Progress is being made to decouple GDP and impacts on the environment.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) recently published the UK Environmental Accounts for 2016 and they paint a picture that shows we are heading in the right direction.
The accounts set out to measure: the contribution of the environment to the economy; the impact of economic activity on the environment; and society’s response to environmental issues. Data is available over a number of years for most of these. This is important because annual fluctuations in performance can often reflect changing economic or environmental conditions that can distort long-term trends, such as recessions and warm weather, which can affect energy consumption.
The key points are:
- energy intensity fell 40% between 1997 and 2014;
- total energy consumption was 9% lower in 2014 than in 1990, having peaked in 2005;
- fuel use decreased by 16.6% between 1990 and 2014, falling from 213.6 million tonnes of oil equivalent (Mtoe) to 178.1 Mtoe;
- resources consumed per person fell 30% between 2000 and 2014;
- UK GHG emissions were 35% below 1990 levels in 2014, and provisional figures show emissions fell a further 3% in 2015 (see also pp28–29);
- resource productivity (the total amount of materials used by the economy in relation to economic activity) increased by 65.9% between 2000 and 2014;
- there were reductions between 1990 and 2014 in acid rain precurers (72%) and emissions of lead (98%);
- UK government spending on environmental protection between 1997 and 2014 increased from £4.1bn to £15.4bn or 1.9% of total government expenditure; and
- low-carbon and renewable energy activities generated a turnover of more than £46bn and employed 238,500 FTE in 2014.
The report also includes a section on natural capital accounting, including carbon stock accounts, which highlight the importance of soil as a bio-carbon stock. Based on an evaluation of the value of ecosystem services as a whole, the overall asset value of UK woodland was £168bn in 2014, with the recognition that ‘the value of a tree left standing provides up to 30 times more in other services than it would provide if cut down for timber’.
