Geology Reference
In-Depth Information
The U.N.'s System of Environmental-Economic Accounts (SEEA) follows a simi-
lar accounting structure to the SNA and applies the same concepts, definitions and
classifications in order to facilitate the integration of environmental and economic
statistics
9
. The way in which the statistics are universally organised permitting well
established procedures for their analysis is perhaps the greatest contribution of the
SEEA.
The SEEA is organised into three main parts: the Central Framework, Exper-
imental Ecosystem Accounts, and Extensions and Applications. In particular, the
former is intended to be a universal single measurement system providing informa-
tion on water, energy, minerals, timber, soil, land, ecosystems, pollution and waste
production, that is to say, the consumption of all things that create interactions
between society and Nature.
According to the Central Framework, which claims to facilitate the comprehen-
sion of data provided by scientists and economists and build a bridge between them,
an environmental asset can be defined as “the naturally occurring living and non-
living components of the Earth, together comprising the bio-physical environment
that may provide benefits to humanity”. Such assets are presented as both physical
and monetary data.
Sec. C.1 in the Appendix describes the SEEA methodology of mineral and energy
resource accounting. Briefly stated, it recommends SI units for the accounting of
solid wastes, wastewater, emissions to water, soil and air, dissipations in uses (such
as dispersion of fertilisers) and in losses (such as the abrasion in tyres), natural
residuals and finally water and energy losses in extraction, distribution, storage and
transformation (Fig. 2.1).
Energy and water flows are accounted in physical units from the cradle to the
grave. They, compared to their material counterparts, are much simpler to account.
This is because of the diverse nature of materials, insofar as they can be separated,
reacted and mixed together to produce new ones thus making physical flow tracing
di
cult.
The Economy-Wide Material Flow Accounts (EW-MFA) provide an aggregate
overview. These accounts, expressed in mass units, describe the material input-
output of a given economy and includes the environment and the rest of the world
as subsystems (Eurostat, 2001; OECD, 2008). Converting the units into money
permits, in theory, a comparison among different assets. The SEEA's preferred
approach of asset valuation is the use of market prices. “Strictly, market prices are
defined as amounts of money that willing buyers pay to acquire something from
willing sellers”.
The Central Framework recommends the Net Present Value (NPV) to estimate
market prices for non-market assets. This approach, also named the discounted
value of future returns, “uses projections of the future rate of extraction of the asset
together with projections of its price to generate a time series of expected returns”.
9
See http://unstats.un.org/unsd/envaccounting/seea.asp. Accessed Feb. 2012.
Search WWH ::
Custom Search