ADAMA SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY

Course name = INDUSTRIAL ECOLOGY

Course code = ChE 5311
Assignment -2
Group name
1,Fana T/Mariam …… R/0467/08
2,kuma kebde ……….r/00617/07
3,tsion melese ……….r/1190/08
4,teshager ketema …..r/1144/08
5,miskir desta ………r/0868/08

Submitted to Mr. Goitom

A.
 ENIVROMENTAL/ ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT
Ecological footprint is a  tool which is used  to  represent the  amount productive  land  area 
which may be needed to regenerate the resource which are consumed by human population 
and it also represent the earths ecological capacity to regenerate the natural resources. Each 
country have its own ecological footprint and its need of the hour to manage the same. In the 
recent days researchers are focussing on identifying tools and technologies that may improve 
the  environmental conditions and  in turn increase  overall sustainability. For India, the 
ecological deficit is 0.40 (biocapacity of 0.51  against human footprint of 0.91gha/capita).
Considerable  empirical evidence  are  available  which shows that, while  developing  nations
often are the least ecoefficient in the sense that they consume a lot of resources per unit of  GDP,
they also consume the least amount of resources in absolute and/or per capita terms. Less
affluent nations, such as China  and  India,  need  to shift their development strategies away from
relentless economic  expansion and  focus on strategies that improve  people’s quality of life. In
the recent times, stakeholders from around the world are concentrating more  on ways to promote
sustainability and decrease environmental degradation. By highlighting  the inequities within
and between people and nations, ecological footprint provides a useful  tool that can
help to raise public awareness and shape a healthier and more sustainable future. This paper
elucidates the importance of ecological footprint and its importance in improving 
the environmental standards.
The ecological footprint measures human demand on nature, i.e., the quantity of nature it takes to
support people or an economy. It tracks this demand through an ecological accounting system.
The accounts contrast the biologically productive area people use for their consumption to the
biologically productive area available within a region or the world (biocapacity). In short, it is a
measure of human impact on Earth’s ecosystem and reveals the dependence of the human
economy on natural capital. The ecological footprint is defined as the biologically productive
area needed to provide for everything people use: fruits and vegetables, fish, wood, fibres,
absorption of carbon dioxide from fossil fuel use, and space for buildings and roads. Biocapacity
is the productive area that can regenerate what people demand from nature. Footprint and
biocapacity can be compared at the individual, regional, national or global scale. Both footprint
and biocapacity change every year with a number of people, per person consumption, the
efficiency of production, and productivity of ecosystems. Environmental Footprint The effect
that a person, company, activity, etc. has on the environment is called an environmental
footprint. For example, the number of natural resources that they use and the amount of harmful
gases that they produce.
Advantages of ecological foot prints
1. It is a single unit that allows disaggregation of indicators.
2. It could be widely applied to various programs/ activities.
3. It may be top down or bottom up.
4. It is useful as a means of communication policy.
5. The method is constantly being updated and improved by the Global Footprint Network.
6. It is able to indicate the nature of limited natural capital.
7. It creates credibility as a policy tool.
8. It has an ability to analyze sustainable development of a vague concept into measurable
objectives. Disadvantages of ecological foot prints
1. Ecological footprint analysis uses hypothetical land, which does not represent the actual land
use.
2. It simplifies the use of natural resources,
3. It risks as having double counting.
4. Most are portraits of consumption.
5. It does not provide clear policy guidance except for the subtraction of consumption.
6. Sometimes, it is based on questionable assumptions
Critically assess Ecological Footprint with other existing environmental tools:

The Ecological Footprint is based on the concepts of capacity and the precautionary principle
which though out without their critics are commonly accepted in the field of ecological impact
assessment Its methodology is grounded in the physical measures of the ecological limits and the
environmental impacts of the human activity and it provides a theoretical foundation for the
evaluation and comparison. Essential in the metric is an interpretation of the goal of the
ecological sustainability that is to live within the bio-productive capacity of the earth. The tool
that is being used is clearly focused on the ecological sustainability and with its creator
acknowledging there is an additional need for the social assessment frameworks. Thus, the
Ecological Footprint is not proposed as a complete measure of sustainability. Rather, it is
presented as a tool captures the main global ecological concerns within its metric which reflect a
crucial precondition for the sustainability- living within the ecological limits of the earth.

The inventors of the Ecological Footprint have put more emphasis on various potential uses for
the tool. Since this tool has been developed, the use of the tool has spread quickly into a different
range of applications. Its use now has been expanded from global and national accounts, such as
the WWF’s Living Planet Reports to the regional, city and local area scales.

