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Die Wirkungen von Stoffströmen sind abhängig von der umgesetzten Menge und den spezifischen Auswirkungen pro Mengeneinheit. Die Menge der Extraktion an Primärmaterial aus der Umwelt kann als vorsorgeorientierter Indikator für ein unspezifisches Umweltbelastungspotential herangezogen werden. Die Materialintensitäts-Analyse ermittelt den kumulierten Materialaufwand (=Material Input) nach fünf Hauptkategorien und setzt diesen in Beziehung zum gewünschten Nutzen (= pro Service-Einheit). Beispielhaft wird die Materialintensität verschiedener Systeme der Energieversorgung und des Wasser- und Abwassermanagements verglichen. Ein integriertes Ressourcenmanagement schließt bei einer umfassenden Systemsicht neben einer Minimierung des Ressourcenaufwandes auch die Verminderung kritischer Emissionen ein. Es erfordert ein sektorübergreifendes Stoffstrommanagement und die Berücksichtigung ökonomischer, technologischer, organisatorischer und sozialer Aspekte sowie der regionalen Besonderheiten. Ansätze hierzu werden vorgestellt.
A policy framework for sustainable resource management (SRM) is required both to guarantee the materials and energy supply of the EU economy and safeguard the natural resource basis in the future. Goals and strategies for sustaining the metabolism of the economy are described. Data are presented on the material throughput and physical growth of the EU's economy, on total material requirements (TMR), its composition, the decoupling from economic growth, and the increased shift to other regions. A first future target Material Flow Balance (t- MFB) of the EU is outlined. Detailed data reveal the "top ten" resource flows. Policy design for SRM should aim at an integrated and balanced approach along the material flow, comprising resource extraction, the product cycle and final waste disposal. Strategies and potential instruments to manage fossil fuels, metals and industrial minerals, construction minerals and excavation are discussed. Possible priorities and examples are given for target setting, focusing on limited expansion of built-up area, reduced use of non-renewables, increased resource productivity, and shift to sustainable cultivation of biomass.
Diese Studie untersucht den Zusammenhang zwischen Globalisierung, also der Zunahme der weltweiten Handelsverflechtungen, und ausgewählten ökologischen Implikationen unter besonderer Berücksichtigung von "Nord-Süd-Konstellationen". Obgleich der weltweite Handel sich Mitte der 90er Jahre deutlich vom Weltwirtschaftswachstum abgehoben hat und seitdem nahezu dreimal schneller ansteigt als das Weltsozialprodukt, steigen ausgewählte weltweite Umweltbelastungsindikatoren in Form von Energieverbrauch und CO2-Emissionen nicht in dem Maße an wie der Welthandel. Globalisierung führt offenbar nicht zu einem im gleichen Ausmaß ansteigenden globalen Umweltverbrauch. Im Rahmen einer derartigen Entkoppelung kann es jedoch hypothetisch zu Verlagerungen kommen. Derartige Verlagerungseffekte werden im vorliegenden Papier exemplarisch am Beispiel der globalen Stoffstromverflechtungen der Europäischen Union untersucht. Es zeigt sich, dass im Verlauf der Globalisierung die EU-Länder vermehrt Umweltbelastungen in die Länder des Südens verlagert haben, vor allem in Form von ökologischen Rucksäcken der Rohstoffimporte. Gleichzeitig wurde der Druck auf die inländische Umwelt in Form von Ressourcenabbauprozessen reduziert. Des Weiteren wurden vermehrt "umweltbelastungsintensive" Waren aus Schwellenländern und Entwicklungsländern importiert. Diese zeichnen sich durch emissionsseitige Umweltbelastungen in den jeweiligen Schwellenländern und Entwicklungsländern aus (industrielle Luft- und Wasseremissionen, Schwermetallemissionen). Dabei diente das verstärkt aus ausländischen Ressourcen gedeckte Materialaufkommen in der EU weniger dem inländischen Konsum; es wurde vor allem zur Herstellung von Gütern für den Export verwendet, und zeigt somit einen zunehmenden Beitrag der EU zum Ressourcenaufwand anderer Ökonomien an. Das Papier leitet ab, dass bei einer Strategie der Ressourcen-Produktivitätssteigerung in Industrieländern, die internationale Dimension unbedingt zu berücksichtigen ist. Längerfristig sollte der Ressourcenverbrauch der EU auch in absoluten Mengen vermindert werden. Dies wäre auch erforderlich, um die Umweltbelastungen durch Importe und Exporte zu vermindern.
