...Executive summary This report seeks to define Environmental sustainability and examine its importance in the contemporary world of corporate dominance in the world arena. Business activities are regularly having an increasing contribution to environmental problems and threatening sustainability. Phenomena like climate change and extreme weather events have evidenced the effects of relentless use and overuse of natural resources. The need for environmental sustainability has become important now more than ever following the occurrence of repeated natural disasters and studies showing the ill effects on human health. It has been established that the misuse of natural resources can threaten the existence of future generations. The role of businesses, civil society and governments has been discussed in the context of environmental sustainability in this report with focus on climate change. The oil and gas sector is an important sector in terms of sustainability related to the environment. The sector has been scrutinized widely for occurrences like leakages and oil spills. The companies in this sector have a huge impact on the environment. The importance of oil companies in the path to sustainable development has been discussed. The multinational giants British Petroleum and ExxonMobil have been used as case studies to understand the kind of initiatives being taken in this sector for a sustainable environment. Lastly, the challenges related to the sector in implementing these initiatives...
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...| Environmental and Sustainability Management Educating hotel guests and tourists | BUAD 390 | | | | Table of Contents Introduction 2 Findings 2 Situation 2 Problem 4 Solution 6 Evaluation 6 Conclusion 7 Recommendations 8 References 9 Introduction This report will look at exactly why it is so important to educate hotel guests and tourists about environmental sustainability. Tourism is one of the top service industries in the world, there is millions of dollars being used to fund these beautiful destinations; equally as much money should be invested to keep the environment sustainable. It’s good ethical practice; the humanistic argument is without a clean environment, human health will be harmed. Without stock of renewable resources for future generations, the lives of those will be poorer quality than ours. (Grace, Cohen, & Holmes, 2014)William Blackstone has quoted saying “everyone has the right to a livable environment, then others have an obligation to allow free enjoyment of this right.” (Grace, Cohen, & Holmes, 2014). The three main groups of guests hotel chains face concerning this matter are: the ones that care about the planet and society, the ones that ask what is in it for me, and the ones who couldn’t be bothered. It is up to hotels which type of guests they wish to cater to, keeping in mind that they risk damaging their relationship...
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...How can the local authorities, government agencies and engineers work together to address the challenges of environmental sustainability? Development in economic booms rapidly compared to past decade was a result due to a generation that pushed and adapted to the growth of economic as a means to improving technology, facilities, and humanity’s condition. Factories, automobiles, buildings and so on had created by generation in order to raise up the development of economic. This had brought many negative effects such as pollution of air, water, soil, and destroy the forest as well as natural sources and creation of toxic wastes. Therefore, environmental sustainability is required to protect and save our earth.Local authorities, government agencies, and engineers play the main roles to work together to address the challenges of...
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...With our world becoming more and more dependent on the decisions we make that effect our environment around us, it’s our job to maintain and innovate new ideas within businesses to sustain environmental health. The only problem with that is many businesses do no participate in environmental sustainability practices, which cause many issue within our environment. That being said we have analyzed the question of what is the impact on businesses that do not pay attention to sustainability issues? When you first think of businesses not participating in environmental sustainability you figure that it doesn’t have that big of an impact, considering there is millions of businesses in today’s market. The truth is thought that just one company can effect and impact a large portion of our environment and of course us in the end. One of the most obvious issues when a business doesn’t participate in environmental sustainability is waste. Waste is non-disposable and ends up in a landfill, which takes up space within our environment. With our rapid expansion of people, cities, homes, and businesses this causes less room for all those components. Also waste produces toxic fumes into our air/atmosphere, which is an obvious concern since oxygen might be the single most important thing to life on earth. Another issue is the placement of businesses or project that extremely effect the environment around these locations. The placement of these businesses around the world are causing harm to large...
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...Not every house you are going to visit, see pictures of or live in is going to be ecologically sustainable. Ecological sustainability refers to the capacity of the biosphere to meet the needs of the present generation, without hindering future generations from being able to meet their needs (reference). There are many factors that need to be considered to ensure that the house you are going to live in is as ecologically sustainable as possible. Currently in Australia, a great majority are living in homes that contradict the idea of living ecologically sustainable. They are living in homes that are too hot or too cold, waste energy and are expensive to rum. Not only this but they are also homes that use far more water than what is necessary , and are made of materials that damage our health and the environment around us. However, by using good design principles, Australians can not only save energy, water and money, but also create a more enjoyable and comfortable home...
