By Ralph Wilde

Note: ASU and TÜV Rheinland in 2009 established a commercial joint venture in Tempe, Arizona – the TÜV Rheinland Photovoltaic Testing Laboratory. It is currently the world’s leading provider for PV technology testing.

Our modern definitions of sustainable development have come a long way from the earliest 18th century German paper about sustainable forestry. Over the last 25 years, however, the concept of sustainability has been stretched considerably to encompass a growing number of issues, ideas, and processes.

Sustainability is now at a point where it may be overladen by too many diverse meanings. At the same time, a number of megatrends are exerting their influence on critical sustainability issues, particularly in the areas of energy landscape, urbanization, and scarcity of resources.
This situation has generated calls for a new approach to sustainability that applies rigorous testing and measurement. Implementing such an approach hasn’t been easy.

One challenge is the vast socio-economic variability among regions. Disparities in when and how such different regions employ new products and systems will complicate their quantification and comparison.

A second challenge is the lack of global standards for tools that can assess megatrend-size systems and practices. Without these tools, sustainability will take a back seat to local political values and conventional practices.

A third challenge is the current test and certification landscape, which is characterized by a narrow focus on individual products and services. While this is a huge step ahead from decades ago, we need a more holistic approach for the future. Testing needs to uncover the potential for improvement not only for a product or service under investigation, but also for its related systems.

Demand for conceptually new approaches to sustainability measurement will grow as soon as our economic framework recognizes the value of working toward optimum performance – in other words, doing more with less. This notion is embodied by the “Negawatt,” which compensates energy consumers for reducing their demand through efficiency measures.

To reach optimum performance, a system needs well-designed combinations of resource saving, efficiency improvement, and reduced material and energy intensity. Designers will be better prepared to achieve this goal when they get reliable input regarding best practices, sustainability policies, and market requirements.

There will certainly be no one-size-fits-all solution. Instead, by using agreed-upon key performance indicators within a given product or service segment, we can identify the best designs and uses while sharing information that will expedite further improvements.

Such initiatives are underway. One example is the Electrical Energy Efficiency Certification established by the International Electrotechnical Commission for Electrical Equipment. It stands out because of its cross-border applicability – results from this testing certification process are accepted in most industrial countries of the world.

While the Electrical Energy Efficiency Certification does not uncover the overall sustainability impact of a given product (its primary sustainability-related focus being on energy efficiency in use), it does provide a useful model for global certification.

The next step forward will be to create an international test scheme that connects key performance indicators across entire systems to assess the full sustainability impact of a given product or service. Doing this in a standardized manner will produce the ultimate in real comparability. It will enable understanding that goes beyond just technical and economic parameters to include social and environmental impacts as well.

A critical issue is getting the key performance indicators right. With too much specificity, products won’t interrelate. With too much generalization or qualitative judgment, results will have little meaning. Most importantly, the selected parameters must be clearly and unambiguously defined to ensure that data can be accepted seamlessly among all participating organizations and countries.

We already see the emergence of these kinds of sustainability assessment and certification programs based on international standards, such as TÜV Rheinland’s Green Product Mark for consumer goods. The core value in such assessments is interconnecting data on individual products and services to achieve a systems view with regard to sustainability.

We still have miles to go to resolve all the details, particularly issues over how to balance short-term economic results with long-term environmental and social impacts. Nevertheless, we must continue to push forward. With a standardized systems approach, factual performance information will drive products to continuously improve and become more sustainable than their predecessors.

About the author: Ralf Wilde is the executive vice president for products and a member of the board of management at TÜV Rheinland AG, a leading independent test provider based in Cologne, Germany. The 140-year old company has 500 locations worldwide in 65 countries, including the Tempe-based TÜV Rheinland Photovoltaic Testing Laboratory. An automation engineer with an MBA and doctoral degree, Wilde previously served as president and CEO of TÜV Rheinland in Japan. There he was responsible for developing all of the company’s business activities in the Asia region.

Dan O'Neill, a lecturer and program chair at ASU's College of Technology and Innovation, moderated a panel on the nitty-gritty of sustainability during the recent American Innovation for Sustainability forum in Washington, D.C.

Research universities – and notably their students – were singled out by administrators from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and the Environmental Protection Agency during an American Innovation for Sustainability forum that took place recently in the nation’s capital. Among the speakers at the forum were faculty members from Arizona State University, including ASU President Michael M. Crow.

