Resource-use indicators seen as first step to efficiency

EurActiv - Resource efficiency is one of the flagship initiatives of the 'Europe 2020' strategy for economic growth. Stakeholders stressed the need to establish coherent and clear indicators to evaluate the bloc's use of resources and progress made towards a more eco-efficient economy...But the main issue is figuring out how to measure resource use, said Pietikinen, who is also chair of GLOBE EU, a cross-party group of MEPs interested in shaping EU policy developments in the fields of the environment, sustainability and global warming.


'What gets measured gets done'

Michael Warhurst from Friends of the Earth Europe (FoEE), an NGO, stressed that measuring is the first step towards decreasing resource use and becoming a more efficient economy.

What gets measured gets attention and eventually gets done, agreed Stephan Evans, professor of life-cycle engineering at Cranfield University.

Evans noted that while businesses can easily measure the amount of waste or CO2 they produce, companies are unable to measure their resource use. He stressed that they need fair, clear and long-lasting indicators and tools to measure their resource use to ascertain whether they are successfully embarking on a more sustainable path.

Evans also argued that business wants legislation and high standards on the matter in order to create a legislative level playing field. Unless all companies are given the same tools they will not do anything to improve their resource use, he warned.

But greening production is not only an issue for internal company management but also a matter of consumer demand, Evans continued. He argued that if resource use is properly valued by consumers, businesses will quickly begin to pay attention to it.

Imported resources

FoEE's Warhurst stressed that the EU's resource use is important not only for Europe, but also for the rest of the world.

He said imports should also be considered when talking about resource use. For example, a country's total CO2 emissions or water consumption increases if the amount of imported goods is taken into account in the calculations.

According to Stefan Giljum, a researcher at the Sustainable Europe Research Institute (SERI) in Vienna, the EU has virtual and actual agricultural land. In total, EU net imports of virtual farmland total 15 million hectares, as the bloc imports 33 million hectares and exports 18 million hectares.

Tim Rice, biofuel policy officer at Actionaid, noted that EU companies have already acquired some five million hectares of African land - equivalent to the size of Denmark - for biofuel production. However, he argued that if the EU wants to use biofuels, it needs to bring production home and match its energy needs with sustainable local biofuel production.

How to measure EU resource use?

Referring to a June 2009 publication by SERI on measuring Europe's resource use, Stefan Giljum said that resource use measurement needs to fulfill ten key criteria.

Related indicators should provide a solid basis for policy-making and cover all relevant resource categories, for example. They should also enable their universal application including reasonable, possibly varying scales and time periods. According to SERI's Giljum, the indicator should also integrate the issues of equity and social justice in the measurement.

The SERI indicators cover four different resource-use categories appropriated for production or product use: materials - both biotic and abiotic, such as fossil fuels - water, land use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

While GHG emissions are not a resource and thus not a standard category of resource use, it was included in the categories because GHGs are on the top of the political agenda, Giljum said.

The indicators can then be brought down to product level to measure a product's land use, water or carbon footprint.

According to Giljum, the SERI indicators represent a good starting point for a comprehensive resource-use measurement in the EU, as they also analyse the trade-offs between different resource categories and thus identify real solutions instead of merely shifting the burden between resources.