Archive:Environment statistics introduced

Latest update of text: June 2019

Planned article update: September 2020

Eurostat, in close partnership with the European Environment Agency, provides environmental statistics, accounts and indicators supporting the development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the European Union’s environmental policies, strategies and initiatives. Eurostat produces statistics and accounts on environmental pressures, impacts on the state and change of environmental quality and on the measures to avoid or mitigate impacts on the environment.

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European environmental accounts

Environmental accounts analyse the links between the environment and the economy by organising the environmental information in a way that is consistent with the accounting principles of national accounts. Environmental accounts can be used, for example, to identify: efficiency and productivity in use of natural resources and energy (carbon, materials, water, etc.); how circular is our economy, estimate environmental footprints; which are the most polluting activities or the ones that most deplete natural resources; what is the role of government and households; how expensive it is to protect the environment and who pays for it; growth and jobs in the environmental economy.

The environmental accounts methodology is based on the system of integrated environmental and economic accounting (SEEA 2012), published by the United Nations, the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund, the OECD and the World Bank.

The legal basis for European environmental accounts is Regulation (EU) No 691/2011 on European environmental economic accounts and its amendment in Regulation (EU) No 538/2014, which so far includes six modules, namely air emissions accounts, environmental taxes, material flow accounts, energy accounts, environmental protection expenditure and the environmental goods and services sector. In addition to the six mandatory modules, there are two voluntary environmental accounts on forests and environmental subsidies and similar transfers.

This legislation strengthens the coherence and availability of environmental accounts on an EU-wide basis by providing a legal framework for their compilation, including methodology, common standards, definitions, classifications and accounting rules.

Indicators derived from the environmental accounts are used to monitor EU progress towards a more resource efficient- and circular economy, to assess progress towards sustainable growth as defined by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and to follow the implementation of the 7th Environment Action Programme, as well as for analyses of Members States’ performance in the frame of the European Semester (e.g. indicators on resource productivity, Domestic Material Consumption, environmental taxes, etc.).

Sustainable development

Sustainable development has since long been at the heart of the European project and the EU Treaties give recognition to its economic, social and environmental dimensions that should be tackled together. The 2030 agenda for sustainable development, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2015, provides an opportunity for the EU’s own strategic orientation to be firmly anchored in the global effort to build a sustainable future. At the core of the 2030 agenda are 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) and 169 targets. The SDGs provide a useful framework for the EU's work on sustainable development and are closely linked to many of the EU's internal and external policies and the European Commission's 10 priorities, as shown by the European Commission Communication on 'Next steps for a sustainable European future: European action for sustainability' (COM (2016) 739).

The Communication also announces a detailed regular monitoring of the SDGs in an EU context from 2017 onwards. An EU SDG indicator set has been developed for this purpose, which includes several environmental indicators (see also the article on Statistics for European policies and high-priority initiatives), such as resource productivity (as an indicator for SDG 12 on responsible consumption and production) and greenhouse gas emissions trend (as an indicator for SDG 13 in climate action). Several other environmental indicators are used to monitor progress in relation to other SDGs such as SDG 6 on clean water and sanitation, SDG 7 on affordable and clean energy, SDG 14 on life below water, SDG 15 on life on land, etc.

The recent measures taken by the EU in relation to the Sustainable Development Goals are reviewed in the Commission reflection paper ‘Towards a sustainable Europe by 2030’. This paper launches a debate on further developing the EU’s sustainable development vision and the focus of sectoral policies after 2020, whilst preparing for the long term implementation of the SDGs.

The seventh EU environment action programme (7th EAP)

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 No 1386/2013/EU of the European Parliament and Council in November 2013 under the title ‘Living well, within the limits of our planet’; it guides the EU’s environment policy up to 2020. The programme draws on a number of recent strategic initiatives, including the resource efficiency roadmap, the biodiversity strategy and the low carbon economy roadmap. The programme is focused on nine priority objectives in three groups.

Key objectives:

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.

Enabling objectives:

better implementation of legislation
better information by improving the knowledge base;
more and wiser investment for environment and climate policy;
full integration of environmental requirements and considerations into other policies.

Horizontal (cross-cutting) objectives:

to make the EU's cities more sustainable;
to help the EU address international environmental and climate challenges more effectively.

Responsibility for achieving the programme’s goals will be shared by the EU and the Member States. Practical steps to be taken include phasing out environmentally harmful subsidies, shifting taxation from labour to pollution, drawing up partnership implementation agreements between Member States and the European Commission on the implementation of environmental laws, and developing a system for reporting and tracking environment-related expenditure in the EU budget.

The Commission’s evaluation of the 7th EAP covers achievements from 2014-2018 and focuses on progress made in environmental areas. The evaluation of this programme provides an analysis of the added value of a central framework with recommendations for more resources, dedicated monitoring and improved integration.

Eurostat’s statistics, accounts and indicators contribute to the implementation of the 7th EAP, playing a particularly important role under the enabling objectives.

Climate strategies

With its Roadmap for moving to a competitive low-carbon economy in 2050 (see COM (2011) 112), the European Commission has looked beyond short-term objectives and set out a pathway for achieving much deeper emission cuts by the middle of the century: by moving to a low-carbon society, the EU could be using around 30 % less energy in 2050 than it did in 2005. As steps towards the 2050 objectives, key climate and energy targets were specified in the 2020 climate and energy package.

