christians, (90% in Latin America and 77% in North America). 73% in Oceania self-identify as Christian, and 76% in South Africa are Christian.

According to new polls about religiosity in the European Union in 2012 by Eurobarometer, Christianity is the largest religion in the European Union, accounting for 72% of the EU population. Catholics are the largest Christian group, accounting for 48% of the EU citizens, while Protestants make up 12%, Eastern Orthodox make up 8% and other Christians make up 4%. Non-believers/Agnostics account for 16%, atheists account for 7%, and Muslims account for 2%.

Throughout the Western world there are increasing numbers of people who seek to revive the indigenous religions of their European ancestors; such groups include Germanic, Roman, Hellenic, Celtic, Slavic, and polytheistic reconstructionist movements. Likewise, Wicca, New Age spirituality and other neo-pagan belief systems enjoy notable minority support in Western states.

Sport

The Bull-Leaping Fresco from the Great Palace at Knossos, Crete. Sport has been an important part of Western cultural expression since Classical Antiquity.

 

Baron Pierre de Coubertin, founder of the International Olympic Committee, and considered father of the modern Olympic Games.

Since classical antiquity, sport has been an important facet of Western cultural expression. A wide range of sports was already established by the time of Ancient Greece and the military culture and the development of sports in Greece influenced one another considerably. Sports became such a prominent part of their culture that the Greeks created the Olympic Games, which in ancient times were held every four years in a small village in the Peloponnesus called Olympia. Baron Pierre de Coubertin, a Frenchman, instigated the modern revival of the Olympic movement. The first modern Olympic games were held at Athens in 1896.

The Romans built immense structures such as the amphitheatres to house their festivals of sport. The Romans exhibited a passion for blood sports, such as the infamous Gladiatorial battles that pitted contestants against one another in a fight to the death. The Olympic Games revived many of the sports of Classical Antiquity—such as Greco-Roman wrestling, discus and javelin. The sport of bullfighting is a traditional spectacle of Spain, Portugal, southern France, and some Latin American countries. It traces its roots to prehistoric bull worship and sacrifice and is often linked to Rome, where many human-versus-animal events were held. Bullfighting spread from Spain to its American colonies, and in the 19th century to France, where it developed into a distinctive form in its own right.

Jousting and hunting were popular sports in the European Middle Ages, and the aristocratic classes developed passions for leisure activities. A great number of popular global sports were first developed or codified in Europe. The modern game of golf originated in Scotland, where the first written record of golf is James II's banning of the game in 1457, as an unwelcome distraction to learning archery. The Industrial Revolution that began in Britain in the 18th Century brought increased leisure time, leading to more time for citizens to attend and follow spectator sports, greater participation in athletic activities, and increased accessibility. These trends continued with the advent of mass media and global communication. The bat and ball sport of cricket was first played in England during the 16th century and was exported around the globe via the British Empire. A number of popular modern sports were devised or codified in Britain during the 19th Century and obtained global prominence—these include ping pong, modern tennis, association football, netball and rugby.

Football remains hugely popular in Europe, but has grown from its origins to be known as the world game. Similarly, sports such as cricket, rugby, and netball were exported around the world, particularly among countries in the Commonwealth of Nations, thus India and Australia are among the strongest cricketing states, while victory in the Rugby World Cup has been shared among New Zealand, Australia, England, and South Africa.

Australian Rules Football, an Australian variation of football with similarities to Gaelic football and rugby, evolved in the British colony of Victoria in the mid-19th century. The United States also developed unique variations of English sports. English migrants took antecedents of baseball to America during the colonial period. The history of American football can be traced to early versions of rugby football and association football. Many games are known as "football" were being played at colleges and universities in the United States in the first half of the 19th century. American football resulted from several major divergences from rugby, most notably the rule changes instituted by Walter Camp, the "Father of American Football". Basketball was invented in 1891 by James Naismith, a Canadian physical education instructor working in Springfield, Massachusetts, in the United States. Volleyball was created in Holyoke, Massachusetts, a city directly north of Springfield, in 1895.

Themes and traditions

A Madonna and Child painting by an anonymous Italian from the first half of the 19th century, oil on canvas.

Western culture has developed many themes and traditions, the most significant of which are:^{[citation needed]}

• Greco-Roman classic letters, arts, architecture, philosophical and cultural tradition, which include the influence of preeminent authors and philosophers such as Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Homer, Virgil, and Cicero, as well as a long mythologic tradition.
• Christian ethical, philosophical, and mythological tradition, stemming largely from the Christian Bible, particularly the New Testament Gospels.
• Monasteries, schools, libraries, books, book making, universities, teaching, education, and lecture halls.
• A tradition of the importance of the rule of law.
• Secular humanism, rationalism and Enlightenment thought. This set the basis for a new critical attitude and open questioning of religion, favouring freethinking and questioning of the church as an authority, which resulted in open-minded and reformist ideals inside, such as liberation theology, which partly adopted these currents, and secular and political tendencies such as separation of church and state (sometimes termed laicism), agnosticism and atheism.
• Generalized usage of some form of the Latin or Greek alphabet, and derived forms, such as Cyrillic, used by those southern and eastern Slavic countries of Christian Orthodox tradition, historically under the Byzantine Empire and later within the Russian czarist or the Soviet area of influence. Other variants of the Latin or Greek alphabets are found in the Gothic and Coptic alphabets, which historically superseded older scripts, such as runes, and the Egyptian Demotic and Hieroglyphic systems.
• Natural law, human rights, constitutionalism, parliamentarism (or presidentialism) and formal liberal democracy in recent times—prior to the 19th century, most Western governments were still monarchies.
• A large influence, in modern times, of many of the ideals and values developed and inherited from Romanticism.
• An emphasis on, and use of, science as a means of understanding the natural world and humanity's place in it.
• More pronounced use and application of innovation and scientific developments, as well as a more rational approach to scientific progress (what has been known as the scientific method).