Development of environmentally extended water use and water quality accounts

Environmental economic accounting provides insight into the links between the economy and the environment and a means for informed decision-making. One of the outcomes of the recently completed EXIOPOL project (http://www.feem-project.net/exiopol) was the creation of multi-regional, environmentally extended economic Supply and Use Tables (SUTs) for the entire world, with new detail in terms of sector and emission coverage. The follow-up project CREEA will update the economic SUTs and add physical SUTs.

The integration of regionalised water use and consumption data covering agriculture and electricity production, the two major consumers of freshwater, is a core element of the CREEA water accounts development. Linking water consumption data to a watershed-scale impact assessment method (Pfister et al 2009) will give the global water accounts a further dimension and enhance their effectiveness as a decision-making tool.

Accounting for changes in water quality is also being developed within the CREEA project, and degradative emissions to water are one aspect of this work. Thermal pollution from power plant cooling water emissions is a well-known environmental issue, and a global method, building upon the work of Verones et al (2010), is being developed for the environmental impact assessment of such waterborne thermal emissions. The integration of thermal emissions into the accounts, will also contribute to the understanding of energy flows from the environment into the economy, and back into the environment.