In January 2014 the European Commission published a Communication on a policy framework for climate and energy in the period from 2020 to 2030 (COM (2014) 015 final). This included targets and policy objectives to help the EU achieve a more competitive, secure and sustainable energy system and to meet its long-term 2050 greenhouse gas reductions target. This 2030 climate and energy framework was adopted in October 2014 and comprises three targets for 2030 but targets for renewables and energy efficiency were revised upwards in 2018:

at least 40 % cut in greenhouse gas emissions (from 1990 levels);
at least a 32 % share for renewable energy;
at least 32.5 % improvement in energy efficiency.

The policies include:

a reformed EU emissions trading scheme (ETS);
new indicators for the competitiveness and security of the energy system
first ideas on a new governance system based on national plans for competitive, secure, and sustainable energy.

For the commitment period from 2021-2030, two new Regulations have been adopted recently;

Regulation on binding annual GHG emission targets by Member States for 2021-2030 for the sectors not regulated under the EU ETS, such as transport, agriculture and waste
Regulation on the inclusion of greenhouse gas emissions and removals from land use, land use change and forestry in the 2030 climate and energy framework. This includes binding commitments for each Member State to ensure that accounted emissions from land use are entirely compensated by an equivalent removal of CO₂ from the atmosphere through action in the sector.

In December 2015, a global agreement was reached at the 2015 United Nations’ climate change conference in Paris; the Paris Agreement entered into force on 4 November 2016. The agreement sets out an action plan to avoid dangerous climate change by limiting global warming to well below 2°C and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. The EU tracks its progress on cutting emissions through regular monitoring and reporting.

Eurostat works on improving the visibility and relevance of existing official statistics to support climate change analysis and reporting on greenhouse gas emissions. The dedicated section on climate change statistics brings together statistics from various domains in an easily accessible and structured way to help users better understand, analyse and monitor climate change. The Statistics Explained article 'Climate change - driving forces' explorers what is behind the changes in greenhouse gas emissions over time by analysing trends in official statistics on the underlying activities. In addition, greenhouse gas emission inventories are republished in Eurostat's database and related indicators are presented in various publications, for example the Europe 2020 and SDG monitoring reports. Eurostat is a member of the Conference of European Statisticians (CES) steering group and task force supporting the implementation of the CES Recommendations on climate change-related statistics.

Circular economy

In 2015, the European Commission adopted an ambitious Circular Economy Action Plan, which includes measures that will help stimulate Europe's transition towards a circular economy, boost global competitiveness, foster sustainable economic growth and generate new jobs. The circular economy is also instrumental in supporting the EU’s commitments on sustainability, as outlined in the Communication ‘Next steps for a sustainable European future’ and in particular to reach Sustainable Development Goal 12 'Responsible consumption and production'.

In 2018, the European Commission adopted a circular economy package including an EU strategy for plastics, an interface between chemical, product and waste lesgislation, a monitoring framework on progress towards a circular economy and a report on critical raw materials.

Eurostat maintains the monitoring framework. It shows the progress in four areas of the circular economy: production and consumption, waste management, secondary raw materials and competitiveness and innovation. The monitoring framework comprises 10 indicators.

Europe 2020 — Europe’s growth strategy

At the European Council meeting of 26 March 2010, EU leaders set out their plans for a Europe 2020 strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. The strategy includes three targets specifically related to the environment and climate change: greenhouse gas emissions 20 % lower than 1990; 20 % of energy from renewables by 2020; and a 20 % increase in energy efficiency by 2020. The key areas of the strategy are expressed in the form of five headline targets on EU level and additional seven flagship initiatives in order to drive progress towards the Europe 2020 goals. In 2014-2015, the Commission performed a mid-term review of Europe 2020 which showed that the strategy is still seen as an appropriate framework to promote jobs and growth.

Eurostat’s environment statistics and accounts accompany the Europe 2020 strategy and contribute to help monitor its success through a set of statistics and indicators, in particular for the areas of the sustainable use of natural resources and resource efficiency.

Initiatives for natural resources, water and waste

Eurostat maintains the environmental data centre on natural resources, which has a strong focus on statistics, accounts, indicators and information regarding resource efficiency and use of natural resources.

The European Commission Communication ‘A Blueprint to Safeguard Europe's Water Resources’ was endorsed by EU Member States in December 2012. This blueprint is intended to combine a stocktaking of the achievements of the Water Framework Directive with an analysis of policy needs in the water domain for the years to come.

Eurostat’s statistics on water quantities, together with data on water quality reported to the European Environment Agency, will help measure the success of this initiative.

The EU's approach to waste management is based on the 'waste hierarchy' which sets the following priority order when shaping waste policy and managing waste at the operational level: prevention, (preparing for) reuse, recycling, recovery and, as the least preferred option, disposal (which includes landfilling and incineration without energy recovery). The objectives and targets set in EU legislation have been key drivers to improve waste management, stimulate innovation in recycling, limit the use of landfilling, and create incentives to change consumer behaviour. Turning waste into a resource is one key to a circular economy.

Eurostat produces basic statistics and indicators for the EU’s waste policy. Since the Regulation (EU) No 849/2010 entered into force in 2010, the usability and policy relevance of waste statistics have increased. The revised legislative framework on waste has entered into force in July 2018. It sets clear targets for reduction of waste and establishes an ambitious and credible long-term path for waste management and recycling.

Eurostat’s environmental data centre on waste is the main source of data and background information on waste generation and management in the EU, presenting statistics for key waste streams by waste category and by economic activity and treatment method, such as recycling and disposal.