Absolute decoupling of manufacturing industries ´nutrient emissions from the GVA is observed in 9 countries (Austria, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Hungary, Netherland, Spain and Portugal). Decrease in emission coupled with decrease in GVA occurred in United Kingdom, France, Italy and Sweden. However in all cases the rate of emission decrease was greater than the one of GVA. Increase of nutrient emission despite drop in gross value added was observed in Belgium.
The developments arise from different absolute levels of emission intensities and depend on no major changes in the data coverage during the period within the countries, such as including more facilities in the latest year reporting despite already existing in earliest year. It should be noted that as some industrial emissions may vary considerable from year to year, the comparison of two selected years, only, may be subject to variations not being representative for a consistent trend.
Absolute decoupling of manufacturing industries ´heavy metals emissions from the GVA is observed again in 10 countries (Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Netherland, Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia, Spain and Portugal). Decrease in emission coupled with decrease in GVA occurred in United Kingdom, France, Italy, Belgium and Sweden. In all cases the rate of emission decrease was greater than the one of GVA. Increase of emission despite drop in GVA was observed in Finland.
Given the multiple factors that affect both sectoral GVA and the pollution pressure originating from manufacturing, it is complicated to draw direct relationships between these two variables. Some key descriptors which could aid in explaining the behaviour of these are the structure of the sector (e.g., facility size distribution, production technology, relative proportion reported as E-PRTR releases) , the socioeconomic characteristics (e.g. salary levels) of the area and the policy measures in place (e.g., treatment requirements). However, it must be noted that the specific context of each country could result in varying combinations of the mentioned factors and their aggregate effects.
Data and maps
Emission intensity of manufacturing industries in Europe