I was just glancing at WRAP's 2010 report on the resource efficiency of the UK economy and was surprised to see the claim that the UK's Total Material Requirement (TMR) has been broadly flat since 1990. I thought it had decreased somewhat.
And I was right. WRAP reaches its conclusion by only looking at the data up to 2008 (despite the 2010 publication date), which show that TMR was broadly flat during that period (although down 5%). Since then however, it has fallen off a cliff and in 2010 was down over 20% on 2008 and 27% on 1990.
Of course a large portion of these falls has been induced by the recession and could prove to be cyclical in nature. But at the same time, we may be witnessing large-scale structural changes and just don't yet know it.
Either way, the UK economy is using far fewer resources now than it was in 1990 despite intervening GDP growth and indeed is lower than at any point since records began in 1970. To me, this doesn't currently justify widespread concerns about the UK economy's use of natural resources.
