Green National Accounting in Theory and Practice: From GDP to Green GDP

by Peter Birch Sørensen (Editor)

Overview

This book explains the theoretical and empirical foundations for constructing a measure of a country’s Green GDP and how this measure relates to the conventional GDP.

Opening with an overview of the academic literature on green national accounting, the first chapter sets up an analytical model of the interaction between a small open economy and the environment to derive a theoretically founded measure of the economy’s Green Net National Income (“Green GDP”). The book then illustrates how the theory can be applied in practice to produce a time series for the evolution of Denmark’s Green GDP and its various components (with an emphasis on the environment) over the last thirty years. As far as possible, the data used in the calculations were constructed in accordance with international statistical guidelines. Therefore, the careful explanation of the methodology which is outlined in the book can be applied to other countries using comparable data.

This book will be of significant interest to scholars in the field of environmental economics and statisticians and practitioners working on green national accounting.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781040369500
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	06/13/2025
Series:	Routledge Explorations in Environmental Economics
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	192
File size:	8 MB

About the Author

Peter Birch Sørensen is Professor of Economics at the University of Copenhagen, a member of the Royal Danish Society of Sciences and Letters, and an international research Fellow in the CESifo research network. He is also a former Director of the Economic Policy Research Unit at the University of Copenhagen. His research has covered topics in Environmental and Climate Economics, Public Economics and Macroeconomics.

Table of Contents

1. A theoretical framework for estimating the Green Net National Income in a distorted open economy. 2. The value of exhaustible and renewable natural resources. 3. The health-related costs of air pollution. 4. The costs of water pollution. 5. The recreational benefits from nature. 6. Valuing biodiversity. 7. The domestic costs of global warming. 8. The evolution of Denmark’s Green Net National Income: Methodological issues and empirical findings. Index

Editorial Reviews

This is a very timely and much needed book when we face both a nature and a climate crisis. The book revitalizes the concept of green national accounting and provides the most comprehensive and long-term coverage of environmental damage costs in national accounting to date. Showing a 10 % lower Green Net National Income (NNI) in Denmark than their conventional NNI, the book illustrates the magnitude the environmental damage costs. This should serve as a wake-up call to people and politicians, and also  provides a unique tool for decisionmakers in all of Europe to stay on the sustainable development path.”

- Ståle Navrud, Professor of Environmental and Resource Economics, Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

“The authors are to be congratulated for re-vitalising the concept of green net national income as an important signal of changes in people’s well-being at the level of the national economy. Readers will find a very extensive coverage of all major environmental adjustments to the conventional national accounts for a small, open economy over a 30-year period. This is most useful material, which can serve as a model for other nations.”

-  Nick Hanley, Professor of Environmental and One Health Economics, University of Glasgow.

From the Publisher