Can the planet support 11 billion people?

At the close of the 21st century, more than 11 billion people will inhabit this planet, according to the latest forecast from the United Nations’ population division. The forecast underlines President Obama’s assertion at the announcement of U.S. EPA’s Clean Power Plan: “We only get one home. We only get one planet. There’s no plan B.”

But while the number itself seems staggering, the real questions may lie in the unevenness of population growth: Where is the population growing the fastest? And which age groups will have the greatest population?

Read the full story at Scientific American.