Aggregates and Construction Markets in Europe: Towards a Sectoral Action Plan on Sustainable Resource Management

Aggregates are granular materials – sand, gravel and crushed rock, in particular. Usually they are not thought of as a hot spot of environmental policy. This paper looks at the most important aspects of the aggregates system throughout Europe and puts it into the wider context of sustainable resource management as launched by the European Commission (2005b Eurostat Statistical Office of the European Communities, editor. 2001. Economy‐wide material flow accounts and derived indicators, Luxembourg: EC. A Methodological Guide. ed. 2000 Google Scholar) in its thematic strategy (COM (2005) 670 final). Aggregates are important for sustainable resource management chiefly for two reasons: •their material intensity – their relevance for increasing resource productivity in the European Union (EU) as part of the Lisbon strategy and the sustainability strategy;1 1. See: http: //ec. europa. eu/growthandjobs/indexₑn. htm for information on the EU Lisbon strategy, and http: //ec. europa. eu/sustainable/for information on the EU sustainability strategy. •their environmental intensity – their relevance for increasing eco‐efficiency and for lowering environmental impacts in the EU. Both dimensions will be looked at in this paper. For understanding those dimensions, the aggregates value chain – the construction material industries, the building industries' outcomes, and the housing sector – is crucial too. The paper sheds some light on aggregates value chains, but does not attempt to provide a full comprehensive view. Distinction is made between direct factors (aggregates themselves and economic incentives for sustainable aggregates management) and indirect factors (downstream environmental and economic relevance of aggregates). It is argued that such a wide life‐cycle perspective will become important for any policies on aggregates. The second section looks at the economic relevance of aggregates throughout Europe in more detail and considers driving forces for the use of aggregates within an economy. The environmental relevance of the aggregates will be reasoned in the third section. Following this, section four looks at existing EU, national and international policies, such as energy and mining policies and taxes that affect or have side effects on the aggregate system. Concluding thoughts are given to the way ahead in the final section.