Environmental accounts: structure and preparation
International practices for the preparation of environmental accounts are based on the System of Integrated Environmental and Economic Accounts (SEEA), which consists of a variety of environmental satellite accounts that have been produced in the context of the system of national accounts.
Three types of accounts are currently relevant for environmental accounting in Austria:
Monetary accounts
contain monetary information of environmental relevance that is not explicitly included in the systems of national accounts.
e.g.: environmental protection expenditures, environmentally-related transfers, environmental goods and services sector (EGSS)
Physical accounts
refer to the flow of materials through society within production and consumption processes, as well as to the stocks of materials and substances - thus depicting, in a sense, the metabolism of society.
e.g.: material flow accounts, energy accounts, air emission accounts
Hybrid accounts
show data from the systems of national accounts (such as value added or employment) together with environmental data.
e.g.: integrated NAMEA