With respect to urban planning and development, Wackernagel and Yount define the Ecological
Footprint as ” a powerful tool for comparing the ecological demand of design options such as
housing densities, transportation systems or infrastructure development”. They say that: “urban
design has a significant impact on people’s consuming behavior. It influences not only how they
shop, but also how they move around, what kind of houses they live in and what kind of urban
infrastructure services they acquire”. In another study, according to Muniz and Galindo they use
the footprint analysis of travel-to-work behavior in Barcelona so as to conclude that urban form
has a clear effect on the travel behavior which is greater that the socio-economic factors for
example the average family income, and however that compact city policies that include the
public transport and a mix of populations and activities resulting in a lower transport Ecological
Footprints.

With growing concerns on the environment, there are several international agencies which are
using environmental data/information and indicators to evaluate current conditions and trends to
provide information on the state of the environment.

There are other environmental tools that exist.

Critically assess EF with other existing environmental tools

Ecological footprint is an approximate of the amount of space on the earth that a person uses in
order to survive using obtainable technology. This space includes biologically productive land
and water area that produces the resources devoted by that person such as food, water, energy,
clothing, and building materials. It also comprises the quantity of land and water necessary to
incorporate the waste generated by that person.

In line with the management consultancy mantra that to manage something effectively you need
to be able to measure it, the metrics of sustainability have become progressively important in the
policy world, as governments, NGOs and others attempt to identify whether their strategies and
policies are indeed beginning to have an impact. This “metric turn” has encouraged support for
existing measurement techniques such as environmental audits, environmental impact
assessments, strategic environmental assessments and state of the environment reporting, while
unchecking a range of new techniques for measuring environmental impacts.

We are using up many of our non-renewable resources such as copper, tin, coal and oil. How
does the Ecological Footprint measure this resource depletion?
As the Ecological Footprint measures demand on the biosphere’s productive capacity, materials
that are extracted from outside the biosphere (such as copper and other minerals that are mined
beneath the ground) do not have a yield value that can be used to translate their creation into a
productive area. One tonne of copper thus does not have an Ecological Footprint in the same way
as one tonne of timber, which requires bioproductive area for its creation. There is, however, an
Ecological Footprint associated with the energy and other materials used in extracting, refining,
processing, and shipping these mineral resources, and together these are often reported as the
Footprint of the mineral. Additionally, when mined materials such as mercury or arsenic enter
the environment, they may cause damage and a loss of productivity.

Non-renewable fossil fuel resources are treated differently from other minerals, however, since
they actually represent an ancient material of biological origin, and their combustion releases a
material, carbon dioxide, which is part of the biosphere’s material cycles. The Footprint of
carbon released from the combustion of fossil fuels is thus defined as the amount of productive
area required to sequester the carbon dioxide emissions and prevent its accumulation. An
alternative method would be to calculate the consumption of fossil fuels according to the
productive area required to regenerate them, which would result in a carbon Footprint many
hundreds of times higher than the current calculation.
What is the Water Footprint and how is it related to the Ecological Footprint?
Though they are often compared and contrasted, Ecological Footprints and Water Footprints are,
as indicators, fundamentally incapable of being substituted. The Ecological Footprint does not,
and is not intended to measure freshwater flows. Because this is nevertheless a vital renewable
resource, in 2002, A.Y. Hoekstra proposed that the Water Footprint be created as a sustainable
water use indicator measuring the total volume of freshwater directly or indirectly used by a
population.

In essence, the Ecological Footprint measures the biological capacity a population uses and the
Water Footprint measures the freshwater a population uses. They each provide a different piece
of information in the sustainability puzzle. Instead of being seen as competing metrics, they
should be seen as two complementary indicators of natural capital use in relation to human
consumption.

the Ecological Footprint the same as the carbon footprint?

Recently, a number of organizations and governments have begun using the term ‘carbon
footprint’ to refer to the quantities of carbon dioxide emissions associated with an activity,
process, or product. This carbon footprint, typically measured in tonnes of carbon dioxide, is an
initial step towards calculating a full carbon Footprint, which in turn is one piece of the total
Ecological Footprint. A carbon Footprint translates tonnes of carbon dioxide released into the
demand this places on biological capacity, measured in terms of the total area, in global hectares,
required to sequester these carbon emissions.

The carbon Footprint adds value to simple carbon emissions data in two ways:

 The carbon Footprint puts the magnitude of emissions into a meaningful context.
Many people do not know how to interpret 1,000 tonnes of carbon emissions, but they
can easily understand that if 1,000 global hectares would be required to absorb this
carbon, but only 500 global hectares are available, this is a problem if we want to
prevent this waste product from building up around us.