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...Table of Contents INTRODUCTION 2 WHY ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY MATTERS 2 WHAT MANY COMPANIES HAVE ALREADY DONE 2 INTERNATIONAL LEADERSHIP & ASSOCIATIONS 3 INVESTOR CONFLICT OF INTEREST VS. GROWING CUSTOMER AWARENESS 4 ECOTOURISM VS. “GREENWASHING” 6 CONCLUSION 7 WORKS CITED 8 Introduction There are an abundance of studies that show how tourism greatly impacts environmental sustainability in various ways. The purpose of this report is to explore and analyze the activities that occur in the tourism industry as a whole, which cause a negative impact on the environment. Tourism and the environment are interrelated in a complex way, with many variables. This report will address three main issues. This first issue is how the tourism industry faces a conflict of interest between investors wanting short-term return on investment and environmentally sustainable management. Second, environmental issues are often times limited to only natural environment, with a major focus on pollution, global climate change, resources consumption, and habitat/ecosystems. These issues remain very important, however, in order for effective environmentally sustainable management to take place, a broader topic of sustainability must be covered which includes dimensions of economics, equity and environment. This report will explain how ecotourism aims to address these issues. The third issue is “greenwashing.” A lack of standardization in ecotourism allows for some companies to deceive customers...
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...The Institution of Environmental sustainability does many amazing things to help protect the earth as well as make Loyola University a better place to live. The Environmental sustainability has many great way to get involved with helping out around campus. The Environmental building helps student become a lot closer to the community and helping the environment. It helps bring students closer together as a community. Loyola is changing their behaviors by making it better for the people at Loyola and for the future generations. Also, for other living things on this planate. The student have many ways of doing this to better help the environment. There are many groups and ways to get involved with these projects to help become better. This helps...
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...The case was very well thought out, read like a professional document and was intuitive in the design and layout. The information contained seemed to follow a logical flow; however, the environmental and social justice sustainability issues were not well vetted nor were they supported throughout the case study. The web site touts many awards and achievements and I believe that Dell is, within its industry, moving in the right direction. When you dig a little deeper, though, you find that many of their successes are focused on the reduction of electrical usage. Ok, I’m all for this as a goal, but the overarching assumptions from Dell seems to be that they are really better than they are. By there own admissions, their chosen sustainability goals were not appropriate and they have yet to outline what these will be in 2012. Hmmm. Dell readily admits that they do not sufficiently measure sustainability, nor are there thorough upstream and downstream management of the supply chain as it relates to the environment. This is critical and should have been the focus of the sustainability segment of the case study. While I agree with Dell that there exists varying and sometimes contradictory measures of both environmental sustainability and environmental recycling processes and procedures, it would be reasonable to have the same passion about solutions about there internal core business and profitable moving this forward as it is about more difficult and less measurable softer...
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...Evaluation of UHV's Green Movement A company shows more than just care for the bottom line when they employ a “go green” initiative. More and more companies are moving towards sustainability practices, and just a few examples from the video include employee volunteer initiatives for earth week, employee education seminars and environmental work days to replace holiday parties. Innovations were also mentioned, specifically a cost conscious invention by one company to initialize a company wide database of office supplies, that way departments can pull from one another instead of ordering a supply that was already available within the company. UHV has joined the ranks of companies around the globe who are making a conscious effort to “go green.” From UHV’s green website, you can gain a clear understanding of the goals of the initiative. There is always room for improvement in any initiative, but UHV is on the right track. The areas of most impact will probably be the administrative practices, simply because saving electricity is probably the area in which the majority of companies need the most conservation effort. UHV will realize a significant cost savings by employing all the techniques mentioned. Just one example would be turning off lights and computers when not in use will make a significant impact on the electric ...
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...Phase 5 Individual Project SCI201-1404B-15 Environmental Science and Sustainability Keara Cole Instructor: Debra Ladner December 22, 2014 The environmental law I chose to write about is the Clean Air Act of 1970. This law sets the goals and standards that's needed for good air quality here in the United States of America. It is required by law, that the Clean Air Act as well as other environmental laws be periodically reviewed to make adjustments when needed. A huge amount of amendments in the 1990's toughened air quality standards and placed new emphasis on market forces to control air pollution, causing many major companies in other countries, though not directly under U.S. Laws, to clean up their pollution standards to continue trade with the USA. This environmental law was set in place due to the deplorable air quality caused by many manufacturing waste/air born byproducts, unnaturally causing many health issues and environmental issues. These issues caused certain strands of cancer, deletion of natural resources due to global warming, acid rain, and damage to the stratospheric ozone layer. As a result, many companies were forced to revamp their waste management programs, ultimately causing better living conditions for all. Violating this law comes with some agonizing penalties. According to the Environmental Protection Agency website, there are a number of examples of companies paying steep fines for breaking this law. One such example is Metal Dynamics...
