Archive:Enlargement countries - environment statistics

Data extracted in September 2016. Most recent data: Further Eurostat information, Main tables and Database. Planned article update: October 2017.

This article is part of an online publication and provides information on a range of statistics related to the environment for the enlargement countries, in other words the candidate countries and potential candidates. Montenegro, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Albania, Serbia and Turkey currently have candidate country status, while Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo ^[1] are potential candidates.

This article provides some information in relation to climate change, waste and water, presenting indicators such as the level of greenhouse gas emissions, municipal waste collected and treated, and water abstraction.

Figure 1: Development of total greenhouse gas emissions, 2004–2014 (¹)
(2004 = 100; based on CO₂ equivalents)
Source: Eurostat (env_air_gge) and (cpc_encliwa)

Figure 2: Development of carbon dioxide emissions, 2003–2013 (¹)
(2003 = 100)
Source: Eurostat (env_ac_ainah_r1) and (env_ac_ainah_r2) and enlargement data collection

Figure 3: Quantity of municipal waste generated, 2010 and 2015 (¹)
(kilograms per inhabitant)
Source: Eurostat (env_wasmun) and enlargement data collection

Table 1: Quantity of waste collected, 2010 and 2015
(kilograms per inhabitant)
Source: Eurostat (env_wasmun) and (cpc_encliwa)

Figure 4: Proportion of households served by municipal waste collection services, 2010 and 2015 (¹)
(%)
Source: Eurostat (env_wasmun) and (cpc_encliwa)Source: Eurostat enlargement data collection

Figure 5: Total freshwater abstraction as a share of available resources, 2010 and 2015 (¹)
(%)
Source: Eurostat (env_wasmun) and (cpc_encliwa)Source: Eurostat enlargement data collection

Figure 6: Proportion of population connected to urban wastewater treatment, 2010 and 2015 (¹)
(%)
Source: Eurostat (env_wasmun) and (cpc_encliwa)Source: Eurostat enlargement data collection

Main statistical findings

Greenhouse gas and carbon dioxide emissions

The gases considered in this article as greenhouse gases are carbon dioxide (CO₂), nitrous oxide (N₂O), methane (CH₄), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and sulphur hexafluoride (SF₆). The indicator in Figure 1 shows the combined trend in emissions of these gases. The basic data are annual emissions estimated and reported according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) guidelines.

The index for total greenhouse gas emissions in the EU-28 was relatively stable until 2006, with progressively larger falls in 2007, 2008 and 2009, in large part related to the global financial and economic crisis and the associated reduction in levels of industrial activity. In 2010, greenhouse gas emissions picked up again, reflecting a rebound in economic activity, but in the next four years the quantity of greenhouse gas emissions continued its downward trend; by 2014, the index was 18.5 % lower than it had been in 2004.

The time series for Turkey shows an increase in greenhouse gas emissions through to 2007, falls in 2008 and 2009 — therefore also during the crisis — before increases again through to 2012; the value for 2013 shows a slight fall compared with the previous year, but this was followed by an increase in 2014 resulting in an overall increase of 28.3 % compared with 2004. The time series for Albania and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia are shorter, running until 2009. These both show a rather inconsistent development, with neither increases nor decreases dominating. Like the EU-28, Montenegro recorded an overall decline in greenhouse gas emissions after 2004 (time series available until 2013), with a particularly strong fall in 2009, reflecting the large fall in industrial output observed in Montenegro during the crisis.

Carbon dioxide is one of the greenhouse gases: while it has the lowest global warming potential of the six greenhouse gases, emissions of this gas in the EU-28 were considerably higher than for any of the other greenhouse gases such that, even when adjusted for global warming potential, emissions of carbon dioxide were far greater than for any of the other greenhouse gases. As a consequence, the developments shown in Figure 2 for the EU-28 and Turkey reflect to a large extent those seen in Figure 1. For Montenegro, emissions of carbon dioxide were relatively stable from 2003 until 2007, after which their development became more volatile, with a sharp increase in 2008 followed by an even sharper decrease in 2009 coinciding with the crisis and a strong rebound in 2010.

