| 30 Sep 2026
An updated Earth System Impact metric for bridging sub-global pressures and planetary boundaries
Abstract. Human pressures at the local scale are driving transgressions of a planetary safe operating space, compromising global and regional stability and resilience. Tools are needed to help organizations assess their environmental performance by bridging local pressures to planetary impacts. The Earth System Impact (ESI) metric prototype was developed in 2021 to enable evaluations of an organization’s systemic impacts relative to established planetary boundaries translated to the sub-global scale. This metric incorporates key interactions between climate change, land cover change and freshwater flows, distinguishes impacts by region, and accounts for current states of climate, land cover and surface freshwater. Here, we present innovations to the ESI approach to enhance the tool’s utility. Simulation data needed for score construction is updated, and the spatial scope is broadened to include dominantly barren land types which were excluded in the prototype. We draw from the latest assessments of safe and just planetary operating spaces to define regional boundaries for land and water. For water, specifically, we account for both upper and lower bounds in flow alteration while the prototype had only recognized the latter. We calculate two sets of metrics: amplification factors, which measure the extent to which impacts are magnified in the Earth system; and location-specific Carbon, Land and Water ESI coefficients which represent the systemic impact of reference pressures in the form of carbon emissions, land cover change and water withdrawal. Overall, amplification factors increased compared to the prototype. The effects of deforestation on the Earth system were doubled to tripled. Most barren land experienced no net amplification except in Australia and Africa (~39% and 65%, respectively) where surface water scarcity is aggravated. The final ESI coefficients were higher in smaller areas (e.g. C3 grass ecosystems in Africa), indicative of the sensitivity of smaller ecosystems to pressures, and in areas where transgressions are coupled with high amplification.
Competing interests: At least one of the (co-)authors is a member of the editorial board of Earth System Dynamics and on the special issue (Earth resilience in the Anthropocene) to which we would like to resubmit, if possible.
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