Exploring the Environmental Consequences of Tourism: A Satellite Account Approach

Abstract

This article demonstrates how selected environmental consequences of tourism consumption relating to carbon emissions and waste can be quantified using a tourism satellite account (TSA), and an environmental module associated with an input-output framework. We move beyond the basic identification of the environmental effects of tourism consumption and seek to measure them. We show the types of information that can be derived from the framework, the applicative difficulties of reconciling tourism consumption to environmental outcomes, and explore the practical usage of the framework adopted. We believe that steps taken in the case to examine selected environmental effects of tourism consumption have a universal relevance for tourism policy makers.