Environmental accounts. Enviromental goods and services

The environmental economy, defined as the value of the activities associated with the protection of the environment and the management of natural resources, decreased by 2.5% in 2023. This represented 2.65% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), compared to 2.97% in 2022.

Employment generated by environmental activities accounted for 2.95% of the total, 0.07 points more than in the previous year.

The Gross Value Added (GVA) associated with the production of environmental goods and services (hereinafter environmental GVA) stood at 39,773.9 million euros, 2.5% less than in 2022, while the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) increased by 9.1% in current terms.

In 2023, environmental employment amounted to 577.7 thousand full-time equivalent jobs, an increase of 5.5% over the previous year. On the other hand, total employment in the economy rose by 3.2% that year.

The domains with the greatest weight over the environmental GVA generated in 2023 were Energy production through renewable sources (31.0% of the total) and Saving and management of energy and/or heat (24.0%).

Activities with the greatest weight in the Environmental GVA in 2023 were Water supply, sanitation, waste management and decontamination activities (23.8%) and Electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply (23.1%of the total).

Conversely, the economic activities with the highest environmental employment were Construction and Water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities, with 214.4 and 136.5 thousand jobs, respectively.

Construction was the activity that contributed the most to the employment growth rate (2.643 points). And the Services sector recorded the largest annual increase, at 8.0%.

The total environmental production rose to 101,362.0 million euros in 2023. Of this figure, 15,801.5 million were allocated to export, 6.0% more than the previous year.

The areas with the greatest weight in exports were Air and climate protection (42.2% of the total) and Energy production through renewable sources (19.6%).  Exports in these areas mainly include electric vehicles, energy products (biofuels) and capital goods associated with the production of renewable electricity (wind power generators).

The objective of the Environmental Accounts (EA) is to integrate environmental information into the central system of National Accounts in a coherent way. They include a set of satellite accounts, which are transmitted annually, compiled using the accounting formats applicable to the different sectoral and territorial areas, with a major presence of physical data. They display the interactions among the economy, households and environmental factors.

The Environmental Goods and Services Sector (EGSS) Account presents data on the main variables associated with the production of goods and services whose main objective is the protection of the environment and/or the most efficient management of natural resources, classified by economic activities and environmental domains.

For more information, you can access the Standardised Methodological Report.

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