Environmental protection expenditures
The expenditures of the public and private sector for environmental protection represent an important aspect of ecologically relevant activities of an economy; the level of national environmental protection expenditure is an indicator of the relative economic importance of environmental protection. However, low spending on environmental protection does not necessarily mean that a country is not practicing effective environmental protection.
In the environmental protection expenditure accounts (EPEA), the resources used by resident economic entities for environmental protection are recorded quantitatively. The EPEA thus reflects the efforts of society and companies to implement the polluter pays principle.
Environmental Protection Expenditure Accounts provide important information on the production and use of environmental protection services and thus contributes directly to the definition and implementation of EU policy priorities in relation to environmental protection, resource management and green growth. Environmental protection includes those activities which are aimed directly at preventing, reducing and eliminating pollution and any other form of damage to the environment.
National environmental protection expenditures are defined as the sum of a country's current environmental protection expenditures and environmental protection investments, including the net financing of these services with the rest of the world. They give an idea of how much money each area spends directly or indirectly on environmental protection activities, i.e. not only on environmental protection activities for its own use, but also on the acquisition of environmental services from other economic entities.
The coverage of the EPEA is based on the classification of environmental protection activities and expenditures (CEPA). The CEPA is a recognized international standard in the context of international economic and social classifications.
Environmental Protection Expenditure Accounts are part of the European environmental accounts. They are in accordance with the international statistical standard "System of Environmental-Economic Accounting - Central Framework" (SEEA CF 2012) and are largely compatible with the International System of National Accounts (SNA 2008) of the United Nations and its European equivalent , the European System of National Accounts (ESA 2010).
The legal basis of the European environmental and economic accounts is provided by Regulation (EU) No. 691/2011 on European environmental and economic accounts as well as Regulation (EU) No. 538/2014 amending Regulation (EU) No. 691/2011 on European environmental and economic accounts. According to this, from 2017 the member states are legally obliged to transmit EPEA data to Eurostat.