This paper examines the connection between globalisation, with its growth in world trade links, and certain ecological effects especially concerning "North-South" relations. Although world trade in the mid-nineties was significantly uncoupled from growth trends in the world economy, so that since then it has increased nearly three times faster than the global GDP, certain indicators of energy use and CO2 emissions have not developed proportionately to world trade; globalisation evidently does not lead to a situation where pressures on the environment are increasing to the same extent worldwide. This de-linking may, however, result in the kind of shifts that we examine here with reference to the material trade flows of the European Union. It will be shown that, in the course of globalisation, the countries of the EU have increasingly shifted environmental burdens on to the countries of the South, especially in the form of ecological rucksacks of imported raw materials, while at the same time reducing the pressure on their own domestic environment by extracting fewer material resources. Furthermore, goods whose production places intensive pressure on the environment (industrial emissions into the atmosphere and water, heavy metal emissions, etc.) have been increasingly imported from newly industrializing or developing countries. The greater covering of material requirements from foreign resources has served not so much the EU's internal consumption as its own production of export goods; this shows that the EU has an increasing share in the resource requirement of other economies. The paper concludes that it is absolutely necessary to consider the international dimension in any strategy for more productive use of resources in industrial countries. In the long term, the EU's resource use should also be reduced in absolute terms. This will also be necessary in order to reduce the pressure on the environment due to imports and exports.
Objective of this study is to support the development of a Thematic Strategy for Sustainable Use and Management of Resources through the provision of background information, in particular "an estimate of materials and waste streams in the Community, including imports and exports" (Article 8 a 6th EAP) using the method of material flow accounting. It further presents first ideas on how the resource use pattern of the EU can be assessed with regards to priority setting for possible policy measures.
By referring to the concept of Industrial Metabolism, resources are defined in a broad sense, embracing the source and sink function of the natural environment, i.e. the provision of raw materials and land, and the absorption of residual materials (waste and emissions). Environmental impacts are associated not only with the extraction, harvesting and catching of raw materials but also with the subsequent production, use and disposal of products and goods. It is the total of environmental impacts associated with the entire life cycle of raw materials which has to be considered.
Three generic "management rules" for the sustainable use and management of renewable and non-renewable natural resources are presented and discussed which have been formulated by several political institutions based on scientific literature:
1. The use of renewable resources should not exceed their renewal and/or regeneration rates.
2. The use of non-renewable resources should not exceed the rate at which substitutes are developed (should be limited to levels at which they can either be replaced by physically or functionally equivalent renewable resources or at which consumption can be offset by increasing the productivity of renewable or non-renewable resources).
3. Outputs of substances to the environment (pollution) should not exceed the assimilative capacity of environmental media ("absorption capacities").
Policies for Sustainable Use and economy-wide Management of natural Resources (SUMR) throughout the production and consumption system are faced with environmental and socio-economic requirements and regulatory constraints. Based on empirical findings of ongoing trends of resource use, decoupling from economic growth, and transregional problem shifting, the paper outlines a potentially sustainable biophysical basis for production and consumption in the EU. It discusses the main challenges for the major resource groups, describing the specific and the common tasks with regard to biomass, fossil fuels, metals, non-metallic minerals. Adopting a medical metaphor, it suggests that policies for SUMR should follow a dual approach reflecting the long-term need for a main cure of the socio-industrial metabolism in form of a "conditioning" towards a more mature, resource efficient, and renewables based constitution on the one hand, and a fine tuning of selected material flows (e.g. for optimized recycling and control of hazardous compounds) on the other hand. Both strategies are deemed complementary and necessary to reduce environmental impacts and increase the utility of material use. Action required is exemplified with regard to the three pillars of SUMR, i.e. improved orientation, information and incentives.
