Current Model of Material Use & Key Policy Actions to Address Structural Barriers

Infographic titled “Current model of material use and key policy actions to address structural barriers.” The graphic illustrates global material flows from sources and extraction through provisioning systems to disposal and sinks. It shows that material use has more than tripled over the past 50 years, exceeding 100 billion tonnes annually and potentially reaching 160 billion tonnes by 2060. Key policy actions such as circular economy solutions and sustainable consumption are highlighted.

Current model of material use & key policy actions to address structural barriers

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CC-BY 4.0 Umweltbundesamt. Source: Ecologic Institute 2025.

Current Model of Material Use & Key Policy Actions to Address Structural Barriers

Infographic Series

Publication: Infographic
Citation: Umweltbundesamt 2025: Current model of material use & key policy actions to address structural barriers. Infographic.

Download infographic

This infographic presents the current model of material use and shows how extraction, production, consumption and disposal drive environmental pressures. It also outlines key policy actions to overcome structural barriers, reduce resource use and decouple human well-being from environmental harm. It is based on the report “Moving from Interconnected Crises to Systemic Solutions. Resource Efficiency, Nature-based Solutions, and Systemic Transformation as Responses to the Complexity of the Triple Planetary Crisis” and highlights concrete pathways for action. The infographic is also included in the accompanying fact sheet under the same title.

Together with the infographic “Impacts of the Triple Planetary Crisis on Human and Ecosystem Health”, the two visuals provide a clear overview of the triple planetary crisis, tracing it from underlying drivers and impacts to systemic solution pathways. They are designed to make complex relationships easier to understand and to support informed decision-making in policy, research and practice.

Download the infographic series on the triple planetary crisis:

The infographics are part of the UBA publications on the triple planetary crisis. Published under a CC BY 4.0 license, they may be shared and adapted provided that the source is credited. We encourage their use and dissemination to support a better understanding of the systemic drivers, impacts and solution pathways of the triple planetary crisis in policy, research and practice.

Current model of material use & key policy actions to address structural barriers
CC-BY 4.0 Umweltbundesamt. Source: Ecologic Institute 2025.

The infographics translate the complexity of the triple planetary crisis into clear visuals, showing how shared drivers and reinforcing feedbacks create systemic risks and and how integrated, cross-sectoral solutions can address the crises together.

Contact

Doris Knoblauch

Co-Coordinator Plastics

Coordinator Urban & Spatial Governance, Coordinator Resource Conservation & Circular Economy

Senior Fellow

Impacts of the Triple Planetary Crisis on Human and Ecosystem Health

Infographic Series

Year 2025

Publication:Infographic

Infographic depicting selected nature-based solutions

Nature-based solutions (NbS) can address multiple dimensions of the triple planetary crisis at once: climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental pollution, while delivering benefits for people and ecosystems. This infographic, visualises how NbS can function as systemic responses when designed and implemented under the right conditions. It illustrates how measures such as mangrove restoration, constructed wetlands, and urban green infrastructure can simultaneously contribute to climate mitigation and adaptation, strengthen biodiversity, and reduce pollution-related pressures. It also highlights the broader societal challenges that NbS can support, including water and food security, human health, risk reduction, and reversing environmental degradation.

Examples of nature-based solutions as systemic solutions for the triple planetary crisis

Infographic Series

Year 2025

Publication:Infographic

Climate change, biodiversity loss and environmental pollution are deeply interconnected and reinforce one another. This infographic, based on the report "The Interconnected Challenges of Climate Change, Biodiversity Loss and Environmental Pollution: Drivers, Interdependencies and Impacts of the Triple Planetary Crisis", illustrates the main human-driven causes of the triple planetary crisis and the feedback loops that intensify its impacts.

Drivers and Feedback Loops of the Triple Planetary Crisis

Infographic Series

Year 2025

Publication:Fact Sheet

The fact sheet explains why climate change, biodiversity loss and environmental pollution must be understood as a systemically interconnected crisis driven by shared pressures such as resource use, land-use change and structural inequalities. It highlights how direct and indirect drivers interact across sectors and regions, creating reinforcing feedbacks and compounding risks for ecosystems and societies.

