Material flow accounting has become a key tool for monitoring and designing strategic and sectoral policies related to material-use efficiency. This methodology makes it possible to map the extraction within a territory and the imports of all materials used by an economy, determine how they are used, and identify their final destination (consumption, export, waste…). These accounts allow us to understand the material profile of a city, region, state, company, or industrial park. From these accounts, key indicators are derived—such as domestic material consumption, material productivity, or the material footprint—which the EU has established as official indicators for tracking material efficiency in economies.
At ENT, we develop material flow accounts at local and regional levels following Eurostat’s harmonized methodological framework, producing indicators that are comparable with those of other EU countries and regions. We have supported official statistical agencies in Catalonia, the Basque Country, and the Balearic Islands in preparing and publishing their official material flow accounts. We have also produced provincial and municipal approximations of these accounts (e.g., Álava and Vitoria-Gasteiz). These accounts are also central to circular economy indicator frameworks and form part of Eurostat’s circular economy indicator set.
By combining material flow accounts with input–output models, we calculate advanced indicators such as the material footprint, as we have done together with Idescat for Catalonia. It is also possible to calculate material flow accounts (e.g., material consumption and productivity) for each individual economic sector or for value chains of strategic interest for a territory, as we do jointly with Ihobe for the Basque Country.
We also carry out waste flow studies. We are experts in developing material flow accounts in the field of municipal waste and work closely with regional and local governments in calculating and assessing flows of bio-waste, packaging, residual waste, etc. These accounts are used to evaluate extended producer responsibility policies, the implementation of new separate collection systems, the impact assessment of economic instruments such as landfill taxes, and to measure compliance with regulatory waste targets.
