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Project Objectives

flowsa has two objectives:

1. Import environmental (and other types of) data from publicly available datasets, formatting the data into a standardized table, a FlowByActivity dataset. FlowByActivity datasets are largely unchanged from the original data source, with the exception of formatting. Data that are currently available in the FlowByActivity format are listed here. See Creating a FlowByActivity Dataset for details on methodology.

2. Attribute resource use, waste, emissions, and loss to 6-digit North American Industrial Classification (NAICS) Codes, which are economic activities, formatting the data into a standardized FlowBySector table. These new datasets are generally created using multiple FlowByActivity datasets. A list of available FlowBySector datasets can be found here, with a more detailed explanation of methodology found in Creating a FlowBySector Dataset.

   • FlowBySector example: The main data source for creating a "Water" FlowBySector table is the USGS, which publishes national water withdrawal information for nine broad categories. One of these categories is "Irrigation Crop", which can only be mapped to 3-digit NAICS ('111' and '112'). To reach the objective of mapping water withdrawal information to 6-digit NAICS, additional FlowByActivity datasets are called on for allocation purposes. In the case of "Irrigation Crop", acreage by crop type and water application rates (gal/acre) by crop type are multiplied to calculate water use by crop type at the 6-digit NAICS. A ratio is calculated for the quantity of water used by a crop out of the total water use calculated using the USDA datasets. This ratio is then multiplied by the USGS water withdrawal information for "Irrigation Crop", allocating the 3-digit NAICS to 6-digits.
     • Acreage information is published in the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Census of Agriculture (CoA) and water application rates are published in the USDA Irrigation and Water Management Survey (IWMS).

Output Files

1. Flow-By-Activity parquets
2. Flow-By-Sector parquets
3. Metadata JSON
4. General Log
5. Validation Log

Examples of flowsa output data use

1. FlowBySector datasets are used in the USEEIO modeling efforts, where the NAICS are mapped to BEA sector codes and transformed into satellite tables for the purposes of environmentally-extended input-output modeling.