Municipal waste

Municipal waste is mainly produced by households, though similar wastes from sources such as distributive trades, offices and public institutions are included; waste from agriculture and from industry is excluded from this indicator. The amount of municipal waste generated consists of waste collected by or on behalf of municipal authorities and disposed of through the waste management system. For areas not covered by a municipal waste collection scheme the reporting countries estimate the amount of waste generated.

In 2014, the average amount of municipal waste generated per inhabitant in the EU-28 was 474 kilograms (kg), in other words, just under half a tonne. This represented a fall of about 30 kg in the quantity of waste generated in the EU-28 since 2010. Among the enlargement countries, the average quantity of municipal waste ranged from 260 kg per inhabitant in Serbia to 402 kg per inhabitant in Turkey (2014 data), with Montenegro (541 kg per inhabitant) above this range (and also above the EU-28 average) and Kosovo (140 kg per inhabitant; 2014 data) below this range (see Figure 3). The quantity of municipal waste generated per inhabitant increased in Bosnia and Herzegovina (2010–2014) and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (2010–2013), while it fell elsewhere between the years shown in Figure 3 (subject to data availability).

Waste can be treated in a number of ways, most notably by landfill, incineration (with or without energy recovery) and recovery (for example, material recycling and composting). For the enlargement countries data are collected for two types of treatment, landfill and incineration and in practice landfill is the dominant form of treatment as can be seen from Table 1. In the EU-28, just over one quarter of collected waste was destined for each of landfill (27.8 %) and incineration (26.8 %) in 2014.

The proportion of households from which household waste is regularly collected by or on behalf of municipal authorities was quite similar across the enlargement countries, ranging from 73 % (2013 data) in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to 82 % (2015 data) in Serbia, with the proportion in Turkey (91 %; 2014 data) above this range and in Kosovo (65 %; 2014 data) below this range. In most of the enlargement countries, the proportion of households from which waste was regularly collected was stable or increased between the years shown in Figure 4.

Water and wastewater

Freshwater abstraction as a percentage of available resources (as shown in Figure 5) is based on the resources available over the long term, a minimum of 20 years. For the two candidate countries for which data are available, this ratio ranged from just 2.5 % in Serbia in 2015 to 18.8 % in Turkey in 2014. Between 2010 and 2014, Turkey recorded a decrease in the relative importance of freshwater abstraction, as its share of available resources fell by 1.2 percentage points; by contrast, Serbia recorded an increase of 0.9 percentage points between 2010 and 2015.

In each of the five enlargement countries shown in Figure 6 the proportion of the population connected to urban wastewater treatment systems (with at least secondary treatment) was relatively low, only standing above one half (54 %) in Albania in 2014. However, the share of the population connected to urban wastewater treatment systems increased in the four enlargement countries for which a comparison is available.

Data sources and availability

Data for the enlargement countries are collected for a wide range of indicators each year through a questionnaire that is sent by Eurostat to partner countries which have either the status of candidate countries or potential candidates. A network of contacts in each country has been established for updating these questionnaires, generally within the national statistical offices, but potentially including representatives of other data-producing organisations (for example, central banks or government ministries). The statistics shown in this article are made available free-of-charge on Eurostat’s website, together with other socio-economic indicators collected as part of this initiative.

Eurostat, in close partnership with the European Environment Agency (EEA), provides environmental statistics, accounts and indicators supporting the development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the EU’s environmental policies, strategies and initiatives. Data on greenhouse gas emissions as reported under the United Nations framework convention on climate change (UNFCCC) are collected by the EEA. Eurostat collects official statistics in relation to a broad selection of subject areas, for example, waste, water, material flows and environmental protection expenditure.

The Kyoto Protocol, an environmental agreement adopted by many of the parties to the UNFCCC in 1997 to curb global warming, covers six greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O), which are non-fluorinated gases, and hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and sulphur hexafluoride (SF6), which are fluorinated gases. Converting them to carbon dioxide equivalents makes it possible to compare them and to determine their individual and total contributions to global warming. A new agreement on greenhouse gas emissions was reached in Paris in late 2015; this provides the basis for emissions mitigation and adaptation from 2020 onwards.

