Prof. Tyler VolkDept. of Biology, NYU, New York, NY, USAThe gross world product has been growing at roughly 3% annually for nearly half a century. The result has been unprecedented economic well-being for large masses of people. If the trend continues then by year 2050 the average world’s lifestyle will be approximately equal to that of developed nations today. Will that be possible to achieve? Issues such as energy consumption, CO2 emissions, climate change, food production, water, and material fluxes are intricately tied together as a global system. In this talk I will review what global numbers, trends, and differences in consumption rates across various resources and region could mean for the challenges that lay ahead of all of us, collectively, in the future.