The paper reviews the current knowledge on the use of biomass for non-food purposes, critically discusses its environmental sustainability implications, and describes the needs for further research, thus enabling a more balanced policy approach. The life-cylce wide impacts of the use of biomass for energy and material purposes derived from either direct crop harvest or residuals indicate that biomass based substitutes have a different, not always superior environmental performance than comparable fossil based products. Cascading use, i.e. when biomass is used for material products first and the energy content is recovered from the end-of-life products, tends to provide a higher environmental benefit than primary use as fuel. Due to limited global land resources, non-food biomass may only substitute for a certain share of non-renewables. If the demand for non-food biomass, especially fuel crops and its derivates, continues to grow this will inevitably lead to an expansion of global arable land at the expense of natural ecosystems such as savannas and tropical rain forests. Whereas the current aspirations and incentives to increase the use of non-food biomass are intended to counteract climate change and environmental degradation, they are thus bound to a high risk of problem shifting and may even lead to a global deterioration of the environment. Although the "balanced approach" of the European Union's biomass strategy may be deemed a good principle, the concrete targets and implementation measures in the Union and countries like Germany should be revisited. Likewise, countries like Brazil and Indonesia may revisit their strategies to use their natural resources for export or domestic purposes. Further research is needed to optimize the use of biomass within and between regions.
The Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy and the UNEP/Wuppertal Institute Collaborating Centre on Sustainable Consumption and Production (CSCP) set out to analyse Japanese dematerialisation and resource efficiency strategies within the 3R scope and searched for options of enhancing resource effi ciency strategies, commissioned by the German Federal Environment Agency. A further task of the project was to initiate a policy dialogue including stakeholders, academia, politics and Japanese and European environmental experts. The following paper summarises findings from the analyses, the results of the policy dialogues (Experts Workshop, 6 June 2007 and International Conference, 6 November 2007) and draws conclusions for a potential Japanese-European cooperation on the resource efficiency issue.
Vor dem Hintergrund des Klimawandels und der Verknappung fossiler Ressourcen haben nachwachsende Rohstoffe in den letzten Jahren an Bedeutung gewonnen. Insbesondere die Bioenergie hat durch staatliche Fördermaßnahmen viel Aufmerksamkeit erfahren. Mit der Ausweitung der energetischen Nutzung von Biomasse sollen Beiträge zum Klimaschutz durch die Vermeidung von Treibhausgasen geleistet, die Versorgungssicherheit soll durch Ersatz der knapper werdenden fossilen Ressourcen erhöht und der ländliche Raum gestärkt werden. Die selben Argumente lassen sich auch für die stoffliche Nutzung von Biomasse heranziehen. Auch wenn diese etwas aus dem Blickfeld der energiebezogenen Diskussion geraten ist, kann hier in den nächsten Jahren ein erhebliches Marktwachstum erwartet werden. Biomasse als erneuerbare Ressource kann in Land- und Forstwirtschaft aber nur begrenzt bereitgestellt werden. Dies gilt umso mehr, als bestimmte Nachhaltigkeits-Anforderungen eingehalten werden müssen. Der zu erwartenden Nachfragesteigerung für nachwachsende Rohstoffe (Nawaro) steht damit eine limitierte Verfügbarkeit entgegen. Aus dieser leitet sich die Forderung nach einer möglichst effizienten Verwertung ab. In diesem Zusammenhang fällt immer häufiger der Begriff der Kaskadennutzung von Nawaro als möglicher Lösungsansatz. Dieses Konzept kann im Wesentlichen als eine Hintereinanderschaltung von (mehrfacher) stofflicher und energetischer Nutzung desselben Rohstoffs gesehen werden und schafft so eine Verbindung von Material- und Energiesektor. Das Prinzip der Kaskadennutzung ist damit ein Ansatz zur Steigerung der Rohstoffeffizienz von nachwachsenden Rohstoffen und zur Optimierung der Flächennutzung. Das Ziel des vorliegenden Berichts ist es, die Option "Kaskadennutzung" strategisch, differenziert und ganzheitlich zu beleuchten. Im Rahmen der Projektarbeit sind daher Anforderungen an eine nachhaltige Kaskadennutzung von Nawaro abgeleitet und Schlussfolgerungen zu deren Ausgestaltung gezogen worden, um die Potenziale von Biomasse hochwertig und erfolgreich zu nutzen.