Eurostat’s data on waste is collected from EU Member States on the basis of a Regulation on waste statistics (2150/2002/EC) and is published every two years in line with common methodological recommendations. Landfill is the deposit of waste into or onto land; it includes specially engineered landfill sites and temporary storage of over one year on permanent sites. The definition covers both landfill in internal sites, in other words, where a generator of waste is carrying out its own waste disposal at the place of generation, and in external sites.

Tables in this article use the following notation:

Value in italics	data value is forecasted, provisional or estimated and is therefore likely to change;
:	not available, confidential or unreliable value.

Context

The key objectives of the EU’s environmental policy are:

to protect, conserve and enhance the EU’s natural capital;
to turn the EU into a resource-efficient, green, and competitive low-carbon economy;
to safeguard the EU's citizens from environment-related pressures and risks to health and well-being.

The Europe 2020 strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth was adopted in 2010. One of its flagship initiatives concerns resource-efficient Europe, while there are three specific targets related to the environment and climate change to be achieved by 2020, namely:

greenhouse gas emissions should fall to 20 % lower than in 1990;
20 % of the energy used in the EU should be from renewables; and
there should be a 20 % increase in energy efficiency.

Environment action programmes have guided the development of the EU’s environment policy since the early 1970s. The current EU environment action programme — referred to as the 7th EAP — was adopted by Decision 1386/2013 of the European Parliament and Council in November 2013 under the title ‘Living well, within the limits of our planet’.

While basic principles and institutional frameworks for producing statistics are already in place, the enlargement countries are expected to increase progressively the volume and quality of their data and to transmit these data to Eurostat in the context of the EU enlargement process. EU standards in the field of statistics require the existence of a statistical infrastructure based on principles such as professional independence, impartiality, relevance, confidentiality of individual data and easy access to official statistics; they cover methodology, classifications and standards for production.

Eurostat has the responsibility to ensure that statistical production of the enlargement countries complies with the EU acquis in the field of statistics. To do so, Eurostat supports the national statistical offices and other producers of official statistics through a range of initiatives, such as pilot surveys, training courses, traineeships, study visits, workshops and seminars, and participation in meetings within the European statistical system (ESS). The ultimate goal is the provision of harmonised, high-quality data that conforms to European and international standards.

Additional information on statistical cooperation with the enlargement countries is provided here.

Further Eurostat information

Publications

Basic figures on enlargement countries — 2016 edition
Basic figures on enlargement countries — 2015 edition
Key figures on the enlargement countries — 2014 edition
Energy, transport and environment indicators — 2015 edition

Database

Candidate countries and potential candidates (cpc), see:

Environment and energy (cpc_en)

Candidate countries and potential candidates: climate change and waste (cpc_enclimwa)

Air emission inventories (source: EEA) (env_air_ai), see:

Greenhouse gas emissions by source sector (source: EEA) (env_air_gge)

Air emission accounts (env_air_aa), see:

Air emissions accounts by NACE Rev. 2 activity (env_ac_ainah_r2)

Air emissions accounts by NACE Rev. 1.1 activity (env_ac_ainah_r1)

Waste (env_was), see:

Waste streams (env_wasst)

Municipal waste (env_wasmun)

Dedicated section

Methodology / Metadata

Candidate countries and potential candidates (cpc) (ESMS metadata file — cpc_esms)
Greenhouse gas emissions by source sector (source: EEA) (ESMS metadata file — env_air_gge)
Air emissions accounts by industry and households (NACE Rev. 2) (ESMS metadata file — env_ac_ainah_r2)
Municipal waste (ESMS metadata file — env_wasmun)

Source data for tables and figures (MS Excel)

Enlargement countries — environment: tables and figures

External links

Notes

↑ This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo Declaration of Independence.

[1] This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo Declaration of Independence.

[1]