Two new resource indicators built around resource dissipation rather than extraction have been introduced. “Adaptation to resources services loss” measures the extra energy needed to extract resources as a result of dissipation and “Resources services deficit” looks at potential future deficits over the next 100 years. They assess the dissipation of both mineral resources and fossil and nuclear energy resources. A key limitation of these new indicators is that current LCI datasets don’t report dissipation flows directly, so emissions are used as proxies which may result in underestimated scores. To more effectively characterize the specific dissipation of resources associated with their system, the practitioner will need to adapt the inventory to include specific dissipative flows instead of generic flows from average activities, such as end-of-life processes from generic background LCI databases. 

While these indicators better represent the associated area of protection, they are quite new and their use and analysis is different than the previous indicators for this category and so they are being introduced as beta indicators alongside the existing indicators, “Mineral resource use” and “Fossil and nuclear energy use”, while community feedback is assessed. If you have feedback on these indicators, please contact us.