The physical dimension of international trade. Part 1: Direct global flows between 1962 and 2005
(2010)
The physical dimension of international trade is attaining increased importance. This article describes a method to calculate complete physical trade flows for all countries which report their trade to the UN. The method is based on the UN Comtrade database and it was used to calculate world-wide physical trade flows for all reporting countries in nine selected years between 1962 and 2005. The results show increasing global trade with global direct material trade flows reaching about 10 billion tonnes in 2005, corresponding to a physical trade volume of about 20 billion tonnes (adding both total imports and total exports). The share from European countries is declining, mainly in favour of Asian countries. The dominant traded commodity in physical units was fossil fuels, mainly oil. Physical trade balances were used to identify the dominant resource suppliers and demanders. Australia was the principal resource supplier over the period with a diverse material export structure. It was followed by mainly oil-exporting countries with varying volumes. As regards to regions, Latin America, south-east Asian islands and central Asia were big resource exporters, mostly with increasing absolute amounts of net exports. The largest net importers were Japan, the United States and single European countries. Emerging countries like the "Asian Tigers" with major industrial productive sectors are growing net importers, some of them to an even higher degree than European countries. Altogether, with the major exception of Australia and Canada, industrialized countries are net importers and developing countries and transition countries are net exporters, but there are important differences within these groups.
Development of scientific and technical foundations for a national waste prevention programme
(2010)
In a new waste hierarchy the amended EU Waste Framework Directive (WFD) (2008/98/EG) confirmed the prevention of waste as a priority measure to protect the environment with regard to the production and handling of waste. Amongst others the Member States are requested to promote waste prevention. According to article 29 par. 1 WFD the prevention measures have to be planned in terms of waste prevention programmes to be created by the Member States until December 12th 2013. These prevention programmes are to describe existing waste prevention measures and set waste prevention goals. The progress is to be monitored and assessed by targeting appropriate, specific qualitative or quantitative benchmarks for adopted waste prevention measures. The programmes may be included in waste management plans or other environmental programmes. By the objectives and measures of prevention programmes the environmental impacts associated with generation of waste shall be decoupled from economic growth.
As illustrated by the case studies of end-of-life vehicles and waste electric and electronic equipment, the approach of an extended producer responsibility is undermined by the exports of used and waste products. This fact causes severe deficits regarding circular flows, especially of critical raw materials such as platinum group metals. With regard to global recycling there seems to be a responsibility gap which leads somehow to open ends of waste flows and a loss or down-cycling of potential secondary resources. Existing product-orientated extended producer responsibility (EPR) approaches with mass-based recycling quotas do not create adequate incentives to supply waste materials containing precious metals to a high-quality recycling and should be amended by aspects of a material stewardship. The paper analyses incentive effects on EPR for the mentioned product groups and metals, resulting from existing regulations in Germany. It develops a proposal for an international covenant on metal recycling as a policy instrument for a governance-oriented framework to initiate systemic innovations along the complete value chain taking into account product group- and resource group-specific aspects on different spatial levels. It aims at the effective implementation of a central idea of EPR, the transition of a waste regime still focusing on safe disposal towards a sustainable management of resources for the complete lifecycle of products.
Concerns over climate change and the security of industrial feedstock supplies have been opening a growing market for biobased materials. This development, however, also presents a challenge to scientists, policy makers, and industry because the production of biobased materials requires land and is typically associated with adverse environmental effects. This article addresses the environmental impacts of biobased materials in a meta-analysis of 44 life cycle assessment (LCA) studies. The reviewed literature suggests that one metric ton (t) of biobased materials saves, relative to conventional materials, 55 ± 34 gigajoules of primary energy and 3 ± 1 t carbon dioxide equivalents of greenhouse gases. However, biobased materials may increase eutrophication by 5 ± 7 kilograms (kg) phosphate equivalents/t and stratospheric ozone depletion by 1.9 ± 1.8 kg nitrous oxide equivalents/t. Our findings are inconclusive with regard to acidification (savings of 2 ± 20 kg sulfur dioxide equivalents/t) and photochemical ozone formation (savings of 0.3 ± 2.4 kg ethene equivalents/t). The variability in the results of life cycle assessment studies highlights the difficulties in drawing general conclusions. Still, common to most biobased materials are impacts caused by the application of fertilizers and pesticides during industrial biomass cultivation. Additional land use impacts, such as the potential loss of biodiversity, soil carbon depletion, soil erosion, deforestation, as well as greenhouse gas emissions from indirect land use change are not quantified in this review. Clearly these impacts should be considered when evaluating the environmental performance of biobased materials.