“Students can increase the ability of research universities to organize research, coursework and experiential learning around the great challenges of the 21st century,” said Tom Kalil, deputy director for policy for the White House OSTP.

“This is important because universities conduct $55 billion in research every year,” Kalil said. “They have strong ties to government, industry and philanthropists. They have expertise that spans science, engineering, social and behavioral sciences, the humanities, business, policy and law. So if more of this intellectual horsepower can be focused on important problems at home and abroad, I think this would be a good thing.”

Sitting in the audience were hundreds of students from American colleges and universities who were participating in the EPA’s annual People, Prosperity and the Planet – P3 – competition at the National Sustainable Design Expo. The only student team from Arizona in the competition was from the College of Technology and Innovation at ASU’s Polytechnic campus. The team is investigating how nutrient wastes from wastewater treatment plants can be used to create an inexpensive algae culture media for biofuel production.

“The environmental challenges today are more subtle, more complex than they used to be,” said Lek Kadeli, acting assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Research and Development. “To solve these problems, to ensure that we can meet the needs of today’s generation while preserving the ability of future generations to meet their needs, we must have innovation that occurs within a sustainable context.”

Since its launch eight years ago, more than 2,000 university and college students have been involved in the P3 program, Kadeli said. “New businesses have been started, new jobs have been created and innovative research ideas from these students have been supported by this unique learning experience that combines research and hands-on work to solve those complex environmental problems,” he said.

“But this program is just one piece to solve the puzzle of sustainable design. In January, President Obama said during the State of the Union address that the first step in winning the future is encouraging American innovation,” Kadeli said. “Solving real problems will take government, industry and academia, working together to ensure a sustainable future.”

The goal of the American Innovation for Sustainability forum was “to facilitate a dialogue, share ideas, foster public and private relationships, to encourage the next generation to continue working on environmental innovations,” he said.

ASU’s President Crow noted that “much of our design world that we have constructed is, in fact, not sustainable.

“There is no dominant culture presently operating in the United State, no industrialized culture in the world, no industrialized nation on the planet that holds sustainability to be a core value,” Crow said. “And, there’s no science yet related to sustainability that holds sustainability as a value for the purpose of science.”

Crow suggested “that we are at a moment in time where we have the capability, the intellectual wherewithal, the enlightenment capability to create sustainability as a core value and sustainability as a value-driven science.”

Secondly, Crow spoke of a change in mindset to move “to innovate from and with nature as our guide, as opposed to innovating to exploit nature as our tool.

“Just that difference (in mindset) could produce tremendous differences in the kinds of scientific, technological and economic outcomes that we can produce,” he said. “We’ve got to turn to the next generation, those who understand that this concept is absolutely essential, this innovation for sustainability.”

Also speaking at the forum was Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO, and Paul Anastas, director of Yale University’s Center for Green Chemistry and Green Engineering.

In presenting the concept of “design thinking,” Brown explained how to use design to create a movement that creates a social change.

“You have to create movements that people want to get involved in,” Brown said. It is viable to create value “but use less stuff to do it” by designing for behavioral change.

Anastas, who worked at the EPA for the past two years before returning to Yale, is widely known as the father of green chemistry. He remarked that “innovation without sustainability is undesirable and sustainability without innovation is impossible. Design is key.”

The concept of sustainable value creation through research, innovation and entrepreneurship was the topic of a panel discussion at the forum, which was moderated by Dan O’Neill, a lecturer and program chair at ASU’s College of Technology and Innovation. The dean of that college, Mitzi Montoya, was on the panel, along with Anthony Michaels, managing director of Proteus Environmental Technologies and chief scientist at Pegasus Capital Advisors. Michaels also is a member of the board of directors of ASU’s Global Institute of Sustainability, a research unit in the Office of Knowledge Enterprise Development.

The Honorable Katherine Hammack, assistant secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment, and Andrew Winston, author of “Green to Gold” and “Green Recovery” and CEO of Winston Eco-Strategies, rounded out the panel.

The forum was presented by the EPA, ASU’s Global Institute of Sustainability and American Public Media’s Public Insight Network. In welcoming guests, Rob Melnick, executive dean at ASU’s Global Institute of Sustainability, noted that the evening’s event was about innovation and sustainability.

