Abstract
An emergy analysis of the main energy flows driving the economy of humans and life support systems consists of environmental energies, fuels, and imports, all expressed as solar emjoules. Total emergy use (371 E20 sej/yr) of the Western Nakdong River Basin is 97 per cent from imported sources, fuels and goods and services. Emergy flows from the environment such as rain and geological uplift flux accounted for only 2.9 percent of total emergy use. Emergy yield ratio and environment loading ratio were 1.03 and 33.27, respectively. Emergy sustainability index, a ratio of emergy yield ratio to environment loading ratio, is therefore less than one, which is indicative of highly developed consumer oriented economies. It is necessary for an efficient management of Western Nakdong River Basin to reduce pollution load basically and to restructure economic activities into an environmental friendly industrial structure depending on renewable energy and resources.