This paper shows an extended version of the hybrid multiregional Input-Output table (MR-HIOT) derived from Exiobase v.3.
The multi-regional hybrid supply-use tables (MR-HSUTs), which are used to derive the input-output tables where tangible goods are accounted in metric tons, energy flows in TJ and services in euros. They respect mass, energy and monetary balances.
The extensions include emissions, stock addition, stock reduction/depletion, supply and use of waste, supply and use of packaging, extraction of resources, use and withdrawal of water and land use.
The MR-HIOT here presented adopts a generalized version of by-product technology model (Stone’s method). Furthermore, a cause-effect based electricity model and indirect land use change (iLUC) model are inserted.
The generalized by-product technology model extends the Stone’s method to a a multi-regional framework and focuses on the respect of mass balance, whenever by-products substitute products with different properties produced elsewhere as principal productions.
The electricity model introduces the concept of national electricity grid where only non-constrained and competitive producers react to changes in demand. The electricity model was introduced by Schmidt et al (2011).
The iLUC model considers the substitution effects of the land use. The model was introduced by Schmidt et al. (2015). It simulates the effect of the substitution of land anytime a new production comes into place in any region of the world. Depending on the peculiarities of a country, the new demand of land may be obtained either by intensification the crops or occupying new land, i.e. forest or grassland. The emissions due to intensification and land use changes are taken into account.
The transaction matrix presented in this paper has a format 8213x8213; 164 products for 48 countries/world regions, 48 national electricity markets, six types of national land use markets for each of the 48 regions, and 5 world land use markets.
A regionalized life cycle inventory model to account for human excretion of food products is presented, constituting an update of a previous model published by the author in 2008.
The updated model provides country-specific estimates on toilet activities (use of toilet paper, tap water, soap) and wastewater/excreta management, the latter addressing not only wastewater collection and treatment as done in developed countries, but also decentralized options such as septic tanks, latrines, and open defecation. The model currently supports inventories for 92 countries, linked to the ecoinvent database. The model is tested here with three products (banana, breadcrumbs, cheese) in five countries (Bangladesh, Denmark, Niger, Israel, USA), where the results for human excretion, per kg food ingested, are compared to food production in terms of global warming and aquatic eutrophication.
The results show that besides a wide geographical variability, the environmental impacts of sanitation linked to food consumption have a higher magnitude than previously anticipated. In global warming, human excretion impacts can be of similar and even higher magnitude than food production, as far as products with a low carbon footprint are concerned, such as bananas. This relevance decreases for products with a higher carbon footprint such as cheese. Regarding aquatic eutrophication, the results suggest a potentially high relevance for human excretion in countries with poor sanitation, while the opposite holds true in countries with advanced treatment of wastewaters.
We stress the importance of including human excretion in LCA studies of food products, especially when the goal is to identify life cycle hotspots or to assess dietary shifts.
ShareIt Link: https://rdcu.be/cxlvU
The project will provide a globally unique tool for quantitative assessment of the climate effects of decision alternatives, popularly speaking a ‘climate footprint generator’, as well as a mechanism to ensure its continued updating. The project addresses a lack of updated, detailed, globally complete, valid, and trustworthy LCA data. The project expands the level of detail, coverage, and applicability of the currently most advanced hybrid input-output database (EXIOBASE 3).
Read more about the project, the work packages, and the project partners at the project page at Aalborg University (DCEA).
Publication from the project: Input-output modelling for household activity-level environmental footprints: a systematic literature review.
Environmental input–output analyses can be a useful decision support tool at the subnational level, because of its ability to capture economic and environmental impacts at other geographical levels. Yet, such analyses are hindered by the lack of subnational IO tables. Furthermore, the lack of physical product and waste flows in what is known as a “hybrid” table prevents a range of consumption-based and circular-economy-type analyses. We demonstrate the development of a multiregional hybrid IOT (MRHIOT) along with environmental extensions at the subnational level and exemplify it for the case of Belgium. The development procedure discloses a novel approach of combining national hybrid tables, subnational monetary tables, and physical survey-based data. Such a combination builds upon a partial-survey approach that includes a range of techniques for initial estimation and reconciliation within a balancing procedure. For the validation of the approaches, we assessed the magnitude of deviations between the initial and final estimates and analyzed the uncertainties inherent to each initial estimation procedure. Subsequently, we conducted a consumption-based analysis where we assessed the carbon footprint (CF) at the subnational level and highlighted the CF inherent to the interregional linkages. This study provides methodological and application-based contributions to the discussion on the relevance of hybrid subnational tables and analyses compared to national ones. The proposed approach could be replicable to some extent for further developing subnational MRHIOT. The study is expected to foster more research toward the development of further subnational MRHIOT as well as its associated wide-ranging applications.
In 2011, co-working with DuPont (former Danisco), 2.-0 LCA consultants initiated an electricity project with the aim of establishing consequential life cycle inventories on electricity in different countries. The project was established as a subscription club administrated by 2.-0 LCA consultants. One of the outcomes of the project was this report.