“Both separately and together, these are core concepts at the university, genuine core values that permeate our teaching, leaning and discovery culture,” Melnick said.

A Thought Leader Series Piece

By Richard Kidd

Imagine the U.S. Army called to war with no fuel, no supplies, and no training.

You can’t. To safeguard against such a scenario, the Army embraces sustainability as a foundation of its global mission, operations, and strategic management. As a matter of preparedness, sustainability is integrated across the Army’s four lines of operation – material, military training, personnel, and services and infrastructure.

This is not a fad, but serious business. Army leaders have been working since 2000 to embed sustainability into the Army’s culture. Through collaborations with academia, federal agencies, and other organizations, and by emphasizing the key role sustainability plays in enabling operations at home and overseas, the Army has shifted its behavior. A strong culture of sustainability now ensures that the Army of tomorrow has the same access to energy, water, land, and other natural resources as it does today.

Net Zero is one of the Army’s signature initiatives in its move toward sustainability. Designed to manage energy and natural resources at Army facilities in an efficient and effective way, this initiative recognizes the value of sustainable approaches. Among the advantages are reduced cost, improved mission capability, healthier quality of life, better relationships with local communities, and increased future options. These are crucial to preserving choice on strategy and installations and to help the Army prepare for future contingencies.

Net Zero works by focusing on three interrelated areas: energy, water, and solid waste. The objective by 2020 is to avoid consuming more energy or water than is sustainably produced and to eliminate solid waste disposal in landfills. Army facilities have begun moving toward this goal. As of April 2012, 17 Army installations differing in size, geography, and mission have been identified as Net Zero pilot projects to test and demonstrate a variety of sustainable practices.

In parallel with Net Zero, the Army has launched the Operational Energy and Contingency Basing initiatives to incorporate sustainability in its contingency operations (actions potentially involving enemy hostilities). The Army clearly recognizes that sustainability on the battlefield is a force multiplier that, when implemented, can increase the combat potential of a military unit and enhance the probability of a successful mission.

The Operational Energy and Contingency Basing initiatives address sustainability in three vital areas: Soldier equipment, forward operating bases, and tactical vehicles. They focus on both increasing energy and water efficiency and also reducing energy and water needs as well as solid waste. By conducting energy-efficient and sustainability-informed operations, the Army reduces vulnerabilities and decreases its logistics tail. It also increases lethality by lightening the Soldier’s load and freeing up more Soldiers for mission-oriented, rather than logistical tasks.

Tracking results is also critically important to sustainability, and the Army has been a leader in both measuring and publicly disclosing its progress. Since 2008, the Army has published annual self-assessments using the criteria established by the highly respected Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). The Army was also the first federal organization to link its annual GRI report to the sustainability goals in Executive Order 13514, which requires reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, increases in energy and water efficiency, and continued reductions in the generation of solid waste.

To be relevant to the current and future Army, new concepts must be appropriate to its mission. Sustainability meets that standard. It is now both a way of thinking and a way of doing that improves the Army’s efficiency. This gives the Army more choice and flexibility, and that ultimately means greater effectiveness.

About the author: Richard Kidd serves as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Army (Energy & Sustainability) where he is responsible for overall program direction, policies, strategies, and oversight for implementation of all programs and initiatives related to energy security and sustainability within the Army. As the Army’s senior energy executive, he also coordinates and integrates both installation and operational energy programs and strategies. A 1986 graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, Kidd served as an Infantry Officer until 1991. After receiving a master’s degree in public and private management from Yale University, he joined the United Nations and served principally in war-affected regions of the world. He served in the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Political Military-Affairs starting in 2001. In July of 2008 he joined the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy where he was responsible for leading the Federal Energy Management Program. In this position he helped craft federal-level energy policy and assisted all federal agencies in meeting statutory energy and sustainability requirements in order to promote energy security and environmental stewardship.

For additional information:
Net Zero
U.S. Army Energy Security and Sustainability: Vital to National Defense
Army Sustainability Report 2010

This commentary was prepared in collaboration with Marc Kodack, Kristine Kingery, Wanda Johnson, and Natalie Jones, all from the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Energy and Sustainability.

