173
Embracing and merging of data, metrics and methods from different disciplines is
needed to address the fundamental questions of how a transition to sustainability can
be achieved. Industrial ecology research greatly benefi ts from such an extension of
its portfolio. After all, humans are part of the ‘ecology’ of industrial systems. Issues
such as income inequality are of concern to both social and ecological sustainability
(Alsamawi et al. 2014b ). It is therefore important that socio-economic issues such as
employment, wages, income inequality, occupational health, bad labour conditions,
slavery, war casualties, etc. are monitored alongside environmental indicators.
It is to be hoped that the joint analysis of data from different fi elds supports a
similar cooperation across different disciplines. The complexity of the sustainability challenge requires inter- and transdisciplinary solutions.
3.2 Assessing Actual Impacts and Their Unsustainability
As mentioned previously, most of the indicators described in this chapter represent
pressures rather than impacts in the strict sense defi ned by LCA. Most footprint
indicators (and consumption-based accounting studies) are designed to portray indirect pressures (Hoekstra and Wiedmann 2014 ), but there are recent attempts to
introduce (environmental) impact assessment in footprint analysis.
This is perhaps most prominently the case for water footprinting where it has
been argued that the scarcity of water needs to be incorporated into the metric
(Chenoweth et al. 2014 ; ISO 2014 ; Kounina et al. 2013 ; Ridoutt and Pfi ster 2010 ).
Some recent studies related to trade weight water use with data on water scarcity
(e.g. Lenzen et al. 2013 ; Orlowsky et al. 2014 ).
A similar case can be made for the material footprint which sums up the mass of
different raw materials into one number, thus refl ecting an unweighted physical
measure of pressure and potential impact (Wiedmann et al. 2015 ). Weighting
according to actual environmental impacts has not been tried yet and is diffi cult,
because different materials have different impacts, one material may have several
impacts and characterisation data and models for localised impacts are not yet well
developed. However, preliminary attempts of weighting resource footprints based
on resource depletion have been presented (Fang and Heijungs 2014a ).
Yet, there remains value in reporting footprints based on pressures alone. The
pure mass or volume of resource use is practical information that relates to physical
reality, i.e. how much actually is fl owing. It allows, for example, to address questions
of allocation of limited supplies or security of supply and sustainability of overall
production and consumption. The ultimate goal of footprint accounting in general
(and the assessment of impacts embodied in trade specifi cally) should be an evaluation of whether or not particular activities are sustainable (Fang and Heijungs 2014b ).
Environmental footprints measure human appropriation of natural resources and
need to be interpreted in the context of maximum sustainable levels at the local and
the global scale (Hoekstra and Wiedmann 2014 ). Exactly how high the sustainable
thresholds of earth systems are is the subject of intense research (Steffen et al. 2015 ).
8 Impacts Embodied in Global Trade Flows
Embracing and merging of data, metrics and methods from different disciplines is
needed to address the fundamental questions of how a transition to sustainability can
be achieved. Industrial ecology research greatly benefi ts from such an extension of
its portfolio. After all, humans are part of the ‘ecology’ of industrial systems. Issues
such as income inequality are of concern to both social and ecological sustainability
(Alsamawi et al. 2014b ). It is therefore important that socio-economic issues such as
employment, wages, income inequality, occupational health, bad labour conditions,
slavery, war casualties, etc. are monitored alongside environmental indicators.
It is to be hoped that the joint analysis of data from different fi elds supports a
similar cooperation across different disciplines. The complexity of the sustainability challenge requires inter- and transdisciplinary solutions.
3.2 Assessing Actual Impacts and Their Unsustainability
As mentioned previously, most of the indicators described in this chapter represent
pressures rather than impacts in the strict sense defi ned by LCA. Most footprint
indicators (and consumption-based accounting studies) are designed to portray indirect pressures (Hoekstra and Wiedmann 2014 ), but there are recent attempts to
introduce (environmental) impact assessment in footprint analysis.
This is perhaps most prominently the case for water footprinting where it has
been argued that the scarcity of water needs to be incorporated into the metric
(Chenoweth et al. 2014 ; ISO 2014 ; Kounina et al. 2013 ; Ridoutt and Pfi ster 2010 ).
Some recent studies related to trade weight water use with data on water scarcity
(e.g. Lenzen et al. 2013 ; Orlowsky et al. 2014 ).
A similar case can be made for the material footprint which sums up the mass of
different raw materials into one number, thus refl ecting an unweighted physical
measure of pressure and potential impact (Wiedmann et al. 2015 ). Weighting
according to actual environmental impacts has not been tried yet and is diffi cult,
because different materials have different impacts, one material may have several
impacts and characterisation data and models for localised impacts are not yet well
developed. However, preliminary attempts of weighting resource footprints based
on resource depletion have been presented (Fang and Heijungs 2014a ).
Yet, there remains value in reporting footprints based on pressures alone. The
pure mass or volume of resource use is practical information that relates to physical
reality, i.e. how much actually is fl owing. It allows, for example, to address questions
of allocation of limited supplies or security of supply and sustainability of overall
production and consumption. The ultimate goal of footprint accounting in general
(and the assessment of impacts embodied in trade specifi cally) should be an evaluation of whether or not particular activities are sustainable (Fang and Heijungs 2014b ).
Environmental footprints measure human appropriation of natural resources and
need to be interpreted in the context of maximum sustainable levels at the local and
the global scale (Hoekstra and Wiedmann 2014 ). Exactly how high the sustainable
thresholds of earth systems are is the subject of intense research (Steffen et al. 2015 ).
8 Impacts Embodied in Global Trade Flows