Consumption of natural resources should not exceed sustainable levels. The increasing use of biofuels and to some extent biomaterials, on top of rising food and feed demands, is causing countries to use a growing amount of global land, which may lead to land use conflicts and the expansion of cropland and intensive cultivation at the expense of natural ecosystems. Selective product certification cannot control the land use change triggered by growing overall biomass consumption. We propose a comprehensive approach to account for the global land use of countries for their domestic consumption, and assess this level with regard to globally acceptable levels of resource use, based on the concept of safe operating space. It is shown that the European Union currently uses one-third more cropland than globally available on a per capita basis and that with constant consumption levels it would exceed its fair share of acceptable resource use in 2030. As the use of global forests to meet renewable energy targets is becoming a concern, an approach to account for sustainable levels of timber flows is also proposed, based on the use of net annual increment, exemplified with preliminary data for Switzerland. Altogether, our approach would integrate the concept of sustainable consumption into national resource management plans; offering a conceptual basis and concrete reference values for informed policy making and urging countries to monitor and adjust their levels of resource consumption in a comprehensive way, respectful of the limits of sustainable supply.
Global trade is increasingly being challenged by observations of growing burden shifting, in particular of environmental problems. This paper presents the first worldwide calculations of shifted burden based on material flow indicators, in particular direct and indirect physical trade balances. This study covers the period between 1962 and 2005 and includes between 82 and 173 countries per year. The results show that indirect trade flow volumes have increased to around 41 billion tonnes in 2005. The traded resources with the highest share of associated indirect flows are iron, hard coal, copper, tin and increasingly palm oil. Regarding the burden balance between regions, Europe is the biggest shifter whereas Australia and Latin America are the largest takers of environmental burden due to resource extraction. To evaluate the findings from a global perspective, the results are analysed in terms of resource flow induced environmental pressure related to a country's land area in terms of total and per capita area. Resource endowment and population density seem to be more relevant in determining the physical trade balance, including indirect flows, than income level.
This article presents the accounts of China's Total Material Requirement (TMR) during 1995–2008, which were compiled under the guidelines of Eurostat (2009) and with the Hidden Flow (HF) coefficients developed by the Wuppertal Institute. Subsequently, comparisons with previous studies are conducted. Using decomposition, we finally examine the influential factors that have changed the TMR of China. The main findings are the following: (1) During 1995–2008 China's TMR increased from 32.7 Gt to 57.0 Gt. Domestic extraction dominated China’s TMR, but a continuous decrease of its shares can be observed. In terms of material types, excavation constituted the biggest component of China's TMR, and a shift from biomass to metallic minerals is apparent; (2) Compared with two previous studies on China's TMR, the amounts of TMR in this study are similar to the others, whereas the amounts of the used part of TMR (Direct Material Input, DMI) are quite different as a result of following different guidelines; (3) Compared with developed countries, China's TMR per capita was much lower, but a continuous increase of this indicator can be observed; (4) Factors of Affluence (A) and Material Intensity (T), respectively, contributed the most to the increase and decrease of TMR, but the overall decrease effect is limited.
Die Bedeutung von Urban Mining nimmt zu, da das Wachstum der Technosphäre, insbesondere des Baubestandes abnimmt. In den kommenden Jahrzehnten wird in Deutschland regional differenziert ein Gleichgewicht zwischen Zu- und Rückbau erreicht werden. Dann wird ein erheblicher Teil des Materialbedarfs aus Recycling gedeckt werden können. Erste Kommunen wie die Stadt Zürich praktizieren ein integriertes Bestands- und Ressourcenmanagement. Auf nationaler Ebene laufen Untersuchungen zur Dynamik des Materiallagers. Die Entwicklung eines Informationssystems Urban Mining bedarf der Kooperation aller Beteiligten.
