Ecological Footprint and Carbon Accounting

The Ecological Footprint is a tool for measuring and communicating the intensity of human resource use and can be applied at a variety of scales from the individual, company, sector, city to country.  Ecological Footprinting accounts the use of the planet's renewable resources (its 'interest' rather than its 'capital').  Non-renewable resources are accounted for only by their impact on, or use of, renewable, bioproductive capacity.  The footprint is a 'snapshot' estimate of demand usually based on data from a single year.  The Ecological Footprint (demand) is compared with the global availability of resources (supply) and results are usually presented on a per capita basis using a standardised unit of area – the global hectare (gha).  The average amount of resources available per capita is known as an ‘earthshare’.  The footprint deals only with demands placed on the environment.  It does not attempt to include the social or economic dimensions of sustainability. 

SRI projects have combined MFA with the Ecological Footprint as it adds value to and complements the MFA approach by setting resource consumption into a sustainability context and communicating this information in a way that is easily understood by decision makers and the general public. 

Carbon accounting encompasses the measurement of carbon-equivalent (CO2-eq) emissions from economies, regions or organisations. Sometimes referred to as a Carbon Footprint, a range of methods are available for measuring both direct CO2-eq emissions and emissions that are indirectly linked to processes or activities, usually referred to as ‘embodied’ or ‘associated’ emissions. Recent methodological advances include the development of multi-regional input-output analysis as a means of estimating embedded emissions in imported products or services.