Industrial Ecology

Industrial Ecology is an interdisciplinary approach to sustainability. It looks at how material and energy flows through society, and how these flows can be optimized to become more sustainable. Modern production and consumption patterns, along with its growing environmental impacts, call for a deeper understanding of how strategic improvements can be made in systems at the product, corporate, sector and societal levels. By integrating fields such as engineering, science, economics, politics, ecology, and psychology, Industrial Ecology aims to create a more holistic understanding of our environmental challenges and solutions.

As the old business saying goes, “You can’t manage what you can’t measure”. While companies and governments have plenty of financial information to manage their economic performance, they have relatively little information to manage their environmental impacts. To analyze and quantify our impacts, Industrial Ecology uses analytical tools such as  Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), Material Flows Analysis (MFA) and Environmental Input-Output analysis (EIO). These tools can help companies visualize the environmental impact of their operations and justify further improvements. Similarly, these can be used to inform national and international environmental policies.