Carbon recycling, in which organic waste is recycled into chemical feedstock for material production, may provide benefits in resource efficiency and a more cyclical economy - but may also create "trade-offs" in increased impacts elsewhere. We investigate the system-wide environmental burdens and cost associated with carbon recycling routes capable of converting municipal solid waste (MSW) by gasification and Fischer-Tropsch synthesis into ethylene. Results are compared to business-as-usual (BAU) cases in which ethylene is derived from fossil resources and waste is either landfilled with methane and energy recovery (BAU#1) or incinerated (BAU#2) with energy recovery. Monte Carlo and sensitivity analysis is used to assess uncertainties of the results. Results indicate that carbon recycling may lead to a reduction in cumulative energy demand (CED), total material requirement (TMR), and acidification, when compared to BAU#1. Global warming potential is found to be similar or slightly lower than BAU#1 and BAU#2. In comparison to BAU#2, carbon recycling results in higher CED, TMR, acidification, and smog potential, mainly as a result of larger (fossil-based) energy offsets from energy recovery. However, if a renewable power mix (envisioned for the future) is assumed to be offset, BAU#2 impacts may be similar or higher than carbon recycling routes. Production cost per kilogram (kg) MSW-derived ethylene range between US$1.85 and US$2.06 (Jan 2011 US$). This compares to US$1.17 per kg for fossil-based ethylene. Waste-derived ethylene breaks even with its fossil-based counterpart at a tipping fee of roughly US$42 per metric ton of waste feedstock.
The current flow of carbon for the production, use, and waste management of polymer-based products is still mostly linear from the lithosphere to the atmosphere with rather low rates of material recycling. In view of a limited future supply of biomass, this article outlines the options to further develop carbon recycling (C-REC). The focus is on carbon dioxide (CO2) capture and use for synthesis of platform chemicals to produce polymers. CO2 may be captured from exhaust gases after combustion or fermentation of waste in order to establish a C-REC system within the technosphere. As a long-term option, an external C-REC system can be developed by capturing atmospheric CO2. A central role may be expected from renewable methane (or synthetic natural gas), which is increasingly being used for storage and transport of energy, but may also be used for renewable carbon supply for chemistry. The energy input for the C-REC processes can come from wind and solar systems, in particular, power for the production of hydrogen, which is combined with CO2 to produce various hydrocarbons. Most of the technological components for the system already exist, and, first modules for renewable fuel and polymer production systems are underway in Germany. This article outlines how the system may further develop over the medium to long term, from a piggy-back add-on flow system toward a self-carrying recycling system, which has the potential to provide the material and energy backbone of future societies. A critical bottleneck seems to be the capacity and costs of renewable energy supply, rather than the costs of carbon capture.
Ein sorgsamer Umgang mit natürlichen Ressourcen gehört zu den Kernthemen von Industrial Ecology. Mit der jeweiligen Betrachtungsebene, vom Unternehmen bis zur globalen Ebene, wechseln die Herausforderungen, Methoden und Lösungsansätze. Gibt es auch Indikatoren, die skalenübergreifend angewandt werden können?
Das Projekt "Ressourcenpolitik" (PolRess) begleitete die Debatte um die anspruchsvolle Ressourcenpolitik, zu der sich Deutschland verpflichtet hat, aus politikwissenschaftlicher, juristischer und ökonomischer Perspektive und setzte dabei auch selbst Impulse.
Der Abschlussbericht fasst Überlegungen des Projektteams für die Weiterentwicklung der Ressourcenpolitik zusammen. Darin heißt es unter anderem, dass das in der Nachhaltigkeitsstrategie erfasste Ziel der Bundesregierung, die Rohstoffproduktivität bis zum Jahr 2020 gegenüber 1994 zu verdoppeln, wohl nicht ohne drastische Maßnahmen (wie einem Ausstieg aus der Braunkohle) erreicht werden kann. Da das hiesige und derzeitige Niveau der Materialnutzung weder global verallgemeinerbar noch langfristig tragfähig ist, müsste die abiotische Materialnutzung Deutschlands (einschließlich der ungenutzten Entnahmen) um bis zu 80 Prozent bis 2050 reduziert werden.
Many countries have started to develop policy programs for the sustainable use of natural resources. Indicators and targets can cover both a territorial and a life-cycle-wide global perspective. This article focuses on how a safe operating space for global material resource use can be outlined based on existing economy-wide material flow indicators. It reflects on issues such as scale and systems perspective, as the choice of indicators determines the target "valves" of the socio-industrial metabolism. It considers environmental pressures and social aspects of safe and fair resource use. Existing proposals for resource consumption targets are reviewed, partially revisited, and taken as a basis to outline potential target values for a safe operating space for the extraction and use of minerals and biomass by final consumption. A potential sustainability corridor is derived with the Total Material Consumption of abiotic resources ranging from 6 to 12 t/person, the Total Material Consumption of biotic resources not exceeding 2 t/person, and the Raw Material Consumption of used biotic and abiotic materials ranging from 3 to 6 t/person until 2050. For policy, a "10-2-5 target triplet" can provide orientation, when the three indicators are assigned values of 10, 2, and 5 t/person, respectively.
