Human societies may be modelled as very large complex systems involving multiple flows of energy and materials between different sectors. Traditional exergy analysis methods are inadequate for the analysis of such systems because they do not take non-energetic flows into account. Extended exergy analysis (EEA) allows for the inclusion of exergetic equivalents of non-energetic quantities labour, capital and the costs of environmental remediation. In this work, EEA is conducted to characterize the extraction, conversion, and end use of energy and materials in the economy of Nova Scotia, Canada, in 2006. The economy of Nova Scotia is divided into seven sectors (agriculture, industry, tertiary, domestic, natural resource extraction, energy conversion, and transportation) and each sector is modelled according to its characteristic material and energy fluxes. A model of the structural connectivity of the economy in terms of exchanges between sectors is constructed. Equivalent values of exergy are computed for each flow of energy and material, and energy, exergy and extended exergy efficiencies are calculated for each sector of the economy of Nova Scotia and compared with those of Norway, China, Italy, Netherlands and the UK. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.