As part of the local project 'Det Cirkulære Nordjylland' an inventory is made of North Jutland's total resource flows and environmental impacts. The inventory includes both a socio-economic analysis, mass flow analysis and an inventory of total environmental impacts. In addition, a number of possible, concrete measures for changes in existing mass flows are identified, as inputs to the strategy for a circular approach in North Jutland. The calculation is made from both a production and a consumption perspective.
The production perspective includes a statement of the total material and energy inputs to, as well as product and waste outputs from all companies (both private and public) in North Jutland. In addition, the total environmental impacts from company 'purchases' (materials, energy, services, etc.), direct emissions from the companies, and treatment of the companies' waste are calculated. Environmental impacts are shown as greenhouse gas emissions as well as a selection of other environmental impact categories, eg particulate pollution, biodiversity, nutrient load, etc.
The consumption perspective includes a statement of the total material and energy inputs to, as well as waste outputs from, the citizens of North Jutland. In addition, the same environmental impacts as for companies are calculated for the citizens' total consumption of goods, energy, services, public services and waste treatment services.
The final project report is here (in Danish):Cirkulær Økonomi i Nordjylland – opgørelse af massestrømme og LCA resultater.
The comprehensive global multi-regional input-output database EXIOBASE database is ideal for corporate, sectoral, national and global footprinting. Furthermore, the database can be used as a background database for detailed LCAs as well as for mass flow analysis of regions and countries as part of circular economy analyses. Other uses include life cycle costing, social LCA etc.
Currently, EXIOBASE 3 has a fully-fledged version in hybrid units with accounting for most commodities in physical units and fully mass-balanced accounts that also provide estimates on waste generation and treatments/recycling. The current hybrid version of EXIOBASE uses 2011 as base year and therefore, there is a need for updating to a more recent year. Through the EXIOBASE Hybrid Update Club, this project will provide such an update.
This project is initiated by 2.-0 LCA Consultants, who led the development of the hybrid work in EXIOBASE as a member of the EXIOBASE consortium. At the moment, the hybrid update project does not involve other consortium members but builds upon the work of others in the consortium. As such, the update project will stand on the shoulders of hundreds of person-months delivered by the EXIOBASE partners. The current publicly available version of EXIOBASE (version 3) is an outcome of several projects funded under EU’s 6th and 7th Framework programmes:
All the material developed as part of this crowdfunded project will be made available to the public, and published on Zenondo here: https://zenodo.org/records/13449634
Currently, the following materials have been published:
EXIOBASE v3 is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
As a member of the crowdfunded project, you will contribute to the development of EXIOBASE-hybrid update.
If you want to learn more about the current EXIOBASE 3 and the hybrid version, you can access this free one-hour webinar recorded on 18th September 2019.
Below, we have listed a number of selected publications:
NTNU: Currently, there is a monetary version of EXIOBASE for the years 1995-2022 published by NTNU (see https://zenodo.org/records/5589597 for more info). The time-series referred to in the above publications are based on nowcasted data from 2011. The monetary version has a range of environmental extensions provided by partners, including Vienna University (material accounts to 2013), University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (land use to 2015), and Arkaitz Usubiaga of UCL (energy and fuel combustion emissions to 2015) and estimated updates of all greenhouse gas emission data to 2018-2019 (NTNU). The monetary tables are a fundamental prerequisite for updating of the hybrid version of EXIOBASE. Therefore, thanks to NTNU, this work will feed into the current update project, where we produce an update of the hybrid version of EXIOBASE. For further information and updates of the monetary tables, please contact Richard Wood, wood@ntnu.no.
For club membership (or questions), please contact us. To go to the club click here.
This report presents the life cycle inventory of Brewer’s grain, DDGS and milk replacer. The current report serves as an extended appendix to Schmidt and Dalgaard (2012) and Dalgaard and Schmidt (2012).
Production or consumption processes can be seen as a transformation of inputs into outputs. Some of these flows may have a market value, therefore they have a price and can be accounted in monetary units. Some others, for example, might only be accounted in mass units, or in energy units or even in some other metrics, such as hours,items and so forth. Therefore, a framework that uses many metrics is necessary for describing the complexity of reality.
Secondly, there are unquestionable laws that rule our world, such as the laws of Thermodynamics. Production or consumption processes also obey to these laws. In practice, this means that for any input there must always be outputs that obey these laws.
Given these preconditions, the paper introduces a multi-layer supply and use framework, where each layer is balanced and accounted in a single metric. Then an input-output model is built upon this multi-layer framework. The model adopts the Stone's method, which is more known as the by-product technology assumption. Furthermore, endogenous matrices of technical coefficients are presented. This means that technical coefficients are not predetermined and kept fixed when running a simulation. Rather, they are endogenous variables that change according to the implemented analysis. Finally, the model makes use of linear programming techniques instead of implementing the Leontief inverse.