Their team, named FlashFood, earned a trip to the Imagine Cup Worldwide Finals in Sydney, Australia in July. Team members include senior biomedical engineering major Eric Lehnhardt, senior materials science and engineering major Katelyn Keberle, senior computer science major Steven Hernandez and senior marketing and sustainability major Jake Ervin.

Read the story »

This year, all eleven high school student participants in the SCENE research program won at least one award at the Arizona Science and Engineering Fair.

AZSEF Award Winners 2012

Stockholm Junior Water Prize
Jessica Liu and Joyce Yang (Mentor: Mary Laura Lind, Chemical Engineering)
Jean Juang (Mentor: Cesar Torres, Biodesign)

United States Metric Association SI Award
Sanjay Srinivasan (Mentor: Nate Newman, Materials Engineering)

Society for Technical Communication
1st place-Jessica Liu and Joyce Yang
2nd place-Saisanjana Kalagara (Mentor: Sindy de la Torre)

Association for Women in Science Award
Zuena Mushtaq (Mentor: Anca Delgado, Biodesign)
Jessica Liu and Joyce Yang

Behavioral & Social Sciences
1st place-Suhitha Veeravelli (Mentor: Stephanie Bittner, Life Sciences)
2nd place-Saisanjana Kalagara

Chemistry
2nd place-Jessica Liu and Joyce Yang
3rd place-Mara Green (Mentor: Nate Newman, Materials Engineering)

Engineering: Electrical & Mechanical
1st place-Enoch Kang (Mentor: Nate Newman, Materials Engineering)

Environmental Management
1st place-Snehashish Sridhar (Mentor: Wen-Ching Chuang, Sustainability)
4th place-Jean Juang

Engineering: Materials & Bioengineering
1st place-Ivy Chang (Mentor: Nate Newman, Materials Engineering)
2nd place-Sanjay Srinivasan

Environmental Sciences
3rd place-Zuena Mushtaq

In addition to the awards listed above, Ivy Chang was a finalist and 5th-place winner at the Arizona Junior Science and Humanities Symposium, and will be going to the national competition as an observer. Suhitha Veeravelli and Snehashish Sridhar were invited to participate at a statistics symposium here at ASU.

The Southwest Center for Education and the Natural Environment (SCENE) was founded to promote learning about our environment through scientific discovery. SCENE’s mission is to provide Arizona citizens with a scientific basis for making informed decisions about the environment.

SCENE links science expertise and resources at Arizona State University with the community at large, and with schoolchildren and their teachers. The organization is a partnership among the ASU Global Institute of Sustainability, municipalities and members of the private sector.

The President’s Award for Sustainability recognizes ASU teams that have demonstrated excellence in fostering the successful development, implementation, and promotion of sustainability principles, solutions, programs, and services in the teaching, learning, research and business missions of the University. The 2012 winners of this award were Farmers Market @ the ASU Tempe campus and the Sustainable Cities Network.

Read more »

TEMPE, Ariz., – April 20, 2012 – During its annual Global Sustainability Milestone Meeting on April 18th, Walmart announced that it is integrating the knowledge products produced by The Sustainability Consortium (TSC) into the retailer’s Sustainability Index and Live Better Scorecard. Walmart will use these tools to help its merchants evaluate suppliers and their products and collaborate to make the products on Walmart shelves more sustainable.

Walmart representatives expressed that they are particularly excited about integrating TSC’s Category Sustainability Profiles (CSPs) and corresponding Key Performance Indicators into their Sustainability Index this year. Both Walmart and Sam’s Club will be using these tools as a basis for ranking suppliers in a particular category according to their sustainability progress and to inform buyers about actionable opportunities for improvement.

Linda Hefner, EVP of Merchandising for Sam’s Club, says that using The Consortium’s CSPs can “further the collaboration with suppliers to make more progress…with some meaningful measure behind them.”

A Category Sustainability Profile (CSP) is a summary of the best available, credible, and actionable knowledge about the sustainability aspects related to a product over its entire life cycle. CSPs are developed and managed by The Sustainability Consortium, which is currently finalizing the first 22 Category Sustainability Profiles for its members. This will help some of the world’s largest companies prioritize and focus their sustainability efforts on the most pressing issues in those product categories. Some of the categories include; beef, milk, plastic toys, computers, laundry detergent, televisions, toilet tissue, packaged cereal, copy paper, bread, surface cleaners, showering products, farmed salmon, printers, beer, and wine. TSC plans to release additional CSPs that cover a vast range of products to its members before the end of the year.