 The Ecological Footprint provides an overarching systems perspective that can reveal
spill-over effects, when reducing demand in one area leads to an increase in demand
elsewhere. For example, will shifting from fossil fuels to biomass fuels decrease or
increase humanity’s overall demand on the planet’s biological capacity? Would
increasing the use of biomass fuels be more or less effective than returning cropland
to forest cover?

How the Footprint Works

Ecological Footprint accounting measures the demand on and supply of nature.

On the demand side, the Ecological Footprint measures the ecological assets that a given
population requires to produce the natural resources it consumes (including plant-based food and
fiber products, livestock and fish products, timber and other forest products, space for urban
infrastructure) and to absorb its waste, especially carbon emissions.

The Ecological Footprint tracks the use of six categories of productive surface areas: cropland,
grazing land, fishing grounds, built-up land, forest area, and carbon demand on land.

On the supply side, a city, state or nation’s biocapacity represents the productivity of its

ecological assets (including cropland, grazing land, forest land, fishing grounds, and built-up
land). These areas, especially if left unharvested, can also absorb much of the waste we generate,
especially our carbon emissions.

Both the Ecological Footprint and biocapacity are expressed in global hectares—globally
comparable, standardized hectares with world average productivity.

Each city, state or nation’s Ecological Footprint can be compared to its biocapacity.

If a population’s Ecological Footprint exceeds the region’s biocapacity, that region runs
an ecological deficit. Its demand for the goods and services that its land and seas can provide—
fruits and vegetables, meat, fish, wood, cotton for clothing, and carbon dioxide absorption—
exceeds what the region’s ecosystems can renew. A region in ecological deficit meets demand by
importing, liquidating its own ecological assets (such as overfishing), and/or emitting carbon
dioxide into the atmosphere. If a regions biocapacity exceeds its Ecological Footprint, it has
an ecological reserve.

How is an Ecological Footprint calculated?

Ecological Footprints can be calculated for individual people, groups of people (such as a
nation), and activities (such as manufacturing a product).

The Ecological Footprint of a person is calculated by adding up all of people’s demands that
compete for biologically productive space, such as cropland to grow potatoes or cotton, or forest
to produce timber or to sequester carbon dioxide emissions. All of these materials and wastes are
then individually translated into an equivalent number of global hectares.

To accomplish this, an amount of material consumed by that person (tonnes per year) is divided
by the yield of the specific land or sea area (annual tonnes per hectare) from which it was
harvested, or where its waste material was absorbed. The number of hectares that result from this
calculation are then converted to global hectares using yield and equivalence factors. The sum of
the global hectares needed to support a person is that person’s total Ecological Footprint.
The Ecological Footprint of a group of people, such as a city or nation, is simply the sum of the
Ecological Footprint of all the residents of that city or nation.

Typically, the Footprint is reported as “the Footprint of consumption.” It is the productive area
needed to provide for that person’s or population’s consumption. Ecological Footprint accounts
can also calculate the Footprint of production which is the direct demand on nature by that
population’s economy. What the economy produces plus all that is imported minus what the
economy exports is the amount that population consumes.

When calculating the Footprint of a business or organization, the organization’s activities to be

included within the assessment must be clearly defined.

What is a global hectare?

A global hectare is a common unit that encompasses the average productivity of all the
biologically productive land and sea area in the world in a given year. Biologically productive
areas include cropland, forest and fishing grounds, and do not include deserts, glaciers and the
open ocean.

Using a common unit, i.e., global hectares, allows for different types of land to be compared
using a common denominator. Equivalence factors are used to convert physical hectares of
different types of land, such as cropland and pasture, into the common unit of global hectares.

Global hectares can also be converted into global acres.

Are there any standards set for Ecological Footprint assessments?

Global Footprint Network’s Standards Committee has released an official standards document
that addresses Footprint methodology and communication, including use of source data,
derivation of conversion factors, establishment of study boundaries, and accurate communication
of findings (www.footprintstandards.org). These standards are widely used by Global Footprint
Network’s partners and by other analysts who conduct Ecological Footprint research and
assessments.

At the national level, Global Footprint Network maintains the National Footprint Accounts,
which provide benchmark Ecological Footprint results for 150 nations from 1961-2005. The data
and methods used in these accounts are overseen by Global Footprint Network’s National
Accounts Committee.

How does the Ecological Footprint address waste flows?