Im Auftrag des Bundesforschungsministeriums hat das Wuppertal Institut eine Studie zur systemischen Betrachtung und Modellierung der Bioökonomie erstellt. Sie zeigt Wege auf, die komplexen sozio-ökonomischen Zusammenhänge und Umweltauswirkungen der Bioökonomie zu erfassen und soll als Grundlage für den Aufbau eines kontinuierlichen Monitorings dienen. Die Autor(inn)en erfassten Indikatoren und Modellierungsmethoden mit Bezug zur Bioökonomie und weisen auf bestehende Lücken hin: Diese finden sich vor allem bei der Erfassung neuer technologiegetriebener Sektoren, der systemischen Betrachtung eines nachhaltigen Konsums und bei der Modellierung der Zusammenhänge zwischen Innovationen, Wirtschaftswachstum und Ressourcenverbrauch (insbesondere die Landnutzung).
Zur Umsetzung eines systemischen Monitorings empfiehlt die Studie das folgende Vorgehen: Unter Zuhilfenahme des DPSIR-Konzeptes (Analyse von Wirkungsbeziehungen nach Driving forces, Pressures, States, Impacts und Responses) sollten Schlüsselindikatoren und Nachhaltigkeitsziele in einem Indikatoren-"Dashboard" zusammengeführt werden. Benötigt wird zudem ein Werkzeugkasten von Methoden, der vor allem integrierte Analyse- und Bewertungsmodelle sowie ein systemisch konzipiertes Metamodell umfasst.
The CO2 utilisation is discussed as one of the future low-carbon technologies in order to accomplish a full decarbonisation in the energy intensive industry. CO2 is separated from the flue gas stream of power plants or industrial plants and is prepared for further processing as raw material. CO2 containing gas streams from industrial processes exhibit a higher concentration of CO2 than flue gases from power plants; consequentially, industrial CO2 sources are used as raw material for the chemical industry and for the synthesis of fuel on the output side. Additionally, fossil resources can be replaced by substitutes of reused CO2 on the input side. If set up in a right way, this step into a CO2-based circular flow economy could make a contribution to the decarbonisation of the industrial sector and according to the adjusted potential, even rudimentarily to the energy sector.
In this study, the authors analyse potential CO2 sources, the potential demand and the range of applications of CO2. In the last chapter of the final report, they give recommendations for research, development, politics and economics for an appropriate future designing of CO2 utilisation options based upon their previous analysis.
The paper reflects the hypothesis that those technological and institutional innovations survive which extend the safe operating range (SOR) of the Humans-Technologies-Institutions (HTI) system (e.g. companies, cities, regions and countries). The multidimensional SOR of a country comprises in particular safe livelihood, quality of life, security, monetary stability, supply security and quality of the environment. A "mechanism of progress" is described involving the search for higher safety and independence of constraints. With innovation and learning in a key role, the mechanism leads to a relative decoupling of resource use and economic value added and a growing share of knowledge generation in the economy. Competition of HTI systems for scarce resources may lead to independence strategies such as enhanced resource efficiency. It may also lead to cooperation of competing HTI systems facilitated by new institutions thus forming an HTI system at higher level of complexity. While the consortium could coordinate their resource consumption within the boundaries of safe operating space, the partner HTI systems would further expand their SOR. Data is provided that net resource importing countries have developed higher material productivity thus increasing their independence from resource supply, and countries with such capability have gained higher innovation capacity.
The bioeconomy is gaining growing attention as a perceived win-win strategy for environment and economy in the EU. However, the EU already has a disproportionately high global cropland footprint compared to the world average, and uses more cropland than domestically available to supply its demand for agricultural products. There is a risk that uncontrolled growth of the bioeconomy will increase land use pressures abroad. For that reason, a monitoring system is needed to account for the global land use of European consumption. The aim of this paper is to take a closer look at the tools needed to monitor global cropland footprints, as well as the targets needed to benchmark development. This paper reviews recent developments in land footprint accounting approaches and applies the method of global land use accounting to calculate the global cropland footprint of the EU-27 for the years between 2000 and 2011. It finds a slight decrease in per capita cropland footprints over the past decade (of around 1% annually, reaching 0.29 ha/cap in 2011) and advocates promoting a further decrease in per capita cropland requirements (of around 2% annually) to reach global land use targets for keeping consumption within the safe operating space of planetary boundaries by 2030. It argues that strategic land reduction targets may still go hand in hand with the growth of a smart, innovative and sustainable bioeconomy by reinforcing the need for policies that support greater efficiency across the life-cycle and reduce wasteful and excessive consumption practices. Recommendations for further improving land footprint accounting are given.