“(Walmart) is working to improve the sustainability of the products our customers love. Providing our merchants with simple tools to identify leaders and laggards, and giving them actionable recommendations for what they can do to drive improvements, will help us accelerate and deepen our impact on consumer goods sustainability,” says Andrea Thomas, Senior VP, Sustainability at Walmart.

Kevin Dooley, Academic Director at The Sustainability Consortium, comments, “I was very excited to see Walmart talking about the product sustainability scorecard in Walmart’s Global Milestone Meeting, as I know the hard work that researchers and stakeholders have done to convert vision to reality.  We look forward to facilitating positive change in the product categories that we will cover by the end of 2012, and the products we will additionally cover in 2013 and beyond.”

Walmart’s Global Sustainability Milestone Meeting can be viewed in its entirety at http://www.sustainabilityconsortium.org/walmartlive/.

About The Sustainability Consortium
The Sustainability Consortium (TSC) is an independent organization of diverse global participants that work collaboratively to build a scientific foundation that drives innovation to improve consumer product sustainability. TSC develops transparent methodologies, tools, and strategies to drive a new generation of products and supply networks that address environmental, social, and economic imperatives. The Sustainability Consortium advocates for a credible, scalable, and transparent process and system. The organization boasts over 75 members from all corners of business employing over 57 million people and whose combined revenues total over $1.5 Trillion. Arizona State University and the University of Arkansas jointly administer The Sustainability Consortium, with additional operations at Wageningen University in The Netherlands. Learn more at www.sustainabilityconsortium.org / Twitter: follow @TSC_news http://twitter.com/tsc_news

###

Media Contacts:
Elizabeth Kessler, Marketing Coordinator
The Sustainability Consortium
Arizona State University
Elizabeth.Kessler.1@asu.edu | 480.965.3810

“EPA will benefit from the tremendous pool of talent, energy and commitment offered by Arizona State students,” said Jared Blumenfeld, EPA’s regional administrator for the Pacific Southwest. “This collaboration will enhance participation in environmental studies by students from every corner of the state.”

Arizona State University offers leading-edge research and education in fields that impact health, energy and environmental quality. ASU, home to the Global Institute of Sustainability and the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering, has earned national recognition for the number of degrees awarded to Native American and Hispanic students. ASU has been able to attract a diverse student body through recruitment statewide and at community colleges.

“ASU is pleased to engage with U.S. EPA, Region 9 programs to bring together great minds to problem-solve some of the grand challenges facing society, such as finding the best methods to bring clean, potable water to our local communities,” said Diane Humetewa, special adviser to the President on American Indian Affairs. “In the process, we hope to build opportunities for students to learn from experienced EPA professionals and to consider careers related to the environment and natural resources.”

Community colleges throughout Arizona feed students into ASU, including Diné College and Tohono O’odham Community College. In the Fall 2011 semester alone, more than 6,700 Arizona students transferred from community colleges to ASU. EPA will work with ASU to enhance outreach efforts in Indian Country, an area the Agency has identified as a priority in its strategic plan.

Arizona is home to more than 250,000 Native Americans, with 20,000,000 acres of tribal land comprising more than 25 percent of the state. Arizona has more Indian Land than any other state.

The agreement between EPA and ASU provides numerous opportunities for both partners including:

• EPA coordination with ASU to enhance ASU’s outreach efforts to recruit diverse students seeking degrees in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics;
• EPA student internships during summer and academic year, and EPA staff members serving as mentors or coaches for ASU students;
• Agency participation in career fairs to make students, faculty and alumni aware of employment opportunities at EPA;
• ASU faculty and student participation in public policy forums, presentations and other events at EPA;
• EPA staff participation in lectures, conferences and other events at ASU;
• EPA expertise for environmental curriculum development and teaching at ASU;
• ASU faculty serving as visiting scientists at EPA, working on joint research projects.

Data from the U.S. Department of Education has shown that the number of students, especially students of color and Native American students, pursuing science and other related technological careers is decreasing. ASU, with a current enrollment of more than 70,000, supports several programs geared towards minority students, and increased its numbers of Native American students from 902 in 1996 to 1372 in 2010.