Environmental impacts of natural resource use

Abstract

Decoupling economic growth and environmental degradation requires sustainable sourcing and management of resources over the whole life cycle. While the mass-flow indicators of chapter 2 are very useful for understanding the environmental pressures from material consumption, information about the environmental impacts of resource use and resource management practices is also needed to support policymaking for the sustainable use of natural resources (Voet et al., 2005). This chapter focuses on the environmental consequences of resource extraction and processing. It illustrates the legitimate need for appropriate policy to manage natural resources, which is required if we are to remain within the safe operating space (Steffen et al., 2015) and achieve the SDGs.