NATURAL CAPITALISM

The text proposes 'natural capitalism' as a successor to the current industrial system, which the authors claim liquidates natural capital and treats it as income. It outlines four core strategies—radical resource productivity, biomimicry, a service and flow economy, and investing in natural capital—to decouple economic growth from environmental degradation. The document emphasizes that the limiting factor for future prosperity is no longer industrial capacity but the availability of life-supporting ecosystem services.

• Conventional industrial capitalism is described as a 'nonsustainable aberration' because it fails to account for the value of natural and human capital, effectively liquidating its capital base while recording it as income.
• The document identifies four essential types of capital required for a functioning economy: human capital (labor, intelligence, culture), financial capital (cash, investments), manufactured capital (infrastructure, machines), and natural capital (resources, living systems, and ecosystem services).
• The authors argue that the primary constraint on future economic development is the functionality of natural capital and irreplaceable life-supporting services, rather than the availability of raw commodities.
• The document proposes 'radical resource productivity' as a cornerstone of natural capitalism, aiming for 'Factor Four' (75% reduction) or 'Factor Ten' (90% reduction) increases in the efficiency of energy and material use.
• Biomimicry is presented as a strategy to eliminate industrial waste by redesigning systems based on biological processes, utilizing low-temperature, low-pressure, and solar-powered assembly techniques.
• The 'service and flow economy' suggests a shift from selling goods to providing services (e.g., leasing 'coolth' instead of selling air conditioners), which incentivizes manufacturers to create durable, upgradeable, and recyclable products.
• The text asserts that investing in natural capital is necessary to prevent global conflict and instability, as resource shortages in water, arable land, and fish are increasingly linked to regional tensions and refugee populations.

APA

RMI (n.d.). NATURAL CAPITALISM. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_NCchapter1.pdf

Chicago

RMI. NATURAL CAPITALISM. n.d. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_NCchapter1.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=RMI |title=NATURAL CAPITALISM |url=https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_NCchapter1.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{rmindnatural, author = {{RMI}}, title = {{NATURAL CAPITALISM}}, institution = {RMI}, url = {https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_NCchapter1.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }