07.22.2021

RSG cofounder’s watershed study validated using real-world data nearly 50 years later

RSG cofounder Dennis Meadows was part of a team of MIT researchers who released a groundbreaking environmental study in 1972. Now, new research conducted by KPMG Director Gaya Herrington and published in Yale Journal of Industrial Ecology has confirmed the findings of Meadows's team's study against current real-world data and trends.

The original report documenting Meadows's findings, titled The Limits to Growth, was based on system dynamics modeling of society's resource use and extraction. In it, Meadows's team looked at then-current trends to predict several future scenarios. Importantly, one of these scenarios was a base case the would result in a decline in both industrial and population capacity. The latest research from KPMG confirms the accuracy of Meadows's team's modeling based on current trends.

Click here to read Vice's reporting on KPMG's updated findings »