The Interconnected Challenges of Climate Change, Biodiversity Loss and Environmental Pollution

Fact sheet

Year 2025

Publication:Report

Humanity has already exceeded six of the nine planetary boundaries, with climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution pushing the Earth system beyond its safe operating space. Because these boundaries interact through complex feedback loops, surpassing one accelerates pressures on the others, creating cascading effects that amplify environmental degradation. This interconnected dynamic is driving a systemic triple planetary crisis, or polycrisis, that undermines ecological resilience and threatens long-term human well-being. Addressing it requires integrated, cross-sectoral approaches that tackle shared drivers and deliver co-benefits across environmental and socio-economic domains.

Integrated Approaches to Addressing the Triple Planetary Crisis: Country Best Practices

Lessons learned from Brazil, Colombia, Japan, New Zealand, Panama, Rwanda and Sweden

Year 2025

Publication:Fact Sheet

This fact sheet summarizes the information contained in the publication Burgos Cuevas et al. (2025): Moving from interconnected crises to systemic solutions. Resource efficiency, nature-based solutions, and systemic transformation as responses to the complexity of the triple planetary crisis. Interim report, Climate Change 83/2025. German Environment Agency: Dessau-Roßlau. https://doi.org/10.60810/openumwelt-8108.

Moving from Interconnected Crises to Systemic Solutions

Resource efficiency, nature-based solutions, and systemic transformation as responses to the complexity of the triple planetary crisis

Year 2025

Publication:Report

The triple planetary crisis is a systemic challenge, not three separate issues: climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution reinforce one another through shared drivers and feedback, threatening planetary and human well-being. It is driven by fossil fuel dependence, unsustainable production and consumption, overexploitation of land and resources, and structural inequalities. The analysis concludes that the triple crisis can only be effectively addressed through systemic, cross-sectoral, and justice-oriented approaches. By linking resource governance, NbS, and transformative change, this report highlights how today’s triple crisis can be turned into an opportunity to regenerate ecosystems, reduce inequalities, and build resilient societies within planetary boundaries.

Moving from Interconnected Crises to Systemic Solutions

Resource efficiency, nature-based solutions, and systemic transformation as responses to the complexity of the triple planetary crisis

Year 2025

Publication:Report

This report, commissioned by the German Federal Agency (UBA), provides a systematic analysis of this triple planetary crisis. It demonstrates why climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental pollution cannot be understood and tackled in siloes, but instead share common drivers, feedback mechanisms, and cascading effects. The aim of the report is to close knowledge gaps and provide political and scientific actors with an integrated, holistic understanding.

The Interconnected Challenges of Climate Change, Biodiversity Loss and Environmental Pollution

Drivers, Interdependencies and Impacts of the Triple Planetary Crisis

Year 2025

Project

The research project analyses the need for integrated strategies in order to ensure sustainable development and preserve the basis of life. The project focuses on analysing the challenges and interactions between the three crisis areas and the question of how measures can be designed to create synergies between climate protection, biodiversity conservation and the reduction of environmental pollution. More crises are being added, e.g. land degradation and food security.

Challenges for International Climate Protection in the Face of the Global Triple Crisis

Climate change, biodiversity loss and environmental pollution

Jan 2025 - Mar 2027

Language: English
Credits: Media format: coloured infographic for a report and fact sheet
Copyright: CC BY 4.0
Content: Doris Knoblauch, Aaron Best, Charlotte Felthöfer, Natalia Burgos Cuevas, Teresa Spantzel, Yannick Heni
Graphic design: Jennifer Rahn, Lena Aebli
Funding: German Environment Agency (UBA), Germany
Published in: Report: Moving from Interconnected Crises to Systemic Solutions
Published by: German Environment Agency (UBA), Germany
Year: 2025
Project: Challenges for International Climate Protection in the Face of the Global Triple Crisis
Project ID: 50205
Keywords: Climate

Communication

Resource Conservation + Circular Economy

triple planetary crisis, systemic environmental solutions, climate change and biodiversity loss, resource efficiency, nature-based solutions, planetary boundaries, environmental justice, cross-sectoral transformation, sustainable resource use, integrated environmental policy

