Transcript Slide 1

Is resource efficiency
slipping off the agenda?
Ariadna Rodrigo
Friends of the Earth Europe
November 2014
Overconsumption?
Global material consumption, 1980 - 2008
Source: Green economies around
the world? 2012, SERI
Absolute material consumption, 2008
Source: Green economies around the world? 2012, SERI
Like we should not focus only on GHGs…
...the focus should not be only on materials
Materials
Measuring Resource Use
Abiotic materials (incl. fossil fuels)
Biotic materials
Water
Land area
Greenhouse gas emissions
A container ship arrives in Felixstowe, UK
Should we consider the ‘rucksack’ of resources –
materials, land, water, greenhouse gas emissions-that
went into making these products?...
(Picture: Courtesy of the Port of Felixstowe)
The 4 footprints
Water footprint
Material footprint
Land footprint
Carbon footprint
The resource productivity indicator
(GDP/RMC)
Example: oil  biofuels
2nd generation
Materials
biotic
Water
Land
GHG
abiotic
?
Example: coal  wind
2nd generation
1st generation
Materials
biotic
abiotic
Water
Land
GHG
Conclusions
The EU needs to take the lead on resource use.
This would include:
Standardising and agreeing the four indicators
Publishing EU – and national – resource use figures
every year.
Develop resource use reduction targets for all
member states.
Creating new policies to reduce our resource use
Incorporating resource use into the impact
assessment of policy options
Thank you!
www.foeeurope.org/resources
[email protected]