Outlook: Florida's Incredible Hulk is an unsustainable development

Islands of Adventure, one of two giant theme parks owned by Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida, contains a ride called The Incredible Hulk. Named after a Marvel comic superhero, the coaster accelerates its cargo of screaming joy riders from 0 to 40mph in two seconds and then throws them into a stomach churning confusion of loop the loops, corkscrews and near vertical drops. In less than 40 seconds, the ride is over, the passengers spill out on to the pavement and stagger off in search of other thrills, their heads still spinning from the G forces they have just been subjected to.

The spectacle is both awesome and appaling at the same time. Awesome, because nobody could help but marvel at the degree of human advancement in technology, logistics, mass spending and leisure time that has made such rides possible. Appaling, because there could hardly be a more potent symbol of wasteful, self-indulgent overconsumption than a Florida theme park.

Perhaps one in four of those sampling the rides and attractions of Islands of Adventure this weekend will be either overweight or outright obese. Theme parks seem to attract those that suffer from this latter day curse in disproportionately large numbers, and it's not hard from the riot of hamburger joints, hotdog stalls, ice-cream parlours and soft drink booths to see why. Theme parks are modern day temples to consumption. In their totality, Orlando's theme parks consume more energy, food, and drink and are responsible for a greater level of economic activity than many self-respecting countries. It's no exaggeration to call them one of the great wonders of the modern world.

Few of those riding The Incredible Hulk this weekend will be thinking much, if at all, about the "World Summit on Sustainable Development" in Johannesburg. Many of them won't even be aware of its existence. And why should they, it might reasonably be asked, given how little the summit is likely to achieve? From the outside, Johannesburg looks like a giant talking shop for self-important do gooders, special interest lobbyists and vested interest, quite incapable of delivering anything of importance. Who's to say its delegates are being any less self indulgent than those riding the Incredible Hulk?

Sustainable development was defined by the UN-sponsored Brundtland Commission more than 15 years ago as "development that meets the needs of present generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs". Another way of saying the same thing would be "develop all you like, but make sure you don't use up all the world's resources and destroy its environment in the process". Fifteen years on and it is even harder to see how this might be achieved than it was then, before the reality of global warming was properly understood.

As things stand, 80 per cent of the world's wealth belongs to just 20 per cent of its population. Put the other way around, the statistics look even starker. The bottom 80 per cent of the world's population accounts for just 20 per cent of its wealth. The sheer scale of the divide between rich and poor that these oft quoted numbers illustrate is shocking enough. But perhaps the more worrying aspect of them for those already in the top 20 per cent is the thought of quite how much development is going to be necessary to allow the bottom 80 per cent to catch up with the top 20 per cent – the United States, Europe and other areas of relative prosperity.

It scarcely seems likely that it ever will, but one thing is certain. The developing and Third World is going to try its damnedest to make it happen. China, India, Brazil and other nations desperately attempting to pull themselves up by the boot straps are not going to take any lessons from the US and Europe on environmental protection and resource preservation. The desire for self improvement, accumulation and growth lies deep within the human spirit – as basic an instinct as procreation or survival itself. In other parts of the animal kingdom, nature finds its own balance. Human consciousness, of its own mortality as well as its power to shape the world in which we live, ensures that the Brundtland Commission's definition of sustainable development can never be anything more than an ideal.

Most of us take the attitude that life is for living. The Keynsian principle that if you look after the short run, the long term will generally take care of itself has become a mantra of the modern age. "In the long run, we are all dead," Keynes famously said, a truism that perhaps today more than ever concentrates human endeavour on the pursuit of unsustainable development, so as greater to enrich our lives for the course of our all too short stay on the planet.

Ok, so there are some reasons for hope. In her book, The Weightless World, Diane Coyle, The Independent's former economics editor, neatly demonstrates that economic growth is becoming progressively more weightless. One of the things she means by this is that the economy is using fewer raw materials to achieve growth.

In developed Western economies, we seem to be consuming more, but in fact the reverse is true. Service industries account for a growing proportion of all economic output. The internet allows for much higher levels of economic activity for the same amount of effort. Even in manufacturing, competition and advances in technology have forced producers to deliver more bangs for fewer bucks.

Modern industrial processes allow for the use of lighter materials, and less of them. There's less waste than there was, energy use is more efficient, while improvements in design and technology allow for greater product longevity and capability. The raw data seem to back Ms Coyle's thesis. During the course of the 1990s, the British economy grew by 25 per cent. This was achieved despite a 10 per cent reduction in the use of minerals, metals, biomass and energy. Is that not sustainable development?

Maybe. Only one problem. While it may be possible for advanced, post industrial societies to use progressively less resource, and continue to grow at the same time, consumption of resource none the less looks set to remain at exceptionally high levels well into the foreseeable future, and that's before taking account of the developing world. As the developing world pursues its attempt to catch up with the West, overall demand will rise exponentially.

Consider the world's most sought after resource – oil. Much of the modern world has been shaped, one was or another, by oil. The motor car and air travel are its two most visible manifestations, but it is oil which has also made possible the great earth moving machines that lie behind 20th century improvements in sanitation, water purity and diet. More efficient use of oil will help, but no more. According to the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, oil consumption is set to grow by at least a third over the next 20 years. Lord Browne of Madingley, chief executive of BP, has this striking observation to make. "The amount of oil used in the next 10 years will easily exceed all the oil consumed in the first five decades of the 20th century".

Delegates in Johannesburg can wring their hands, and sound off about the iniquities of global capitalism as much as they like, but it's not going to change anything. As it happens, democratically accountable, market-led capitalism's drive towards ever higher levels of efficiency is much more likely to deliver solutions than any of the alternatives. But sustainable development? That's about as likely as a queue free ride on the Incredible Hulk.

jeremy.warner@independent.co.uk