According to the Guardian article, the world's population currently consumes the equivalent of 1.6 planets a year – and, at the rate we're going, that will jump to two planets a year by 2030. But what does that mean, exactly?

Earth Overshoot Day, or Ecological Debt Day, refers to the "date on which humanity’s resource consumption for the year exceeds Earth’s capacity to regenerate those resources that year."  It's determined by the Global Footprint Network, a think tank that provides ecological footprint accounting services.

This year Earth Overshoot Day was August 13 – six days earlier than last year. That means that despite efforts to reduce resource depletion, global consumption continues to rise due to both population growth and increased consumptive behavior.

While industrialized countries have traditionally been responsible for the largest share of global consumption, this balance is shifting as the rest of the world develops. 

Experts believe that humans first began to exceed the planet's ability to regenerate resources in the 1970s. According to the Guardian, the UK alone "consumes around three times more than the equivalent level that ecosystems can renew."

In layman's terms, this means we're fishing more than the ocean's can replenish, we're harvesting more timber than trees can grow, and we're overtaxing farmland and we're releasing more carbon emissions than can be absorbed.