Global, Germany, Europe, Global South

systematic literature review, systems analysis of societal metabolism, cross-sectoral policy analysis, nature-based solutions assessment, justice- and MAPA-focused governance analysis, infographic, visualization, illustration, creative commons, fact sheet, report

Attachments

infographic-3-uba-dreifachkrise.pdf (980.98 KB)

infographic-4-uba-dreifachkrise.pdf (693.09 KB)

infographic-2-uba-dreifachkrise.pdf (1.11 MB)

infographic-1-uba-dreifachkrise.pdf (702.2 KB)

Further Links

PublicationReportIntegrated Approaches to Addressing the Triple Planetary Crisis: Country Best Practices

Humanity has already exceeded six of the nine planetary boundaries, with climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution pushing the Earth system beyond its safe operating space. Because these boundaries interact through complex feedback loops, surpassing one... Read more

Iwaszuk, E.; Spantzel, T.; Kroos, F.; Knoblauch, D. (2025): Integrated Approaches to Addressing the Triple Planetary Crisis: Country Best Practices. Lessons learned from Brazil, Colombia, Japan, New Zealand, Panama, Rwanda and Sweden. Policy paper. Climate Change 81/2025, German Environment Agency: Dessau-Roßlau. https://doi.org/10.60810/openumwelt-8106

PublicationReportMoving from Interconnected Crises to Systemic Solutions

The triple planetary crisisThe triple planetary crisis is a systemic challenge, not three separate issues: climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution reinforce one another through shared drivers and feedback, threatening planetary and human well-being. It is... Read more

Burgos Cuevas, N.; Heni, Y.; Spantzel, T.; Felthöfer, C.; Brunkhorst, H.; Knoblauch, D.; Riedel, A. (2025): Moving from interconnected crises to systemic solutions. Resource efficiency, nature-based solutions, and systemic transformation as responses to the complexity of the triple planetary crisis. Interim report, Climate Change 83/2025. German Environment Agency: Dessau-Roßlau. https://doi.org/10.60810/openumwelt-8108.

PublicationFact SheetMoving from Interconnected Crises to Systemic Solutions

The Triple Planetary CrisisThe triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution constitutes an interconnected system of risks, driven by unsustainable resource extraction and processing, fossil fuel dependence, and entrenched social and... Read more

Burgos Cuevas, N.; Heni, Y.; Spantzel, T.; Felthöfer, C.; Brunkhorst, H.; Knoblauch, D.; Riedel, A. (2025): Moving from interconnected crises to systemic solutions. Resource efficiency, nature-based solutions, and systemic transformation as responses to the complexity of the triple planetary crisis. Fact sheet. German Environment Agency: Dessau-Roßlau. https://doi.org/10.60810/openumwelt-8102.

PublicationReportThe Interconnected Challenges of Climate Change, Biodiversity Loss and Environmental Pollution

For a long time, the multiple environmental crises, also called the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental pollution were viewed separately. However, research and policy increasingly recognize that they are deeply interconnected... Read more

Knoblauch, D., Felthöfer, C., Heni, Y., Burgos Cuevas, N., & Best, A. (2025). The Interconnected Challenges of Climate Change, Biodiversity Loss and Environmental Pollution: Drivers, Interdependencies and Impacts of the Triple Planetary Crisis. Interim report, Climate Change 82/2025. German Federal Agency. https://doi.org/10.60810/openumwelt-8107.

PublicationFact SheetThe Interconnected Challenges of Climate Change, Biodiversity Loss and Environmental Pollution

The fact sheet explains why climate change, biodiversity loss and environmental pollution must be understood as a systemically interconnected crisis driven by shared pressures such as resource use, land-use change and structural inequalities. It highlights how direct... Read more

Felthöfer, C., Knoblauch, D., & Best, A. (2025). The interconnected challenges of climate change, biodiversity loss and environmental pollution: Drivers, interdependencies and impacts of the triple planetary crisis (Fact sheet). German Federal Agency. https://doi.org/10.60810/openumwelt-8070

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