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...and the Quest for Corporate Environmental Sustainability Name University Professor Course April 12, 2012 Abstract Greenheart has greatly reduced in promoting environmental sustainability after a change of ownership and some financial difficulties brought by the environment. With this, its leader should remember that the greatest promoter of power is people. By increasing the number of internal stakeholders and supporting their coordinators, the company can again revive their lost power and ambiance and bring back again the gains and the resources that were once lost. Case Study: Greenheart and the Quest for Corporate Environmental Sustainability Introduction Greenheart is a multinational food producer stated in Netherlands since 1900s. It has long sought environmental sustainability through ample means of reducing its environmental impact. However, with the change of ownership and some economic difficulties, environmental issues became merely of secondary importance, taking them more in a structured, integrative, and “realist” basis. The new owner had a singular approach and would rather focus more on the marketing issues, with some shifts in corporate values and corporate mission statement. After 2002, the vision statement no longer mentioned the environment but rather the initiative to be a world leader in the food industry by creating quality products for long-term sustainability. By this, Greenheart has...
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...average economic growth of 6.2% in the previous decade. Concerned about the new stages of economic development Mahathir went to New York looking for of foreign investment. In that time, the timber exportation had brought more foreign exchange than tin and rubber exportation. However, studies had indicated that this harvest without a rigid control would lead to a rapid deforestation of the region. Environmental groups, that said be concerned about the consequences of deforestation, threatened to boycott the use in the Western of timber-derived products produced by Malaysia. In this scenario, the question to be analyzed is to answer to international pressure of environmentalists, to ensure the attraction of new investments, without an abrupt break with the timber industry, essential for the politic economic and social stability of the country. The most appropriate decision is partially accept the demands of environmentalists. The short-term action is to resume the agenda of the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO) to search results that combine economic viability and environmental of the timber industry. Although internally controversial, the deforestation reduction will be naturally seen as a market move in response to projections of falling of commodities prices. In the long term, the country should direct new investments to the development of industrialization, while using tools in the macroeconomic scope to maintain an undervalued exchange and competitive for export...
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...Keonte Stevens September 20, 2014 Module 5 Assignment 1 Ecology and Environmental Sustainability Examining Your Community’s Source of Energy Each community has their own source energy that they get their power from. This type of power allows energy to be powered from their homes from solar panels then to win power. Each area is different depending on where you live, for example the power company that my family uses is Georgia power. This company has many different type of energy sources, that helps power not only my home, but many homes here in Georgia as well. Our power company produces 1100 megawatts of renewable energy as well as nuclear energy to help power our home. The main type of energy that they use for and energy source is solar energy. This is one of the most valuable types of energies around. In order to be able to use this energy, you first must use solar water heating system, so that it can absorb the suns energy. For it to do this, solar panels are placed on the roof of your home or apartment complex building, allowing it to get the power it needs to power your home. This method is more preferred to many people here in Georgia, to help get the energy they need into their homes. Hydropower is another form of energy that we use here as well. Hydropower is fuel by the water that fall from the dams. Once powered, the water is then released and begins to generate the power that is needed. The thing that makes this energy...
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...Securing sustainable healthcare, requires alignment of environmental sustainability, financial sustainability and social sustainability to achieve co-benefits for current and future generations. For this activity, we were asked to consider sustainable health care applied within the context of our own organisations and teams. A summary can be found in Appendix A. Key lessons about sustainable healthcare that can be applied to my team and organisation Undertaking this activity has highlighted to me the lack of a visible organisational drive for sustainable healthcare activities within my trust. ‘Sustainability’ is one of our 4 strategic objectives, but when reading this objective summary (Appendix B) and the trust business plan, I have always interpreted this as financial sustainability and implementation of lean processes. In the infrequent newsletter drives to reduce paper usage and switch off computers and lights, it is always the financial savings that are referred to. No mention is ever made that these actions mitigate environmental impact. Some of the greater adaptive changes we have made though are evident, including the design of new buildings, tree planting in the grounds, the lighting systems and air recirculation systems for temperature control; the messages we send out to staff and put in the media for our local community about...
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...iLab 7: Sustainability Environmental Science w/Lab (exercises 1-4) Melissa Rodriguez Exercise 1: There are quite a few landfills in the state of Illinois. I found that depending on where you are in the state – county wise – that will depend on where the trash will be taken to. I am interested in finding more information on the following two landfills – Advanced Disposal Services Zion Landfill, in Zion, which takes about 28% of the trash in the state, and River Bend Prairie Landfill, in Dolton, which takes about 1.5% of trash for the city of Chicago. For the state of Illinois, there have been 33 landfills that have been found abandoned. The problems with the landfills not being properly sealed and closed: they look and smell bad, they have exposed garbage, and have the potential of contamination to both groundwater & surface water. Both the city of Chicago and the state of Illinois has received monies from the Environmental Protection Agencies in order to conduct inspections, investigate complaints & train landfill inspectors under the state’s certification requirements. Exercise 2: Of course we can go on for days about the concerns associated with plastic bags, but the two that I picked – one of the top 10 pieces of trash collected on beaches and the major cause of death of many marine animals, are the ones that I am very concerned about. When plastic bags are found on the beaches by the marine animals, it is a sad instance to see when an animal eats it and...
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