Consumption and the environment (SOER2010) - European ...

Thematic assessment | Consumption and the environment
(CO 2
) per person, purely as a result of differing patterns
of consumption (Girod and de Haan, 2009). Encouraging
greener procurement by government and business can
also pay significant environmental dividends and may be
more easily achievable than shifting private consumption
patterns as it does not involve millions of citizens. Green
procurement by government and business can also play an
exemplary role and encourage more widespread adoption
of sustainable purchasing amongst citizens.
The broad private consumption areas of housing, food
and drink, and mobility are given special attention as
they have been identified by a number of studies as being
responsible for a large part of the pressures caused by
consumption in the EU (JRC/IPTS, 2006; ETC/SCP, 2009).
Although it overlaps with the other consumption areas,
tourism has also been identified as an important contributor
to environmental pressures, especially water shortages,
land-use changes in vulnerable areas and consequently
considerable impacts on biodiversity (Nijdam and Wilting,
2003; EEA, 2009a,b; EEA, 2006), and GHG emissions from
air travel.
Changes in consumption behaviour are needed to
complement technological improvements as targeting
consumption can tackle issues that production- and
technology-focussed policies cannot. Firstly, environmental
gains made through technical efficiency are often partially
or wholly offset by resulting increases in consumption due
to lower costs of production and/or use and more money
thereby becoming available for spending on other/more
goods and services — the so‐called rebound effect (Box 3.1;
Hertwich, 2008). Secondly, global environmental pressures
that take place overseas but are caused by European
consumption are beyond the reach of current European
production-related policies. The most direct way to reduce
these pressures may therefore be to influence which types
of imported goods are being purchased.
The potential for reducing global environmental impacts
through influencing consumption is yet to be exploited.
The EU Sustainable Development Strategy (European
Council, 2006) has identified the promotion of sustainable
consumption and production as one of seven key
challenges and stipulated respective objectives and targets.
More specifically, the EU Action Plan on Sustainable
Consumption and Production and Sustainable Industrial
Policies (EC, 2008) includes elements that aim directly at
influencing consumer behaviour and promoting greener
public procurement, but its main focus lies in cleaner and
leaner production and better products. The planned review
of the Action Plan in 2012 may provide an opportunity to
expand and strengthen the consumption elements.
The Europe 2020 Strategy for Smart, Sustainable and
Inclusive Growth includes a flagship initiative on
Resource-efficient Europe which aims to support the shift
towards a resource-efficient and low-carbon economy
(EC, 2010). Achieving this will require major technological
improvements, but also changes in consumption —
moving towards goods and services that are more
resource-efficient.
This will not be easy. Environmentally harmful
consumption patterns are institutionalised, economically,
politically, technically and socially, and consequently
seem normal and inevitable to most Europeans.
They also help define the aspirations for public
spending and consumption by the growing consumer
class in developing countries, that could amount to
1.2 billion people in 2030 (see EEA, 2010c).
The promotion of more sustainable consumption patterns
in the future may be achieved most effectively through
the development of sophisticated tailored policy packages
that provide a framework that enables consumers,
retailers and producers to act more sustainably. Such
packages would include well-chosen mixtures of economic
incentives, provision of information to consumers through
awareness-raising, labelling and other means, investments
in improved infrastructure, technology support, voluntary
agreements and where necessary regulation to achieve
objectives as effectively as possible.
In the following sections, the global environmental
pressures resulting from European consumption and
key individual consumption areas are assessed on the
macro scale. The differing environmental profiles of
households and their underlying behavioural causes
are then reviewed to assess the potential for reducing
consumption-related environmental pressures.
The complex nature of consumption and the underlying
factors that shape it now and in the future are briefly
investigated. The environmental pressures related to
four areas of consumption with high environmental
pressures — food, housing, mobility and tourism — and
the responses used to tackle them are examined. The final
section provides concluding reflections on consumption,
environmental priorities and the role various actors —
public authorities, business, and citizens — can play to
achieve desired change.
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The European environment | State and outlook 2010