In a globalized economy, the use of natural resources is determined by the demand of modern production and consumption systems, and by infrastructure development. Sustainable natural resource use will require good governance and management based on sound scientific information, data and indicators. There is a rich literature on natural resource management, yet the national and global scale and macro-economic policy making has been underrepresented. We provide an overview of the scholarly literature on multi-scale governance of natural resources, focusing on the information required by relevant actors from local to global scale. Global natural resource use is largely determined by national, regional, and local policies. We observe that in recent decades, the development of public policies of natural resource use has been fostered by an "inspiration cycle" between the research, policy and statistics community, fostering social learning. Effective natural resource policies require adequate monitoring tools, in particular indicators for the use of materials, energy, land, and water as well as waste and GHG emissions of national economies. We summarize the state-of-the-art of the application of accounting methods and data sources for national material flow accounts and indicators, including territorial and product-life-cycle based approaches. We show how accounts on natural resource use can inform the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and argue that information on natural resource use, and in particular footprint indicators, will be indispensable for a consistent implementation of the SDGs. We recognize that improving the knowledge base for global natural resource use will require further institutional development including at national and international levels, for which we outline options.
Renewable energy targets in the European Union (EU) have raised the demand for timber and are expected to increase dependence on imports. However, EU timber consumption levels are already disproportionally high compared to the rest of the world. The question is, how much timber is available for the EU to sustainably harvest and import, in particular considering sustainable forest management practices, a safe operating space for land-system change, and the global distribution of "common good" resources. This article approaches this question from a supply angle to develop a reference value range for the current as well as future sustainable supply of timber at the EU-27 and global levels. For current supply estimates, national-level data on forest area available for wood supply, productivity in that area, as well as the rate available for harvest were collected and aggregated into three potential supply scenarios. For future supply estimates, a safe operating space scenario halting land use change, a sensitivity analysis, and a literature review were performed. To provide both a comparison of global versus EU sustainable supply capacities and to develop a benchmark toward evaluating and comparing levels of consumption to sustainable supply capacities, per capita calculations were made. Results revealed that the per capita sustainable supply potential of EU forests is estimated to be around three times higher than the global average in 2050. Whether a global or EU reference value is more appropriate for EU policy orientation, considering both strengthened economic and cultural ties to the forest in forest-rich countries as well as the need to prevent problem shifting associated with exporting land demands abroad, is discussed. Further research is needed to strengthen and harmonize data, improve methods for modeling future scenarios and incorporate interdisciplinary and multi-stakeholder perspectives toward the development of robust and politically relevant reference values for sustainable consumption levels.
The growing demand for wood to meet EU renewable energy targets has increasingly come under scrutiny for potentially increasing EU import dependence and inducing land use change abroad, with associated impacts on the climate and biodiversity. This article builds on research accounting for levels of primary timber consumption - e.g., toward forest footprints - and developing reference values for benchmarking sustainability - e.g., toward land use targets - in order to improve systemic monitoring of timber and forest use. Specifically, it looks at future trends to assess how current EU policy may impact forests at an EU and global scale. Future demand scenarios are based on projections derived and adapted from the literature to depict developments under different scenario assumptions. Results reveal that by 2030, EU consumption levels on a per capita basis are estimated to be increasingly disproportionate compared to the rest of the world. EU consumption scenarios based on meeting around a 40% share of the EU renewable energy targets with timber would overshoot both the EU and global reference value range for sustainable supply capacities in 2030. Overall, findings support literature pointing to an increased risk of problem shifting relating to both how much and where timber needed for meeting renewable energy targets is sourced. It is argued that a sustainable level of timber consumption should be characterized by balance between supply (what the forest can provide on a sustainable basis) and demand (how much is used on a per capita basis, considering the concept of fair shares). To this end, future research should close data gaps, increase methodological robustness and address the socio-political legitimacy of the safe operating space concept towards targets in the future. A re-use of timber within the economy should be supported to increase supply options.