We can’t manage what we can’t measure

Our economies are depleting finite environmental assets (EAs) – from clean air to rare metals – at an unsustainable rate. To navigate the coming challenges, we must transition from mindless consumption to mindful governance. But effective governance is impossible without precise, individual-level accounting.

Today’s environmental footprinting relies on broad sector averages, obscuring responsibility and hindering effective policy. We need to move Beyond Sector Averages.

What is μ-IOA?

Micro-Scale Input-Output Analysis (μ-IOA) is a methodological framework to calculate the environmental footprint of every product and every income, by tracing environmental impacts through the entire web of economic transactions.

It’s the foundation for:

• Truly progressive environmental taxes.
• Verifiable “green” investing and spending.
• Empowering consumers and citizens with accurate data.
• Holding corporations accountable for their entire supply chain.

A Collective, Emerging Field

This vision for granular environmental accounting is shared by a growing community. The role I’m trying to play is to help rigorously formalize the core ideas and bring people together.

While the theoretical foundations are taking shape, the vast work of building the data standards and tools for real-world adoption lies ahead. This site is a small hub for this collective effort.

My contribution

When I first engaged with this field, I noticed some key theoretical gaps in answering a basic question: how can we actually build a μ-IOA system? My work so far has focused on clarifying these, particularly the formulation of bidirectional responsibility and a practical core data model for micro-scale analysis. More details are on the Early Note and Publications pages.