Environmental damages of the top ten percent consumers exceed global climate and biodiversity funding gaps
Calculating the cost of overshooting planetary boundaries
Communications Sustainability (June 2026)
What is the cost of overshooting planetary boundaries? This study puts a concrete price tag on these damages for the first time – with alarming results.
The top 10% of global consumers is disproportionately responsible for transgressing planetary boundaries, causing damages for which broader society bears the costs. The authors of this article monetise the climate change, biosphere integrity, biogeochemical cycles, and freshwater-use footprints of these consumers using prices of the Environmental Prices Handbook. They find annual damages owed by the global 10% to be $1.7-$5.7 trillion, equivalent to $2.3k-$7.5k per person (in $2017). This surpasses international climate and biodiversity financing gaps.
The top 10% US consumers see a bill of $19k-$63k, equal to 6-20% of their income or 0.8-3% of their wealth. The two biggest contributors to the damage bill are biodiversity loss at 47-56% of the total and climate change at 36-45%.
These costs highlight the mitigation responsibility of the top 10% and illustrate the potential revenue of environmental taxes if the polluter-pays principle is adopted.