From an Ecological Footprint perspective, the term ‘waste’ includes three different categories of
materials, and each category is treated differently within Footprint accounts.
First, biological wastes such as residues of crop products, trimmings from harvested trees, and
carbon dioxide emitted from fuel wood or fossil fuel combustion are all included within
Ecological Footprint accounts. A cow grazing on one hectare of pasture has a Footprint of one
hectare for both creating its biological food products and absorbing its biological waste products.
This single hectare provides both services, thus counting the Footprint of the cow twice (once for
material production and once for waste absorption). This results in double counting the actual
area necessary to support the cow. The Footprint associated with the absorption of all biological
materials that are harvested is thus already counted in the Footprint of those materials.

Second, waste also refers to the material specifically sent to landfills. If these landfills occupy
formerly biologically productive area, then the Footprint of this landfill waste can be calculated
as the area used for its long term storage.

Finally, waste can also refer to toxics and pollutants released from the human economy that
cannot in any way be absorbed or broken down by biological processes, such as many types of
plastics. As the Ecological Footprint measures the area required to produce a material or absorb a
waste, materials such as plastics that are not created by biological processes nor absorbed by
biological systems do not have a defined Ecological Footprint. These materials can cause
damage to ecosystems when they are released into the environment, and this loss of biocapacity
can be measured using an Ecological Footprint approach when it actually occurs. Such
assessments are difficult, however, and not often completed. Assessments of the Footprint of
toxics and pollutants, when completed, generally refer to the Footprint of extracting, processing,
and handling these materials, but not to the Footprint of creating or absorbing these materials
themselves.

How does the Ecological Footprint account for recycling?

As the Ecological Footprint reflects the demand for productive area to make resources and
absorb carbon dioxide emissions recycling can lower the Ecological Footprint by offsetting the
extraction of virgin products, and reducing the area necessary for absorbing carbon dioxide
emissions. Recycling paper, for example, can decrease the total amount of virgin timber that
must be harvested to meet global demand for paper, thus reducing humanity’s total Ecological
Footprint.

The savings that result from the recycling process can be allocated to the person who recycles a
material and/or the person who buys recycled material in a number of different ways:

 100% to the person who buys the recycled paper (the wood fibre in a 100% recycled
ream of paper could have no forest Footprint, since the footprint of that wood fibre
was already allocated to the person who bought the virgin paper),
  100% the person who recycles the paper (a person purchasing 100% virgin paper who
recycled all of it would have no Footprint for the wood fibre in that paper, since all of
it is reused later, assuming that no fiber is lost in the recycling process), or

 Split between the person who buys recycled paper and the person who recycles paper
(the savings can be split 50%/50%, or in any other allocation).
Different researchers use different allocation principles for the savings from recycling,
and standards compliant Footprint studies (www.footprintstandards.org) will state their
chosen allocation method explicitly. Regardless of allocation method, however, the
largest reductions in Ecological Footprint can most commonly be achieved by reducing
the total amount of materials consumed, rather than attempting to recycle them
afterwards

Case studies

The steps necessary to perform an EFA are detailed using sample data from two case studies:
Anglian Water Services (AWS) and Best Foot Forward (BFF).

1.Data scoping.
2. Data collection.
3. Assembling your footprint table.
4. Calculating your Ecological Footprint.
5. Normalisation, scenarios and global sustainability assessments.
6. Refining the footprint – sensitivity analysis.
7. Environmental management systems – using the footprint .

The two case studies (AWS and BFF) are then presented in full.

Five scenarios are developed for AWS based on ‘business as usual’ and resource reduction
alternatives using energy, transport, materials and waste data. Scenarios are projected from
1998/99 to 2010 based on historical data and predicted consumption.

Analysis shows that 1.3% of AWS customers’ average per capita ‘earthshare’ is appropriated by
the provision of water purification services.

The footprint methodology was also applied to BFF for the year 1999/2000 using energy,
transport, land, materials and waste data. A component breakdown showed transport to be the
most significant element in the first year followed by direct energy use.

Changing to a renewable energy supplier and reductions in the need to travel reduced the
company footprint from 1.72 to 0.61 hectares. Working at BFF initially accounted for 33% of the
individual’s average earthshare – a figure which was reduced to 12% following energy and travel
changes.
It can be concluded that the Ecological Footprint can be applied to good effect at the corporate
level as an aggregated eco-efficiency indicator that links in with global carrying capacity and
hence global sustainability. Although in itself, EFA does not integrate all aspects of sustainable
development, it can be used with other indicators to drive integrated sustainability indicators. As
with many sustainability measurements, Ecological Footprinting will benefit from lessons
learned in wider usage and from further research into the methodology, supporting data and
practical application.