Chris Rodinis
Defining Sustainability
According to the EPA:
Sustainability is based on a simple principle: Everything that we need for our survival and well-being depends, either directly or indirectly, on our natural environment.
Sustainability creates and maintains the conditions under which humans and nature can exist in productive harmony, that permit fulfilling the social, economic and other requirements of present and future generations.
Sustainability is important to making sure that we have and will continue to have, the water, materials, and resources to protect human health and our environment.
How Well does Sustainability Pay?
According to a recent study by MIT and BCG, almost 40% of companies are reporting a profit from their new sustainability practices. This an almost 25% increase above 2011.
This year was the fourth time that the study was conducted from about 2,500 executives from corporations around the globe. About half of these companies have created new models to achieve sustainability which is up by 20 percent over 2011.
Within the larger group of companies surveyed there is a smaller group known as “Sustainability-Driven Innovators,” that are making a profit from new sustainability practices. They represent about 23 percent of the group.
They are the ones that made a profit from their changes.
Interestingly enough the aggressive changers profited more than the conservative ones. Where companies that had changed three or four models, half of them profited. Ones that only changed one model had only a 37 percent success rate.
Corporate Reasons
Reducing the cost of energy, making packages simpler, and eliminating supply side risks are the foremost reasons companies choose to be “green.” And this is especially true for “resource-intensive” industries.
In spite of these rosy numbers many companies struggle in this area.
Almost half of the companies are not able to rectify the numbers with the benefits. More than a third said that it interferes with their productivity.
Two questions that shed light on the downside: “Four in ten said that the higher operational costs of sustainability take away from profit, and 33 percent cited increased administrative costs connected with sustainability programs as another profit drain.”
One last thing the report noted is that as far as worldwide standards go, the US lags behind Europe in reaching sustainability goals.
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